For the past couple years, those restaurants have changed the happy hours to either just be more expensive or remove things etc. making it more expensive (Know of two local places, off hand, that removed half price food specials for happy hour. One just limited it and upped the price, the other I think got rid of it all together (and significantly raised the price of drinks). Sure it's possible most couldn't sustain the cheaper pricing but eh...seems a bit convenient.
Anyways, to Steam/other distributors, now you don't need to convince people as much to part with their cash, so you ease the discounts and rake in cash. I'm sure it's a mix of distributors and publishers (or most publishers and a bit of distributors) but yeah. Wouldn't be shocked, thinking about it, if it's part of the reason we saw a reduction in flash sales and voting on Steam, hell maybe even the loss of a game. Don't need to make you feel you have to buy it right now or the offer is gone forever, because you'll probably buy the damn thing anyways. I'd argue before the limited time(ness) of 8 hours before helped fuel impluse buys and that sense of losing out on a great deal, thus again convincing people to spend their money.
The one thing it doesn't excuse is the repeating of the same damn games. You don't need to put Left 4 Dead 2 up for the 400th time, at this point anyone not having it is probably not buying the damn thing. They need to clear out some of the stuff that goes on sale EVERY SINGLE SALE for years now and start putting different things up. Seems it be an obvious smart business move, but nah lets put up what everyone owns...again.
The other issue I have, you don't need to put up things like Wolfenstein, NBA 2k15, DayZ, etc. Maybe I'm drastically wrong, but is having those up on the sale page at 25-33% off really increasing the sales of those titles that much? The front page deals should be like your local stores deal, they mean to draw you in and buy the other (expensive stuff). They don't want you coming in to buy a can of beans for the $0.50 deal, they want you to come in and gets those beans, then decide you need a steak, some cereal, and other non-sale/expensive items. Likewise, I don't get the idea of using a poor discount on, say, DayZ as a way to get people in the door, throw up a game that isn't as popular but will get people in for the great deal. "Hey, we got C,S,D! for $2, and Doctor Who: The Adventure games for $1.50 (or whatever)." Use heavy discounts and cheaper stuff to draw people in and get them buying their DayZs etc. for full/slight discount.
Granted the last point is arguably by the way, kind of one the fence myself if I'm being bias because I hate those damn deals and want good ones, or actually showing a bit of business sense.
One last thing on the point of having a sale game, already covered why (same as above, draw people in). Also get idiots whales to spend tons on junk. Still don't get why they don't figure out some way to do an achievement based one. With the cards, trinkets, and everything else added now, seems it should be easy enough to find a way to do it where completing a daily checklist or x amount of achievements, etc. gets people some trinket. Not only is it more fun then many of the recent ones, but it also should drive sales from people buying the dailies to get the achievements done and get their reward. Sure don't need to (last sale is a good example) but....if you can make even more, why the hell not do it?
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