The idea of a new Xbox that refuses to play used games may sound like a problematic, consumer-unfriendly, potentially suicidal idea to reasonable people who are capable of long-term thought, but some people are right behind it. Volition design director Jameson Durall, for example, thinks it's fantastic.
"Personally I think this would be a fantastic change for our business and even though the consumers would be up in arms about it at first ... they will grow to understand why and that it won’t kill them," he wrote in a blog. "It does have it's faults that would have to ironed out, like game rental. I'm a fan of rental companies because they have to buy copies of the game to be able to rent them out and if someone likes the game, there is a chance they would purchase it for themselves.
"Another issue would be with simply lending the game to a friend, but maybe they could implement something similar to what Amazon is doing with their Kindle Books lending policy. The license of the game could be transferred for a set time to another Gamertag and the original owner won't be able to play during that time. Seems like it could work.
"In the end, I fully believe that we have to do something about these issues or our industry is going to fall apart. People often don't understand the cost that goes into creating these huge experiences that we put on the shelves for only $60. They also don't seem to realize how much they are hurting us when they buy a used game and how pirating a copy is just plain stealing."
I love how his "solutions" to the MANY faults with this idea are ones that make previously simple acts far more complicated and inconvenient to consumers. Want to borrow a game? Transfer a license to your system! Want to rent one? Sign up for Microsoft's exclusive rental service! You'll get used to this new waste of your damn time, kids!
Of course, that's the answer to everything, isn't it? When you want more consumers to buy your products, make enjoying those products as inconvenient as possible, because that's got such a proven fucking track record of success, doesn't it?
Shit on your consumers, make them jump through hoops, and answer the criticism by saying, "Ah, you'll get used to it, it's not going to kill you." That seems to the game industry's M.O. right now, it's an absolutely terrible slope to start slipping down.
If this industry dies, it won't be due to piracy, nor will it be to used games. Just ask the businesses that started to fail, pissed off their customers trying to fix themselves, and then died overnight. Oh wait, you can't, because they're dead. THAT's what will kill this industry, if it falls. Not GameStop, and certainly not you or I.
It's when I hear these "solutions" to combating used games by making life tougher for every consumer, that I start to worry about this industry's doom.
Contest:
12:45 PM on 02.06.2012 | 
I had no idea that they were charging a mere $60 bucks out of the goodness of their hearts. Bless them.
Seems to work just fine for the PC with Steam, no?
- I Was A Cactus
This made my day.
Here is how my buying habits work, as well as literally everyone else I know. This is also how the large majority of others gamers buying habits work, since I worked at an EB Games for a long time.
Step One- Take old games that no one is playing anymore and trade them in to EB Games, or sell them on Ebay.
Step Two- Take money from that trade or sale, and buy a new game with it.
Step Three- Play that new game.
Step 4- Wait until a different new game that you want to play has released.
Step 5- Repeat Steps 1 through 4
Now, here is what it will look like if I can no longer trade in my old games in order to afford new ones.
Step One- Take old games that I am not playing anymore.
Step Two- Throw them in the trash since they are now useless.
Step Three- Read about all of the great new games being released that I can no longer afford because my ability to pay for those new games has been taken away.
Step Four- Get frustrated that I can longer play 80% of the games that I used to buy New, and simply pirate those games instead.
That's another part of the problem. Major publishers expect to earn so much money that they only invest in enormous, multi-million "triple-A" (lol) titles that would generate millions of $ in revenues. The game doesn't do as well as the (often unrealistic) expectations? Time for some major layoff / shut down the studio.
What's wrong with games with a moderate budget enjoying a moderate success?
Even if it turned out to be true, however, all it would succeed in me doing is leaving "hardcore" gaming consoles behind for PC and I'd just keep Nintendo around.
Volition, however, I have no sympathy for now. Not that I had much before. Spouting nonsense like this isn't really a good idea when your publisher is presently cutting jobs and shutting down studios. You don't want to give gamers reasons to not buy your games, after all.
Someone like Microsoft/Sony/Nintendo, though? No thanks.
Let's see, a game on Microsofts system that has some shitty coding that stops me playing elsewhere and prevents me from playing it elsewhere or the exact same game minus that code on Sony's system. Which to choose, which to choose...
Game companies don't recognize the good that comes from used games. Extra money for that 10 year old kid to use towards a new game, new interest in a series that is long gone (IE Darkness, a game thats sequel releases tomorrow hasn't been found new for years).
Not to mention the fact that I enjoy the act of collecting. Not being able to have a physical copy would effectively kill my desire to pick up many titles till they reach bare minimum.
Maybe devs should try a little bit harder to get something out of publishers. They are the ones making the games why don't they try going after the people that are actually taking their money?
