Whats better disc or digital

Digital is beginning to dominate the gaming and other media formats today thanks to methods such as streaming from Netflix®, music from iTunes® marketplace, the popular e-books and kindle® and Steam store®. This has changed peoples opinions over the physical product and those with great internet are taking advantage of this life change.

First I will start with the pros of the digital format. First off now there's no need for going to the store for your products since there directly downloaded to there computer or streaming to there computer or game console. Another great feature that many favor is safety of scratches to the products since its downloaded it cant crack, break, or stop working from spill of water or a moved console. A great fact is how it affects mother nature since there's less plastic from discs and paper from books wasted and this will have a positive impact on the environment.

Now with the cons, digital may have made life easy for consumers but not for media store like video stores(Hollywood and blockbuster® movie stores, bookstores(Borders® and B&N®) and many local music stores. Many have gonna bankrupt and lost their stores and chains of business's others have modernized with the B&N nook. Also people are paying more for what there getting. First of all your not getting the disc, the box, or all the paper and ink from the book, does this still change to price? No it doesn't your still paying the physical price and that isn't right. Now my last and most hateful con is nothing to do with it in the future, how would you feel if all that digital media has no resell value or no being able to share or trade it with friend so every purchase is a permanent purchase

Now I'm still not all the way with digital media but this is just the beginning and some of those cons may be fixed in the future but the permanent damage will not be. Are you with or against digital media please comment below

[Rrobba]

Call me old-fashioned, but I prefer discs. I like to be able to physically touch and hold what I buy. Also, if they have nice boxart, they can make the best of a shelf :)

[Kee]

Yeah, you just need something tangible. Otherwise you don't feel as though you really have anything. It's hard to explain... But I'd rather have something in the physical plane than virtually having it.

[ABizzel1]

I like both. I prefer digital for my handhelds, because I don't like packing a bunch of games around with me when I'm on the go. Imagine is apps were physical, would you like having that many.

For my console it doesn't bother me which I have. I would say I prefer disc for my console, since I'm home to play it. I like digital downloads for my console, but I must say they take up a lot of space on your HDD quicker than you think. My 320GB is practically full, and I need to buy a new one to store all the stuff I have on my PS3.

[news4geeks]

I made a comment about this the other day, but worded it slightly wrong.

I personally prefer digital and am almost all digital in movies/books/music/games. It's more convenient for me since I move house a lot and it keeps me mentally sound. I like the idea of not having anything physical, but I'm not sure why.

People enjoy physical media because it's something tangible and that comforts them. A video games collection or a book/cd shelf is almost like a trophy collection. It's a display of yourself, your interests and what you have achieved.

I agree with what Rrobba and Kee have said, but that doesn't cut it for me. Maybe I just don't like the fact some people may use it to show off.

[LightofDarkness]

Agreed, it seems to me that the people who generally purport their unwillingness to move to digital content are also the most materialistic among us. To them, the appearance of their collection is more important than what's in the collection.

To me, all that really matters is the content. The game, the words, the music, the video itself. This is what is of real value. It is, unfortunately for the collectors, ethereal and intangible. It's 1s and 0s, analogue waves and phosphors igniting in sequence. The rest is just worthless packaging that serves no real purpose, other than for one to display it to all others, so as to say "look what I have!"

[Tachyon_Nova]

At the moment I buy about 50% of my PC games in physical form and 50% in digital form. I must admit to being somewhat materialistic in that I like to be able to look at my collection sitting on the shelf, it brings up good memories. However, I tend to only buy the best games (or at least the ones that I feel proud to own) in physical form, as digital is definetly more convenient, and it avoids the problem I now have with my PS3 collection (I'm close to running out of shelf space).

CD's I feel a bit differently about, indeed I have only ever bought 1 music CD. I only listen to music on my iPod or my phone (Xperia Play baby!), so why would I go to the trouble of buying a CD only to then have to rip the music off into digital form? I do agree however that your entertainment collection really is a display of who you are, I guess music just doesn't mean that much to me.

[ian72]

What Rrobba said,
"Call me old-fashioned, but I prefer discs. I like to be able to physically touch and hold what I buy. Also, if they have nice boxart, they can make the best of a shelf :)"

[Brownghost]

the only thing that is making me stick to disc is the faster the value goes down, ability to trade, and sell

[seinfan]

A physical medium is the best way to ensure that the product that you payed for will remain your's. I recently lost a a few songs that I bought on iTunes because my hard drive went to shit a few months ago; if I want that content back, I have to buy it again from the iTunes store, which I will not do. Discs, if taken care of, give me the luxury of a reliable back up in case information in computer land gets damaged/lost. This is why I still buy CDs. And, like you said, the art makes for a nice keepsake.

[The Matrix]

I will always buy disc because I am as much a collector as a video game player, movie watching or music listener. If sales eventually go totally digital there's a chance I may just give up many of these hobbies.

