Used Games Sales and the Future: Still Needed?

[ShadowSoldier]

Until everywhere in the world has decent internet for cheap prices (literally, it costs less than 5 cents to give consumers a GB of bandwidth), cloud gaming will never become the new standard.

And there are just more people who prefer physical over digital anyways.

For used games, I think they're awesome, but retailers need to make up for it. If someone buys a used game, then some profit should go to the publisher.

 

[Another World]

i would embrace the digital format over physical if there was a law that said in 30 years the digital format must be archived and preserved for a long as humanly possible. i know that my carts will eventually degrade, but right now my 30 yr old atari games are working great. will i still be able to download my digital games in 30 years, probably not. the companies creating the work shouldn't be debating new/used sales, but rather discussing the preservation of the bulk of their library. they don't realize that they are living history. 50 years from now someone will want to experience their games. if the cloud was shut down, the service suspended, or the company disbanded, we may end up only experiencing these games by reading about them.

-another world

 

[pwsincd]

i feel bad on VW that the passat i bought wasnt new and infact came from a dealer .. pre owned .. but hell i saved a few quid.

 

[osm70]

Used games are worse than piracy, because you pay money and developers gets nothing.

 

[anhminh]

Used games are worse than piracy, because you pay money and developers gets nothing.

They do get money from the first guy who buy it so it isn't nothing.

 

[Mario92]

As kid I had to buy second hand games as new ones were really pricey and I didn't have PC and certainly didn't have reliable internet connection. Nowdays I'm PS+ subscriber and use Steam alot. Of course I can still see many especially younger audience usually has that one console with no way to put that 3G modem to and no credit/debit card to even buy digital products. Actually few of my friends are struggling to buy items from eShop even when they have the money! If they make good system to buy digital games from stores with deep discounts (like you can do with steamwork games) and ability to install most of the game locally then I can see pretty bright future with digital only games without need for making all the DLC and multiplayer components to single player games.
Of course that's just ideal and consoles should play games offline always which makes such system irritating. On PC it just works.

Used games are worse than piracy, because you pay money and developers gets nothing.

Not exactly. Someone did pay in first time hmm? And second person can buy DLC and such. Of course first one to buy game had to pay more of it than person who bought digital version from steam with -90% discount. Difference is now that first person has to buy game again to play it where steam user still has it.

E:

i feel bad on VW that the passat i bought wasnt new and infact came from a dealer .. pre owned .. but hell i saved a few quid.

Of course becouse car comparison has always worked with digital products yeah!

 

[aiat_gamer]

Well I think whether we want in or not, we WILL move into a place where physical media is obsolete. As a mainly pc gamer, I never buy a physical disk even if I have the chance to do it, it is just a hassle for me. My new pc does not even have a DVD drive! I am pretty sure by the end of this gen, physical games will be dead and gone.

 

[FAST6191]

Hmm...with everyone already defending the player's perspective (to which I agree), I think it's better practice if I defend the industry's side a bit as well...
Used cars have a higher insurance, and usually higher maintenance.

Some interesting points, I can not really agree with any of them and will have to echo Armadillo in this regard. I usually figure that if for a moment they could have got a ruling against it they would have, at best all I can do is consider that grousing about second hand games to be a world class act of social engineering (double so if GOTY/DLC, poisoned clouds like Steam, perhaps the likes of rolling releases for games (popular in mobile phone world and what are termed MMOs) and the like are the other side of the incentive package).
As for used cars, insurance and repair.... no. Insurance is usually value linked to the car with it one of the more dominant factors to pricing there (improved anti theft and safety in newer models being the main thing to temper that in favour of new(er) cars. Parts and repair. Usually masked by warranties and compulsory services, you try buying dealer/company parts in the first few years of a car (assuming they are not shared between now older models) and between core charges and general premiums you will be paying a fortune and similarly as the dealers are technically the only people that can work on them (various governments force info to be given up in fairly short order). This flips back around when things become classics and may not be provided for even by the aftermarket set (usually where I find myself coming in as well as in those first few years)

As for the matter at hand I spent some time at the weekend attempting to work up a model for predicting the rarity of games. The gamestop selling NTSC Xenoblade as used did not bother me in the slightest and I struggle to even see why it should (to the point I will probably be hostile to those that consider it a bad thing), gamestop are certainly a bunch of moral questionable profiteers but that is what we call business.

In the end I will return to my usual offer. Game companies, if you want a slice of the second hand pie then either buy shares in someone that deals in them or offer the services yourselves.

For me the only way for me to embrace cloud gaming is for me to do it on my own terms and allow me to leverage my technical skills towards that end. As Steam, which does not do it on my own terms, became the go to example both in general of for those that aspire to do similar things I am not predicting it will happen any time soon. If you want to try selling me a service/consumable you are quite free to try though.

 

[KingBlank]

I really hope gamestop does not stop selling used games.

 

[Obveron]

The games industry is doing better than ever, I don't feel the least bit bad about buying a used game. The big publishers are finding more and more ways to gouge the consumer, why should consumers feel bad about buying a used game?

