Gaben Did it Again: The Return of the Summer Sale

Well, it’s time once again, Gaben’s rain of terror has begun anew, and he’s going straight for our wallets. That’s right, there’s another summer sale active this summer. Woe fall upon you if you thought that Gaben would have mercy on your bank accounts, even after the global pandemic Gabe Newell will not relent.

Note: This is from 2016, but is still a great visual for this summer sale.

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For those of you out of the know, or regulated to consoles, Gabe Newell is the president of Valve, a game creation company that made their own online marketplace for PC players. This of course leaves a good portion of the gaming community without the ability to interact with Valve’s creations, but even still, Gaben’s influence has extended beyond mere gaming, or a slight multi million dollar online marketplace; Gaben has become something of a meme within the gaming community. A literal tyrant of savings (as weird as that sounds).

But what exactly is a summer sale? I hear you, my straw man argument, asking me from the void. Well, go ahead and sit down, straw man, and buckle up. A summer sale is no different from most seasonal sales that happen in most marketplaces, both physical and digital. But Gaben’s marketplace interacts with sales a little differently than other stores. Gaben’s summer sales are legendary for making AAA games, like Borderlands 3, cost as much as a 10 minute indie game about depression. The secret to this is pretty ingenious. These games stay at, or near, their release price, to drive up demand for their product, then during a sale, drop their price by as much as 90% (The price for Borderlands 3 has dropped by 67%).

Now I know, I know, you don’t care about the financial implications of the sale. No, you want to know just how much damage this sale can do to your wallet, trust me, I understand. All jokes aside, there are some pretty good sales this summer, so you may want to act before this is all over on July 8th. So there are some pretty big sales that you’ll be able to use to catch up on older games that you may not have had a chance to snag. I used this sale to get caught up on games like Stellaris, which the base game is 10 bucks right now, and the DLC is generally an average of 70~% off. Making it about 60 bucks to get the DLCs rather than the 200 that it normally is.

This summer sale is different though, there are categories that are tailored to each player. Do you like horror games? There’s a category for that, are you a sucker for simulation games? There’s a category for that! There is also a fair amount of items available in the Points Shop, which equates out at about 100 points to 1 dollar. You can get a themed profile picture that looks a bit like this.

Note: Yes this is my steam profile. It's not a bit, you can add me if you want I guess

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You can also use this to gain levels on your steam account by buying the summer sale badge. While this doesn’t really amount to much, it does add cool functions to your profile, like achievement highlights, game highlights, and it lets you have more friends on your account. This all doesn’t really add up to much, but it is pretty neat to see the account level go up.

All in all this sale seems pretty solid. I definitely suggest that you go out and check it out next week, you don’t want to miss out on these sales. Tell you what, why don't I list off a solid list of five good games to snag, and you can check them out, or don't, I'm not a cop.

• Borderlands 3: This game is a romp through a dystopian future run by megacorps, except you're on a couple of backwater planets shooting everything that moves to get more money and more weapons. It's a lot of fun with friends and still pretty solid if you're playing alone!

• Halo: Master Chief Collection: This is a collection of Halo games that are, you guessed it, starring Master Chief or taking place with Master Chief in the area. This is a bundle of six games for a third of the price each one had on release.

• Red Dead Redemption 2: I will never not sing the praises of this game. This is a game that has 100+ hours of playtime just in story alone, and that's without 100%ing the game, and without factoring in online play. It's a lot of bang for your buck even at full price

• Hades: Hades is a pretty fun rogue like that has a ton of playtime. I have played for about 30 hours, and still haven't finished the game. It's a fun game with a variety of playstyles that are all unique.

• Dark Souls III: Dark Souls three is a challenging game, and it is a game that most people should play if they consider themselves gamers. It's a blast to play the game solo and with friends, there is also an active PvP community, which is actually pretty fun if you like testing your mettle against other players.

These are just a handful of the good games that are available on Steam right now, so go check them out!

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So, I know what you must be wondering, ‘Why write a Blog post about this?’. Well, the summer sale is pretty cool, I’m always a big fan of annual sales, especially when it comes to my favorite pastime. I have had countless hours worth of fun as a result of these sales, I figured it was about time to try and get some more people interested in the sale.

Well, I'm gonna go play some Knockout City, which is also on sale, with some friends, good hunting this summer sale season, and keep an eye on your wallets. Gaben is hungry.