In Defense Of: Used Games

"The Used Games war rages on. Which side of the line do you fall under? In this piece, Eject Disk will go behind the front lines and take a look at the battle from the consumer's point of view."

[Bigpappy]

The digital side. What do I do with digital games I no longer need but paid good money for? I no longer want to wait in line to buy hard copies then have to find a safe place to store and care for them. I want to sell and trade digital games. Sharing them would be nice too.

[pompombrum]

*translation* - I want what Microsoft tells me I want.

[pompombrum]

To clarify before people label me a troll, this article has absolutely nothing to do with psychical vs digital media and seems to me like someone is trying to promote Microsoft's "vision" of the future.

[Bigpappy]

People are negative on my comments because I am a know Xbox fan. But the truth is, I m not anti-used games. I traded most of my games this gen to get new ones. I acknowledge that I did not get enough of a return, but it was better than nothing. Which brings me to the point of my comment.

I am at this state of mind, that physical disc are going to go the way of the CD very shortly. There is just too much upside to digital for Physical to sustain its popularity. With M$ and Sony releasing the Digital downloads of games on day one. It is going to hurt a lot of the retail shops that rely on physical. That is just the way I see it. My view is my view, no one else's.

So this leads to the question. When I buy Digital, what do I do with it when I no longer have a desire to play it? I need a used game policy for Digital downloads. It is that simple

[pompombrum]

I have nothing against someone for being an Xbox fan but

"The digital side. What do I do with digital games I no longer need but paid good money for? I no longer want to wait in line to buy hard copies then have to find a safe place to store and care for them. I want to sell and trade digital games. Sharing them would be nice too."

Sounds like you were saying exactly what Microsoft's initial vision wanted gamers to say, the last sentence especially being the giveaway. If you're a passionate gamer, I'd respect you regardless of your console of choice. However, if you spout Microsoft propaganda in an article which has very little relevance to what you're saying, then you come across as a shill at best, brainwashed fanboy at worst.

[iceman06]

I agree with you that all digital is the future. However, before we rush into the future, we have to be careful and survey the landscape. That is why options are good for this. Sony has been offering day one downloads for a couple of years on the major titles. It hasn't hurt retail. Why? People still love the physical copies. Digital music has been around for years and we still find CD's in the stores.
What I am saying is that it takes a transition period. With that, things like distribution prices and trade-in policies can be developed while still providing options. The LAST thing that we need is not to have options, especially on consoles, when in this transition. Otherwise, we are truly at the whim of a billion dollar corporation to just do the right thing.

[Bigpappy]

No where have I advocated getting rid of Physical copies or the policies they have in place.

I am saying that there ALSO needs to be a DIGITAL policy because many of use are going to be buying game that way, and in my case almost exclusively. So you guys come off as saying that I should not care about digital because what I am fighting for was part of what M$ was offering. Who gives a rat's potuny who was offering the policy. You can have a Digital and a physical policy.

M$ misstep was they made is seem like they were at war with physical and used games. But if accept that they have done the 180 and now give the option the allow physical Disc to stay as is, you have to also look at that other half of the picture. We will be buying Digital content whether or not Physical media survives. I personally thing, that here in the U.S, games on Disc will be less than 40% of the market within the next 4 years. If I am wrong, I still want a Digital policy that gives value to what I download.

Hope you guys are not thinking that they should be no value to digital, just to keep Physical a good option? That would be a really selfish way of dealing with the issue. You would be just doing the opposite but equal version of what you accused M$ of.

[iamnsuperman]

The inclusion of the statistic is odd because it is a little biased in nature

"In an interview with Gamasutra, GameStop president Paul Raines has commented on this exact transaction. According to him, some 70 percent of what consumers net in trade-in value is then spent on new games, resulting in $1.8 billion dollars of revenue that devs and publishers otherwise wouldn’t see a penny of."

It is from GameStop and it is also hard to believe. If they are buying used games to start with, why are they using the savings on new games? Surely they would still go for used games as they are cheaper

[NioRide]

Every New game on the shelf is paid for long before the customer buys it.

