Poll: So pc gamers . Do you still buy your pc games at retail stores?

[RandV80]

I'm a budget gamer so I generally sit and wait patiently for Steam sales. However, on rare occasion that I do buy a game on or near the launch date I will buy retail when a publisher is charging us console price for a PC game. $60 for a digital distribution copy of Starcraft? Yeah if they're not going to pass the cost benefit of digital distribution down to me I'm going to say **** em and go buy it from the store. I'm expecting the same deal from Skyrim... though maybe I'll be able to cash in a little on a Steam Christmas sale.

 

[BoredAussieGamer]

Sometimes.

If it's a game that's not on steam, EB games, here I come. The games in this list are games like Thief and Thief 2. If I can still get my hands on a legit copy, I won't pirate.

The last game I bough off of steam for PC was the GOTY edition of Fallout 3. Best $50 I ever spent.

 

[Aeriath]

I still buy retail sometimes, the last game being Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Even when I wasn't using capped internet, the downloads would take forever. For any game over about 2 gigs it has always been faster for me to go to the shop, come home and install the game than to download it.

Unless it's a Steam sale, the price difference between boxed and digital copies isn't usually big enough for me to choose download over retail.

 

[steeple]

well, seeing as games here tend to cost right around the 90$ mark sometimes, I rather just use steam and get them cheaply and effectively...

 

[jimik1990]

yeah.
call me old fashioned, but i love the experience of going into a shop and talking with the assistant, have a bit of banter, and come away with a disc with a game on it, which i can then have no matter what happens to my computer.
incidentally, I don't download music either

 

[redisforever]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! *cough*
No.

Honestly, Steam, and the rest of the online stores are just too cheap and convenient, to make me get up and go to a store. Last time I actually remember buying a game was Serious Sam the Second Encounter when it was new. I remember I was 8, or 9, I think, and seeing this game in the store every time I passed by, until I convinced my dad to buy it. And, because we were both fans of the first game, he did buy it.

Since then, Steam all the way.

 

[CleverNickname]

Sometimes, because amazon.co.uk is often cheaper than Steam for me. In Germany. Despite the delivery fee. ... Yeah.

Last one was Driver:SF. But the next 3 or 4 games I'll get digitally again.

 

[Zipa]

This picture sums up my thougts on it.

Seriously though I haven't bought a retail PC game in years. Most retailers dont stock any pc games and the few that do stock games that are so outdated that they don't even run properly.

 

[lacktheknack]

I would, but there aren't any.

PROTIP, RETAILERS: It's much easier to buy my games from you when you actually bother to sell them.

 

[red the fister]

how else is someone without a credit/debit card to buy games?

 

[Daeric]

Mostly I buy from Steam or order off Amazon, but if I'm in town I now and then pop into GAME and have a look and see if they have anything decent in.

 

[rayen020]

soemtimes. i afraid to say i frequent the walmart electronics section when i go grocery shopping. It's usually to look through the $5 DVD bargain bin, shoveling through the mountians of crap and B horror to find that glittering diamond thats worth a damn. seriously every time i go there there the same twenty or so crappy movies and like three DVDs of some good movie they threw in there to spice things up. but i digress.

occasionally i browse the game setion and the PC titles are slim pickings and a casual bonanza but if i know for certain steam doesn't have it on sale at the moment (not often) i will buy a solid copy. What really chaps mybutt though is the box usually comes with an install disc for steam and a code for the game. i resisted steam for a long time, but recently it's kinda become unavoiable. EXCEPT FOR EA TITLES, OH GOODY. yeah EA doesn't get my business anymore if they continue to insist on Origin. god the publishers are trying hard to kill PC gaming.

tl;dr: so yeah i do occaisionally but not often because when is there a not sale on steam?

You succumbed to Steam, but refuse to do so for Origin?

I love double-standards. They're so fun.

yeah it's a double standard, just like the one that I'll eat at Wendy's but not McDonald's. Same thing when you get down to it, but Wendy's has the spicy chicken nuggets on the value menu while McDonalds has no spicy nuggets and what nuggets there are aren't on the value menu.

I use steam because as a PC gamer it's basically impossible not to and it doesn't have the "we are going to monitor everything your computer does even when our program is 'closed' and use it for whatever we want" clause. Also steam has great deals. When i hear about EA giving away free games on origin and i feel i can use the program without feeling like i just ate shitty Mcnugget.

Seriously those things are gross.

 

[Amondren]

I like to buy collector editions and when I get something nice for buying it in person like the Skyrim map from gamestop.

 

[Jodah]

If I am going to pre-order it I usually get it at Gamestop unless Steam has better bonuses.

 

[Ne1butme]

The only PC game i've bought at retail in the last 6 years was Starcraft 2. Figured since the first game's disc lasted me 10 years, the sequel should last just as long. I looked at the disc once, registered my copy on battle.net, then downloaded the game client.

 

[Yopaz]

Now the best deals I can get come from Amazon.co.uk. The place where I buy my games? Steam. I own very few retail copies for PC games. Right now the only retail copy I have that I care about is Command and Conquer The First Decade. Just because I wanted a legal copy of Red Alert 2. Epic game.

 

[Leftnt Sharpe]

For release day purchases I usually pre-order a physical copy on-line from either GAME or Amazon. This is partly because PC games at retail in the UK are usually cheaper than digital download and partly because it takes forever to download larger games with my internet connection. However, for older games(which is play a lot of) I prefer Steam and the supremely awesome GOG because they are smaller and are on sale quite a lot. GOG is also brilliant because they tinker with older games to ensure they run on modern systems, which you often have to do yourself when you use physical copies of old games.

 

[Funky Flump]

Apart from about 5 games, all of them are Steam or Origin purchased.

 

[ParanoidEngineer]

Yes.