Used games only account for $1.59 billion in revenue, which means that a year's-worth of the used game market barely makes up for a fraction of what Activision or Electronic Arts make in a single quarter.
So there you have it - last year the entire used games market wouldn't have made a dent in the profits of a single publisher over a single quarter.
This stands to reason through simple common sense. The majority of a title's profit has always traditionally been within the first few weeks (often the first two alone). This is when the product is shipped to the retailer and it's rare any more product is shipped after the initial sales volume. After this time, it is reduced in price to clear it from shelves to make space for the next set of titles. This is the same of DVDs, comic books and to a lesser extent books and music (which depreciate in value less quickly).
In order for a used game to be sold, it first has to have been purchased in the first place. If one in three games are traded back in after being sold and sold again, then it follows that three quarters of all copies of the game that were purchased have still been bought new. This relationship is immutable. Furthermore, a used game resold is a game that has been traded in, and the majority are traded in for store credit which supplements continued sales of new games. Further to that used games sold don't generate profit entirely for the retailer - part of that sale goes into the purchase of new stock from the publisher.
Used game sales aren't killing the games industry, they have always been there, and they're actually in decline:
The used game market has also dropped by 17.1% in 2012 compared to what it was in 2011.
So where is all the money going, and what is killing the games industry? Why are developers closing left right and center through lack of funds? Well, the obvious thing to do is follow the money. I'm going to drop some sample numbers that don't get out into the open often enough:
On a £60 videogame in the UK (Call of Duty MW3 on the Ps3 as a prime example), the first 20% / £12 is lost to sales tax aka VAT. The retailer will take 17.5% / £10.50 and the rest - 62.5% / £37.5 a total of goes to the publisher.
The publisher will cover it's cost at around 1.2% / £0.65 for the cost of distribution, 2.9% / £1.75 will go into marketing, 13.3% / £8 goes into platform licensing, and 5% / £3 goes to the developer. This leaves the publisher (after costs) with 40.1% / £24.10 - a return of almost half.
So, in order, the biggest killers are these, whilst the rest recieve a pittance:
40.1% - The publisher.
20% - The government.
17.5% - The retailer.
13.3% - The platform holder.
Now, this doesn't paint the whole picture, because there are costs that are not really included in this breakdown: the retailer has to run a store and a buy new stock with that overhead, but you'll find most RRP £60 games retail for less than the asking price for the sake of competition - I believe the lowest price for MW3 in the UK was around £45 and deliberately being sold at a loss. Generally speaking the retailer will take a smaller cut in profits for the sake of generating competition. Not that this matters, because 45% of all the UK's videogames retail stores closed in the last 12 months. This means they are generally not profitable at all, even with used game sales. Publisher investment in research and development is also not factored in; a part of that 40% will be reinvested in developers towards new products - but it's difficult to determine how much without knowing individual game budgets (and that's a money trail you can't follow).
Either way, at the end of the day, corporate greed and red tape is what is killing the games industry - if anything is.
I don't see how getting rid of physical media would hurt or kill consoles. Personally, if the next console cycle is all digital download, I would be likely to purchase even more games, like I do on steam, because I do not have to drive to the store to get them. You can't resell steam games either, but steam is a hugely successful platform.
I think most consumers understand the difference between an Ipad that can run angry birds, and a PS4/Xbox whatever that is running high end, next gen games.
Even so, most downloadable downloaded games on consoles are lite titles, I don't think many people are willing to download Rage on a console which weighs in over 40GB, that + updates + constant data check stream = well over 60GB+, which is in most house holds the cost of a full month data cap going for 50$+
If you're going to do that, then you already are going to game on PC, or are at a point that you don't need the game new, and have waited a while for it and have some small spare cash to change for it.
And before you say, yes, this is part of the problem, this has been the problem which has been raging on the internet for the past couple of months with Google Fiber and Warner, another company putting a new line to pass isn't helping.
Then there is the issue of why bother? If a game is going to stop working when it's released due to servers being flooded, and it stops me playing it for a full month straight, why exactly should I even buy it a full retail price? I'm pretty sure in a few days, places like Walmart will half price it.
Latest Sim games has been out for a full month and they still haven't fixed some of the issues, people even as late as last week reported not being to access entire regions.
Alot of you guys talk about "OH noes, next gen is going to be more expensive", and you know what? Yes, and with extra barriers like this to playing A GAME, how exactly do you expect to 'Cream-Sell' a game at it's initial price point when I will get a much better service later? Why bother supporting the dev? I'm not going to care about you as a customer, just like a dev doesn't know my name or care about me.
Games are games, they are not Tesla Electric Cars where such things can be forgiven in everyday physical importance.
The entire point of early adopters in the Tech. world is so that the same item becomes cheaper later on, and more accessible to your everyday layman, just like how 5MB HDD were being sold for thousands of dollars, same for games, you sell them at a high price point and dwindle the costs from there, basic market 101 principles.
With stuff like this, the number of early adopters will drastically fall down, at which point, you need to keep your budget in check even more.
Maybe I'm over-thinking it, but if people honestly think for an instant that entire 'system' will only affect a select few consumers at the end of the day, they're sorely mistaken, everything affects anything at anytime, especially for tech. that is so heavily networked.
The more appropriate question I have is why doesn't MS test this system on a more simple system in place? Something that doesn't involve entertainment software?
I don't see how getting rid of physical media would hurt or kill consoles. Personally, if the next console cycle is all digital download, I would be likely to purchase even more games, like I do on steam, because I do not have to drive to the store to get them. You can't resell steam games either, but steam is a hugely successful platform.
I think most consumers understand the difference between an Ipad that can run angry birds, and a PS4/Xbox whatever that is running high end, next gen games.
it will not kill the AAA game market it will kill the monopoly that microsoft and sony have over the distribution network. thats what the console really is. both the consumers and the producers are locked into the physical platform. with digital downloads there is no difference between the distribution network of an xbox and a steambox. or any other box that people come up with. it is very easy for manufacturers to offer devices that match the performance of what sony or microsoft offer. in most cases it will probably be cheaper with better performance. if they offer those devices with some other services and a reasonable catalogue of games they could easily sell the same volume or better then microsoft does with its games systems. publishers will have a much bigger market on more devices to sell there games. the idea of "exclusive release" is an idea that is tied to the game console distribution network it makes no economic sense if there is a proliferation of platforms which essentially have the same distribute network and a large potential customer base.
gray; the assumption that the platform is independent of the distribution network is false. Software will only run on the platform it is intended to run on because there's layers of abstraction between the hardware and the game. There's a reason why iPad competitors have no access to the App Store, or the same content. Console hardware would be no different and would be similarly locked in.
@Bibendum
as noted used book vs new book markets have some overlap but there are significant differences in the two markets that make them distinct. you can not show any direct correlation between them in there entirety so you end up making the same point that is made about piracy and that argument has no standing.
@Dataday
your number are off. from what i have seen gamestop did about 2 billion. the core game market was over 80 billion dollars and the long term trend is growth.
that make the total size of the used game market in dollar terms around 2% of the size of the total core game market. the normal fluctuation in ANY market is over 5% form year to year. fluctuation of OVER 10% is normal in most industries. the idea that the game industry suffers losses due to the existence of the used game market is an utter joke. no industry or market has that level immunity from volatility. most industries have much higher volatility and much more indirect competition then the game industry does. that is the norm.
the game industry is not special. it is no different then the film industry the music industry, fashion, cars etc. all of these industries have second hand markets and they have no control over when and where you can use there products. it has been proven time and time again that these things have no impact on the the primary markets above what they suffer from normal market fluctuation due to other market forces.
i don't care what certain studio heads say about used games. they are the most biased opinions you can find. same with movie studio and music heads. I don't listen to the RIAA, MPAA and accept there nonsense about piracy etc. because its mostly a huge pack of lies. they want to use the law as a weapon and as a tool to extract unearned profits at the public's expense. if the used game market dissipated it would not make one bit of difference to the current situation that game studios are in. same for film studios. the real problems are internal problems and macro economic problems that effect almost the whole economy.
Please explain to me some of these distinct and significant differences in reasons why someone would purchase a used game aside from the price?
Used games are not vintage clothing or even a used book, people don't buy them for the unique scratch patterns on the disk that give them a worn look clearly indicating they've been played and loved by many owners. They buy them because they contain the exact same content as a newly purchased game at a lower price.
Edit: I guess enthusiasts who buy decade old out of print games off ebay for their collections would be part of the used game market with distinct differences. Calling them a minority would be an understatement though.
gray; the assumption that the platform is independent of the distribution network is false. Software will only run on the platform it is intended to run on because there's layers of abstraction between the hardware and the game. There's a reason why iPad competitors have no access to the App Store, or the same content. Console hardware would be no different and would be similarly locked in.
the distribution network is the tcp/ip and related protocols that run over the internet. which is universally usable on all devices. it is not under the control of Microsoft apple or any other single party. this is a vast difference from a dvd that run on a single dedicated console device.
the platforms do have different interfaces and licensing but this has nothing to do with the distribution network. access to the platform interface to run software is complicated because they all have a different model at this point. with the exception of apple these systems are produced my multiple hardware manufacturers and sold by multiple vendors and they compete in the market for customers. that is totally different then a hardware system designed and sold by one corporation with total monopoly control.
for software developers/game studios it makes little difference you can port and sell your software on any of these platforms. if you want to do something like steam it can be a bit more tricky but i think there plan is to partner directly with hardware system manufacturers as a drop in games solution and run on open platforms which have no restrictions like ios or windows does. in face that is what most hardware device makers are doing because they don't need or want microsoft dictating terms and cutting into profits.