[Sprudling]

You can't collect digitally?

[Tachyon_Nova]

Not in the traditional sense you can't. I suppose the reason people collect things is that it gives them a great deal of satisfaction. It's hard to get the same sense of satisfaction from a few icons on your screen as can be found from actually possessing something.

[Sprudling]

Collecting boxes in a drawer or icons on the desktop. Both are equally silly to me :) Besides, a digital game is an actual possession. Perhaps you mean tangible?

[DragonKnight]

Disc. If you take care of your discs they'll last forever and you never have to worry about it. But hard drives crash, bugs happen that make digital content unplayable, hackers can potentially ruin things for you. Digital may be convenient, but it brings all sorts of issues along with it. Not to mention bandwidth costs. The big telecom companies are really trying to crackdown on bandwidth caps and bringing them way down.

[thorstein]

It is all about to be moot anyway as we "return" to solid state storage. No more moving parts.

[Nitrox]

For consoles I prefer the hard copy, not only for the sense of ownership, but because I can always trade the game in later on. For PC though, I go digital all the way.

From the crazy deals Steam runs periodically, to not having to have a disk in the drive, digital seems the way to go for PC games. After all the biggest plus (imo) for disc based console games is the ability to trade it in, which just isn't possible for PC games (outside of ebay, and even then publishers are beginning to require linking the license key to a specific account... like that bunch of Nazis over at EA.)

[dinkeldinkse]

Disc for games I want on release day and digital for games I am not sure about. The one thing that will hurt digital downloads is that the price never goes down which makes the disc form a better buy in alot of cases (From my experiences on PSN store, I have never used Steam).

[Main_Street_Saint]

I am with you on this one. I think that there is room for both. Although if they want me to swing towards the digital side of things, definite pricing structure is going to be happening.

[xX-StolenSoul-Xx]

Digital for sure, because i can keep these forever without worrying about it breaking on me.

[Vortex3D]

With disc, you can loose a few here and there. With digital, if you can loose all of them if DRM becomes void.

And if you like to pass your old games to your sibling or friends, good luck to digital version.

[bwazy]

Digital, less impact on the environment.

[Theo1130]

Digital, I never want to wait outside a store for a game like a schmuck.

[Brownghost]

then dont go to the midnight release

[KING_KAI]

personally i like the atmosphere at a mid night launch

[jakerhodes]

I'm starting to lean towards digital just because it saves so much space.

[TABSF]

Yeah Digital on Steam all the way.

I can pre-purchase a game on Steam, have it pre-loaded and get it almost 9hrs every time before there released in the stores.

Plus this thing about not having a tangible copy, I really don't get it.
If I get the disk version and install it,
If I get the Steam version and install it
Both install on the PC appear the same.

Its like your only bothered about the box-art or the trophy cabinet like news4geeks said.

Valve have already said they have a system in place for Steam if they went bankrupt, all the games would be given to the gamers digitally with no need for Steam.

Main benefit for me is the cost, Digital Distribution has proven that PC gaming is cheaper than console gaming costing £10 - £20 saving on new games meaning over a consoles life cycle your saving thousands of pounds.

[Sprudling]

Digital no doubt, because they can't get lost or get destroyed by scratches etc. Not to mention they are easier to organize and don't take up any physical space. I barely have any working games older than 2000 right now, and I've been buying games since 1985.

[Xian]

Most of my purchases these days are digital, but I will get the disc sometimes too, just depends on which one is cheaper. I buy a lot on the Steam Sales.

Being able to resell doesn't bother me that much - I never do it. I still have the floppies for the games I purchased for the Atari 800 in 1983 for instance.

DRM is the thing that concerns me. Steam's offline mode is problematic at best. We had a bad storm that knocked out the phone lines for my DSL for a few days and Steam refused to go into offline mode, so I couldn't play any Steam games, single player included. I think you have to be online when you tell Steam to go offline for it to work properly, so it's a Catch 22 when you lose access unexpectedly.

[Neko_Mega]

Disc, because its harder for a disc to go bad and you can take it back if it doesn't work/work right.

Digital is ok but if you buy something you don't like, well you are stuck with it and can't even sale it.

[Brownghost]

i hate digital now because no refunds, you pay the same price for the physical copy and after gettting board you have nothing else to do no trading to someone or selling

[Bladesfist]

Digital, My PC does not even have a dvd drive, I see no need in these things and im sure they will be outdated soon. Digital is cheaper, better for the environment, It also cannot be scratched or damaged.

[Brownghost]

how is digital cheap? if you go to steam games are the same price as a physical copy also since thats the way your computer was built i have nothing against you

[Bladesfist]

I mean for the publishers, Digital copys are cheaper to produce

[Brownghost]

but still alot for us if all digital versions were $5 less i would buy them