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As Downloads Take Over, a Turning Point for the Video Game Industry

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Re: As Downloads Take Over, a Turning Point for the Video Game Industry

#41

Post by shmerl »

bsilvereagle wrote: post #35
shmerl wrote: post #24

I really hope digital downloads will take over. It will reduce the influence of retail distributors who like to set skewed regional pricing that in result affects even prices in digital stores. It is often simply a rip off (ask Australians what they think about it). Surprisingly, that didn't quite happen yet. Some games like the Witcher 3 reported[1] a major percentage to be retail sales (almost 75%). I expected it t…

> I really hope digital downloads will take over. There are lots of people on capped satellite/3G/"water tower" internet who enjoy gaming that are going to be cut out of the market if consoles go to a pure digital distribution system. Additionally, gamers in very remote locations (submarines, remote foreign villages, etc) couldn't have the latest releases mailed to them. Somehow they'd have to find a broadband connec…

Some niche retailers will surely remain for those who have very limited or no Internet connection. But they'll be serving a small market, and it will be quite different from current situation when retail distributors dictate prices for digital stores.

And it's indeed easy to make it a service on demand, when they get the digital game and ship it to you on a small flash drive. It's not a problem for DRM-free games, and may be GOG can even start offering such service in the future. DRMed games however shoot themselves in the foot by making it too hard, but I personally don't care about them.

Re: As Downloads Take Over, a Turning Point for the Video Game Industry

#42

Post by Houshalter »

jonknee wrote: post #38
Houshalter wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They can't charge less for the digital version because of gamestop. Gamestop won't carry games where the digital version is cheaper. There might also be similar arrangements with the console makers themselves, not wanting to encourage the PC market. Games made only for PC are cheaper and have better sales. As for reselling games, that would seriously hurt developers. A single game could be resold 100s of times, but o…

> As for reselling games, that would seriously hurt developers. A single game could be resold 100s of times, but only the first sale goes to the developer, and everyone else in the chain plays for free. Video games have been resold since video games were invented and there still continue to be new titles.

And it has always hurt developers. Games could be cheaper or have larger budgets without Gamestop taking such a huge cut.

The worrying thing about digital is it could be vastly easier to trade used games. There is no worrying about scratched discs, and you don't get pennies on the dollar for the trade. You could just play used games endlessly without ever spending more than an initial investment.

Re: As Downloads Take Over, a Turning Point for the Video Game Industry

#43

Post by Pfhreak »

SapphireSun wrote: post #19
moskie wrote: post #13

I think a harbinger of this was the fact that the latest console generation did not come with an upgrade in (physical) game medium. Previously, each console generation came with newer cartridges, then with newer disc formats (CD, then DVD, then HD-DVD / Blu Ray). But this generation just stuck with Blu Ray. That signaled to me that this may very well be the last generation to even support physical media. If this cons…

I think the limiting factor is how much hard drive space you want to take up with coresident games. If you use a blue ray, you can load a significant amount of content from disk. Otherwise you're forcing your players to make tradeoffs based on how much space they have left which would cause first releases for a system to have a natural advantage over later releases (sales wise) as HDD space fills up. Edit: Fair enoug…

I'm not that sure that's the limiting factor these days. If Sony/Microsoft/Steam can be trusted to remember what I have in my library, I only need enough space to store the set of games I'm currently interested in. And with sufficient bandwidth, I can swap that set around very easily. Especially if I can control what I have installed via a mobile device -- think I might want to play a game tonight? Kick it off during my lunch hour, and it's ready and waiting when I get home.

Re: As Downloads Take Over, a Turning Point for the Video Game Industry

#44

Post by shmerl »

moskie wrote: post #13

I think a harbinger of this was the fact that the latest console generation did not come with an upgrade in (physical) game medium. Previously, each console generation came with newer cartridges, then with newer disc formats (CD, then DVD, then HD-DVD / Blu Ray). But this generation just stuck with Blu Ray. That signaled to me that this may very well be the last generation to even support physical media. If this cons…

> If this console generation lasts the typical ~7 years or so... do we expect people to still be using any physical media in the early 2020s?

