Five Reasons Why Sony & Microsoft Turned Down All-Digital Consoles

The Wall Street Journal reported today that Sony both considered and turned down an all-digital next-gen console. Citing Internet connection and access as the main factor, here are five additional reasons keeping us out of a download-exclusive future.

[zeal0us]

If they did make an all digital, I would not have brought it. Internet cap and connectivity being the main reason. Beside I like having a hard copy in my hands anyway.

[kevnb]

internet cap excuses are bull, are you going to buy like 20 games every month?

[FarCryLover182]

One should have that option if they want.

[madjedi]

Not everyone has the same isp choices as you do. Okay take all the sales of the ps3 and/or 360 version of the latest cod and change it to digital downloads.

Add in people playing online games, streaming, dling demos and other full or arcade games, and you don't see cap or bandwidth issues popping up.

Digital only is suicide for consoles.

[mananimal]

@Kevnb... 20 games a month?, dude no one can play & beat 20 a month dipshit, besides lets see YOU pay for those games instead of mommy. You dont see the big picture KID, if your Local IP goes down or the Games Services goes down, You cant play your precious 20 games a month, did that ever cross your short sided thinking? I thought not. Thats why having a DISC means You the gamer can play whenevr you want, without some CONTROL FREAKS telling when you can. geez man, use that thing between your ears next time.

[FarEastOrient]

kev

I don't where you are at, but it only takes 5 games the size of Max Payne 3 which is 32 GB on the PC to go over my ISP cap through Comcast.

With all the video streaming and additional internet connections it doesn't take long to go pass the ISP's cap.

[dcbronco]

It's easy to get around the internet caps. Publishers could pay IPs a monthly fee to offset the cost and the end user wouldn't have it count against their cap. It's still cheaper than shipping things in trucks.

As for owning a disc. Make Limited Edition hard copies for pre-order only.

[dark-hollow]

Digital downloads only? letting sony and ms have full control of games prices?
HELL NO!

[SKUD]

Still waiting on the day when you can return a game you bought through DD if you don't like it. At this rate. Never gonna happen.

[TheMrFraz]

You'll be surprised to hear that GreenManGaming.com actually lets you recycle your old games purchased through them for store credit. No joke. They even had a game giveaway last week...and let everyone return it! I currently have five bucks in my wallet with them and never bought a thing. So awesome.

[ApolloAdams]

Because they are behind the times in my opinion. Make it all digital slash the prices and open up the systems. But that is a dream so I guess people still want to buy hard copies even though almost all media is going digital and laptops are even dropping optical drives. I love the digital moment but I guess console games aren't there yet.

[BitbyDeath]

The PSPGo tested those waters and sank.

Most people do not have a connection to handle downloading anything/everything.

And that was with much smaller games than what we have on todays consoles.

[kevnb]

how many games a month do you think people buy? Worst case scenario you have to download a 20 gig game a month, so what? On comcast that leaves you with over 200 gigs...

[BitbyDeath]

That one 20gb game would probably take at least a month to download.

[ApolloAdams]

PSP Go was a failure not because of it being download only though it was failure from hardware to over priced software. Apple got it right people don't need to spend 40 bucks to have hours of fun.

[Hicken]

Retailers make money off of retail copies of games. These same retailers stock Sony and Microsoft's systems in their stores. Software, however, makes more money. Digital copies being markedly cheaper than retail copies would alienate retailers, who could rightfully refuse to stock- and thus, sell- a manufacturer's system.

Besides, Microsoft or Sony could then set their prices at whatever they wanted, be it cheaper or more expensive. Buying a crap game would mean you wasted your money, since there'd be no way to recoup that money through resale or trades of any kind. And there's all the issues of digital information going bad, servers being shut down, and other things that mean a digital copy isn't likely to last as long as a physical copy.

Digital has its advantages, but there are far too many issues that need to be resolved before it becomes the primary method for gaming.

[TheMrFraz]

Servers shutting down terrifies me the most. I actually only just thought of this, but...Consider a console generation completely devoid of physical media, right? All digital. Now fast-forward...eh, say 100 years. All of that history will be gone. There will be nothing left to show for what gaming was back then. There will not be museums or hoarders with physical anythings, and much of the electronics will have failed.

Dangit, now I'm going to have nightmares.

[SaffronCurse]

There goes Gamestop and the majority of retail sales.

[srcBFMVBMTH]

Downloading a game off the internet will NEVER give me the same feeling as opening up, unboxing, and unwrapping, a new game. NEVER. Just opening that baby up and looking at the new disc whether it be upside down, turned side ways, or right side up is something else. And seeing that manual with no creases....... DAMN. Better than getting high if you ask me lol.

[TheMrFraz]

I love everything about this comment.

[Squatch83]

I guess it was nothing to do with the huge success of PSPGo?
/sarcasm

[titans9999]

Thank God....but, why can't consoles become better by improved/new opticles...isn't there a step up better than blue ray...??