The Steam Summer Sale is back, and naturally, many games – including Counter Strike: Global Offensive – are on sale. However, this time around, it appears Valve has changed something: you cannot purchase CS:GO as a gift now.
Currently, CS:GO can be bought for a mere RM15.50; it usually goes for 50% more at RM31. Needless to say, this is a very good discount, and the fact that it cannot be given as a gift during the sale is quite disappointing. This “issue” was first spotted by a Redditor, who was asking if anyone else is facing the same issue.
It wasn’t long until a Valve representative responded to the Redditor’s enquiry. Basically, this restriction is placed to clamp down on alternate accounts, among other things. “Our goal with sales is to grow the community and historically, during sales, the new users that stick around are mainly the ones that purchase copies for themselves,” the representative said.
While it is definitely commendable of Valve to place such a restriction to curb resellers and “smurfing,” those who genuinely want to purchase CS:GO for someone else will not be able to do so. Of course, said individuals can always pass the money to whoever he or she wants to gift the game to, but it’s definitely not as convenient.
