University of Tsukuba Study Finds Four Pricing Patterns in How Publishers Set Steam Prices
The study's numbers put a publisher habit behind the regional price gaps that make buying from cheaper storefronts worthwhile, with Brazil and India the clearest cases of sellers pricing above Steam's own recommendation.
Reporting from 1 source: Automaton.
A University of Tsukuba research team led by associate professor Mitsuo Yoshida and Tomohiro Murakami analyzed how publishers set Steam prices against the platform's recommended regional rates. Using August-September 2023 data covering 268 publishers and 7,375 titles across eight markets, they grouped publishers into four pricing types. Prices ran near recommended levels in France, the UK, Japan and South Korea, but averaged about 128% of recommended in Brazil and about 130% in India.
The analysis covered Brazil, China, France, the UK, India, Japan, South Korea and the US, using price ratios against Steam's recommended rates. France, the UK, Japan and South Korea stayed close to those recommendations, with little spread between titles from the same publisher. China averaged about 111%, close but with wider variation.
The researchers then clustered publishers by the average, variation, median, maximum and minimum of their price levels across the eight markets, which produced the four pricing types. The data window is August-September 2023, and it was limited to publishers selling 10 or more titles.
Synthesized by Yomimono from the 1 cited source below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited, then editorially reviewed before publishing.