If gamestop buys 100 copies of X game, and only sells 20 of them, and turns around and sells the rest for $30 vs $60, the developer/publisher has already gained there money.

Customers do not pay the devs/pubs, companies like gamestop/walmart/bestbuy/fry&# 39;s do.

That's why this whole "used games are killing the industry" stuff is complete BS.

Especially as of late, one person *who blocked me actually* said that the new tomb raider failed because of used games.

He said that the game needed 5-10 million copies sold to make a profit, He then said the game only sold a couple million new and the rest of the sales were on used copies.

Well when you reboot a series that has had the last 5 games in it barely break a million you need to plan your budget.

don't spend more money on the game then what the previous games would need to sell to make a profit.

[iamnsuperman]

"If gamestop buys 100 copies of X game, and only sells 20 of them, and turns around and sells the rest for $30 vs $60, the developer/publisher has already gained their money)

True but that hasn't got anything to do with used game sales. The shops are trying to get rid of stagnant stock that came from the publishers (note they will not restock unless they are running low) at a lower price.

Gamestop would buy a certain amount of games they think they will sell in a week or so. If they do not sell them quickly they do not restock from the publisher.

This is how used comes in though. If the retailer is buying those few games back (from the consumer) and selling them for a cheaper price then the retailer still doesn't buy (doesn't need to) more stock as the new games still do not move because a cheaper option for a consumer is to buy it used (so they buy it used instead of buying the new packaged ones)

The shop will get a small profit off these games but at the same time the publisher isn't getting the money from Gamestop from them refilling their stock as the refill of stock is done without them and with the consumers (i.e. used games)

[NioRide]

That is where you are wrong, they are getting stock from gamestop.

Do you think that the money they use to buy the new games just magically appears out of thin air?

The money they get from used games is a lot higher then what they do from new games.

This means they have a larger budget to buy new games.

In the end used games generate new sales purchases from companies like gamestop, In the end it balances out. If you remove used games, companies like gamestop wouldn't be able to even buy new games. They wouldn't make enough of profit to do so.

You notice companies that rarely if ever do used games are companies that sell many other products besides games.

Usually stores like walmart, fry's, bestbuy, And so on.

Without used games, companies similar to gamestop would most like go under and not exist anymore.

[iamnsuperman]

@NioRide
"Do you think that the money they use to buy the new games just magically appears out of thin air?

The money they get from used games is a lot higher then what they do from new games.

This means they have a larger budget to buy new games."

Why should we care about what profits gamestop gets? If they went under it isn't like we can't get games anymore. That is irrelevant to the used game sale debate. I am not sure if you haven't noticed but amazon still sells games. So do supermarkets here in the UK.

The reason why places like Gamestop and Game are struggling is because they can't compete price wise. Amazon makes a lot from games but being only a web based store they can take the hit with selling their products for less as they employ less people/space (sort of why our high streets are dieing because online shops can make more profit while giving the consumers better deals)

Gamestop will not spend that extra profits from used games sales on new stock. The new stock doesn't move so they are not going to keep buying new stock. Actually it goes back into buying more used games to sell to the consumer at a profit but for less than a brand new game. The consumer still picks up the used game as it is cheaper. It is a cycle. It is how gamestop and shops like that have survived so long. They invest heavily in the used game business.

Now if they used the profits to buy new stock for a different game they still only buy a limited supply and use the used game market to sell more than the supply they buy from the publishers. Without used games these shops would have to restock every time they sell out which means the publishers get more money from constant restocks. Instead what happens they stock up a smaller supply (pay the publisher less) and then buy games from the consumers to top up their stocks as they go fast than the new stocks. This leads to the stagnation of the "brand new" game stock I talked about. So they do not buy more from the publishers as they do not need to replenish that stock

I don't think you fully understand the process of how retail shops and their stocks work

[pompombrum]

The problem with used game sales is that it stops generating as much income for games after release. With the amount of used copies around, there is no need for game shops to go out and buy new copies of games especially when they have a financial interest in shifting the used copies.