 

[Taleweaver]

Some interesting points, I can not really agree with any of them and will have to echo Armadillo in this regard. I usually figure that if for a moment they could have got a ruling against it they would have, at best all I can do is consider that grousing about second hand games to be a world class act of social engineering (double so if GOTY/DLC, poisoned clouds like Steam, perhaps the likes of rolling releases for games (popular in mobile phone world and what are termed MMOs) and the like are the other side of the incentive package).
As for used cars, insurance and repair.... no. Insurance is usually value linked to the car with it one of the more dominant factors to pricing there (improved anti theft and safety in newer models being the main thing to temper that in favour of new(er) cars. Parts and repair. Usually masked by warranties and compulsory services, you try buying dealer/company parts in the first few years of a car (assuming they are not shared between now older models) and between core charges and general premiums you will be paying a fortune and similarly as the dealers are technically the only people that can work on them (various governments force info to be given up in fairly short order). This flips back around when things become classics and may not be provided for even by the aftermarket set (usually where I find myself coming in as well as in those first few years)

Sorry...perhaps it was a bad example on my end, but that insurance policy was only an illustration. What I was trying to say is that everyone who sells a product on a large scale has the factor 'used resales' to deal with. If I sell product X to you, you own it and are entitled to sell it at a lower cost if you want.
What game companies are complaining about is that on one hand, they have to sell (sometimes very) large amounts to make any money off their investments, and on the other hand the actual game pretty much does not diminish in quality whatsoever. It's not that they want a certain special arrangement for their industry (at least: not that I can tell), but it IS a reality. Game companies know that having a huge audience doesn't mean that much if the majority of said audience is going to pirate, buy it used or await a purchase until the price drops. So they aim to collect money from that audience in other ways. And I don't think it's a coincidence that those other ways (DLC, extra content, F2P, cloud gaming) tend to circumvent the used market.

 

[osm70]

They do get money from the first guy who buy it so it isn't nothing.

If you pirate they still get money from the guy who copied it.

 

[FAST6191]

If you pirate they still get money from the guy who copied it.

What? I do not think things work that way.

I buy a game
You buy it off me
I can no longer play the game.

I buy a game
You get a copy
As do thousands of our friends.
We are now dealing in "if it is was not available"/"I wouldn't have purchased it anyway" type discussions and they never get anywhere fast.

What game companies are complaining about is that on one hand, they have to sell (sometimes very) large amounts to make any money off their investments, and on the other hand the actual game pretty much does not diminish in quality whatsoever. It's not that they want a certain special arrangement for their industry (at least: not that I can tell), but it IS a reality. Game companies know that having a huge audience doesn't mean that much if the majority of said audience is going to pirate, buy it used or await a purchase until the price drops. So they aim to collect money from that audience in other ways. And I don't think it's a coincidence that those other ways (DLC, extra content, F2P, cloud gaming) tend to circumvent the used market.

It is a known variable and if you have to sell so many games and you ignore such things then it is you that has the bad business model, can't really say I would lose any sleep over that one.

 

[Tom Bombadildo]

lololol tl;dr lololol

As a kid I used to always go for used games because they were cheap and I just didn't care about packaging. Now that I'm older and I have access to more money, I prefer buying new games. Mostly because I want to support the developers, I still don't care about packaging.

At this point I stick with digital downloads, too. 99% of the games on my PS3 are all digital, same with my Vita. My PC, of course, is all digital as well. I'm pretty sure I don't even own any more UMD's for my PSP, so those are all digital, too. While the packaging for games is nice and all, I just don't have the shelf space to put 100's of games on. And really, if I absolutely wanted to have a physical case for a digital game I have I would just spend a few bucks and buy the case online, or hell, invest in a good printer, glossy paper, and a ton of empty game cases and make your own.

 

[Guild McCommunist]

We all know the physical game industry is going the way of the music industry and digital will take over with the cries of turbonerds everywhere ringing out "But m-muh video game collecting."

EDIT: AKA used games are going the way of the dinosaur.

 

[Foxi4]

We all know the physical game industry is going the way of the music industry and digital will take over with the cries of turbonerds everywhere ringing out "But m-muh video game collecting."

EDIT: AKA used games are going the way of the dinosaur.

To be fair, used games stores won't magically disappear when we go full-on digital, even if only for the sake of legacy games... think of all the vinyl record stores we have around.

 

[Guild McCommunist]

To be fair, used games stores won't magically disappear when we go full-on digital, even if only for the sake of legacy games... think of all the vinyl record stores we have around.

But those are like niche stores, we won't have massive chains like Gamestop around, although even they are jumping into the digital market a bit.

 

[FAST6191]

We all know the physical game industry is going the way of the music industry and digital will take over with the cries of turbonerds everywhere ringing out "But m-muh video game collecting."

EDIT: AKA used games are going the way of the dinosaur.

But will that change come before the rest of the industry encounters the other big change?

Similarly there is a growing body of case law all over the shop that says users must be able to resell software.

How it will all play out I am not entirely sure, I am expecting gruesome deaths or radical reformations though.

 

[Foxi4]

But those are like niche stores, we won't have massive chains like Gamestop around, although even they are jumping into the digital market a bit.

Of course - that's sort of what I implied.

 

[qweesy777]

Its such a rip off Gamestop sells the used version $5 or $10 bucks less than the new version..... yet they may give you $5 bucks if you trade it in to them. I only buy new games. I sold my playsation and Xbone 360. The dilemma is this since all of my gaming is on the 3DS and PC now, I would buy in the cloud IF it was half the price of the Physical cartridge...... The company doesn't have to make a cart, packaging,booklets or anything whatsoever so I feel they should pass the cheaper cost of the digital version down to the consumer, it literally costs them nothing to make the digital version......apart from the electric bill that it costs to run the computer. Until the industry moves this way I will continue to by NEW physical carts. As for gamestop used games......RIPOFF ALERT the $5 or $10 you'd save, you are not supporting the gaming industry and you help promote their ridiculous prices on USED games stop doing it vote with your dollars.