14 DAY TRIAL // Valve is making some important changes to the Steam Sales, and they seem to be dropping the Flash sales many people found so attractive.
One of the things that really stood out from the Steam Sales were the Flash sales, which were basically bigger discounts than the regular ones, applied only for a short amount of time. Users were waiting to see if something hits the Flash Sale. If that didn't happen, the final day of the sale usually gathered the most successful Flash sales for a final change.
Information about the timing of the upcoming autumn and winter sales has leaked online, as it always does, although this year it seems to have happened a lot faster. The latest information is that the Autumn Sale will start on November 25 and will end on December 1. It's not a very long one, but it's long enough. The Winter Sale will take place between December 22 and Jan 4.
The Flash sales are going away
According to a topic on Reddit, which seems to be legit, an email has been sent to developers to prepare them for the upcoming sales and to inform them that only a single discount will have to be provided, as opposed to the two that have been required until now, for the regular sale and the Flash sale.
"In past sale events, we’ve asked for two discounts—a duration discount that runs for the length of the sale, and a feature discount that runs in the event that a game is featured on the front page. This year, to optimize the sale for customers and to allow us to feature and recommend your products in more ways to more customers, we’re asking for just one discount, to run the length of the sale," reads the announcement from Valve.
They say, in the same message, that it's not a big change and that games will still get highlighted on the front page for 24 or 48 hours, but we all know it's not the same thing.
This new policy is very likely to have been instituted after the addition of the automatic refund feature. A user could have bought a game during the early days of the sale and might have noticed that the Flash sale has the same game, but cheaper. He would ask for a refund and buy the same game, but with less money.
It remains to be seen if this information is true, but it's unlikely we'll know for sure before the start of the Autumn Sale.