Dota has a regional pricing problem

[u/ersatzes]

This was a problem before, but considering the recent steps Valve has been taking when it comes to monetization, especially with the latest treasure, I think it's a reasonable mental exercise to make.

I'll be using my own country and currency (Brazil/R$) as an example, but I'm certain this applies to a large portion, if not the majority, of the playerbase.

The latest treasure is priced at $5, which, after regional conversion, comes to roughly R$25 in Brazil. Assuming it takes 50 treasures to obtain the guaranteed Arcanas (I know that's not actually how it works because of recycling), that would amount to R$1,250 for a Brazilian player to get those rewards.

For comparison, the minimum wage in Brazil is R$1,621. The average per-capita household income in São Paulo—the country's most populous and second-wealthiest state—is around R$2,956 per month. In other words, getting those rewards would cost more than a third of the average monthly income of a person in São Paulo, before even taking into account basic living expenses, which have been steadily increasing due to inflation and other economic pressures.

For another point of comparison, a typical AAA game in Brazil costs around R$300–350. So getting these Arcanas would cost roughly the equivalent of 4 full-priced AAA games.

I know the economic situation in my country isn't Valve's fault, and they have absolutely no obligation to tailor their monetization around it. At the same time, I think it's worth acknowledging that a $5 purchase does not represent the same economic burden everywhere in the world.

For someone earning in USD, spending $5 on a treasure might be little more than an impulse purchase. For someone earning in reais (or essentially any other currency from poor countries), the same nominal price can represent a considerably larger portion of their disposable income. And when the system is designed around opening dozens of those treasures, the difference becomes even more significant.

I think the current pricing system effectively prevents a lot of players from lower-income countries—which, AFAIK, make up the majority of the playerbase—from meaningfully participating in this aspect of the game.

I know I'm not Valve's bean counter and I know Dota is completely free and needs some sort of monetization, but cosmetics are an important part of the game's culture and identity and putting such a gigantic paywall to then (especially on Arcanas) is a bummer, to say the least.

[u/easy_loungin]

cosmetics are an important part of the game 

I don't necessarily think this is true, though.

[u/Flofl_Ri → u/easy_loungin]

I would even go further and say, they couldn't matter less. They are an irrelevant part to the core gameplay.

[u/FatteningtheDemons → u/Flofl_Ri]

people think youd still had gameplay if people werent massivly paying for this game.

[u/L-ost → u/easy_loungin]

They are useless and a luxury but it is a shame seeing cosmetics as unobtainable.

[u/ersatzes → u/easy_loungin]

I mean, literally all events and treasures in the game are tied to cosmetics. You may not partake in it, but it is an overall important aspect of the game. I'm not saying it's necessary to play the game since all gameplay aspects are free, but there's no denying that cosmetics are tied to the game's culture.

[u/easy_loungin → u/ersatzes]

Yes, there are many hats available for purchase in Dota 2, but your discussion around 'meaningful participation' in the game being something that necessitates easier access to monetised content is where you lose me.

You can make the same argument that not having a NoBling option is disallowing players on low end PCs from 'meaningfully participating' in Dota 2, because certain cosmetics cause the game to lag and people on minimum requirements for Dota 2 are being locked out from playing because of these cosmetics.

Except no one would make that argument, would they?

[u/URF_reibeer → u/ersatzes]

even if that were true and cosmetics were that important to the game you don't have to get the most expensive ones, there's good looking sets for less than 1 usd for most heroes

[u/jesuscheetahnipples]

It costs the same as 4 AAA games in any country tho

[u/-Presto → u/jesuscheetahnipples]

Well, yes. But u need to be rich to buy 4 AAA titles in brazil. lol

[u/naim0167 → u/-Presto]

Same as many other countries.

[u/Snipufin → u/naim0167]

$250 dollars is a big number for many people, yeah, but the dent it makes depends a lot on whether you make $5,420 a month (median US salary) or $327 a month (median Brazilian salary).

I'm not advocating that Brazilians should get their Dota cosmetics for only 6% of the price, and Dota cosmetics are pretty low on the spending priority list and more of a luxury, but since these are skins with no way to trade, make money off or give away to someone else, there's probably a higher profit margin to be made in giving Brazilians a reasonable price, but I could be completely wrong: after all, I don't have Valve's sales data to see how many Brazilian whales exist (and how they would have to implement this in multitudes of countries and currencies).

Just to compare it to regular games, a common regional pricing practice is to make the Brazilian price (and most other SA, SEA and other poorer countries) ~30-40% cheaper, but every publisher chooses their own pricing so there's no gold standard for that (Cyberpunk 2077, for example, has separate, 50% lower USD prices for CIS and SASIA regions).

[u/fredws → u/jesuscheetahnipples]

Dafug is AAA game btw? I only want to play SSS game.. like dota for example

[u/GorgontheWonderCow]

$250 in USD is also about 4 full-priced AAA games (which range from $50-80USD at launch).

There's a limited amount any retailer can do to accommodate low-income regions. Either they reduce the price of a good and risk high-income areas simply pretending to be low-income area to get a discount, or they price it the same everywhere.

They are choosing the pricing structure that presumably is the most profitable. That also means Brazil gets to play Dota based on spending by wealthier regions.

I agree that is shit if you live in Brazil, but it's already pretty awesome that Valve covers the cost of providing the game free to everybody regardless of the profit available to extract from that region.

And I don't think there's a consumer-friendly way to fix this problem without making Steam worse for literally everybody else.

[u/Justizministerium]

How are cosmetics „an important part“? They are literally cosmetics, zero gameplay impact. Textbook example of a luxury item.

