hardcastlemccormick
Banned
I tried, but it got locked immediately, so I guess it wasn't thread-worthy.
PA Report - The Xbox One will kill used games, that's good
- Thread starter hardcastlemccormick
- Start date
I tried, but it got locked immediately, so I guess it wasn't thread-worthy.
NervousXtian
Thought Emoji Movie was good. Take that as you will.
..and if things go the way of the PC and retail/used is a thing of the past... there's no reason to believe that the smart move by devs/pubs is to lower the price of games and offer sales as an incentive...
much like the do with retail now.. but it'd be a more profitable way to manage as the middle man (retailer with markup, shipping, distribution) is completely removed and replaced with a far cheaper middle man (MS/Sony/Nintedo/Valve/Etc).
The only reason to think it won't have a positive effect overall on price is the same conspiracy theory BS crap we had when Steam came out.
Bottom line is, if games can't/won't sale for $60 as a DD or other form of resale disabled format that things will shift to where it's still profitable for game makers and console makers.
If for some reason that stick with $60 games and no resale.. then it will... but it is very doubtful that would happen. We have history on our side to prove that non-resellable games have shown a drastic drop across the board of game pricing.
So one would have to completely ignore the history of the PC to continue thinking that MS/Sony would commit console suicide.
..but let's continue to hold on to antiquated technology just because and hold back what could in turn be a boon to the console industry.
I personally can't wait to be done with physical media completely, and I don't have a single issue with losing the advantages of resell, lending, renting for the convenience and flexibility of pricing and selection that DD offers.
It's sort of sad to see the backlash moving forward to something that's been going on with the PC for darn now a decade.
You must of not paid attention to the last 8 years of PSN and games on demand pricing then. There are several reasons for the cheap steam prices. First they are not the only digital service out there and there is competition. Second those sales are being subsidized by console gamers paying up the ass for games. The console makers have shown nothing that would lead anyone to believe they would drop prices if there is no used games. It be the opposite there be no used games to bring prices down. We should understand what MS,EA and Activision really want. They want 59.99 dollar long term digital rentals that require daily check ins to make sure were are not dirty pirates. If this happens it will crash this industry and probably kill it for good. This is all about publishers looking for someone to blame for horrible business decisions.
The console industry has shown nothing that resembles responsible business models or a good understanding of consumers(Sony and MS actually are perfect examples of out of touch companies beyond simply video games actually). I'm not exactly sure why you believe MS/Sony can maintain the console market value/liquidity/demand vs what the 2nd hand market/retail is doing. Where is your faith in these corporations coming from?
Valve is a better ran business then Sony or MS, you shouldnt expect the same consumer awareness quality from these guys.
NervousXtian
Thought Emoji Movie was good. Take that as you will.
You are forgetting that PSN/XBL have had to make sure they don't piss off retail while pricing DD... thus why you saw considerably more deals on games that didn't have retail releases.
There is almost ZERO retail PC game boxes out there, and it's a sliver of the market at best.. they don't care about pricing hurting retail.
The current system relies on retail sales, and the consoles were released at time when DD really just wasn't an option for a game console.. keep in mind when 360/PS3 released.
This next generation was a chance to move out of retail and the issues they have.
We saw reduced prices when retail was removed from the equation for PC games.. and there's zero reason outside of contempt for MS/Sony to think we wouldn't have a similar path with pricing of console games.
The market will not support DD $60 games as a whole, it's clearly apparent to anyone with eyes and sense of things. That's why you see the retail pricing of games fluctuate so much, but you don't see it on their DD avenues.. because they have to keep retail happy to continue to have retail shelf space where the main avenue for their games are to be sold.
You'd transfer the retail price strategy to a digital price strategy.
It's a fallacy to think that games are $60 all the time, you just don't see the Steam sales as often with PSN/XBLA because you see it at the retail outlets... one has to look no further than Slickdeals or CheapAssGamer too see it's happening all the time.
