Do Video Gamers Prefer Hard Copies or Digital Copies?

Lee Andrew Henderson: News about the top hit songs in the US will usually include facts about the number of downloads on Amazon or iTunes or the number of viewings on YouTube. The music industry has headed in a digital direction for some
time and now and other forms of entertainment may follow. Strangely the group that may be the last to go to digital copies is actually the group that people would expect it from the most, video gamers.

[xYLeinen]

I'm divided on the matter. At the moment I like my hard copies of my PS3 games, but in the future I don't think I will have a problem with digital copies. I'm totally okay with digital PSN games.

On my PC I get many of my games through steam and the transition from hard copies PC games to steam was no problem.

For many I think it comes down to "owning" the game. Having the hard copy makes a false feeling of owning the game where digital copy does not imo. But remember, you don't "own" the game with a hard copy. It's only a method to provide the content.

[Montoya]

Hardcopy is nice to have. Digital prevents you from trading games you regret trading later.

[HammockGames]

I like having a hard copy of games, like with most console games.

But I also love the convenience of having games all in one place, too, all on a massive HDD (ala Steam).

I don't generally trade or sell most games, so for me that isn't a big deal (if I question the quality I'll get or preorder something, then I might go for the hard copy)

My biggest objection to digital distribution is the occasional SLOW download server. I have a pretty fast internet connection & usually can download about 2 GB/hour on Steam.

But with Starcraft II (about 8 GB download at the time) it took nearly 36 hours to download - ridiculous, but not unexpected given the huge demand on their servers.

[Oner]

I prefer owning something physical but like the convenience of digital (even more so if the price is discounted). If I had to choose one or the other it would be a hard copy.

[longcat]

i prefer digital - but not at same price of hard copy.

I can buy, play and sell a game in 2 weeks and recover more than half of what i paid.

Digital need to be half priced for me

[Baka-akaB]

i dont trade games anyway . And i many cases the boxes and collectors are rubbish ... so if they're is an actual cost upside , digital for me

[Playerz8]

My favorite quote from the article-"red rings of DOOM" Lol, what a fail.

[darkequitus]

I have only bought 3 hardcopy games since the release of HL2 and Steam:

Gears of War PC, UT3 and Testdrive Unlimited and only because they were dirt cheap.

[xYLeinen]

Digital copies seems to be very nice price wise on steam. There are sales very often and they are pretty darn good from time to time.

Guess this is a bigger issue with PS3 and Xbox 360. Hard copies are a lot cheaper than digital copies from my experience and both Microsoft and Sony are both pretty bad at sales at this point when it comes to digital copies.

[HammockGames]

Steam sales are one of my vices.

I think I have 100+ games off of Steam now - most of those bought for a fraction of their retail price.

And to think - I was originally hesitant to buy digital. Now it's like crack to me!

[longcat]

a lot of psn pricing has imprvoed - but some of that is due to apple competition

[Cyb3r]

Im cool with buying DLC on PSN and Live but I dont like the idea of games on demand on Xbox Live they are old games that are overpriced and not only do they fill up your hard drive they also take forever to download and add more to your download limit on your ISP.

[metsgaming]

Will always prefer hard copies, i want to feel that im actually buying something and not just data.

[DeeZee]

I prefer physical media. It makes me feel like I really own it...

[metsgaming]

u said it better than i did, you dont feel ownership with digital copies

[yewles1]

Ditto.

[BannedForNineYears]

Same here. I haven't boughten a single PSN game. And I haven't sold a single retail physical PS3 game.
:D

[BannedForNineYears]

Errrrrrr, excuse my terrible grammar.
******I haven't bought. D:

[PS3Freak]

While I do occasionally buy PSN games, I deffinetly prefer Physical media.

[Darkfocus]

I like having a hard copy but not actually needing to use the disc to play

[Mista T]

I like both, digital copies can definitely cut down on huge amount of cases lying around :P

[FreddySavage]

....what? why yall lookin at me like that?

[N2G]

as long as i can download the game as many times as i need to & the game is still worth playing 2 years later then digital copy is fine with me otherwise hard copy all the way.

[Philaroni]

I like digital if they do it right, being they make more $$ on each copy of the game and we lose the ability to share it and sell it they should mark the game done or do good deals just like Steam. If they follow what Steam does then hell yes.

[Wolf873]

Well, I'd buy a digital copy if there is a big price difference (e.g. Steam sales), but hard copies means something tangible to add to your collection. Plus it saves me HDD space.

[HelghastKid]

Though I like hard copy for the box art, id take digital any day. It feels cool to just hop on my ps3 and have all of my games downloaded and ready to go. Same with my psp, multiple games ready to play.

[dorron]

Definitely Physical media. I like to feel that I own what I buy, collect the games and be able to play them even 10 years from now...

And of course, there's the matter of lending the game to my friends or taking games to another console.

[zak94ma]

Hard copies of course paying 60$ for a digital copies is nothing but waste of mony

[PirateThom]

Big fan of hard copies for everything. Games, books, movies, music... still buy everything physical, when possible. I like having a tangible product when it's available to me.

However, I have come around to the idea that some people do prefer digital. Steam is a huge example, I don't know ANYONE who really buys PC games in hard format anymore.

I don't think preference is an issue and there's room for both to co-exist, I think the digital marketplaces need to work out pricing a bit though. I don't mind paying for the right of a physical copy, but people buying digital should never, ever be paying the same or more than a physical copy.

[longcat]

part of the widespread acceptance of DD on PC is due to excellent pricing

[tommyth3cat]

I like digital because it makes it easier to pretend I don't have an addiction.

