Bitcoin Forum

Perhaps many don't know, but Steam accepted Bitcoin payments some time ago, but stopped in the same year (2017).

Do you buy Games paying with Bitcoin? Electronics, headsets, peripherals, etc. Paying with Bitcoin, LN or Altcoins?

Nah. Actually there some wallet that let user buy steam wallet code using Bitcoin like in my country "coins.ph". They just convert the BTC instantly right after you made the purchase but still same as buying directly on the steam using Bitcoin. For now, Using Bitcoin for payment is not advisable due to slow confirmation and high fee compared on other cryptocurrency like USDT(TRC20).

I never used Bitcoin to buy games on Steam so I obviously don't miss that and I don't play video games anymore because it's a big waste of time.

After doing duckduckgo search I found out that some places are still accepting Bitcoin for purchasing games, like Joltfun, Keys4Coins, GamesPlanet, Bitrefill, etc.

We did have a topic regarding steam accepting Bitcoins but at the same time , topic regarding how they inturn stopped accepting payments. But I do think that it's not a bad move since the payment fee for Bitcoins is considerably higher as compared to other options.

I do now miss the payment options on steam regarding bitcoins since at the end of the day we have other options and not only that I consider bitcoins as a form of investment more than as a form of payment or exchange.

At the same time, as other people said you still have indirect options available there.

Until big websites like Amazon, AliExpress etc. Will start accepting Bitcoins ot altcoins there is a rare chance that major chunk of people will buy things using bitcoin. These websites actually account for most of the e-commerce sales rest of the e-commerce stores especially the private stores just account for a small percentage and are generally niche specific, only thing I have bought so far in my life using bitcoin outside forum is hosting and domain. Namecheap was the website from where I bought these things. But no tangible things bought so far.

I have never bought any of them but I would love to purchase some of the games that I want with bitcoin if they happen to accept bitcoin payments again.

For these items like a good headset, I'd like to purchase with any that I've got. Whether it would be bitcoin or altcoins, as they're intended to be used. You can hold as much as you can but it's also good to spend and use it for those things you need.

In the form that it was - via BitPay - not really, it was stressful to wait for that confirmation in 15 minute window that they gave you. If Steam started accepting Bitcoin again via Lightning Network, then I would have used Bitcoin for sure. My two problems with Bitcoin payments is that fees could get high in certain days due to increased trading activity or hashrate changes, and the second is that I keep all my coins in cold storage and I'm too lazy to boot it up for a small payment. If I had an LN wallet and LN payments were accepted, I would use BTC more.

Not to mention that BitPay are anti-bitcoin, anti-privacy, pro-KYC, and I wouldn't buy anything via them or support any merchant which uses them. https://debitpay.directory/anti-bitcoin/.

Bitrefill accept Lightning deposits, and also sell Steam gift cards for a variety of currencies and countries. I'm not sure about Steam because I've never bought a Steam card, but for a number of other cards you can buy any denomination you like. On more than one occasion I've bought a card of an exact value to exactly cover a particular transaction, e.g. $22.40. It's as close as you can get to buying directly with Lightning without having any left over bitcoin with a third party or fiat left on a gift card.

Used it once or twice many years ago, in order to buy a game which was put on sale. It was really inexpensive if I remember correctly, approximately $5-6. Back then, I wouldn't really think twice when spending any BTC I had, something I regretted many years later.

I've stopped buying games now, but even if I was, I wouldn't spend any more BTC, especially for such cause.

Yep, they stopping it in the last month of 2017. I even made a thread (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2537482.0) about it.

At that time I usually bought a game on it using Bitcoin, I love how convenient the process was. But it is indeed, that at some point the tx became congested as a result the tx fee arises. I hope that as the Bitcoin developments became matured, Steam or many services will considering accepting BItcoin. Not to mention that lightning nodes are gaining a traction which will suit for many micro-trasancactions.

     Nope, I do not miss it since I never once did it. Not because of not being aware but because there are far more convenient ways to pay for games or credits on steam and even for garena along with other standalone games. Besides, back then at 2017, the prices were quite volatile in a good way and gave most of the crypto enthusiasts in this industry a sense of excitement; a lingering taste of rush from that feeling of gambling on the potential of most of the crypto currencies in this industry at that time.

I miss the option I guess in its potential but Im already accumulated within the steam value system anyhow; if anything I want to do the reverse and take funds and asset worth from steam inventory back into Bitcoin.   Thats my plan right now, Im planning for some horrible rapid low occurring in BTC possibly that I can seize on to exit the steam virtual in game items and turn them into BTC which would be awesome as we can then easily double in price off some tail end sell off scare.
  Steam doesn't really want me to withdraw value, they do allow free trade of items which alot of games do not so you can always sell in some kind of way.   Steam gains in value (and taxes it) in allowing this trading, they are gaining value from monetary velocity I think, items almost have a proxy currency kind of worth to them imo (like any commodity can).   But its also awkward to do so, I'd rather have the BTC and exit that system or hedge my bets against the end of any game eco system as many games and their inventory/vanity items do decline in worth eventually.