Do you honestly think retailers are eating all that markdown? Hell no.
NervousXtian
Thought Emoji Movie was good. Take that as you will.
The same shit you are hearing now about Sony/MS you heard about Valve when Steam started... so I'd turn the question around...
What makes you think Sony/MS are so stupid to as to commit console suicide by eliminating value and never reducing prices ever?
MS has already shown that it's out of touch with their early adopters and even with the gaming media. They had months to prepare for the questions on used games and always-online and still managed to make a mess with their PR.
This same lack of awareness might cause them to blame everything except their pricing decisions, if they turn out to cause a market decline. Corporations are not immune to the human tendency of blaming everything but oneself for one's problems.
Bold - That was because it was something new and unfamiliar territory for a large number of gamers. It worked because Valve isn't a company continually fucking over consumers since the early 90's through oligopolies or monopolies.
Unbolded - Sony and MS have proven their track record(of being crap for the past decade and a half) with consumer awareness throughout the company. Neither company has shown that they have any real quality consumer awareness that they originally had when they were much much smaller.
Your lollipop view that because what we have is shit, that MS and Sony can make it not shit is ridiculous. How you can possibly think MS or Sony can handle the responsibility of upholding consumer liquidity is a fucking mystery to me, based on their past history with every industry they are involved in.
The Windows 8 store for one...
If that was the plan MS would of had answers for the questions. It would of been yes you lose rights but games will never be over 39.99 or something like that. They could easily match retail prices and not piss them off. 90% of games on console DD are over priced and some of them cost twice the cost of retail. They could easily match retail and everyone would of been happy. Hell go the extra mile and match a buy 2 get 1 free that retail does a few times a year. Not going to piss of retail that way since just price matching for a lesser item.
NervousXtian
Thought Emoji Movie was good. Take that as you will.
Yup, they will do away with sales and lower the value of product to consumers and completely bankrupt their companies based on sheer arrogance.
Seriously, this is getting into the old man yelling at clouds territory.
I personally want a console that forces internet, so things can be built with it in mind. When you have half-assed in-between you are splitting the market and not letting devs develop a universal experience. I want retail games to die, so I can do away with physical media completely and have a Steam like buying experience.
The tv stuff, whatever.. if it works smoothly I'll use it. I'll be buying one to play games... which despite all the BS topics.. is still what both consoles are made to do at their core.
The Bold - If you think Sony and MS will have the same consistent value checks as the used game market, you are kidding yourself. They may throw people bones, here and there, but it wont be like steam, and it sure as hell wont be like the 2nd hand market. The game industry isnt some unique snowflake that can just get rid of a billion dollar part of their industry and just assume they will maintain the same amount of consumer demand and liquidity...
The unbold - You can believe that Sony and MS can competently handle the console market without the 2nd hand industry all you want, we will see who is right if the industry goes through with removing the 2nd hand market.
Open Source
Banned
-why are we operating on that assumption? They aren't.
-wrong, there are significant technical barriers related to the hardware and the OS that cannot be worked around, and revamping all the backend stuff would be nightmarishly difficult, expensive, and time-consuming. Not to mention the overhaul that would have to be done to the SDK, the certification process and requirements, etc. it could not be done or justified except with a new console.
- explain to me how any of this relates to using gamestop's used game revenues as an indicator of the growth of used game sales this gen compared to last. If anything, their market share has shrunk as other players have joined in, so those growing revenues are an even stronger indication that used games are more prevalent this gen. Which was the whole fucking point in the first place. Nothing to do with future anything, so wtf are you talking about?
- what's "sales brunt"? Sorry to say but you are just showing ignorance here. It's well known that THQ turned to aaa as a last ditch effort to turn around their company. They used to be all about mid-budget licensed crap. Just fucking google it instead of making up shit.