Please explain to me some of these distinct and significant differences in reasons why someone would purchase a used game aside from the price?
Used games are not vintage clothing or even a used book, people don't buy them for the unique scratch patterns on the disk that give them a worn look clearly indicating they've been played and loved by many owners. They buy them because they contain the exact same content as a newly purchased game at a lower price.
Edit: I guess enthusiasts who buy decade old out of print games off ebay for their collections would be part of the used game market with distinct differences. Calling them a minority would be an understatement though.
yes and every other old piece of hardware and software has a group of people who want to buy and use that equipment because "its fun". that "is" the used games market as far as the law is concerned so explain why people who buy and play snes or atari or other old console games should be thrown in jail for 10 years for "piracy" and "braking the law" because they want to play a game of fucking tank! its tank! LET THEM PLAY TANK!!! :thumbup:
its all or nothing. its illegal or not. much more complicated then just gamestop.
If the greatest amount of profit for console games are in the first two weeks. The only way a major impact would happen to publishers is if the turnover happened in those two weeks. Which to me, would signify a flawed game. Either it was too short, and/or had little replay value.
If the greatest amount of profit for console games are in the first two weeks. The only way a major impact would happen to publishers is if the turnover happened in those two weeks. Which to me, would signify a flawed game. Either it was too short, and/or had little replay value.
While I agree with your sentiment, theres one problem. Its sending the message that game experiences have to be long (which few actually are given how fast gamers go through games) and its saying they need to be multiplayer to some extent (replay value). It limits what kind of game can be present.
You can beat bioshock in one sitting (between 8-11 hours), it neither has any real replay mechanics nor can it be considered long... so is it then flawed?
I think most would say "hell no". So you have this great gameplay experience spanning 8-11 hours, it then gets sold back to a retailer after 1-2 days and someone else picks it up for $5 less used. They go through the same process.
IN this case, again I think we can agree the game isnt flawed. SO should it lose revenue because it doesnt have a tacky multiplayer addon or mechanics that keep the player playing the same thing over and over again?
That is just one example of many games that do not necessarily have "replay" value but are not flawed and not particularly long. Do they need to be? I would hate to send the message to developers that only games that are long and multiplayer or rpg based should be developed.
Its like telling developers who make games like Heavy Rain and Alan Wake that its not worth it to make those kinds of titles.
Thus I do not think its accurate to say the game either is flawed, too short or lacks replay value.
IN this case, again I think we can agree the game isnt flawed. SO should it lose revenue because it doesnt have a tacky multiplayer addon or mechanics that keep the player playing the same thing over and over again?
your fundamentally missing the point that resale can NOT be considered a loss of profit for the original producer. this it a priciple that is upheld and protected in both copyright law and general contract law. and it includes licenced goods.
do you hear the RIAA crying about the millions of used cd stores everywhere? no because its totally marginal has no effect on them.
even if it did have some effect on there sales they still do not have the right to restrict the resale. which is another issue that i am not going to get into because you don't even need to go there. there is enough evidence to show that it has no effect and they have no valid complaint to make about the secondary markets.
I think most would say "hell no". So you have this great gameplay experience spanning 8-11 hours, it then gets sold back to a retailer after 1-2 days and someone else picks it up for $5 less used. They go through the same process.
It would be interesting to see actual numbers about that. Somehow I doubt that anyone willing to play a brand new game for 8 hours in one sitting is really going to go back to Gamestop the next day and get a mere 20 bucks out of the original 60...
I mean, do people really do that ? Sometimes I wonder where the used Gamestop games come from when they are available right after release. Are people that desperate to get a few bucks back (and being left with no game), as opposed to waiting for a price drop to 39$-new ?
I've been puzzled by that for a while so I'd be seriously curious to hear what's going on.
Being Steam on the discussion, have you ever wondered why steam prices are higher than retail?. Being digital, they should be cheaper, but that's not the case. For that reason, i don't see with good eyes a platform with "only digital download games". What the heck, i also want a drive to play blu-ray videos!
The majority of new games -90%- i buy for pc are in DVD format (and they cost me less than 25), and you see them on steam priced at 49,99. Btw, we can buy cheaper games with steam drm in other stores such as greenmangaming, amazon, etc.
And about pricedrops, in 2-3 months, you can buy any game with a 50%-75% discount. The past week i bought tomb raider, 20,99 at amazon.es. I had my copy 1 day after i ordered it, and i didn't need to have the pc turned on for the download (my internet connection is not good).
Too many years ago, i used to rent pc games for a week (2), and as far as i know, there are plenty of shops renting games. Games are the moment, you play them, you forget them. And more the single players with less than 7 hours of gameplay. I really would like to rent them instead of buying them, like googleplay films, or rented films in general. For me it's an abuse, but you know, i always end buying the games in a good sale.
Another thing that should be changed is that if i buy a game on a platform, i should have the right to play the game on all the different platforms. For example, too many EA games on steam can be registered on origin with your key. And when i buy a blu-ray film, i also have a DVD version!
your fundamentally missing the point that resale can NOT be considered a loss of profit for the original producer. this it a priciple that is upheld and protected in both copyright law and general contract law. and it includes licenced goods.
do you hear the RIAA crying about the millions of used cd stores everywhere? no because its totally marginal has no effect on them.
even if it did have some effect on there sales they still do not have the right to restrict the resale. which is another issue that i am not going to get into because you don't even need to go there. there is enough evidence to show that it has no effect and they have no valid complaint to make about the secondary markets.
You keep harping on the same thing, when it is just one part of the over all argument.
Fundamentally missing the point? What exactly is "fundamental" about it? It is an objective fact that losses are incurred from used game sales. Used game buyers are consumers willing to spend money for product X. It is a fact that DLC is a mechanism created to offset the losses faced by the used game industry. Estimates have up to 75% of the losses a publisher will face coming from used game sales.
This is by no means defending publishers, in fact I dislike them very much...but I wont let bias get in the way of objective and rational thought. Whether you like it or not, the used game industry has done far more damage than piracy and its not just my opinion...its a verifiable fact touted by many developers across the industry.
Its less about protecting the profit margins of the big publishers and more about protecting the developer and the consumer. Consumers dont benefit when DLC is used to unlock existing content on a game disk, or when multiplayer features are disabled unless the game is bought new.
The losses are real and it has effected everything the types of games being made, developers and their jobs, and the actions taken to prevent an abusive second hand industry.
Gamestop likes to tout how its done so much for the industry, but all it has done is cannibalize it.
The video game industry brings in more annual revenue (including retailers) than the movie, tv and music industries combined... but how much of that goes back into the development process? Not as much as it should. Some consumers think the attack on the used game market is an attack on them, but it couldnt be any further from the truth.
I rarely see anyone even asking for a middle ground... such as a 6 month waiting period before used games can be sold or a % of all used game profit being given to the developer/publisher.
They are either being in denial about the problem (your post) or dont care at all.
And yes I think the owner of the said software has a right to put license restrictions on their software. Games are software and you are have to adjust or mindset to accept that. Be careful where you draw the line when it comes to "rights" as they are often just the feeling of entitlements to someone elses work.
I mean, do people really do that ? Sometimes I wonder where the used Gamestop games come from when they are available right after release. Are people that desperate to get a few bucks back (and being left with no game), as opposed to waiting for a price drop to 39$-new ?
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Sadly its not all that uncommon. Developers are often surprised how fast gamers can consume content. I have personally met people who buy, play all day (maybe all night) and return the next day for trade in credit (when its high for new games especially) and get the next used game, and then repeat the same process.
You can have 1 new game purchased and then recycled multiple times within a few months. Developer/publisher sees profit for 1 game, retailer promoting used games over new sees profit for 10 sales of that very same game. Its just bad.
It is a fact that DLC is a mechanism created to offset the losses faced by the used game industry.
Is it? Or is it a mechanism to turn an increased profit from a game sale? DLC is cheaper to generate than a fully fledged product. Take a look at Call of Duty - a £60 game that comes wrapped up with four £15 DLC sets every year. Double the potential income with a tiny additional R&D cost.
DLC and microtransactions aren't an anti-piracy mechanism (although DLC may encourage purchasers to hang on to their titles), they're a more constant revenue stream.
Estimates have up to 75% of the losses a publisher will face coming from used game sales.
Firstly, this is bullshit and I already provided the statistics (with references) further up in the discussion. Secondly it isn't reasonable, as that would imply that in excess of 3/4s of all game sales are used game sales and it would also imply that used sales are a loss because one used game sale is equal to one new game sale. This is also a lie.
Long story short, stop telling people what 'the facts' are, without a single quoted source. A lot of what you've been posting is nonsense.
