"With purchasing power and foreign exchange rates constantly evolving, we needed to make significant changes."
Steam's pricing tools and recommendations have been tweaked by Valve in a bid to simplify the way developers manage global prices on the platform.
According to Valve, the revamped tool makes it easier to control the timing of price changes and review prices for any errors or anomalies.
For instance, the new tool will provide a clear summary of price changes and display warnings for currency prices that are drastically higher or lower than other currencies. It will also feature an integrated CSV import/export with a preview function, and provide a simplified flow for updating all packages to match recommended currency conversions.
Valve has also rolled out a pricing recommendation update to help developers understand how their games should be priced in other currencies, given a base price in USD.
"For instance, these suggestions might be helpful if you’ve already decided to charge $19.99 USD but aren’t sure what to charge in Qatari riyals or Norwegian krone," wrote Valve. "We think it’s a helpful guide, but with purchasing power and foreign exchange rates constantly evolving, we needed to make significant changes to those conversion recommendations to stay current.
"The new recommendations are now live – but as always, developers on Steam are in control of their own pricing. Any given product could use our recommended conversions for all, some, or no other currencies."
Valve has pledged to keep the pricing guide current by "establishing a more regular cadence to review prices," and will be taking a close look at its recommendations on an annual basis and making adjustments accordingly.
The new pricing tool is live and can be used by Steam developers right now. For more information on the Steam pricing updates, including tutorial documentation, check out the Steamworks blog.
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