Even videogame executives are haunted by the boogieman in their dreams. But this isn’t the same monster that scares children. The executive’s personal monster comes in the form of Gamestop. This is because a customer buying a used game instead of a new one is the biggest losses to revenue, since developers get 0% of the profits from such a transaction. In the past there wasn’t anything the executives could do because used game sales aren’t illegal and there wasn’t any way to get people to hold onto their games without it being an ultra kickass game. That all changed with the rise of console internet connectivity....
We will see who is the biggest "monster" when consoles get digital distribution only and we will still pay the full 70€ per game.
Developers are concerned about their profit on a used disc based game but ironically, their digital version costs way more than a disc version of it. Discs are good since multiple retailers can sell them allowing competition and better prices for the consumers. In a scary future when all games are download only, we will get games from a single vendor. He will make his price and thats it. No competition means the price will always be right in their eyes and they wont go down anytime soon.
Mark my words! When games get digital only we will pay more money for them!
I think that the executives at these publishers don't get it. What's going to make their games sell is producing something worth buying, not trying to control the distribution medium so that people are forced to pay. Do that and charge a fair price and more people will buy.
It's the mentality that a used sale is a lost sale. Just because there is no used copy doesn't mean someone's going to shell out full price for a new copy. Many people can't buy new because the price is just too high. Many people are in the position where the only way they're able to buy new games is if they can have the price subsidized by selling their used copies.
You never hear these executives talk about how many of their sales happen *because* companies like Gamestop offered someone money to offset the price of their new game.
They're perfectly happy to have Gamestop foot 25% or more of the bill. Then they complain because the games are resold and they don't get a cut.
$60 is a lot for some people, but $40 and $20 in store credit received by trading a month-old game they've finished is a lot easier to afford. My opinion is that if we were to go digital distribution only in an attempt to curb used game sales the number of new games sold would actually decline unless the prices drop.
With this debate is the slippery slope that we are headed for by allowing game companies to have ANY say in what we do with something we purchase after the fact. Would you be willing to give FORD 20% of the trade-in on your used car? Ask DIVX how the pay-to-play thing worked for movies. People want to, and as of now, have the right, to do what they want with something they have purchased. People have been buying and selling used CD's and movies for years, and no one makes a peep about it. Trying to limit the sale of used games will just force more people to turn to piracy, which hurts developers and publishers even more.