Heck, 10 years ago I remember that my local game store (which did not sell used games) would accept a game as a return if you finished it in 24 hours. That retailer is actually still in business, although I suspect their policies have since changed.
You can have 1 new game purchased and then recycled multiple times within a few months. Developer/publisher sees profit for 1 game, retailer promoting used games over new sees profit for 10 sales of that very same game. Its just bad.
Yeah, but is it really that simple a calculation tho ?
Lets say a game is highly successful, to a point where someone would indeed do the whole "buy for 60$ new on release, trade in the next day for 30$ store credit". Besides the fact that the cycle cannot go on forever (since there is not a brand new big release everyday, meaning that the trade-in value of the returned game is quickly diminishing over time), isn't that simply a sign that the product is performing well as a whole ? Meaning that overall there's gotta be an overwhelming amount of people buying it new anyways ...
It certainly is true that Gamestop found a profitable niche and is basically printing money in the process but I wouldn't go as far as saying that all that revenue is being taken away from the original publisher ...
Is it? Or is it a mechanism to turn an increased profit from a game sale? DLC is cheaper to generate than a fully fledged product. Take a look at Call of Duty - a £60 game that comes wrapped up with four £15 DLC sets every year. Double the potential income with a tiny additional R&D cost.
DLC and microtransactions aren't an anti-piracy mechanism (although DLC may encourage purchasers to hang on to their titles), they're a more constant revenue stream.
No the original intent of modern DLC was to offset the losses faced by the used game market. The point being even if you bought a game used, if you wanted the extra content (or in many cases missing content) you had to pay a premium price for it.
For example, buy mass effect 2 used but if you want the locked content on the disk you had to pay around $15 if Im not mistaken. If you bought the game new, the content was given freely via one time use code.
Epic's Rod Fergusson: "It's less about shipping what's left over. It's not about, 'Oh, we had this map left over'... it's keeping the disc in the tray. In a used game culture that you have to actively fight against, I think DLC is one of the ways that you do that." "DLC is a tool used to fight used game sales"
TakeTwo's CEO explains that Red Dead Redepmtions DLC was used to combat the used game problem. Link
There is a handful more of that scattered all over the internet. Far more than is necessarily to solidly argue the intent of DLC as it pertains to used game sales.
Now you cant say I offer no sources. I hope this can help diminish any confirmation bias present.
Firstly, this is bullshit and I already provided the statistics (with references) further up in the discussion. Secondly it isn't reasonable, as that would imply that in excess of 3/4s of all game sales are used game sales and it would also imply that used sales are a loss because one used game sale is equal to one new game sale. This is also a lie.
Long story short, stop telling people what 'the facts' are, without a single quoted source. A lot of what you've been posting is nonsense.
Heck, 10 years ago I remember that my local game store (which did not sell used games) would accept a game as a return if you finished it in 24 hours. That retailer is actually still in business, although I suspect their policies have since changed.
Its not BS and no you didnt. What you provided was a link to a blog like website which twisted around some data posted in an article posted on Gameindustry.biz. The purpose of the article was to point out that over all retail sales have gone down by 22%, which you left out, along side the 17% drop in used game sales. Over all sales have gone down across the board. I think its intellectually dishonest if you only show the used game sales number while ignoring the entire new retail sales drop, which is highly relevant. IN addition to that, the purpose of the article was to point out the growth of digital sales for mobile games which has been on the rise.
Thanks for the links ! And indeed the locked-in DLC approach is ... smart . It could also be seen as a ripoff but yeah at the very least there should be a mention of it on the used box.
Regarding the case of Heavy Rain, I guess it's all about perspective. The studio is saying that they "lost 10 millions", but I think that's not a solid argument. I know that I personally would consider buying Heavy Rain today, used (or, new with a huge bargain years after the original release) simply because I don't think that the game was worth buying for 60$ new in the first place - I just don't think it was good enough for the price asked.
Maybe it should have been released as a 15$ PSN game ? I know for sure that I would have bought it instantly that way. 60$ was just too much!
Maybe the root of the problem is that big console releases are not the only source of great entertainment anymore and publishers and studios need to acknowledge that in order to remain competitive. Hopefully QD and Sony will be able to adjust their strategy for their next big release.
(BTW I am not saying that every game should be downloadable only - I personally dig that fact that in order to play Halo4 I can just pop in the disc and play within minutes - and eventually install the game to the HDD if I want to play it often. That kind of convenience is a huge factor in favor of the console market. In a way I think I would play more PC games than I do if they offered that kind of flexibility.)
i really don't want to argue because we both want to protect the studios and artists. its just that i know for a fact by looking at the numbers that the second hand market is peanuts and has no effect on the health of any of the entertainment industries. anyone who think they lost there job or there studio went under because of gamestop is delusional.
the numbers your throwing out with a % here and % there make no sense. don't throw out numbers and %%% for effect it makes your argument look silly. there are so many logical errors that I'm not even going to touch them.
ironically i buy all my games new on amazon etc for pc, and i buy games on steam both on pc and linux. i do buy lots of used books and used music. the argument your making would effect ALL used media. books, music, movies, games etc. your effectively arguing for a new dark ages where no one could read books unless they had a license. and the terms were completely up to whoever printed the books. same goes for all other media. the internet? that would be shutdown and you might be able to connect to certain places and pay to read major publisher magazines. and maybe pay to log onto internet tv stations by all the major corporations. it would also probably effect most other property also because pretty much every thing we have in the modern world was produced by someone else. we have laws to protect private property and consumer rights for a reason. were not going to roll back the clock to a time when huge corporations could do what every they wanted and exploit anyone the felt like exploiting with no prosecution or punishment.
the always online issue is much more interesting but it seems this thread got steered off into used games only.
No industry is worthy of the kind of special treatment you think the games industry should have. The government and society are not obligated to provide any policy or mechanism to ensure that businesses get the profit they think they deserve, the developers/publishers/etc. have to prove to the market that they are worth the price by providing compelling reasons. You know, marketing? If you can't convince people to buy a new copy over a used one, then you are the problem, not the customers nor GameStop. They have a right to create a secondary market, it's protected in the first sale doctrine and copyright law.
In other words, if you buy a copy, you own that copy (i.e. the disc and the information stored on it) and you have the right to dispossess yourself of that copy by selling it. EULA doesn't supersede that. The copyright owner still holds the right to distribute new copies, but they don't have the right to prohibit people that already bought a copy from selling it.
If you want people to buy new, then give them a reason that makes them want a new copy, not by making the used copy worse. That's like taking a steaming dump on a competitor's product just to make yours look better by comparison. It's low and dishonest. People can see through that and will give you a pass because if you have to make used look bad by comparison, then what value does your game really have?
Your "proof" that used games is a threat to developers seems pretty specious as well.
"Quantic Dream believes that the company lost between 5 and 10 million of royalties due to the second hand sales of influential PlayStation 3 title Heavy Rain."
They believe that they lost between 5 and 10 million euros? They don't know for sure how much they lost, it's what they believe? Your links all lead to articles that make unsubstantiated claims directly from a biased source, the developer. No verifiable data is offered. Nobody can fact check them, so you just take them on their word that it's true, because they say so? That's pretty damning to your argument.
While I agree with your sentiment, theres one problem. Its sending the message that game experiences have to be long (which few actually are given how fast gamers go through games) and its saying they need to be multiplayer to some extent (replay value). It limits what kind of game can be present.
You can beat bioshock in one sitting (between 8-11 hours), it neither has any real replay mechanics nor can it be considered long... so is it then flawed?
I think most would say "hell no". So you have this great gameplay experience spanning 8-11 hours, it then gets sold back to a retailer after 1-2 days and someone else picks it up for $5 less used. They go through the same process.
IN this case, again I think we can agree the game isnt flawed. SO should it lose revenue because it doesnt have a tacky multiplayer addon or mechanics that keep the player playing the same thing over and over again?
Actually, I will have to difer from you and argue the game is flawed then. Bioshock 1 took me days to get through, guess Im just slow. However, Bioshock 2 took like 2 sittings... They both cost the same. For the gameplay time, Bioshock 1 offered more value... even with B2 having multiplayer. B2's MP added nothing to the game, and was just pointing to lack of content in the single player.. Both are though replayable (not to you maybe).
I don't think the answer is adding MP, instead it's just making experiences people want to revisit. I know I'm against the grain on this, but quality to me is a game that can be played again. I think the idea that the game doesn't need more than for a once through that some developers state, is in reality their justification for lazy and linear play design.
I know I'm against the grain on this, but quality to me is a game that can be played again.
I agree with this sentiment. That's not to say there aren't a few exceptions but 90% of the time this is how I feel about a game. I want it on my shelf because I think I'll want to replay it again later.
I also just want to say, I disagree with the idea that if publishers/studios were making more money from used game sales being impossible, that there would somehow be less layoffs. This relies on the mentality that business owners are super nice folk who aren't simply looking for profits. Laying people off at the end of a dev cycle is going to mean more profits whether they're also making more money from sales or not, and it will likely continue to happen until things within the industry change. ...maybe it will cut down on the frequency of it, but I really have my doubts.
