I recently got the Gears of War 3 Limited Edition Xbox controller and the codes for the Infected Omen downloadable weapon skins that come with it. When I got out the card with the code I took a look at it and went to claim it on Xbox.com. I had just finished entering it when I stopped, put the card down and went to eBay. Searching on eBay for the same card, I found a couple of auctions charging up to $30AU for the code and one that had twelve bids for nearly $10. I decided on a potentially profitable experiment and put my own code on eBay, starting at $10. I thought, if I get that then it’s worth it. It sold for just over $13 and it honestly feels like money for nothing.



There has been a small market for this stuff for a few years now; the biggest and earliest one I can recall is the pets with the collector’s edition of World of Warcraft. Last year in particular players were given many pre-order bonuses for games such as Mass Effect 2 and Red Dead Redemption. Most of these codes just provided players with a couple of different skins that were otherwise unobtainable. It’s a good idea as it rewards early adopters with a small bonus for their purchase and indeed encourages players to buy early.

The problem I think with this is the extra market it has created for people that just have to have it all. I’ll admit I was quite obsessed with obtaining the bonuses that arrived with Mass Effect 2 though never enough to pay $20 for a single character skin code. This was rectified with later DLC but I couldn’t help but feel sorry for the people that had spent the money on something so small. Like most, I think these people are silly and will likely ultimately regret their purchase but it would be much easier if the publishers just provided a way for these people to get all the bonuses at a small price without going third party. This would obviously serve to benefit the company and the obsessed consumer too.



Sure, give early adopters a free skin on something and sure differentiate the bonuses between businesses but also offer everyone the chance to get these other bonuses for a small fee if they want them. Rockstar later offered the RDR skins as a cheap download but it wasn’t quite soon enough. It’s not hard; it will get the company a bit more pocket money and stop these people buying these things at absurdly inflated prices. And I suspect a lot of these sales are just from sneaky game store employees anyway.

By putting my own code on eBay, I have made myself part of the problem, now I want to be part of the solution.