[Vortex3D]

Hard copy of games for sure. Digital download version has no physical media ownership other than license to play them. They are locked to the gamer account. Also, they take up a lot of hard drive space. I don't care the excuse of hard drive is cheap because on game consoles, it's not just put in a new hard drive and easily copy the old games over. There are so much DRM that it takes hours just trying to ensure everything from the old hard drive is successfully moved over because I can't simply plug in a 2nd hard drive. The myth of able to redownload any games you bought is a lie. There has been certain digital games/movies that aren't available for redownload. The point is there is no guarantee even with all the sales promises.

If full retail games are going to be released as Digital Download only, I'll just skip those games. So what if I miss some games because there are too many games in the market today. Like music CDs, even digital version is more popular today, I continue to buy them on CD version. Once I buy the music on the CD, it's mine forever without the stupid DRM control.

The only issue I see is even games continue to be released on the physical media, more and more of the contents will be locked using activation code.

[big_silky]

The problem I have with digital downloads is that they're increasingly requiring online authentication and whatnot. What happens when the next gen rolls around?

[kaos_fish II]

What happens when the servers are shutdown for good? The company gonna send you a hard copy?

I'll take hard copies any day of the week over digital - even though I've bought digital items

[Stealth20k]

I want to actually own my games. I dont want to borrow them from a publisher which is what dd is.

Rights,value, goods are taken away when its DD only.

Thankfully we wont have to worry about that for another 10-20 years.

Sony has stated that none of there future game consoles/portables will be dd only. And nintendo would never do it.

[AliTheBrit19]

Hard for sure!

One of my favourite games this gen is Battlefield 1943 - But because I have it as a digital download, it just doesn't feel like I even own it, more so I come and play it as like a rental.

Nothing will beat that physical touch of a game you own.

[DarkSpawnClone]

I like it hard ;)

[Vip3r]

Hard copy. But if a digital game is on a sale on Steam for an instanly low price, then I'd buy it over a hard copy.

[Pandamobile]

Digital. I like being able to move around and have my entire game library with me.

[ScubaSteve1]

digital copy we can take it where ever we go, very reliable and we wont have to mess with the game disc being scratch

[Ri0tSquad]

Which ever one is cheaper.

[KiLLz]

All day..what am I gonna do if I get tired of the game and want to sell it,how will I get rid of it..sell it u mean???

[skyblue14213]

I will always prefer a hard copy of a game over a digital copy of a game anytime. Besides me preferring it that way like having an actual game in my hands, a manual to finger through and look at and read, a case and case art to look at, and being able to display my collection, and knowing long after the game is no longer being supported that I don't have to worry about losing the game(s), also this notion was reinforced indefinitely in stone when I wasted $50 on both left 4 dead and left 4 dead 2 a while ago.

I first got left 4 dead off of a torrent to see if it was worth buying, and while it did not have to have a connection to the internet and steam to play it(a hacked version of the game) it played smoothly without any hiccups. Then after about so much into the game I decided to buy both left 4 dead and left 4 dead 2. So I put down $50 for both hard copy versions of the game(which also required me to download the games off of steam, in which I thought they were on the discs that I bought.)

I was beginning to get aggravated because I felt like I just got deceived into buying the discs for nothing which was the end result of this situation but I will get to that in a moment. Anyway I still went through with the process anyway and downloaded the steam client in order to proceed to being able to play both games. So when all was downloaded and installed. I proceeded to play the games. So I started the first game and everything seemed fine until about 10 minutes into the game, then all of a sudden the frame rate and audio dropped to a "crash like" state rendering the game unplayable. I found this odd because I previously played the pirated version really without any problems that made the game unplayable, so I thought to myself maybe the game resource settings are too high, so I eventually lowered them to a bare minimum state(the lowest setting possible) in which my computer was more than capable of handling. So I started the game up and the same problem occurred. The same problem also occurred when I played left 4 dead 2.

[skyblue14213]

Come to find out that it not only affected the games but also affected the whole operation of my computer bogging my system down so bad that the only way to stop it was to restart my computer. At this point I was so aggravated and mad that I could barely think on how I should handle this situation correctly, but after calming down and thinking the situation out and getting the patience to handle the situation I decided to contact steam/valve support to address the situation.

So I contacted them informing them of the situation and within a few days they asked me to try a few things, in which I did what they said in which it did absolutely nothing to even improve the situation(not even slightly), but I figured I will inform them about the results hoping that they would get back to me in a few days with something else to try to fix the situation. So I waited and waited with no answer, they did not even let me know if they were working on the problem. It was not until at least a weeks time had passed until I got a response from them, and by then I was so fed up with the situation that I did not bother to pursue the situation any further and the games have been collecting dust ever since.

During this time that I had the problem with both games I did some research, and come to find out that I was not the only one that has had this particular problem, and in fact many people have had this problem and to my knowledge it has not been resolved to this day by steam or valve.

That situation will be the first and last time that valve will get my support. My theory on why this problem ever occurred in the first place is entirely being blamed on valve and stream. Because I think that the steam client installed some type of drm(without my knowledge) that conflicted with my computer's operating system after so much time actually running both the games, whats even more proof of this is that I had to stay connected with the steam client in order to even play both of the games.

Then I remembered reading about the ubisoft assassins creed 2 drm situation for the pc, and then after remembering that situation my problem started to make more sense. My mother a while ago also bought some games online without the ability to re-download them if something ever happened where she was unable get access to them, and something did eventually happen disabling her to get access to the games that she originally payed for, and in that situation she wasted her money also like I did in my situation. These two incidences taught me and important lesson and I will just leave it at that.

[hazelamy]

give me a box or give me death.
actually though i prefer boxed discs, i have bought downloads, but i will always prefer discs.