They believe that they lost between 5 and 10 million euros? They don't know for sure how much they lost, it's what they believe? Your links all lead to articles that make unsubstantiated claims directly from a biased source, the developer. No verifiable data is offered. Nobody can fact check them, so you just take them on their word that it's true, because they say so? That's pretty damning to your argument.
To his credit this is the only kind of sources Dataday can provide as business is seldom to showing all of their financial figures (in this case we'd need accurate figures from both the publisher and the retailers). He's getting a lot of flak from us so I'm grateful that he's gone and gotten some sources.
To his credit this is the only kind of sources Dataday can provide as business is seldom to showing all of their financial figures (in this case we'd need accurate figures from both the publisher and the retailers). He's getting a lot of flak from us so I'm grateful that he's gone and gotten some sources.
hold on. if dataday gets to quote totally unsubstantiated claims by people who have huge financial investments in the subject there making claims about. and a direct conflict of interest in telling the truth if it weakens the unsubstantiated claims there trying to spin. then i get to use the quran as a factual text. and i also get to quote every book that david icke has ever written about the lizard people as "plausible truth" to substantiate claims that the true reason for the closure of so many studios and the never ending layoffs in the game and film industry is... THE LIZARD PEOPLE...
hold on. if dataday gets to quote totally unsubstantiated claims by people who have huge financial investments in the subject there making claims about. and a direct conflict of interest in telling the truth if it weakens the unsubstantiated claims there trying to spin. then i get to use the quran as a factual text. and i also get to quote every book that david icke has ever written about the lizard people as "plausible truth" to substantiate claims that the true reason for the closure of so many studios and the never ending layoffs in the game and film industry is...
Did I say that? No I didn't. What I said that it was pretty much the case that the sources he provided were the best schlubs like us could get on short notice.
The only people who have the real facts have more than enough reasons to not release them and that's even when it has nothing to do with used games!
If the quoting the Quran or lizard people were the only relatable articles you could source to back up your argument then sure, use them. I would commend you for doing so if you seriously believed it and went to the effort to do so when previously your argument was made of personal opinion and hot air. (not a reference to your argument necessarily, but how and why I commented about Dataday's posts)
Does it make it fact or substantial? Not necessarily.
Does that mean people will change their minds or agree? Not necessarily.
It's a better argument than: "I think so!" - "I don't think so!"
thats not good enough you have to show that in the absence of the secondary market the bulk volume of used sales would equal purchases of new games. that is totally theoretical and open to wild speculation. it is the exact same argument that the MPAA makes regarding piracy even the MPAA does not have the balls to make that claim about used cd's tho. the secondary market does not equal loss of revenue you can essentially put in any number you want as a loss. its totally bogus and has been rejected by courts and has no intellectual merit.
do used book stores damage the new book market? no they are totally separate markets which are driven by different market forces and participants. people buy new books for various reasons. they buy used books for another set of reasons. some of the reasons overlap but most do not. there is no direct correlation between the sale of a book in one market and a loss of sale in the other.
if we used the MPAA's logic you could make the claim that someone who is in the market for buying arari2600 carts at a garage sale is contributing to the loss of revenue of crysis 3. you can also go even further and claim that any market that has a tangential connection to your own burdens you with a loss of sales. movie dvd sales are a loss of game revenue because they are both sources of 'entertainment' and both sold on 'dvd'.
Again, I'm not against the sale of used goods, I'm against the mass-industrialization of it, gamestop has always been about selling the games that are very new but have been traded in.
I'm all for the private persons right to sell their games, but it sickens me when greedy corporations will hijack that and kill of any old-games used market for a new-used-games market completely aimed at profit.
Point made, but you'll be able to resell them soon enough.
When steam products are deemed to be equal to physical goods gamestop will essentially be able to sell steam games at the typical "5 usd under steam store price!" by hoarding from sales and having people trade their steam games in at a tiny trade-in price.
The fact that there is no actual physical product and that supply is unlimited makes that very idea silly, but it has to be reality for the steam resale scenario to work.
Being Steam on the discussion, have you ever wondered why steam prices are higher than retail?. Being digital, they should be cheaper, but that's not the case. For that reason, i don't see with good eyes a platform with "only digital download games". What the heck, i also want a drive to play blu-ray videos!
Publishers and wanting to be buddies with retail, having a lower price on steam compared to retail will make some enemies I'm sure, and steam still does take quite a cut.
Prices are high, I agree, which is why indie-games often land a more reasonable price-point, often with more content to the game as they do not have to follow the price-guides of the publishers.
I would personaly say there's no gain to physical products as they merely act as storage for an otherwise fully digital product, no manuals and a cheap package :P
It would be interesting to see actual numbers about that. Somehow I doubt that anyone willing to play a brand new game for 8 hours in one sitting is really going to go back to Gamestop the next day and get a mere 20 bucks out of the original 60...
I mean, do people really do that ? Sometimes I wonder where the used Gamestop games come from when they are available right after release. Are people that desperate to get a few bucks back (and being left with no game), as opposed to waiting for a price drop to 39$-new ?
I've been puzzled by that for a while so I'd be seriously curious to hear what's going on.
The person returning the game effectively paid $40 for a brand new game on the day of release. Yeah, people are more than willing to do that...
To his credit this is the only kind of sources Dataday can provide as business is seldom to showing all of their financial figures (in this case we'd need accurate figures from both the publisher and the retailers). He's getting a lot of flak from us so I'm grateful that he's gone and gotten some sources.
Dataday didn't meet the burden of proof to substantiate his claim. He provided biased sources that lacked any facts and tried to use it to disprove an argument that did cite factual sources. He doesn't get any credit for that.
"If the connection is interrupted then after a period of time--currently three minutes, if I remember correctly--the game/app is suspended and the network troubleshooter started."
How nice of them that you can at least play for 3 minutes after your connection have died. After that I'll guess you'll just have to wait until the internet come backs, before you can resume your game. But wait, it gets even better.
"He said this a confirmed feature for the platform, claiming the system's notes specifically state that the Xbox 720 "must be Internet-connected to use."
You know what was great? When people could go home and just play a game on their tv without having to worry about any other paid service being involved. Getting real tired of this "games are a service not a product" schtick.
You're going to love the nextbox then. I have a suspicion they'll be towing the 'games as a service line' pretty hard. Sony will likely do the same, but hopefully to a lesser extent.
I also miss the days of being able to buy a game, stick it in a drive and play. That's what made consoles attractive in the first place.
How nice of them that you can at least play for 3 minutes after your connection have died. After that I'll guess you'll just have to wait until the internet come backs, before you can resume your game. But wait, it gets even better.
And of course you have to hope that your game deals with that situation nicely and doesn't just bail out, throwing away your progress.
The thing is, the games industry really is a service industry, just not in the way the hardware vendors and publishers are spinning it. The service lies in the creation of games, that's the real service. It's a lot like contractors building a skyscraper, you pay them for their time, effort, and resources to build it. In game studios, developers are paid for their time, effort, and overhead to make a game. The only difference is who the patron is that pays those bills.
Shit WarrenM, I had not even thought of that. As much as I love Dark Souls for my PS3 it does this if you lose connection and you're playing online. I've had it kick me to the title screen for losing connection as I had a new bonfire in site. I remember raging when it happened in that game, but man if I had to worry about that with EVERY game? Fuck that.
The person returning the game effectively paid $40 for a brand new game on the day of release. Yeah, people are more than willing to do that...
Well, since they returned the game to a used game store (presumably GameStop) You can't really say that they paid $40 for a brand new game that they got to keep. It would be more accurate to say that they paid $40 to rent a brand-new game. There are people who are willing to do that. But I still maintain that those people are not very intelligent.
Paying $40 for limited-time access to a title does not strike me as a decent value. If I'm patient, I can pay $20 for the exact same game six to seven months later, and I don't have to trade it in. If I was using a service like GameFly or RedBox, I could pay considerably less than $40 to rent those games for the same period of time.
GameStop's return-policy churn has, and always will be, a calculated scam meant to prey on those unwilling to search for better alternatives. Used game sales can be great, but not in their current form. They should be used as a means of keeping enthusiasm alive for older systems and titles. Instead they've been transformed into some twisted parasite on the latest systems and titles.
The thing is, the games industry really is a service industry, just not in the way the hardware vendors and publishers are spinning it. The service lies in the creation of games, that's the real service. It's a lot like contractors building a skyscraper, you pay them for their time, effort, and resources to build it. In game studios, developers are paid for their time, effort, and overhead to make a game. The only difference is who the patron is that pays those bills.
By that logic, all industries where someone sells something to a consumer are service industries.
Yeah. It's not up to the owners of the apartments in that skyscraper to pay the contractor for their service to build it; they just pay the real estate agent for the sale.
By that logic, all industries where someone sells something to a consumer are service industries.
Not at all. A service industry doesn't necessarily provide a physical good, but it can. However, a product industry always produces a product. What matters is what is actually being paid for. In games, what is being paid for is the creation of a game. The disc isn't a product, it's packaging for the game, a delivery method. The value is in the developer's ability to create a game. Time and labor is the valuable commodity being traded in a service industry. Developers provide a service to publishers and publishers try to turn that service into a product that they can sell as discreet units of property. But a game isn't a discreet unit of property, it's an expression of an idea(s) and expressions have no discreet unit of existence. The publishers try to get around this fact through constructs like copyright. If you can make access scarce, it creates artificial limits and the illusion of a finite quantity.