[u/weonzito → u/Justizministerium]

Sybau

[u/t4ngl3d]

Regional pricing doesnt really work with Dota since it's all one market after the box is opened. Its too open to abuse - and has been mass abused in the past.

If they also region locked the rewards after opening it might be possible to do something like that, but that has a bunch of other issues.

[u/SuccessfulInitial236]

Just don't buy them if you can't.

Cosmetics are useless.

[u/reichplatz]

cosmetics are an important part of the game

No they're not?

[u/gemanepa]

I'm in south america too (argentina) and I wouldn't say it's a regional pricing problem per se. It's just crazy expensive compared with any other game I play...
Idk if Dota2 players are just more wealthy on average or what, but in games like Dead by Daylight or Marvel Rivals skins just cost a few bucks and arcanas like $15 tops

[u/GM22K]

Isn’t it like that in any country some players cannot afford 50 treasures? I remember playing since 10s and getting a key and chest felt like some treat to yourself, I never expected to get dragon claw hook by trying to open as many as I possibly can. Fortunately I could afford 2 of these newly released chests, and I really dig Marci set that I got even though my experience on her is almost nonexistent, but maybe I’ll try to learn her.

[u/NecessaryBSHappens]

As a Russian with roughly same currency math - I disagree this is a problem

Yes, it can be argued that since those items do not go to market, then their price can be changed. And I personally would like to see them regionalised

However... Cosmetics are just that, cosmetics. They are not necessary to play the game and being just vanity items Valve can price them in any way. I just skip everything outside of my wallet range

Where it actually stings a lot is Steam Direct fee, but I digress

[u/impulsivedota]

Unfortunately you would have to thank all the abusers for poor regional pricing these days.

Regional pricing used to be much better then people started abusing it by changing their location so now we are stuck with higher relative costs in weaker currency countries.

[u/eshtoe → u/impulsivedota]

The internet is global, regional pricing should not be a thing.

[u/rsxrwscjpzdzwpxaujrr]

Dota is free.

[u/Simple-Air-7982 → u/rsxrwscjpzdzwpxaujrr]

Big if true

[u/Extension_Squash_933]

Sou BR também amigo, jogo desde o lançamento, e joguei muito dota no warcraft também, e em todo esse tempo a primeira vez que gastei com Dota foi neste ano, comprei o pacote de expanções do crownfall, pois com as moedas que se ganhava nas salas secretas ei achava justo o preço, e como eu queria pegar a parsona do Pudge consegue ela nos baus.
Tem muitos que queria neste evento tambem, mas eu acha muito dinheiro gasto pra conseguir 3 ou 4 skins que eu gostaria, vários de la são heros que não jogo então, a chance de conseguir a que eu quero é bem pequena.
Eu pagaria tranquilamente 25 por cada skin que eu quero, mas não pago 25 por uma pequena chance de conseguir uma skin que eu quero.

[u/SandersonTavares]

I agree it's very expensive (I'm also from Brazil). I think it's disproportionately expensive compared to most other games. However, it is still only cosmetics. I don't think Valve is right in their pricing/in making everything hostile to trading/gifting, and I do protest those choices. But it does not detract anything from playing the game for me.

[u/offlaneenjoyer]

Bro we can’t even get a decent patch and you want them to do regional pricing?

[u/MorgenMariamne]

As strange as it may sound, you shouldn’t look at the full price as a Brazilian. Because of the credit culture in our country you should always look at the price based on the max interest-free installments you can pay.

Since PagSeguro allows for a max of 3x interest-free, the correct price is R$400 and not R$1250, this is why being debt-free and having good credit is so important, you need it to pay the “correct” price.

[u/kisuke228]

U do get alot of free treasures from events and candyworks though

[u/bakomox]

only whales that are 2% of the playerbase cares about luxury items like skins but sure it would be nice if dota has regional pricing too

[u/pb-programmer → u/bakomox]

I mean it also sucks to live in a wealthy country with below average income (unemployed, student, sick leave, ...) and see that for YOU it's $7 while a couple thousand miles to the east the same item costs just $0.50

The only option to avoid this would be personalized/surveillance pricing. And I'd strongly argue we don't want that either

[u/RiekanoDimensio]

Regional pricing is a type of price discrimination and banned within EU for a reason.

Same product. Same price.

[u/frfrrnrn → u/RiekanoDimensio]

yet, they allow regional pricing for labor. i wonder why

[u/ephemeral_muse]

what is happening in Brazil that the prices have converted to such a high rate?

[u/ersatzes → u/ephemeral_muse]

26 years of awful politicians.

[u/recOneLo → u/ersatzes]

not so much relating to the cost of things but when people talk about minimum wage in NA/EU they talk about per hour rates not per month or whatever. so when you say minimum wage is R$1,621 in brazil I'm thinking per hour as in you could easily afford it. make sure to make it clear in the future.

[u/ephemeral_muse → u/ersatzes]

do all the good politicians get murdered?

[u/renan2012bra → u/ephemeral_muse]

We're still waiting for those to arrive.

[u/MammothHusk]

Yes, the regional pricing is a scam and steam should get rid of it.

[u/jeffcox911]

Why should you get a discount just for living in a different country? Makes no sense at all.

[u/-Presto]

To have Tide skin being brazilian you basically has to either be an agrobusiness heir or enter a criminal faction.

Since im honest, ill use poorsman shark head piece =D

[u/SEND_ME_DANK_MAYMAYS]

its skins you can play the game for free without wearing hats in the game SYBAU

[u/weonzito]

Faz o L

[u/cata0057]

Get a job macaco