- THE WILD CASE STEAM FULL
- THE WILD CASE STEAM PORTABLE
- THE WILD CASE STEAM SERIES
- THE WILD CASE STEAM WINDOWS
Valve stipulated these requirements as a clear effort to curb scalpers who would likely take advantage of the high demand for the Steam Deck by creating last-minute accounts. Accounts would also be limited to one Steam Deck per Steam account. The major sticking point was that would-be buyers needed a Steam Account used to make a purchase before June 2021 to be eligible within the first 48 hours of preorder reservations opening up.
![the wild case steam the wild case steam](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/97/5d/0e/975d0e720287086b1565064baca57d5c.jpg)
Thankfully, Valve’s approach with the Steam Deck queue system demonstrated a number of smart choices that made buying this high-ticket gaming hardware much simpler for actually interested buyers than the rest of the recent crop.Īhead of preorders opening on July 16, Valve revealed Steam Deck hopefuls would actually have to meet some requirements to even be eligible for the first wave of preorder reservations. eBay is starting to remove these egregious listings from its site, per its pre-sale policy, which specifies that pre-sale items must ship within 30 days, but it’s clear scalpers hoped to find the same success as they had with the recent console launches.
THE WILD CASE STEAM FULL
Yes, even a cursory glance over the weekend demonstrated scalpers took full advantage of the Steam Deck’s preorder launch, with several listings pricing the handheld well above its MSRP for the high-end model.
![the wild case steam the wild case steam](https://secureservercdn.net/50.62.172.113/eb8.ef0.myftpupload.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/blood-moon-zelda-breath.jpg)
THE WILD CASE STEAM SERIES
Valve’s Preorder MandatesĪs someone who preordered a PS5 and an Xbox Series X, and also purchased two RTX 30 graphics cards (one on launch day and another within weeks after release), I found reserving a preorder for the Steam Deck to be less of a headache.
![the wild case steam the wild case steam](https://www.gamersheroes.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Ghost-Recon-Wildlands-Weapon-Case-Map-Itacua-Region.jpg)
THE WILD CASE STEAM PORTABLE
If you focus on money consumers spent on gaming hardware alone, it was $5.3 billion, higher than it was in 2019, making it the most in hardware spending since 2011 which reached $5.6 billion in hardware spending alone, according to NPD.īetween an ongoing chip shortage, a global pandemic that has caused most of these high-ticket items to be sold mostly online or in select in-store locations through specific means, combined with unprecedented demand, it seemed, at first, that Valve’s portable gaming PC was to have a similar fate. In 2020, US consumers spent record amounts on video games, as NPD reported a record $56.9 billion spent on gaming, hardware, and accessories.
THE WILD CASE STEAM WINDOWS
The lack of defined restocking windows has even led to a bit of a cottage industry, as Twitter accounts and live streams kept tabs on restocking moments for major retailers like Amazon and Walmart.Īll of this demand and limited supply came at a time when interest in gaming skyrocketed, in part due to pandemic stay-at-home orders leaving many looking for means of entertainment. And it’s not even resellers marking GPU prices up either Nvidia and AMD consistently keep their own in-house GPUs at the MSRP both announced, yet third-party companies such as EVGA and Zotac tend to increase the prices above the debut MSRP.Īn ongoing global semiconductor shortage has strained various industries, including the gaming industry, which further limited supplies of all this new hardware. Both graphics cards, especially Nvidia’s, have been just as if not more complicated to purchase as a ninth-gen gaming console since their release late last year, and most of these GPUs can cost you upwards of over $1,000 depending on the GPU you are looking to buy, such as an RTX 3080 Ti or a Radeon RX 6900 XT. Both AMD and Nvidia announced a new line of graphics cards in 2020: AMD’s Radeon RX 6000 series and Nvidia’s RTX 30 line. And though Xbox kept preorders for its new console set to a specific date and time, those consoles too became difficult to find in stock, and in both cases scalpers found opportunities to sell consoles at massive markups.Īnd PC owners looking for the latest parts have run into similar issues. Preorders, unsurprisingly, ran out nearly instantly, and in the months since most of those looking to buy a PlayStation 5 have had to wait for retailers to randomly drop stock availability periodically, or if they felt no other options were available, to turn to third-party sellers on the Facebook marketplace or eBay where consoles could potentially have an overinflated price and, in the worst cases, even potentially be a scam.