tl;dr: key shops… use https://gg.deals as a finder
For those who didn’t know, whenever Humble Bundle or other services have a package available, you can usually find the individual titles for even cheaper than you normally would at keyshops if you don’t want/need the whole package.
For example, this month’s Humble Choice is $11.99, but I only wanted to add Aragami 2, The Red Lantern, and Twin Mirror to my collection.
Using the above gg.deals website, it pointed me to:
- Aragami 2 - driffle - $2.41
- The Red Lantern - kinguin - $0.78
- Twin Mirror - kinguin - $1.27
Total: $4.46
Those prices were the final I paid after discount codes and service fees, but may change at any time for better or worse at different shops.
Hope this is helpful to someone, this concludes this PSA.
edit: regarding possible scams from gray markets
I have purchased literally hundreds of steam keys from such shops over the years and have had a grand total of only 3 keys be removed from my account within days or weeks, and was granted refunds from the shops when I provided proof from Steam that the keys were rejected as duplicates. Every game I’ve installed other than those 3 have worked without issues. It’s an educated risk that I failed to mention because it’s been over 99% successful for me. Make your own call.
edit2: Also worth mentioning that there are many games in my Steam account that were added after the games were delisted, such as the original GTA Trilogy, solely because I could still find keys on keyshops. If you want a delisted game, it’s worth considering.
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I mean that might be true, but those key reseller sites are also often grey-market. Sometimes they are legit, but sometimes they resell keys they bought with stolen credit cards etc.
I personally wouldn’t buy from a site that I couldn’t easily verify is legit (steam, gog, hb, etc)
Multiple indie developers I’ve seen (wube who makes factorio has been very vocal about it) have complained about losing significant amounts of money from grey/black market keys since they end up being on the hook for fees when people do credit card chargebacks.
I totally agree.
The site OP linked to at least warns about scammy sites and risks associated. It also tracks prices on official resellers.
I wouldn’t use it to save a few bucks on an indie title, but it’s a nice resource when waiting for a AAA game to become affordable.
Options for everyone.
tracks prices on official resellers
I’d use isthereanydeal for that.
And if a shop aint listed there it’s suspicious to start.
edit: [see main post edits]
They aren’t taking about dupes that don’t work and you get screwed out of money. They are talking about legit keys bought by stealing money from other people. If you buy such keys (no way to know whether one is or isn’t), then you are splitting the profits from fraud with a criminal enterprise. You get a discount, they get laundered stolen money.
Your reply doesn’t address the core problem in any way.
Like you said, no way to know one way or the other. Disapprove of me if it makes you feel superior. I’ve still spent a mint on Steam and GOG, and I’m still pirating. And half this community bitches about paying for anything so excuse me while I lol.
I’m for piracy when the ones being hurt are massive companies who can cover it by lowering their quarterly bonus .5%. I’m not for knowing your neighbors bike was stolen and then buying one “just like it” from a pawn shop at a steal.
This isn’t about feeling superior, this is about having empathy for the people whose money was stolen and frustration that this business model is profitable because of people who support it.
Do what you’re going to do, but folks reading this thread deserve to understand the moral implications of taking part in this.
Ok then, everyone is informed about things you cannot verify as true per key, and that you support piracy when it screws the right entity with employees, so you’re a model of selective morality.
Like he said, do as you will, everyone.
edit: honestly, I love the usual “it’s ok to screw gaming corporations” angle, when if you had a sense of morality worth talking about, you’d advocate zero piracy and that everyone should wait until games were something like 1/2 price or bargain bin, because at least then the corporations may reverse course on raising prices, and maybe not lay off so many workers. But when you say it’s fine to pirate that, you’re possibly contributing to those massive layoffs, regardless of how much money the company still has, because such decisions are determined by performance metrics. Like I said, model of selective morality.
Every individual stolen key does massive harm.
They didn’t say piracy is good. They said piracy is (by a massive amount) less malicious and less harmful than buying from fences for stolen keys like all the disgusting sites you’re promoting.
Rage on, it’s entertaining at this point.
I’m for piracy when the ones being hurt are massive companies who can cover it by lowering their quarterly bonus .5%.
That is selectively supporting piracy, like it or not.
And to be clear, the only site I actually promoted and linked to is gg.deals, where you can compare the prices at regular storefronts in one place, not just for keyshops. Where I got my keys were mentioned but not linked. As said before, options for every moral stance.
It’s weird cos you’re the only person bringing up pirating first (others are bringing it up as a talking point you’ve raised), and that’s not the dichotomy - it’s not dubious reselling sites or pirating, it’s Humble Choice, the topic of your post, where the games are already discounted, the developers have decided to opt in, and some money is actually going to charity.
Even if you bring up your original post as providing “options for everyone”, it was written in the spirit of advertising grey market sites as an alternative to Humble Choice, and therefore it’s entirely fair that others are bringing up the harms of grey market sites so that everyone knows what the risks are between them. I used to use those grey market sites as a kid more than a decade ago before I understood that they were a tool by scammers to make their money, and now I no longer use them. It would only be honest for you to have talked about that in your original post rather than ignoring it because the only alternative to you is piracy.
