Prices for the Valve Steam Machine are skyrocketing on the black market

The long-awaited arrival of Valve's Steam Machine console is just around the corner, and with it comes the return of a well-known problem in the gaming industry: resellers. Selected users who pre-ordered the device have finally received confirmation emails in their inboxes these days, allowing them to secure their copy before the official launch. However, resellers have wasted no time and have immediately started making huge profits at the expense of those who were not so lucky.

Valve has already confirmed that the Steam Machine will only be available in very limited quantities when it launches. Such circumstances always attract speculators who want to take advantage of the high demand and shortage of goods on the market. The first ads have already appeared on resale platforms such as eBay, which will make many gamers dizzy.

Some starting bids are around €1,700, which is already a huge “add-on” to the official price. Things get even more bizarre, with some sellers asking as much as €3,200 for a basic Steam Machine bundle with 512GB of storage and a Steam Controller. The craziest part of it all is that the official retail price for this same bundle from Valve is €1,128. This means that resellers are asking for almost three times the actual value.0

What's most surprising about all this is that some eager buyers are actually willing to pay these astronomical amounts. Data from websites shows that at least one ad with a price of 2,800 euros has already been marked as successfully sold. This proves that someone really did pay off their fortune just to be among the first to get the device.

Unfortunately, such practices are nothing new in the world of consumer electronics. We've seen similar scenarios of artificially created shortages in the past with graphics cards, classic game consoles, and even recently with the release of the redesigned Steam Controller.

If you weren't selected in the first round of official pre-orders, experts strongly advise against purchasing through such online intermediaries. While Valve hasn't officially revealed when the next wave of pre-orders will be available, there's a good chance that new stock of devices will be available in the near future, once the initial wave of excitement has died down a bit.