Considering you can buy gift cards easily with Bitcoin, it won't be missed that much. I don't think Steam will think too much about third-party doing service like that, since they don't really need to get in touch with crypto regulations and use the "TOS" rules if anything goes wrong.

And you think something will magically change?

There are a lot of options now to buys stuff on the internet with Bitcoin yet people don't, it's not because you can't find a couch for sale for bitcoin or some fancy pet toys, it's because the view on what bitcoin is has changed, fewer and fewer see it as a currency and more like an investment, you buy and hold and make 2x on it and then you cash out.  That's the general rule, if Amazon will start accepting tomorrow you will see some enthusiasm in the first month with some people trying to spend some coins around, and then it will die down as for most those satoshis are too precious for that.

Am not a PC gamer myself which is why I never cared about Steam, but I am a console gamer and I have purchased Xbox games on multiple occasions from sites like CD-Keys, G2A etc using popular cryptocurrencies without any issues.

Some of my friends use Steam on a regular basis and they don't miss the crypto option at all since they used it only a couple of times. It was never a popular option based on my research.

Yeah, they wouldn't think about such that offer gift cards for crypto that contains game credits for steam wallet. There's also a common market everywhere about load balance in steam wallet from individual merchants that have actual wallets on steam and can be done through dealing with them via P2P. But hopefully that they'll be open again in accepting bitcoin as payment as the merchants and adoption of it is going strong and they should take notice of that.

I don't remember steam accepting bitcoin, actually, I always used a PayPal account for my steam account and never saw any bitcoin payment option on the Steam website. However, it doesn't change anything if you still want to use bitcoin as a payment system for steam because there are many websites doing a proxy job, they accept your bitcoin and after taking your coins they will pay the money using Paypal or the other accepted payment systems for some fee they take from the user. Also, here in bitcointalk if you check the marketplace you can find many people trading bitcoin for steam balance.

No.I would never use my Bitcoins to buy a game on Steam or anywhere else.
I bought a CS:GO skin for 100 euro on Steam,by using a Steam wallet gift card,which I purchased from a website by using Paypal.It was a stupid move and regret buying that skin,but who cares. ;D
I don't know why Steam declined Bitcoin payments.Was it because of the BTC price volatility?
Many skin marketplace websites like Bitkskins,Skinbaron and CS.deals are accepting Bitcoin and altcoin payments.Game marketplaces like G2A and Eneba are also accepting crypto payments.
This means that we don't need Steam to accept crypto,in order to buy games and skins by using cryptocurrencies.

In Coins PH, they had a game section where I can buy Steam codes in their Bitcoin wallet. However, I hadn't tried buy anything on Steam directly via Bitcoin before they disabled it. Maybe it's because of the volatility whether going up or down. But they can adopt crypto payments with stablecoins if they don't like price fluctuations when buying in the Steam store.

I didn't know that steam accepted bitcoin at that time, which I still do sometimes through third party platforms, maybe if you are a gamer you will be familiar with g2a? i still like to buy games and items with crypto there,  and most of my crypto transactions are digital goods or digital services.

Gamers would really be familiar with G2A. And it's been so long since that they've announced their acceptance of bitcoin and it's on the news everywhere, too bad that they have to end it too soon because of the fees.

https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/6/16743220/valve-steam-bitcoin-game-store-payment-method-crypto-volatility

It was during when the network has been congested and steam didn't liked it.  :-\

that was the main reason but it was also because of all the attacks against bitcoin.
regular users may not think about it specially when they already knew the coins that were attacking bitcoin were shitcoins (like bcash, dash, ripple,...) but with all the misinformation they were spreading and all the split risks due to bcash attacks it scared many businesses who don't want the headache of a payment method that is new and not that many use it.

I do purchase games from Steam or other networks. But unfortunately I have never seen bitcoin accepted in Steam. Because back in 2017, I was more active in this gaming space compared to now. But even if cryptocurrency was accepted in steam today,  I would have refrained from using it for purchases.

Because it is expensive due to the network fees and most importantly the amountnin bitcoin I will be spending to buy a game today, could fetch me a gaming desktop 10 years down the line! Simple fomo!

I have personally not not buy any games with btc from steam when it was allowed although I have ordered some gaming stuffs and make other transactions in the past with my coins so not so much regret that I have not been able to do so.But on Google I found that you can buy steam wallet codes or gift cards with cryptocurrencies not directly but through some third party like cryptoreffils and you can have wallet codes with you and just buy your favourite game.

Here is the detailed information for the same: Buy games with bitcoin (https://www.cryptorefills.com/blog/buy-steam-gift-cards-with-bitcoin/)

Although you must have a look for yourself before jumping into any conclusions and make sure every security procedures is followed and it's legit.

I don't mind paying Steam with my debit/credit cards since I don't need strong privacy for buying casual games, and no I haven't used crypto for buying games IIRC, always use VISA. I used BTC/crypto for gambling, web hosting, and stuffs that need stronger privacy. Maybe if there's some good Adult xxx games that I want to buy, I'll use BTC/crypto.

