ST. LOUIS — Sources close to local gamer Chase Koeneke have confirmed that after seeing the game Astroneer hit a record low price during the latest steam sale, he has finally purchased the sandbox adventure game. Happy with the price he paid for the game, Koeneke announced his intention to almost certainly never play it.
“I have no plans to play Astroneer. In fact, I’ve watched several people play it and it really doesn’t seem like my kind of game. I think survival crafting games in general are pretty terrible,” Koeneke said. “But I am filled with a primal terror at the thought of not owning it because what if someday it’s no longer available to purchase, or I finally come around on survival crafting games?”
Some developers, after realizing the majority of games sold on Steam will never be played, have reportedly started producing games that are little more than an executable file that launches to a title screen, and no more. One such developer detailed their experiences with the matter on the condition of anonymity.
“Once I realized I could just put out something that barely met the definition of a ‘video game,’ I started making more money than I ever did working on a functional product. The decision was basically made for me. I’ve been putting out nothing but cheap garbage for years now, and no one has noticed,” the developer said. “You get the occasional refund request when some weirdo actually installs and launches the game, but so far the amount of people that have caught on to the scheme is negligible.”
When asked about the morality of this practice, the developer shared some thoughts on the state of the industry.
“I could do what I’m doing now, or I could break my back working on some huge AAA game. Either way when the thing comes out I’m getting death threats on Twitter. Either because I scammed people or because the DPS on their favorite gun went down by 2% in the latest patch. Happy with my choice.”
Dr. Bridget Stevens, a professor of sociology at Washington University in St. Louis has been studying the phenomena of purchased but unplayed games for several years after noticing her son’s Steam library.
“Many gamers consider themselves amateur cultural anthropologists. Or at least that’s what they tell themselves as they add more and more games fated to sit forgotten and unplayed to their Steam accounts.” Dr. Stevens said. “I ask them, in fifty years, who among you is going to look at their bloated collection of games and say ‘It’s finally time to play this game?” Dr Stevens said then added. “The answer is always the same, ‘Well, I might’. It’s maddening.”
At press time, Mr. Koeneke was seen adding multiple discounted games to his cart on the Nintendo eShop, and determining which unopened folder to add them to on his Switch.