Yeah. It's not up to the owners of the apartments in that skyscraper to pay the contractor for their service to build it; they just pay the real estate agent for the sale.
What? That doesn't make any sense. The tenants don't own the building, the landlord does. He pays the contractors for the construction and then rents the units out. In the case of condos, all of the units belong to one owner until they are all sold off to individual residents. Either way, the original owner pays for the construction of the building.
However, this is all pointless nitpicking and immaterial to the argument at large.
Not at all. A service industry doesn't necessarily provide a physical good, but it can. However, a product industry always produces a product. What matters is what is actually being paid for. In games, what is being paid for is the creation of a game. The disc isn't a product, it's packaging for the game, a delivery method. The value is in the developer's ability to create a game. Time and labor is the valuable commodity being traded in a service industry. Developers provide a service to publishers and publishers try to turn that service into a product that they can sell as discreet units of property. But a game isn't a discreet unit of property, it's an expression of an idea(s) and expressions have no discreet unit of existence. The publishers try to get around this fact through constructs like copyright. If you can make access scarce, it creates artificial limits and the illusion of a finite quantity.
I think we're talking at cross-purposes. Yes the service of producing an intellectual property is paid for, as is the service (or trade) of building a product for sale. The publisher of course pays the developer for the service of making a game, as does the manufacturer pay their workers for the service of designing and constructing their products. A product industry may indeed make products but they do so by employing services.
The game/film/music/book industry is the same. You're right to claim that it is service-built but it is the product that is being paid for. The end consumer is buying a discreet unit of property containing the expressions in a solid state - just like a consumer buying a phone is buying both the material and the expression of engineered design.
It just so happens to be that games/film/music/book industry's raw material in a product is the medium on which it is transported.
*edit*
What? That doesn't make any sense. The tenants don't own the building, the landlord does. He pays the contractors for the construction and then rents the units out. In the case of condos, all of the units belong to one owner until they are all sold off to individual residents. Either way, the original owner pays for the construction of the building.
However, this is all pointless nitpicking and immaterial to the argument at large.
Notice that I did say 'owner' and not 'tenant'? I chose that specifically to avoid such confusion. The owner of an apartment may or may not be the entity that contracted its construction.
I don't think this is immaterial to the argument since I'm quite certain the debate about used-games does concern the:
1) Nature of a game purchasing transaction from the perspective of the end user, in a value commodity fashion.
2) The perception of ownership of a game/software as transactions are made between owners.
I think we're talking at cross-purposes. Yes the service of producing an intellectual property is paid for, as is the service (or trade) of building a product for sale. The publisher of course pays the developer for the service of making a game, as does the manufacturer pay their workers for the service of designing and constructing their products. A product industry may indeed make products but they do so by employing services.
The game/film/music/book industry is the same. You're right to claim that it is service-built but it is the product that is being paid for. The end consumer is buying a discreet unit of property containing the expressions in a solid state - just like a consumer buying a phone is buying both the material and the expression of engineered design.
It just so happens to be that games/film/music/book industry's raw material in a product is the medium on which it is transported.
Then how do you explain downloads, where no physical goods exchange hands? Clarification: Where does the concept of a discreet unit of property apply when it's purely a download?
Notice that I did say 'owner' and not 'tenant'? I chose that specifically to avoid such confusion. The owner of an apartment may or may not be the entity that contracted its construction.
But that's still incorrect. They don't pay the realtor, that would imply that the realtor is the owner, not the other people you mentioned. The property owner pays for the construction, whoever that may be.
Then how do you explain downloads, where no physical goods exchange hands?
The end-user is paying for the content of the digital goods: the very arrangements of the 1s and 0s that in turn make the content have value. Once this data is in a format they can digest, they do so.
Yes a service was rendered somewhere out there for the 1s and 0s to be arranged that way, but if I didn't buy this product - who did? Not me, and yet it exists without my payment of serviced rendered. Therefore when I do buy this product I am committing to a transaction money lost - item received; not money lost - service rendered.
Nobody bought a canvas with paint on it, they bought a canvas with paint on it that looks like *that*. Of course they might be the same person that contracted the painter to paint one like *that* but not always.
But that's still incorrect. They don't pay the realtor, that would imply that the realtor is the owner, not the other people you mentioned. The property owner pays for the construction, whoever that may be.
Really? There is more than one way to build and sell houses/apartments and my examples were to easily claim that the person buying one (including owners/realtor) are not always the original clients contracting construction. If I was to follow your logic then I'd have to consider everything I buy to be second-hand (possibly used even) by the original client.
So if I went out to buy Dead Space 3 today I would not be buying it from a shop? I would be somehow going back in time and paying EA and Visceral for the service of making it for me? Hold on. I reckon you might say yes to that.... I'm not allowed any more to buy Dead Space 3 as a game on the shelf in a shop? What if they all got fired before I bought it? What am I paying for then?
This is getting a bit overblown the way you're describing it. The creators of a game are making a product. Their workers are being paid for a service but at the end of the day they are putting out a product that I am paying money for. If you want to split hairs between downloading a game off steam vs going to Target and buying it off the shelf that's your prerogative, but my point is it used to be I could buy a game, slip it into the disc tray, and then just play the damn thing.
If they decide to go with this always on thing (the point of this thread originally) they had better be ready to blow me out of the damn water with awesome features to make it worth it, because if it's just "you need to touch our servers so we can market better ads based off games you play" I'm going to have to skip out on buying this console. That's what it really comes down to. If you're going to make it harder for me to play games I have spent my hard earned money on, you'd better make it worth my while.
Replies
http://www.cinemablend.com/games/Digital-Game-Sales-Hit-10-Billion-2012-Used-Game-Sales-Retail-Down-54210.html
So there you have it - last year the entire used games market wouldn't have made a dent in the profits of a single publisher over a single quarter.
This stands to reason through simple common sense. The majority of a title's profit has always traditionally been within the first few weeks (often the first two alone). This is when the product is shipped to the retailer and it's rare any more product is shipped after the initial sales volume. After this time, it is reduced in price to clear it from shelves to make space for the next set of titles. This is the same of DVDs, comic books and to a lesser extent books and music (which depreciate in value less quickly).
In order for a used game to be sold, it first has to have been purchased in the first place. If one in three games are traded back in after being sold and sold again, then it follows that three quarters of all copies of the game that were purchased have still been bought new. This relationship is immutable. Furthermore, a used game resold is a game that has been traded in, and the majority are traded in for store credit which supplements continued sales of new games. Further to that used games sold don't generate profit entirely for the retailer - part of that sale goes into the purchase of new stock from the publisher.
Used game sales aren't killing the games industry, they have always been there, and they're actually in decline:
So where is all the money going, and what is killing the games industry? Why are developers closing left right and center through lack of funds? Well, the obvious thing to do is follow the money. I'm going to drop some sample numbers that don't get out into the open often enough:
On a £60 videogame in the UK (Call of Duty MW3 on the Ps3 as a prime example), the first 20% / £12 is lost to sales tax aka VAT. The retailer will take 17.5% / £10.50 and the rest - 62.5% / £37.5 a total of goes to the publisher.
The publisher will cover it's cost at around 1.2% / £0.65 for the cost of distribution, 2.9% / £1.75 will go into marketing, 13.3% / £8 goes into platform licensing, and 5% / £3 goes to the developer. This leaves the publisher (after costs) with 40.1% / £24.10 - a return of almost half.
So, in order, the biggest killers are these, whilst the rest recieve a pittance:
40.1% - The publisher.
20% - The government.
17.5% - The retailer.
13.3% - The platform holder.
Now, this doesn't paint the whole picture, because there are costs that are not really included in this breakdown: the retailer has to run a store and a buy new stock with that overhead, but you'll find most RRP £60 games retail for less than the asking price for the sake of competition - I believe the lowest price for MW3 in the UK was around £45 and deliberately being sold at a loss. Generally speaking the retailer will take a smaller cut in profits for the sake of generating competition. Not that this matters, because 45% of all the UK's videogames retail stores closed in the last 12 months. This means they are generally not profitable at all, even with used game sales. Publisher investment in research and development is also not factored in; a part of that 40% will be reinvested in developers towards new products - but it's difficult to determine how much without knowing individual game budgets (and that's a money trail you can't follow).
Either way, at the end of the day, corporate greed and red tape is what is killing the games industry - if anything is.
I think most consumers understand the difference between an Ipad that can run angry birds, and a PS4/Xbox whatever that is running high end, next gen games.
If you're going to do that, then you already are going to game on PC, or are at a point that you don't need the game new, and have waited a while for it and have some small spare cash to change for it.
And before you say, yes, this is part of the problem, this has been the problem which has been raging on the internet for the past couple of months with Google Fiber and Warner, another company putting a new line to pass isn't helping.