This insane upgrade cycle will disappear. Steam Machines will hopefully increase competition in consoles market and will push MS and Sony to upgrade their hardware more frequently.

Re: As Downloads Take Over, a Turning Point for the Video Game Industry

#45

Post by kevingadd »

Cpoll wrote: post #15
chris11 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Steam has a somewhat reasonable refund policy: http://store.steampowered.com/steam_refunds/ . And most online purchases are made with credit cards, and those usually have strong consumer protections. You could always do a chargeback if the game launch was really bad (SimCity, Dayz). Also, a lot of credit cards have return polices where you can get refunds for any reason within 60 days of purchase.

There are numerous horror stories about people issuing a charge-back on a Steam purchase and having Steam respond by permanently disabling their account (invariably filled with $3000 worth of games).

Until quite recently this was official Valve policy, even if the game was defective. I had to explain the policy to American Express to get them to threaten Valve so I could get a refund on a game that had broken DRM (Securom).

Re: As Downloads Take Over, a Turning Point for the Video Game Industry

#46

Post by Houshalter »

Kronopath wrote: post #36
tammer wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They really need to pivot, and I'm not seeing them do it. To me the answer is obvious: Blockbuster :: Netflix :: actual movie theatre Old Gamestop :: Steam :: new gamestop with all but the rarest used games hauled away, & using the space for pod enclosures that create individual and co-op immersive experiences, rentable by the hour while parents shop at surrounding stores, run errands, etc. Studios get immersive demo…

The problem with your analogy is that while a movie can take two or three hours, a game can take dozens or hundreds, which means a lot more time spent in your "pod". It's interesting to note, however, that a variation on this idea has already come and gone: arcades. Those were the places you went to when you wanted to play a game somewhere other than your home.

Arcades are a pretty interesting analogy to movie theaters. The reason theaters continue to exist, is that movies are released there first. Because they make more money there.

I wonder if games could release to arcades before releasing to the public. But somehow that doesn't seem quite as practical.

Re: As Downloads Take Over, a Turning Point for the Video Game Industry

#47

Post by daemin »

SapphireSun wrote: post #30
_ea1k wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that the limiting factor is hard drive space. It would not have made sense to significantly increase the capacity of the drive by replacing Blu-Ray with something else. That would have just made the hard drive bottleneck even more pronounced. 500 GB really isn't enough for a heavy gamer.

Luckily 4TB hard drives are on the market these days, however, their price alone would contribute significantly to the MSRP of the console.

It's also better to have games on an SSD because it's an even faster loading time than spinnys. I've got my games on a 500"GB" SSD and it's always the most full disk.

Although in good news the SSD disk storage sizes are only going up and the price is coming down, so by the next console generation it should be practical to put in a 1TB SSD into a cheap console.

Re: As Downloads Take Over, a Turning Point for the Video Game Industry

#48

Post by rangibaby »

Houshalter wrote: post #42
jonknee wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As for reselling games, that would seriously hurt developers. A single game could be resold 100s of times, but only the first sale goes to the developer, and everyone else in the chain plays for free. Video games have been resold since video games were invented and there still continue to be new titles.

And it has always hurt developers. Games could be cheaper or have larger budgets without Gamestop taking such a huge cut. The worrying thing about digital is it could be vastly easier to trade used games. There is no worrying about scratched discs, and you don't get pennies on the dollar for the trade. You could just play used games endlessly without ever spending more than an initial investment.

They are already cheap and have AAA games have budgets comparable to mid-tier Hollywood movies. Not being able to sell something you bought seems strange to me.

Re: As Downloads Take Over, a Turning Point for the Video Game Industry

#49

Post by rosege »

daemin wrote: post #47
SapphireSun wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Luckily 4TB hard drives are on the market these days, however, their price alone would contribute significantly to the MSRP of the console.

It's also better to have games on an SSD because it's an even faster loading time than spinnys. I've got my games on a 500"GB" SSD and it's always the most full disk. Although in good news the SSD disk storage sizes are only going up and the price is coming down, so by the next console generation it should be practical to put in a 1TB SSD into a cheap console.

I looked at benchmarks for SSDs in consoles and they were saying not to bother because the difference to loading times was minimal
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