- no, your last sentence in the previous post was based on that assumption. And aggregate behavior is what I am talking about, because that is the only kind that has relevance. If some individuals buy nothing instead of used, so what? That percentage is far less than 100. Hardly "profit you never had" being siphoned off. Used games are a large transfer of money from game creators to parasitic middlemen, with only a very marginal direct benefit to the consumer, and very large but indirect negative consequences to the consumer. But as our current state of government shows, people derp out on indirect consequences because they don't have the wits or the desire to comprehend them and instead freak out about tiny but direct ones.
Only if you cut out people who don't buy used games and don't trade games in either too. And looking at the backlash, it might turn out to be a very bad decision for pretty much everyone even in the short term.
And you're not taking the consumers that decide to skip out on the new generation because of this into consideration.
If the second hand market disappears, it's relatively safe to assume that people who have bought used games previously will just spend less money on console games - after all, there are other forms of entertainment and the disappearance of the used games market has instantly made them cheaper in relation to console games. For your argument to actually work, you have to assume the amount of money spent on new games that would have been spent on used games will be higher than the amount of money earned through selling used games that went back to the publishers due to being spent on new games. And it's a pretty bold assumption.
It's entirely possible (and in my opinion, actually the most likely outcome) that the only groups benefiting from the death of second hand games market would be the publishers who release overhyped flops - those games that tend to be traded in like crazy once people who've bought them realize it's actually a shitty game. People who are not convinced the game is shit and still want to try it out would actually have to buy a new game - and give the hack publisher more money. And I don't think giving more money to publishers of shitty games would benefit anyone.
And yeah, I'm assuming that publishers wouldn't adjust their prices. I actually love Steam but I don't think anyone can match Valve's balls when it comes to sales.
rohlfinator
Member
I don't think that's really true... digital surpassed retail in unit sales in 2010, and afaik Steam was already doing substantial sales at that time. And that was unit sales, box copies were still more than half the market in total revenue.
In 2012, physical copies were still 40% of the PC market's revenue. And that number probably skews much higher for AAA games. And Steam (and Amazon/Gamersgate/GMG) had long been doing deep sales by this point.
Digital sales on PC have almost nothing to do with not having to capitulate to retail, and much more to do with Steam finding a successful business model and other digital distributors following suit.
So you think everyone should just go out and buy in to this on the off chance that maybe MS & friends will lower the price of software?
Goodness gracious.
RedNumberFive
Banned
That's actually pretty generous.
Unknown Soldier
Member
Anybody remember when Penny Arcade was about funny comic strips about gaming?
What the fuck happened, Gabe and Tycho?
What the fuck happened, Gabe and Tycho?
They became what they previously hated. Its really quite incredible the transformation.
If Sony &/or Microsoft gets rid of the ability to sell, trade, or buy used games, then what would be the point of buying either of their consoles when PC, more or less, is exactly the same thing (in which you can buy most stuff digitally)? And does everything better than consoles? We might as well build ourselves good gaming PC's for that.
That's one of the reasons why console gaming is very popular, because of used games.
Open Source
Banned
A used game can be traded in infinite times. There are no Xbox 360 / PS3 games that you cannot buy used. The supply is, for all practical purposes, infinite.
Open Source
Banned
You know that the prices on Steam are set by publishers - in many cases the same publishers who are publishing on consoles - right? It's not Valve making those price cuts - it's the publishers who you're assuming would not cut prices who are cutting prices. They cut prices because it brings in more money. In an ecosystem where 33% of game purchases are used games, the speed and depth of those price cuts aren't effective because game resellers can simply drop their prices further to compensate, especially with their huge margins on game trade-ins. When that changes, it is reasonable to expect that their behavior on XB1 will match their behavior on Steam.
That doesn't practically mean there are infinite copies are out there on the market though. If there were, then you could go into any used game store and buy any game that's been released on either console.
Where were you taught this? Serious question: what school or college or even book did you learn from, that has you believe that the 2nd hand market is "practically" infinite in its supply?
