It Begins: The Steam Autumn Sale

You'd think I would've figured this out by now. Every year, Steam hosts one of its wallet-eviscerating sales right around American Thanksgiving (or, as it's known to many of you, Thursday), yet I consistently fail to budget the necessary amounts of money or time for its incredible bounties. One reason for this might be that it's impossible. Indeed, it would require setting aside all the money in the world and forever, respectively, and I don't have either of those things. Alas. But good gravy, these are - as ever - some terrifyingly enticing deals. Can you say Darksiders II for 66 percent off? How about Walking Dead at 50 percent? Anybody want to give me a loan? And, er, immortality?

To kick things off, Valve's got XCOM going for $33.49, Walking Dead for $12.49, Darksiders II for $16.99, Age of Empires III for $9.99, Terraria for $3.39, and Magic the Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers 2013: The Subtitlening for $4.99. That's less than a dollar per word in its title! What a steal.

There's also a heap of steeply discounted indie games on offer (Legend of Grimrock for $7.49? Yes please) and roughly a billion other games that have had their prices slashed, but aren't listed on the front page in any special way. So that's inconvenient. Also, publisher bundles don't appear to be part of the package this time around. Valve has, however, upped the number of flash deals by quite a lot, and physics-based metal slugger Intrusion 2 for $3.39 and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2 for $2.49 are probably things you should jump on.

There'll be new deals each day until November 26th - which is roughly 27 seconds before the inevitable Steam Holiday Sale kicks off, thus dooming us to lives of poverty, squalor, and totally awesome explosions for all eternity.