Then there is the issue of why bother? If a game is going to stop working when it's released due to servers being flooded, and it stops me playing it for a full month straight, why exactly should I even buy it a full retail price? I'm pretty sure in a few days, places like Walmart will half price it.
Latest Sim games has been out for a full month and they still haven't fixed some of the issues, people even as late as last week reported not being to access entire regions.
Alot of you guys talk about "OH noes, next gen is going to be more expensive", and you know what? Yes, and with extra barriers like this to playing A GAME, how exactly do you expect to 'Cream-Sell' a game at it's initial price point when I will get a much better service later? Why bother supporting the dev? I'm not going to care about you as a customer, just like a dev doesn't know my name or care about me.
Games are games, they are not Tesla Electric Cars where such things can be forgiven in everyday physical importance.
The entire point of early adopters in the Tech. world is so that the same item becomes cheaper later on, and more accessible to your everyday layman, just like how 5MB HDD were being sold for thousands of dollars, same for games, you sell them at a high price point and dwindle the costs from there, basic market 101 principles.
With stuff like this, the number of early adopters will drastically fall down, at which point, you need to keep your budget in check even more.
Maybe I'm over-thinking it, but if people honestly think for an instant that entire 'system' will only affect a select few consumers at the end of the day, they're sorely mistaken, everything affects anything at anytime, especially for tech. that is so heavily networked.
The more appropriate question I have is why doesn't MS test this system on a more simple system in place? Something that doesn't involve entertainment software?
Point made, but you'll be able to resell them soon enough.
it will not kill the AAA game market it will kill the monopoly that microsoft and sony have over the distribution network. thats what the console really is. both the consumers and the producers are locked into the physical platform. with digital downloads there is no difference between the distribution network of an xbox and a steambox. or any other box that people come up with. it is very easy for manufacturers to offer devices that match the performance of what sony or microsoft offer. in most cases it will probably be cheaper with better performance. if they offer those devices with some other services and a reasonable catalogue of games they could easily sell the same volume or better then microsoft does with its games systems. publishers will have a much bigger market on more devices to sell there games. the idea of "exclusive release" is an idea that is tied to the game console distribution network it makes no economic sense if there is a proliferation of platforms which essentially have the same distribute network and a large potential customer base.
as noted used book vs new book markets have some overlap but there are significant differences in the two markets that make them distinct. you can not show any direct correlation between them in there entirety so you end up making the same point that is made about piracy and that argument has no standing.
@Dataday
your number are off. from what i have seen gamestop did about 2 billion. the core game market was over 80 billion dollars and the long term trend is growth.
that make the total size of the used game market in dollar terms around 2% of the size of the total core game market. the normal fluctuation in ANY market is over 5% form year to year. fluctuation of OVER 10% is normal in most industries. the idea that the game industry suffers losses due to the existence of the used game market is an utter joke. no industry or market has that level immunity from volatility. most industries have much higher volatility and much more indirect competition then the game industry does. that is the norm.
the game industry is not special. it is no different then the film industry the music industry, fashion, cars etc. all of these industries have second hand markets and they have no control over when and where you can use there products. it has been proven time and time again that these things have no impact on the the primary markets above what they suffer from normal market fluctuation due to other market forces.
i don't care what certain studio heads say about used games. they are the most biased opinions you can find. same with movie studio and music heads. I don't listen to the RIAA, MPAA and accept there nonsense about piracy etc. because its mostly a huge pack of lies. they want to use the law as a weapon and as a tool to extract unearned profits at the public's expense. if the used game market dissipated it would not make one bit of difference to the current situation that game studios are in. same for film studios. the real problems are internal problems and macro economic problems that effect almost the whole economy.
Used games are not vintage clothing or even a used book, people don't buy them for the unique scratch patterns on the disk that give them a worn look clearly indicating they've been played and loved by many owners. They buy them because they contain the exact same content as a newly purchased game at a lower price.
Edit: I guess enthusiasts who buy decade old out of print games off ebay for their collections would be part of the used game market with distinct differences. Calling them a minority would be an understatement though.
the distribution network is the tcp/ip and related protocols that run over the internet. which is universally usable on all devices. it is not under the control of Microsoft apple or any other single party. this is a vast difference from a dvd that run on a single dedicated console device.
the platforms do have different interfaces and licensing but this has nothing to do with the distribution network. access to the platform interface to run software is complicated because they all have a different model at this point. with the exception of apple these systems are produced my multiple hardware manufacturers and sold by multiple vendors and they compete in the market for customers. that is totally different then a hardware system designed and sold by one corporation with total monopoly control.
for software developers/game studios it makes little difference you can port and sell your software on any of these platforms. if you want to do something like steam it can be a bit more tricky but i think there plan is to partner directly with hardware system manufacturers as a drop in games solution and run on open platforms which have no restrictions like ios or windows does. in face that is what most hardware device makers are doing because they don't need or want microsoft dictating terms and cutting into profits.
yes and every other old piece of hardware and software has a group of people who want to buy and use that equipment because "its fun". that "is" the used games market as far as the law is concerned so explain why people who buy and play snes or atari or other old console games should be thrown in jail for 10 years for "piracy" and "braking the law" because they want to play a game of fucking tank! its tank!
LET THEM PLAY TANK!!! :thumbup:
its all or nothing. its illegal or not. much more complicated then just gamestop.
If the greatest amount of profit for console games are in the first two weeks. The only way a major impact would happen to publishers is if the turnover happened in those two weeks. Which to me, would signify a flawed game. Either it was too short, and/or had little replay value.
While I agree with your sentiment, theres one problem. Its sending the message that game experiences have to be long (which few actually are given how fast gamers go through games) and its saying they need to be multiplayer to some extent (replay value). It limits what kind of game can be present.
You can beat bioshock in one sitting (between 8-11 hours), it neither has any real replay mechanics nor can it be considered long... so is it then flawed?
I think most would say "hell no". So you have this great gameplay experience spanning 8-11 hours, it then gets sold back to a retailer after 1-2 days and someone else picks it up for $5 less used. They go through the same process.
IN this case, again I think we can agree the game isnt flawed. SO should it lose revenue because it doesnt have a tacky multiplayer addon or mechanics that keep the player playing the same thing over and over again?
That is just one example of many games that do not necessarily have "replay" value but are not flawed and not particularly long. Do they need to be? I would hate to send the message to developers that only games that are long and multiplayer or rpg based should be developed.
Its like telling developers who make games like Heavy Rain and Alan Wake that its not worth it to make those kinds of titles.
Thus I do not think its accurate to say the game either is flawed, too short or lacks replay value.
your fundamentally missing the point that resale can NOT be considered a loss of profit for the original producer. this it a priciple that is upheld and protected in both copyright law and general contract law. and it includes licenced goods.
do you hear the RIAA crying about the millions of used cd stores everywhere? no because its totally marginal has no effect on them.
even if it did have some effect on there sales they still do not have the right to restrict the resale. which is another issue that i am not going to get into because you don't even need to go there. there is enough evidence to show that it has no effect and they have no valid complaint to make about the secondary markets.
It would be interesting to see actual numbers about that. Somehow I doubt that anyone willing to play a brand new game for 8 hours in one sitting is really going to go back to Gamestop the next day and get a mere 20 bucks out of the original 60...
I mean, do people really do that ? Sometimes I wonder where the used Gamestop games come from when they are available right after release. Are people that desperate to get a few bucks back (and being left with no game), as opposed to waiting for a price drop to 39$-new ?
I've been puzzled by that for a while so I'd be seriously curious to hear what's going on.
Still kinda feels like a waste of money to me actually! hehe.
The majority of new games -90%- i buy for pc are in DVD format (and they cost me less than 25), and you see them on steam priced at 49,99. Btw, we can buy cheaper games with steam drm in other stores such as greenmangaming, amazon, etc.
And about pricedrops, in 2-3 months, you can buy any game with a 50%-75% discount. The past week i bought tomb raider, 20,99 at amazon.es. I had my copy 1 day after i ordered it, and i didn't need to have the pc turned on for the download (my internet connection is not good).
Too many years ago, i used to rent pc games for a week (2), and as far as i know, there are plenty of shops renting games. Games are the moment, you play them, you forget them. And more the single players with less than 7 hours of gameplay. I really would like to rent them instead of buying them, like googleplay films, or rented films in general. For me it's an abuse, but you know, i always end buying the games in a good sale.
Another thing that should be changed is that if i buy a game on a platform, i should have the right to play the game on all the different platforms. For example, too many EA games on steam can be registered on origin with your key. And when i buy a blu-ray film, i also have a DVD version!
just some thoughts
You keep harping on the same thing, when it is just one part of the over all argument.
Fundamentally missing the point? What exactly is "fundamental" about it? It is an objective fact that losses are incurred from used game sales. Used game buyers are consumers willing to spend money for product X. It is a fact that DLC is a mechanism created to offset the losses faced by the used game industry. Estimates have up to 75% of the losses a publisher will face coming from used game sales.
This is by no means defending publishers, in fact I dislike them very much...but I wont let bias get in the way of objective and rational thought. Whether you like it or not, the used game industry has done far more damage than piracy and its not just my opinion...its a verifiable fact touted by many developers across the industry.