Open Source
Banned
Of course not. You can't even get new copies of every game at every store. But if you want a cheaper used game, you can get it. eBay, Amazon, gametz, craigslist, GameStop, bestbuy.com, whatever. There's no shortage of any game except perhaps a couple obscure Japanese ones.
Open Source
Banned
Why do you continue to ask dumb questions without getting anywhere close to anything resembling a point?
When it comes to used games, if you want one rather than a new game, they are available 100% of the time. There are enough new game purchases and trade-ins that there is never a shortage of used games priced at a discount relative to new games.
What do you think this means?
You think this means that the supply of used goods being abundantly available means that the 2nd hand market is infinite? That is your conclusion from readily available used games?
rohlfinator
Member
It's like how nobody buys new cars because there are infinite used cars, and all the car manufacturers went out of business.
Open Source
Banned
Sure, if cars were digital goods that never degraded under normal circumstances.
Try again.
(and "nobody" is a straw man)
Open Source
Banned
The supply of used games at a $5+ discount from new is greater than demand, has always been greater than demand, and will always be greater than demand. How's that?
Even digital goods can reach the value of 0, even without degradation. Used goods are not automatically considered value. Beyond that, the game industry doesn't regularly keep old games in circulation, and even then the 2nd hand market has been shown to increase demand in industry as long as the new good is still in circulation. Hell, you could probably Google 2nd hand market paper/study and you would be able to see this.
Unless you can show me the data point that shows increase in disposable income for industry income due to the loss of the 2nd hand market, you are just talking hot air. Hell we have examples of what happens when you simply restrict the second hand market, with clothing and auto tariffs. Demand goes down when pressure is applied to second hand markets and it leads to contraction in that industries economy. I mean, I see why you think what you think, but I'm not seeing why you think your points are valid or could even be considered a difference of opinion.
You have evidence for this? You realize this isn't just something you can say? Without showing that the $5 discount on a game new vs used is actually higher(The sales of the used game at a $5 dollar discount vs new at full price) then a new game, you are just saying words. Even if you could find 1 single example of this, you would then have to show that the full value from the people who purchased the game used would translate at a full price purchase, and even then you would have to show why that case isn't the exception to the rule.
You are really arguing at a disadvantage, because there are no numbers showing the 2nd hand market taking away demand from new games(specially as a whole). If there was proof positive of such an event, these numbers would be available to the public.
rohlfinator
Member
Sorry, the idea that people buy games and instantly sell them such that they're "infinitely" in circulation is just ludicrous.
And I take it you've never seen a scratched disc?
Open Source
Banned
- So I have to show that each used sale takes away 1 new sale, or I have to admit that each used sale takes away 0 new sales? What, did we suddenly move to the binary system and get rid of fractions?
- And there are no numbers showing that it doesn't. There is no proof that the availability of used games boosts total demand for games such that publishers get as much or more revenue from new games as they would without the existence of used games. Thus, the sane hypothesis would be to go with the obvious - that consumers substituting used game purchases for new ones, while middlemen leech dollars out of the system, does in fact reduce total purchases of new games.
Open Source
Banned
"Instantly" More straw man.
"Scratched disc" Normal circumstances.
And how is it ludicrous, when used game proponents actually use that as part of their argument on why used games are good because you can trade them in to buy new? What do you think happens when a game is traded in? It gets sold to someone else. Who then has a chance to trade it in. Which is fairly likely given that this person acquired it at a used game shop in the first place.
And the evidence is unassailable. Every new game has a cheaper used version widely available. Case closed.
Italicized - In order for your belief to be considered reality you would have to show evidence to the assertion that the game industry is a unique snowflake.
Bold - We have evidence in most all other markets where the 2nd hand sales does in fact increase demand of new product(which I explained on page 24?) and if you ar willing you can fact check everything I said(just google second hand sales studies, I'm sure there are papers available, at least there was when I was in school). Beyond that, there is also evidence that the 2nd hand market DOES increase demand of new games, as shown by shadowebb on page 24, and that was specifically with the middle man in the equation.
