Steam Staredown

or rather early this morning at 2am, when the clock ticked over on the next Steam objective, I had all but resolved not to participate in the challenge.

The Steam-related "gimme" was not so much of a gimme. I'm not really one for leaving verbal grafitti over someone's public-accessible web profile, especially since it also traces back to me and ruins my privacy.

Of course, I considered: If I bought a gift for someone.... and then left an comment saying, "Hey, check your email for a surprise. :) Please delete this only after 2 days after my entry for the prize drawing is recorded."

That wouldn't be so bad.

Problem was, they hadn't yet activated the sales discounts, so all the three games Civilization V, Zombie Driver and Bob the Builder were going for full price at that point in time.

My best guess was that Civ 5 would go for a nominal 33% discount or so. Now I want Civ 5 eventually, but not at that price point. I want it 50% or 75% off. Probably only when Civ 6 comes out, but that's ok, I'm not through Civ 4 yet. So that was one objective off the list.

I figured Zombie Driver would go for 75% off, at $2.50. It's been there a few times. Every time I stare at it, I go "Hmmmph." in an extremely neutral fashion. It's a drive around shoot 'em up with zombies. With unlocks and levels. There's just nothing spectacularly interesting or innovative about it. The graphics are decent. There's a lot of blood splatter. It's like easy-fun target mode.

I picked up an easy-fun target mode game with levels and unlocks on the Ipad for $0.99 and it's got the slightly different controls of the Ipad going for it.

It's not that $2.50 is a price point I'd mind paying. I just don't know how much value I'm going to get out of it. I could just buy it and give it a shot at that price, but do I need another arcade shoot 'em up on my Steam games list when I have a boatload of considerably more interesting indie games that aren't completed yet?

My guess was that Bob came in Pieces would go for 50% off, at $4.99. The game premise looks pretty interesting, though I'm not really one for physics puzzles. World of Goo held my attention to a point, Eets was cute but I lost steam (haha, pun) halfway through.

At $4.99, I wasn't buying Bob came in Pieces. Thus, no objective there. To get Zombie Driver for just one chance at the drawing seemed pointless too. I wasn't getting the big 28 objectives TF2 hat, I'd probably already crossed 15 objectives, there was no incentive there either.

Thus, I would just not do this round's Steam challenge and sit it out.

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Now the spanner in the works is that when I checked Steam this afternoon, Bob came in Pieces is going for $2.50. For that price, I am tempted to put it into my game collection and give it a spin. If I do that, I can score one objective.

If I do -that-, I may as well get Zombie Driver for another $2.50, and just drive around on an adrenaline filled zombie smacking flamebroiling Mad Max mini-apocalpyse until I score the other objective too.

And then I might as well go ahead with my plans to get -somebody- a Christmas gift of something whose deadline is rapidly closing in on Dec 20, and leave some "Smack Talk" comment grafitti for the third objective.

To be a realist, my chances of winning with one chance in the drawing is probably about as slim as getting three chances in the drawing. But it's kinda like the entertainment value I get out of $5 versus $7.50 usd. Translated to SGD, that's about $6.60 and $9.90.

The first is about equivalent to the spendthrift pleasure of sipping an ice cold mocha peppermint latte from Starbucks. The second is equivalent to the savings pleasure of having a red ten-dollar bill in my wallet. And both are roughly equivalent in terms of hedonistic reward for me personally.

Hence, I am now caught in an absolutely equivalent Steam Staredown. To play or not to play. Is there only one winning move?

Perhaps I should try out both demos tonight to see if the games are really worth owning at $2.50 each.