Actually no, the subject of pirating was first brought up by this response
https://beehaw.org/comment/1949744
Even developers would rather people pirate than buy from key resellers
where they said developers would prefer that to keyshops, and in the order I read them and answered people, that was the one I read and replied to, before first mentioning it myself in reply to another person here
https://reddthat.com/comment/6093055
If you want me to stay in the piracy section, just say so. I’m there anyway.
I’ve also plainly stated in the same comment
I have also purchased literally hundreds of games directly from Steam and GOG, so the sum total of my soul in gaming is in the positive, as far as I’m concerned.
so the rest of your reply is ignorant nonsense, because piracy is not the only alternative for me. It’s one of many options for me.
edit: if you want to argue about the order I read and responded to messages, feel free to check my comment history. They are listed in order of creation regardless of last edit.
But I’m going to bed now. I’m done with this.
Not only are Kinguin and other key resellers notorious for having scamming cases - to the point of having “protection fees” you can pay while purchasing from them - they’re also pointless in any way except for adding a library entry for Steam - and even then, one that might be removed
Even developers would rather people pirate than buy from key resellers
https://www.pcgamer.com/developers-tell-people-to-pirate-their-games-instead-of-using-g2a/
they’re also pointless in any way except for adding a library entry for Steam
uh… yeah… that’s the point. It works exactly the same way it does for keys you get from Humble, Fanatical, or Amazon. If it’s added to my library, and if I can install it, and if it doesn’t get removed, then I own it, regardless of where the key came from.
edit: [see main post edits]
Oh, instead of giving money to the developers and charity, we can instead give money to thieves and scammers? Wow! Thanks! Fuck charity and the people who make the games I want to play, amirite?
Whatever floats your boat.
If you want me to stay in the piracy section, just say so. I’m there anyway.
I have also purchased literally hundreds of games directly from Steam and GOG, so the sum total of my soul in gaming is in the positive, as far as I’m concerned.
Also, if you’re purchasing a humble package for charity, you’d better customize where the money goes because by default the devs and the charity get barely any of it. I’ve bought many of them over the years.
regarding scammers:
edit: [see main post edits]
Reminder to everyone that being an ethical consumer usually means you need to pay a bit more for the greater good.
I agree partially. For indie devs: get the game directly from the dev if possible, never get the codes, because the dev doesn’t really get money for those.
With AAA games, the picture is different. The business model for most has now pivoted to be about extracting money to the point where its absurd. And for them, I have absolutely no qualms with taking advantage of their bad business decisions.
@savvywolf@pawb.social @mateomaui
Going to elaborate on my thoughts here because it’s important.
Anyone promoting key reselling sites in order to help people save a few bucks without even a passing mention of the ethical implications demonstrates a complete lack of empathy.
Firstly, how these sites work. Typically they steal credit cards, buy a bunch of steam keys, then resell them to these black markets. Sure many of them claim that they don’t do this, but given that they think offering an insurance policy for it will be profitable, I’m not giving them the benefit of the doubt.
Then when a chargeback happens, the store (such as Humble here), is charged about $20 by their payment processor, which they then (directly or indirectly) pass onto the indie devs. So you saving $2 costs the developer $20.
You can say that you’re offering “options”, but you’re also intentionally omitting context that allows people to make an ethical decision.
(1/2)
@savvywolf@pawb.social @mateomaui
You can make the point that maybe it’s ethical to do this for big game studios. Not sure I agree, but I can see where you’re coming from. But for indie devs and small stores?
The creative industry, including gamedev, is in a rough spot right now. They’re having to deal with NFT nonsense, the cost of living crisis, the collapse of social media platforms they rely on for marketing and their payment processors pulling the rug out from under them. 2024 is also the year when they seriously have to worry about megacorps being able to mass produce acceptable quality versions of their work for cheap.
My feed is full of creative types begging for people to support them or they’ll have to drop out of the content creation industry.
I speak from a point of privilege here (having a good stable income), but I think anyone for which $2 extra for an indie game breaks the bank also doesn’t want to wish that life on anyone else.
(2/2)
Scamming a charity? :|
For Humble Choice, the charity gets 5%, and there’s no way to adjust that as far as I know, so you’re worried about a whole $0.60 per membership, assuming you paid full price for the month at $11.99. If you managed to get it at $8, it’s $0.40.
If you’re going to be upset about something, save it for non Choice bundles, where you can actually adjust how much the charity gets.
And even then, if I have most everything in the bundle, I’m still not paying $25 or whatever for it.
What’s crazy to me in light of this post’s exchanges is that often these cheap keys show up a day or more after Choice or a bundle goes live, and there may be only one or two keys per merchant, so it’s entirely possible people are buying the bundles, and just reselling the keys separately to make a buck after the publishers and charities already got their cut. Maybe, or not.
I’ve used https://barter.vg to trade games I got in bundles but wasn’t interested in. No money involved.
I’ve just given them away on reddit. The trading sites are fine but rarely does anyone have a key I want, while also wanting a key that I have. Just easier to donate to a random gamer.