If Microsoft is stupid enough to go through with this, we'll have a real nice look at the effect of the used games market on new game sales.
Just wait to see X1's software sales vs Xbox 360's. One side will be right, and one will be wrong.
I'd be willing to bet my account that X1 will sell less software in its first year than 360, although really the second and third years will be more telling, since people can buy X1 games year one by selling their current gen used games.
Just wait to see X1's software sales vs Xbox 360's. One side will be right, and one will be wrong.
I'd be willing to bet my account that X1 will sell less software in its first year than 360, although really the second and third years will be more telling, since people can buy X1 games year one by selling their current gen used games.
Open Source
Banned
Because new book stores, new CD shops, etc. are doing so well? And Steam and CD keys took a healthy PC market and reduced demand for new products by killing off used PC games? And guess what's made books a viable business again for a lot of publishers? Ebooks! No used reselling there. Those studies are irrelevant if they are not looking at products where a used good and a new good are essentially identical.
There is no doubt that it increases demand and consumption generally, just as piracy does, but not for purchases of new products specifically, as there is absolutely zero data to show that the revenue lost to the substitution of used for new is even equaled, much less outweighed, by the revenue gained by increased demand.
I already pointed out the critical flaws in shadowebb's post.
Riddle me this:
Why do sequels to good games almost always sell more than the originals? If they were simply selling to the same people, logic states that they'd sell less since there are invariably people who are disappointed with even the best games.
Open Source
Banned
How do you control for factors such as:
- availability and selection of software
- console pricing and availability
- differences in competitive landscape (including MS' own consoles - they killed Xbox before 360, not doing the same this time)
- macroeconomic situation
rohlfinator
Member
None of this supports your premise of "infinite supply". That's just an explanation of how the used games market works, so... ok?
Depending on your definition of "widely", I suppose. I recently bought a used copy of Etrian Odyssey 4, there were maybe 1-2 copies floating through eBay per day, and most were selling for barely below new price (unless they were missing box/instructions).
Open Source
Banned
Again, there is no evidence to suggest that:
1) used games grow the market enough to compensate for the new sales they take away
2) publishers won't use their own discounts to grow the market in the same fashion once those discounts will be efficacious (since used games can't simply just continue to undercut the discounted prices)
Bold - Book stores, CD shops and ect are not doing well because of the natural change of the market, not because of second hand sales.
Underlined - Steam came in when the PC market was already in a glut. Also the PC Game market never had a strong 2nd hand market; beyond that the 2nd hand market didn't go away it just got ignored. PC's didn't remove the ability to sell your used games with the CD keys. The PC market never had to worry about getting rid of a billion+ dollar market.
As for used books... did you miss the hysteria when Amazon started selling used books? They never blocked the sales of used books(and still happens all the time still), they created better/more value offers to consumers, instead of trying to artificially force consumers to do what they(publishers) wanted them to do.
2nd Bold - You pointed out why the information wasn't complete or 100% representation of what happens, but that is why I called it evidence. We have nothing that proves the contrary and you didnt point out "critical flaws", that would mean the data he had was wrong. The industry just refuse to show us all the numbers to prove the assertion(which in itself should be quite telling).
So basically, when this thing comes out and the software sales are shit, you'll claim it wasn't a controlled experiment because the results don't match your presumptions.
Got it.
Open Source
Banned
Of course it's not infinite in technical terms. If it were infinite, then there would be no scarcity and prices would collapse completely (actually, some games are at that point...heh). But in practice, with a handful of exceptions, it's unlimited, meaning that someone who wants a discount and is willing to buy used will always have that option.
3DS is a bit of an exception to the rule because it uses an expensive storage system that makes it extremely risky to create too many copies, thus depressing supply. But you'll still see that $5 discount for those games as well.