A good example is Heavy Rain.. a few months back I wanted to pick up a copy of this game and going into my two local GAME shops I couldn't find a single brand new copy of it. This either leaves me with getting a second hand copy or waiting a few extra days and buying it new online.

Now I'm pro used game sales and don't like the idea of any company telling me I can't sell something I bought however I can see how it damages the market and that's why I usually always only ever buy new games.

[NioRide]

It's also part of the fact that they may not have access to new copies.

Game pubs do not just print unlimted copies of game disks.

[Hicken]

Things like that, though, are at the whim of age and availability. I bought a copy of The Last Story on the Wii for $25 because it's hard enough to find used, let alone new(note: I don't have a Wii or 360 yet, but I've got 3 Wii games and 2 360 games).

Imagine trying to find a new copy of, say Valkyria Chronicles. On ebay, it's selling new for about $18; at GameStop, it's less than $10. In either case, the devs aren't seeing money for that.

Even Heavy Rain is subject to that: how many copies did they print? It's rare that enough are actually produced to cover EVERYONE who'd want to buy it new; that's usually reserved for the yearly sports games and Call of Duty releases. And a game like Heavy Rain is also an unknown quantity, so to speak. It's so different from other titles that a lot of people would have a hard time paying for it with the knowledge that they can't return it if they don't like it.

There are a lot of reasons used games is good. There are a few drawbacks, sometimes, but the positives far outweigh the negatives.

[rainslacker]

While you're not wrong, it is worth pointing out that most stores aren't going to stock any game as new indefinitely, even if there were no used games.

Lets take Heavy Rain for instance. It's a rather niche title that had a very big marketing push behind it. It certainly doesn't appeal to the impulse buyer, as it's a story driven, moody, QTE ridden experience(only say this for lack of a better term. I really do like the game). Anyhow, for a company that has hundreds, if not thousands of stores to stock, and limited shelf/warehouse space to keep stock, the fact is that they simply are going to stop purchasing or stocking those games in the store in favor of the newer, or higher selling titles.

A good example of this in practice is a store that is dedicated to selling movies, or even Best Buy's movie section. On new releases, you know you will likely find what you want for the first few months. After that, new releases may or may not be filled, or games will be kept at a warehouse and sold on a ship-to-store basis.

On a side note: Heavy Rain Director's Cut was still available new at my local GameStop a few days ago. It may have been the gutted copy though.

[bobjohnson]

People should stop dahfending the xbox one remember what they tryed doing with used games??

And as far as the hole ram ps4 rumour going around its beeen debunked so try hard xbot losers

[Bhuahahaha]

yeah in not rich (also not a kid anymore so no more mommy or daddy to give me money for my gaming needs)
i sell some of the games i purchase in order to buy new up coming ones.

with this, buying a new release ip from big dev/pub or even new ones isnt much of a problem, i can easily sell it(if i end up not liking it) and help found for the next one. without this practices i will be picky and just stick to a well know ip or dev.

[iceman06]

You are exactly why GameStop and other "Used Games" stores are important. So am I. As you said, those with limited incomes usually sell used to buy new. They take those games that they have finished, decided not to finish, or simply just didn't like and they trade. Usually, there is an incentive (more trade value) to trade toward the more high profile games and publishers.
GameStop is important to the industry because if it wasn't, it would be gone already. Their stock prices fluctuate with announcement from the major console holders. How difficult would it be to just not do business with them? Why don't they? Because it is another revenue source for the industry. As for developers, they get most of their money up front as contracted. Publishers are the ones screwing developers first and most. That's why so many indies want to stay indies...to find the best publishing deal on a game by game basis.
In the end, don't pass your issues with mismanaging funds, striking deals, PR, or sales on to me...the consumer.
This coming from someone that hasn't purchased a used game in 2-3 years. But, I have sold plenty of games to get money to purchase games that I want (mostly on the internet now). It's good to have that option.