Its less about protecting the profit margins of the big publishers and more about protecting the developer and the consumer. Consumers dont benefit when DLC is used to unlock existing content on a game disk, or when multiplayer features are disabled unless the game is bought new.
The losses are real and it has effected everything the types of games being made, developers and their jobs, and the actions taken to prevent an abusive second hand industry.
Gamestop likes to tout how its done so much for the industry, but all it has done is cannibalize it.
The video game industry brings in more annual revenue (including retailers) than the movie, tv and music industries combined... but how much of that goes back into the development process? Not as much as it should. Some consumers think the attack on the used game market is an attack on them, but it couldnt be any further from the truth.
I rarely see anyone even asking for a middle ground... such as a 6 month waiting period before used games can be sold or a % of all used game profit being given to the developer/publisher.
They are either being in denial about the problem (your post) or dont care at all.
And yes I think the owner of the said software has a right to put license restrictions on their software. Games are software and you are have to adjust or mindset to accept that. Be careful where you draw the line when it comes to "rights" as they are often just the feeling of entitlements to someone elses work.
Sadly its not all that uncommon. Developers are often surprised how fast gamers can consume content. I have personally met people who buy, play all day (maybe all night) and return the next day for trade in credit (when its high for new games especially) and get the next used game, and then repeat the same process.
You can have 1 new game purchased and then recycled multiple times within a few months. Developer/publisher sees profit for 1 game, retailer promoting used games over new sees profit for 10 sales of that very same game. Its just bad.
Is it? Or is it a mechanism to turn an increased profit from a game sale? DLC is cheaper to generate than a fully fledged product. Take a look at Call of Duty - a £60 game that comes wrapped up with four £15 DLC sets every year. Double the potential income with a tiny additional R&D cost.
DLC and microtransactions aren't an anti-piracy mechanism (although DLC may encourage purchasers to hang on to their titles), they're a more constant revenue stream.
Firstly, this is bullshit and I already provided the statistics (with references) further up in the discussion. Secondly it isn't reasonable, as that would imply that in excess of 3/4s of all game sales are used game sales and it would also imply that used sales are a loss because one used game sale is equal to one new game sale. This is also a lie.
Long story short, stop telling people what 'the facts' are, without a single quoted source. A lot of what you've been posting is nonsense.
Heck, 10 years ago I remember that my local game store (which did not sell used games) would accept a game as a return if you finished it in 24 hours. That retailer is actually still in business, although I suspect their policies have since changed.
Yeah, but is it really that simple a calculation tho ?
Lets say a game is highly successful, to a point where someone would indeed do the whole "buy for 60$ new on release, trade in the next day for 30$ store credit". Besides the fact that the cycle cannot go on forever (since there is not a brand new big release everyday, meaning that the trade-in value of the returned game is quickly diminishing over time), isn't that simply a sign that the product is performing well as a whole ? Meaning that overall there's gotta be an overwhelming amount of people buying it new anyways ...
It certainly is true that Gamestop found a profitable niche and is basically printing money in the process but I wouldn't go as far as saying that all that revenue is being taken away from the original publisher ...
Interesting stuff to think about for sure.
No the original intent of modern DLC was to offset the losses faced by the used game market. The point being even if you bought a game used, if you wanted the extra content (or in many cases missing content) you had to pay a premium price for it.
For example, buy mass effect 2 used but if you want the locked content on the disk you had to pay around $15 if Im not mistaken. If you bought the game new, the content was given freely via one time use code.
Epic's Rod Fergusson: "It's less about shipping what's left over. It's not about, 'Oh, we had this map left over'... it's keeping the disc in the tray. In a used game culture that you have to actively fight against, I think DLC is one of the ways that you do that." "DLC is a tool used to fight used game sales"
TakeTwo's CEO explains that Red Dead Redepmtions DLC was used to combat the used game problem. Link
GameStop stores in California will now have to warn you when their used games come with one-time-use online passes or additional fees for downloadable content. (directly tied to DLC being based around combating used game sales) Source#2
CNBC: Video game firms fight back against used game industry (DLC)
There is a handful more of that scattered all over the internet. Far more than is necessarily to solidly argue the intent of DLC as it pertains to used game sales.
Now you cant say I offer no sources. I hope this can help diminish any confirmation bias present.
Its not BS and no you didnt. What you provided was a link to a blog like website which twisted around some data posted in an article posted on Gameindustry.biz. The purpose of the article was to point out that over all retail sales have gone down by 22%, which you left out, along side the 17% drop in used game sales. Over all sales have gone down across the board. I think its intellectually dishonest if you only show the used game sales number while ignoring the entire new retail sales drop, which is highly relevant. IN addition to that, the purpose of the article was to point out the growth of digital sales for mobile games which has been on the rise.
To further prove my point, from the most important perspective (not the publish, nor the consumer, but the developer themselves).
Fable 3 Dev: Used Games Sales are "More Problematic" Than Piracy
Realtime CEO Blames Used Games for Flat Crackdown Sales
Heavy Rain Dev Says Pre-Owned Sales Cost it Millions
These developers are not saying this for NO legit reason.
Regarding the case of Heavy Rain, I guess it's all about perspective. The studio is saying that they "lost 10 millions", but I think that's not a solid argument. I know that I personally would consider buying Heavy Rain today, used (or, new with a huge bargain years after the original release) simply because I don't think that the game was worth buying for 60$ new in the first place - I just don't think it was good enough for the price asked.
Maybe it should have been released as a 15$ PSN game ? I know for sure that I would have bought it instantly that way. 60$ was just too much!
Maybe the root of the problem is that big console releases are not the only source of great entertainment anymore and publishers and studios need to acknowledge that in order to remain competitive. Hopefully QD and Sony will be able to adjust their strategy for their next big release.
(BTW I am not saying that every game should be downloadable only - I personally dig that fact that in order to play Halo4 I can just pop in the disc and play within minutes - and eventually install the game to the HDD if I want to play it often. That kind of convenience is a huge factor in favor of the console market. In a way I think I would play more PC games than I do if they offered that kind of flexibility.)
i really don't want to argue because we both want to protect the studios and artists. its just that i know for a fact by looking at the numbers that the second hand market is peanuts and has no effect on the health of any of the entertainment industries. anyone who think they lost there job or there studio went under because of gamestop is delusional.
the numbers your throwing out with a % here and % there make no sense. don't throw out numbers and %%% for effect it makes your argument look silly. there are so many logical errors that I'm not even going to touch them.
ironically i buy all my games new on amazon etc for pc, and i buy games on steam both on pc and linux. i do buy lots of used books and used music. the argument your making would effect ALL used media. books, music, movies, games etc. your effectively arguing for a new dark ages where no one could read books unless they had a license. and the terms were completely up to whoever printed the books. same goes for all other media. the internet? that would be shutdown and you might be able to connect to certain places and pay to read major publisher magazines. and maybe pay to log onto internet tv stations by all the major corporations. it would also probably effect most other property also because pretty much every thing we have in the modern world was produced by someone else. we have laws to protect private property and consumer rights for a reason. were not going to roll back the clock to a time when huge corporations could do what every they wanted and exploit anyone the felt like exploiting with no prosecution or punishment.
the always online issue is much more interesting but it seems this thread got steered off into used games only.
No industry is worthy of the kind of special treatment you think the games industry should have. The government and society are not obligated to provide any policy or mechanism to ensure that businesses get the profit they think they deserve, the developers/publishers/etc. have to prove to the market that they are worth the price by providing compelling reasons. You know, marketing? If you can't convince people to buy a new copy over a used one, then you are the problem, not the customers nor GameStop. They have a right to create a secondary market, it's protected in the first sale doctrine and copyright law.
http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#109
In other words, if you buy a copy, you own that copy (i.e. the disc and the information stored on it) and you have the right to dispossess yourself of that copy by selling it. EULA doesn't supersede that. The copyright owner still holds the right to distribute new copies, but they don't have the right to prohibit people that already bought a copy from selling it.
If you want people to buy new, then give them a reason that makes them want a new copy, not by making the used copy worse. That's like taking a steaming dump on a competitor's product just to make yours look better by comparison. It's low and dishonest. People can see through that and will give you a pass because if you have to make used look bad by comparison, then what value does your game really have?
Your "proof" that used games is a threat to developers seems pretty specious as well.
They believe that they lost between 5 and 10 million euros? They don't know for sure how much they lost, it's what they believe? Your links all lead to articles that make unsubstantiated claims directly from a biased source, the developer. No verifiable data is offered. Nobody can fact check them, so you just take them on their word that it's true, because they say so? That's pretty damning to your argument.
Actually, I will have to difer from you and argue the game is flawed then. Bioshock 1 took me days to get through, guess Im just slow. However, Bioshock 2 took like 2 sittings... They both cost the same. For the gameplay time, Bioshock 1 offered more value... even with B2 having multiplayer. B2's MP added nothing to the game, and was just pointing to lack of content in the single player.. Both are though replayable (not to you maybe).
I don't think the answer is adding MP, instead it's just making experiences people want to revisit. I know I'm against the grain on this, but quality to me is a game that can be played again. I think the idea that the game doesn't need more than for a once through that some developers state, is in reality their justification for lazy and linear play design.
