I wish more business people would take math courses. They'd realize there's a threshold for maximizing (read: micromanaging) individual sales vs throughput of overall sales. Something they'd find out, very quickly, is throughput makes you more money.

Here's the deal, Game Publishers. If you want to treat video games as a service ... they need to be created AS A SERVICE. This means, constant iteration on a product I've already bought! You can't have it both ways! It's either a product and acts like all consumer purchasable products, or it's a service, and you have a responsibility to maintain and update the game for longer than 6 months if it does really well. Not the pros of both, putting the disadvantage only on the consumer (more money, less product).

This is, obviously, absolutely ridiculous.

If publishers weren't such pussies they'd just tell GameStop to fuck off and they'd avoid the used game problem entirely. But they are ... so they snivel and concoct plans of overthrowing physical stores while duping the consumer at the same time. It's just ridiculous.

The sad part is ... people will buy all of it making it, "the new big thing" and it'll just perpetually continue. The only way this sort of nonsense is going to stop is if people stop paying them to do these things. Corporations do not have your best interest in heart, it'd be nice if people understood that.

I imagine if Microsoft did do something like this ... and they were the only hardware manufacture to do so ... chances are a large majority of people would either stop playing games entirely (as they would now not be able to afford them) or they'd simply stop using Xbox. Live isn't particularly ahead of the curve anymore and it doesn't seem like most gamers are particularly fond of Kinect. So ... I'm not sure what they'd really have to keep them there? You can only make so many Halo and Gears of War games before people stop caring ... at least if you don't change them (which seems to be the case)

Yikes. Did we learn nothing from all the DRM BS the PC had to deal with in the 00s? It didn't stop or even slow the pirates, pi$$ed off paying customers, and lead to a serious downturn in PC gaming which we are only now starting to recover from.

At some point brick and mortar stores will be a thing of the past. Once games go download only you can take used game stores out of the equation. But we aren't there yet.

If this is serious, 720 is going to be a hard sell.

And so nobody bought the nextbox.

I can tell you right now if this is the way the game industry's going, then I'm out. I'll stick with my older consoles. I'm at a point in my life where it's time to get married, start a family etc. and as much as I love gaming I'm sorry, not giving my hard earned money to greedy/stupid corporations who continuously screw over paying customers. I was pissed when publishers started locking out multiplayer for used games and this will be the last straw if it's proven to be true. This doesn't only screw over people who buy games used but also people who rent games. Fuck them all, you won't be getting my hard earned dollars.

Yep.

So what about GameFly then? Or even used game stores? It sounds like Microsoft is going to take down some businesses in their effort to get alllllllllll da money.

I highly doubt the rumor's true on this tech though. I don't think Microsoft wants the backlash this would cause. The again... it's Microsoft.

Digital distribution will kill the used game market eventually but it won't be in the next generation of consoles I think. I don't think people are ready or even want full digital distribution for games yet. And IF they want to really push digital downloads for games they really need to charge less for games. They'll be saving money on producing discs, boxart, manuals etc. so cut the cost on downloadable titles. I would download WAY more games on my console if they were cheaper.

From what I hear Sony is going to offer Vita game downloads at 40% less than the cost of the retail releases. I think that is the right way to go. Cut out the middleman and pass the savings on to the consumer. I'm not going to miss having a disc and box if I can save $10-$20 every purchase.

EXACTLY!! I love collecting games but paying $20 less for a digital game would change my mind instantly. This is how you eliminate the used game market properly.

I'd almost say taking math courses or business courses is total overkill.

It's the same argument for pirated copies. If X% of players play used games, Y% play new and Y is greater than X than you are better served increasing your market for said game so the Y% equals a larger customer base. If 1,000,000 copies of a game is sold, and 200,000 are used, you have an 80/20 ratio of new to used sales. If you double the number of games sold, you increase used sales from 800K to 1.6 million while only increasing used from 200K to 400K. You are gaining way more money increasing your new game sales than trying to stop your used game sales.

I don't know shit about business but this is plainly obvious to me.

And like Mr. Black said, I'm out with gaming anyways. I'm sticking to what I have now and calling it good. Might pick up a Vita just to have something for the road.

I agree. If this is the cost of next gen systems, then the day xbox720 comes out I'm just going to buy $400 worth of 8 and 16 bit games and call it a day.

Pretty much. All I need to find is a top-loading NES and a 3DO and I'll be set for classic consoles I think. I have a large collection of NES, SNES and N64 games not to mention I own every current-gen system. I'm good to go when it comes to gaming so if game companies want to be dicks and fuck over their consumers then I'll just revisit my older/timeless titles.

These kinds of actions will come and bite companies/publishers in the ass, mark my words. The industry may think it's recession proof, just wait until you keep trying to fuck over people who are living the recession. See how fast they stop their money-sucking hobby when they're constantly being screwed over.

I think the last few years have shown they're clearly not recession proof. Publishers have kept those profit numbers up by hacking apart their workforce. :\

Because every single copy of a game in a store is availible to buy Brand new....

Good thing I pirate all my games, not just because of their rapidly declining quality, but because of garbage like this.

u srs?

Hearing shit like this has made me glad I jumped back in to PC gaming. I've pretty much decided I've retired from console gaming. This was the first generation I didn't own each system available (of the major systems, I don't count that 3D0, CD-i bullshit). Knowing what the future holds its time to pull a John Elway and retire on top rather than try and hang on too long.

Pretty much what turned me on to piracy. Drop $60 and get fucked for having my internet drop, have some asinine spyware installed for "security" and have my shit uploaded to some company, or bypass it all for free. Yeah, pirates are gonna win that argument every time.

I'm honestly starting to agree at this point. Good thing I haven't had many troubles with Steam and I enjoy my library of PS2 games. As long as Nintendo avoids shit like this, I'm happy.

I think that Jim Sterling said it best when he said that these anti piracy measures make the buyer jump through hoops, not the people using piracy.

And I hate these used game measures. If it's something like giving free outside content for new game buyers, then great. But if it's locking out entire modes or not even letting you access the game without being online, then it just doesn't work. Some people just can't afford to shell out $60+ dollars per game and rely on the used game market and exchanging for credits in stores. Making all of these measures of anti used game detection just makes the whole physical copies of games moot.


Same here. Nintendo really hasn't done anything to screw over the customer (though their online functions are limited).