The Insanity of Valve

Like many gamers, I have succumbed to the amazing summer Steam sale, buying up tons of games already. My purchases so far are:

- BIT.TRIP.RUNNER
- Might and Magic Pack
- Everyday Shooter
- Garshasp
- Just Cause 2
- Mount and Blade: Warband
- Singularity
- Transformers: War for Cybertron

I would have easily bought a few more games but my funds are tight and I'm trying to buy only a few things each day so I can check out each of the daily sales. Picking up gems like Just Cause 2 for $5 is amazing and is definitely worth it. I'm always amazed at how many sales Steam is able to offer to its customers, not to mention some of the deals are unbelievably good.

I haven't really been up to much lately, just playing some of my new Steam games while listening to some older episodes of the Giant Bombcast (from Giantbomb.com). I got back in to Team Fortress 2 as well, after having only played about 7-8 hours at some point back in 2009 (when I bought it). Seeing all the changes Valve made to it really shocked me; they seem to be one of the few developers left out there acting like PC developers of old. By releasing free updates frequently, they keep their gamers happy and coming back week after week. The only slightly shady side may be the microtransactions.

Of course, I can't fault Valve for trying to recoup some of the development costs of all these updates (even more so, now that the game is free to play). They even offer options to make the weapons you don't have with the ones you have multiples of, ensuring that those who play enough and are patient never have to spend a dime. With random chests dropping that require keys to open (keys that must be bought with real money) and vanity hats going for extremely high prices, there is a twinge of uncomfortableness to the level of the microtransactions.

Hopefully, I'll have a more in-depth post tomorrow. Waiting for a good idea to come along and inspire me to write something more interesting. I know that the last one wasn't too hot and wanna make it up to myself. Enjoy the last bit of your weekend! And get TF2 if you haven't already!