I agree with this sentiment. That's not to say there aren't a few exceptions but 90% of the time this is how I feel about a game. I want it on my shelf because I think I'll want to replay it again later.
I also just want to say, I disagree with the idea that if publishers/studios were making more money from used game sales being impossible, that there would somehow be less layoffs. This relies on the mentality that business owners are super nice folk who aren't simply looking for profits. Laying people off at the end of a dev cycle is going to mean more profits whether they're also making more money from sales or not, and it will likely continue to happen until things within the industry change. ...maybe it will cut down on the frequency of it, but I really have my doubts.
To his credit this is the only kind of sources Dataday can provide as business is seldom to showing all of their financial figures (in this case we'd need accurate figures from both the publisher and the retailers). He's getting a lot of flak from us so I'm grateful that he's gone and gotten some sources.
hold on. if dataday gets to quote totally unsubstantiated claims by people who have huge financial investments in the subject there making claims about. and a direct conflict of interest in telling the truth if it weakens the unsubstantiated claims there trying to spin. then i get to use the quran as a factual text. and i also get to quote every book that david icke has ever written about the lizard people as "plausible truth" to substantiate claims that the true reason for the closure of so many studios and the never ending layoffs in the game and film industry is...
THE LIZARD PEOPLE...
DEAL WITH IT...
The only people who have the real facts have more than enough reasons to not release them and that's even when it has nothing to do with used games!
If the quoting the Quran or lizard people were the only relatable articles you could source to back up your argument then sure, use them. I would commend you for doing so if you seriously believed it and went to the effort to do so when previously your argument was made of personal opinion and hot air. (not a reference to your argument necessarily, but how and why I commented about Dataday's posts)
Does it make it fact or substantial? Not necessarily.
Does that mean people will change their minds or agree? Not necessarily.
It's a better argument than: "I think so!" - "I don't think so!"
Again, I'm not against the sale of used goods, I'm against the mass-industrialization of it, gamestop has always been about selling the games that are very new but have been traded in.
I'm all for the private persons right to sell their games, but it sickens me when greedy corporations will hijack that and kill of any old-games used market for a new-used-games market completely aimed at profit.
When steam products are deemed to be equal to physical goods gamestop will essentially be able to sell steam games at the typical "5 usd under steam store price!" by hoarding from sales and having people trade their steam games in at a tiny trade-in price.
The fact that there is no actual physical product and that supply is unlimited makes that very idea silly, but it has to be reality for the steam resale scenario to work.
Publishers and wanting to be buddies with retail, having a lower price on steam compared to retail will make some enemies I'm sure, and steam still does take quite a cut.
Prices are high, I agree, which is why indie-games often land a more reasonable price-point, often with more content to the game as they do not have to follow the price-guides of the publishers.
I would personaly say there's no gain to physical products as they merely act as storage for an otherwise fully digital product, no manuals and a cheap package :P
Dataday didn't meet the burden of proof to substantiate his claim. He provided biased sources that lacked any facts and tried to use it to disprove an argument that did cite factual sources. He doesn't get any credit for that.
http://www.gamespot.com/news/xbox-720-requires-internet-connection-to-load-games-6406433
How nice of them that you can at least play for 3 minutes after your connection have died. After that I'll guess you'll just have to wait until the internet come backs, before you can resume your game. But wait, it gets even better.
"He said this a confirmed feature for the platform, claiming the system's notes specifically state that the Xbox 720 "must be Internet-connected to use."
http://www.gamespot.com/news/subscription-based-xbox-720-priced-at-300-with-500-standard-model-6406544
I also miss the days of being able to buy a game, stick it in a drive and play. That's what made consoles attractive in the first place.
The thing is, the games industry really is a service industry, just not in the way the hardware vendors and publishers are spinning it. The service lies in the creation of games, that's the real service. It's a lot like contractors building a skyscraper, you pay them for their time, effort, and resources to build it. In game studios, developers are paid for their time, effort, and overhead to make a game. The only difference is who the patron is that pays those bills.
By that logic, all industries where someone sells something to a consumer are service industries.
You guys are not dealing with it very well, c'mon.
Well, since they returned the game to a used game store (presumably GameStop) You can't really say that they paid $40 for a brand new game that they got to keep. It would be more accurate to say that they paid $40 to rent a brand-new game. There are people who are willing to do that. But I still maintain that those people are not very intelligent.
Paying $40 for limited-time access to a title does not strike me as a decent value. If I'm patient, I can pay $20 for the exact same game six to seven months later, and I don't have to trade it in. If I was using a service like GameFly or RedBox, I could pay considerably less than $40 to rent those games for the same period of time.
GameStop's return-policy churn has, and always will be, a calculated scam meant to prey on those unwilling to search for better alternatives. Used game sales can be great, but not in their current form. They should be used as a means of keeping enthusiasm alive for older systems and titles. Instead they've been transformed into some twisted parasite on the latest systems and titles.
Yeah. It's not up to the owners of the apartments in that skyscraper to pay the contractor for their service to build it; they just pay the real estate agent for the sale.
Not at all. A service industry doesn't necessarily provide a physical good, but it can. However, a product industry always produces a product. What matters is what is actually being paid for. In games, what is being paid for is the creation of a game. The disc isn't a product, it's packaging for the game, a delivery method. The value is in the developer's ability to create a game. Time and labor is the valuable commodity being traded in a service industry. Developers provide a service to publishers and publishers try to turn that service into a product that they can sell as discreet units of property. But a game isn't a discreet unit of property, it's an expression of an idea(s) and expressions have no discreet unit of existence. The publishers try to get around this fact through constructs like copyright. If you can make access scarce, it creates artificial limits and the illusion of a finite quantity.
What? That doesn't make any sense. The tenants don't own the building, the landlord does. He pays the contractors for the construction and then rents the units out. In the case of condos, all of the units belong to one owner until they are all sold off to individual residents. Either way, the original owner pays for the construction of the building.
However, this is all pointless nitpicking and immaterial to the argument at large.
I think we're talking at cross-purposes. Yes the service of producing an intellectual property is paid for, as is the service (or trade) of building a product for sale. The publisher of course pays the developer for the service of making a game, as does the manufacturer pay their workers for the service of designing and constructing their products. A product industry may indeed make products but they do so by employing services.
The game/film/music/book industry is the same. You're right to claim that it is service-built but it is the product that is being paid for. The end consumer is buying a discreet unit of property containing the expressions in a solid state - just like a consumer buying a phone is buying both the material and the expression of engineered design.
It just so happens to be that games/film/music/book industry's raw material in a product is the medium on which it is transported.
*edit*
Notice that I did say 'owner' and not 'tenant'? I chose that specifically to avoid such confusion. The owner of an apartment may or may not be the entity that contracted its construction.
I don't think this is immaterial to the argument since I'm quite certain the debate about used-games does concern the:
1) Nature of a game purchasing transaction from the perspective of the end user, in a value commodity fashion.
2) The perception of ownership of a game/software as transactions are made between owners.
Then how do you explain downloads, where no physical goods exchange hands? Clarification: Where does the concept of a discreet unit of property apply when it's purely a download?
But that's still incorrect. They don't pay the realtor, that would imply that the realtor is the owner, not the other people you mentioned. The property owner pays for the construction, whoever that may be.
The end-user is paying for the content of the digital goods: the very arrangements of the 1s and 0s that in turn make the content have value. Once this data is in a format they can digest, they do so.
Yes a service was rendered somewhere out there for the 1s and 0s to be arranged that way, but if I didn't buy this product - who did? Not me, and yet it exists without my payment of serviced rendered. Therefore when I do buy this product I am committing to a transaction money lost - item received; not money lost - service rendered.
Nobody bought a canvas with paint on it, they bought a canvas with paint on it that looks like *that*. Of course they might be the same person that contracted the painter to paint one like *that* but not always.
Really? There is more than one way to build and sell houses/apartments and my examples were to easily claim that the person buying one (including owners/realtor) are not always the original clients contracting construction. If I was to follow your logic then I'd have to consider everything I buy to be second-hand (possibly used even) by the original client.
So if I went out to buy Dead Space 3 today I would not be buying it from a shop? I would be somehow going back in time and paying EA and Visceral for the service of making it for me? Hold on. I reckon you might say yes to that.... I'm not allowed any more to buy Dead Space 3 as a game on the shelf in a shop? What if they all got fired before I bought it? What am I paying for then?
This is getting a bit overblown the way you're describing it. The creators of a game are making a product. Their workers are being paid for a service but at the end of the day they are putting out a product that I am paying money for. If you want to split hairs between downloading a game off steam vs going to Target and buying it off the shelf that's your prerogative, but my point is it used to be I could buy a game, slip it into the disc tray, and then just play the damn thing.
If they decide to go with this always on thing (the point of this thread originally) they had better be ready to blow me out of the damn water with awesome features to make it worth it, because if it's just "you need to touch our servers so we can market better ads based off games you play" I'm going to have to skip out on buying this console. That's what it really comes down to. If you're going to make it harder for me to play games I have spent my hard earned money on, you'd better make it worth my while.