I first heard about it in 2017; it is fascinating. I do some research about it before cause I might be able to resell it for profit due to cashback and discount. I haven't heard them disabling the promo, but as of now, they offer more variety of game credits. A verified account is still required.

Didn't even consider buying games at that since I was broke ass student and I mostly rely on 100% off for some of their games although I haven't played any of them yet. I have seen it done but it's a pretty secret kind of way to pay because there's things that you have to click before anything else which is cumbersome.

Tried paying my bills from my local wallets with bitcoin.
And about purchasing any games using bitcoin? Not yet tried it. Though Im kinda feel regret spending my bitcoin with those games, there are still players who always do buy some skins, etc. That can be used from their games.

But then, I always used bitcoin by purchasing other products and used them in other ways.

I don't miss it that much, the prices were doing good at that time and I don't want to waste my bitcoin in a game that I only havea few chance to really play and end up overpaying for the game because the prices have gone up. It's good that they remove it because Steam Wallet works just fine even without the bitcoin payment option.

I don't miss steam games with money with bitcoin because playing with bitcoin games is more risky. I don't like playing games too much it will lose everything and fall into despair from playing games on bitcoin to steam with money I invest and hold less risk here this protects the wallet and there is no possibility of fear that the price will go up again. Greed for extra money will ruin everything.

Smart.  I don't know why anyone right now would want to buy games--whether on Steam (which I know isn't an option anymore) or anywhere else).  With inflation increasing the way it is, it's much better to hold onto bitcoin and any other cryptocurrency, and spend fiat for things whenever you can.  Could bitcoin's price drop significantly?  Sure.  But inflation is constantly eating away at the purchasing power of the US dollar, and other fiat currencies are inflating even faster.  That can't happen with bitcoin unless its price dropped to 2009-2010 levels--and I seriously doubt that's going to happen.

That's smart, too, and those are some of the uses of bitcoin that suit it best IMO.  Personally, I'd rather avoid those vices in order to hold more bitcoin, but that's just me.  The few vices I have don't need privacy and can be bought in cash quite easily.  Lol.

If you always have fiat to spend, yeah it's better to hold Bitcoin. But sometimes, you don't have fiat and only have your pile of Bitcoin if you went all in. Not everyone can have an exceptional quality of self-control to restrain the urge to shop, gamble, or whatever especially when bull market. In this situation, spending directly in Bitcoin is better than to go in/out crypto market. You'll still have to pay miner (tx) fee, plus withdrawal fee, except your Bitcoin is already in the exchange, which is rather scary.

Yeah I remember those times, but at the same time maybe we should be glad that they stopped, what if you bought when the price of bitcoin was still kind of low and now bitcoin is above 30k? That game would have been the more expensive of your life, after all one of the advantage of video games compared with other forms of entertainment is that you can have a lot of hours of fun for a low price, something which will not be true if you paid with bitcoin.

I didn't actively use it to buy games, but i remember that the day it came out i tried to add balance to my steam account through bitcoin and it took a long time, i tried it once and due to how slow it was i never did it again, and probably i think that is one of the main reasons that steam took it down, and i remember that in 2017 we saw a rise in transaction time and fees, and a lot of sites that used to accept it as a payment method took it down.

There are still many places that you can do this. You do not end up buying games directly from steam but you could use cd key places. Go ahead and type in "buy steam codes with crypto" into google and you will face with a lot of them.

I have bought probably over a thousand by now and I can say that it has nearly no problems at all and even if you face a problem then they help you out very quickly. I didn't buy over a thousand for myself of course, the project I was part of bought games using fiat and then sold it for crypto, which did turn out to be a horrible idea during the bear run and lost a ton of money as might be expected, but it was definitely something that was easy to do. You could do the same, just do what I said and check it on google and you could find some, I would say g2a and gamivo and allkeys are sort of what could be really good.

Steam discontinuing BTC support may have been one of the 1st indicators of a downtrend in that 2017 year. There was a certain eerieness to it. Other large retailers followed the trend. Almost as if it was a large coordinated effort. That was a scary moment, it was uncertain to what extent the trend was coordinated or would be extended.

Steam retains gift card support. Which can be purchased with crypto and exchanged for games and whatever else. With reduced anonymity. I can't comment on the experiences of others. Personally, I have a difficult time finding games that interest me. There are only a few games each year that pique my interest. If even that.

What I do miss is some of the smaller and less known places that supported bitcoin deposit and withdrawal via paypal having that option removed.

Yes, I'm aware that Steam is accepting bitcoin payments before but I don't actually take it as a big deal nor think of using bitcoin payment to purchase some games there. My reason is just simple, there is a much convenient way available in our country to purchase games there.

But for let's say only crypto payment is the most convenient way for me to purchase games there, I will consider using it as long as I really like the game. Like for example here (http://=https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4425227here), although ETH was used as a payment method and it's not a direct payment to Steam, I badly needed that game so I consider buying it with my crypto