Tl;dr:
- Gifting from countries with lower prices to countries with higher prices is now blocked (even if they are in the same price region). I suspect the blocking system is automatic.
- Saving gifts in your inventory to send them later is blocked. The gifts you’ve already bought are still in your inventory but you can’t buy more, you MUST choose the recipient and date of delivery immediately.
I usually take that kind of changes negatively, and this case in not the exception. Regional politics never was the best side of Steam. Especially in Eastern Europe where I hail from - somewhy the devs generally don’t consider us a market and either offer no regional prices (while general Steam region lock still applies which is ridiculous) or don’t publish their game in our region at all (which equals to saying “we don’t need you money, use torrents”, which is no less funny).
To sum up, I don’t like regional locks. In my opinion the problem of different currencies and different prices is a complex one. Trying to solve it in a naive way by creating artificial walls is kinda… ridiculous. Not to mention “anachronistic”.
So what do you guys (and gals) think? Do you support this decision, or do you have any better alternatives in mind?