Indies make a ton of money from Steam sales and Humble Bundles.

Steam sales saved Introversion from Bankrupcy a few years ago. Now they are releasing their new game.

Same as with any other products. Everything is on 'sale' all the time nowadays.
If I have to believe Amazon, new blu-rays cost $40, but they are so nice to offer a 40% discount on release. Case in point Monsters University, list price $48, day 1 38% discount, only $29.99! What a steal.

I guess to step inline with the general way of retail, (fake) discounts are a must. Discounts on release are simply to hide an early bird markup The real discounts (summer sales, humble bundles etc) still help though. Like you said many gamers end up with games they don't have time to play (certainly not fully) and would never have bought. More money for the industry, and a cheap way to sample different games. It's better for the industry then building and hosting free demos.

Most indie games aren't worth even half the asking price. Not even worth playing. The amount you pay for them is really only worth it if you get them dirt cheap through indie bundles on PC. And even then you're usually getting some of the better games which make paying that low price more appealing..

10 or 15 dollars doesn't make a big difference to me triple a titles with a digital download is what i look for... Of its am Indy title i don't but at release unless I'm really interested... Got a 1tb hdd with over100 games I'll check the discounts if there is anything i want... Like lego pirates for $5 was a gray deal for me

The initial price isn't inflated, it is in line with the hard copy to appease retailers. They have no choice, as Gamestop etc would pull shelf space for whichever company offers heavily discounted digital sales at launch (where most of the money is made). Later they can bring the price down, as it matters less.

This argument can apply to all but the best selling games. Bioshock Infinite is something like $40 right now. It's not like it's a surprise that if people waited they could have gotten it for that price.

That's another issue within this spectrum though. A lot of gamers have this "wait till it's on sale or drops in price" attitude, yet initial sales data is what most companies use as a litmus test for whether a game was successful or not. If a game "has legs" and eventually gets decent sales over a longer period of time, that's nice, but it might (and often does) still mean that you'll never see a sequel, or even that the company is in financial trouble because they didn't make that money sooner. With so many waiting to purchase games they allegedly want, they're (from a certain perspective) not supporting that game or developer very strongly, and it could damage chances for future releases.

That isn't to say I haven't waited on buying games myself ever, I have. But usually, if I have the $$$$, I will buy a game near it's release, both because I want it, and to support the game/dev.

This is a great post!

I'm proud to say I'm one of the few people here who doesn't go crazy with Steam Sales. I think I only bought 1 game during the last summer sale and didn't bought anything during the Halloween sales. Yay for being a cheap bastard!