Ars Technica did an article last week exploring possibilities: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2012/01/how-the-next-xbox-could-stop-you-from-playing-used-games.ars
Yep, it has worked out great for the PC! I mean, granted piracy on the PC is so brutal that many developers have abandoned it altogether and nobody can remember the last time a multi-platform game sold better on the PC....But besides that, I can see how removing the PC crowds ability to trade in their old games has really helped the PC market!!!
I mean...besides that whole massive piracy thing that is 90% worse on the PC than it is on consoles...probably because we can actually trade in our old games in order to afford new ones, so we don't have to pirate like the PC crowd does....but, ya know, whatever....
Maybe play some emulators, but honestly, it wouldn't be missed to be honest.
Lets not forget the people out there who have 2-3 kids and work 2 jobs that still want to play games on their little free time. They barely have enough to buy a $20-$30 used copy of MW2 a year or two after its been released to play on the PS3/Xbox they got as a gift one Christmas. You are entirely cutting out a customer base there. They might after had a few bucks left on their system from a Points or PSN card to buy some of that DLC that you have already stuck on the disk and charge customers for again to unlock it.
I'm sure we aren't far from being charged $40 for a game...then if we want to play Co-Op mode we have to pay $5 to unlock that, want to play multiplayer? $20 oh and of course the typical DLC comes out that you pay more for...
I rarely pirate games as is now and if I do, I almost always buy the game within a month after I know if I like it or not. If they start going to a "new game only" model you bet your buck I'm gonna pirate almost every game I get from then on. If you really want your market to fail see what happens when you p.o a bunch of game nerds :)
Learn that the way to attract customers is to provide a better more enjoyable product then the other guy. Whichever one of these dumb shit devs / publishers figures out how to give us what we want without a bunch of bullshit will get to rule the market from atop a golden, jewel encrusted throne perched on a mountain of money.
And that bullshit line: ONLY 60 dollars. FUCK YOU ASSHOLE. Games stopped being only $60 when you fuckers started selling them to us peacemeal. Sure $60 bucks gets you most of the game, but if you want the entire fucking game you better drop $80-100 and preorder the fucking thing.
Narrow minded, self entitled, arrogant dev slapnuts!
As for his over complication of things, that's really all this is going to bring to gamers willing to pay for new games. But frankly we're already in a world where making things simple means wasting your time doing things you shouldn't have to do in order to get there -and mostly because these companies want to "get theirs". Like look at how Netflix was going to split up their company and double up on the steps customers would need to do to enjoy their services. It seems like the idea is that to move forward, we have to move quite a few steps back first.
Remember when the future used to be a fun thing to think about? Now the future just sucks balls.
I can't wait to see if this really goes into place, just to see the company who implements it lose everything because more then half of their fanbase can't afford the games any more. Theres so many more theories that could be cooked up too, like how games will need to become longer because most companies will have to make fewer games because their titles will get less support overall, like the movie studio who can only release on 3 movies a year -5-10 hour games probably won't cut it any more. Or how it'll become an elitist club of people who can afford the luxury, as apposed to those of us who, you know, actually have expenses.
....
[common sense]
Where are the voices that realize that vidya games, although a luxury, dont have to be a rich man hobby. They can be for anyone, and the day the MRSP reflects that sentiment will be the day that the user base expands so greatly that the threat of the used market will be a thing of the past.
[/commmon sense]
I don't want to "steal traffic" by promoting my own blog here but I wrote a bit about the Volition dev's statement the other day, for anyone who is interested: http://www.mlindgren.ca/archives/536
Are all the jackass developers who would have to face facts that their game sucked, wasn't worth nearly what they were asking and that they DESERVE to go OUT OF BUSINESS!
Unfortunately for every asshat developer who releases a staming pile and is perplexed by its low sales then immediately shouts "Piracy & Used Games!" ..... There are probably three to five smaller deves who release quality games that fall through the cracks that might not make it if not for the fans they made because someone picked one of their older titles up used on a whim.
My main issue is with such concepts comes down to pricing. Microsift are living in cloud-fucking-cuckoo-land with the pricepoints of a huge majority of their "on demand" offerings, and if we're locked paying whatever they deign to charge, everybody loses - especially MS when sales fall through the floor.
I can't imagine they'd be stupid enough to follow through with this, but one thing I can do without is a tool from Volition telling me that it's a great idea and anyone that disagrees is some sort of thief or cheat of the system. Pffff!!
While i dont belive that the machine itself wont have this measure but who is to know when a publisher will start to impliment something like this directly into their games (locking games to a single consol perhaps, turning games into a bind on equipt item.
)
Coming from MS I don't find the idea to far fetched.
Because they already sort a got a cut on THE FIRST SALE ..... and like everyone else under the sun, that's all they're entitled to.
but if you think they should next time you go buy a sandwich maybe you should send some money to the company that made the bread or the cheese because they apparently deserve additional profits from that secondhand sale of their goods.
I keep hearing devs/pubs bitching about how used games are somehow sucking the very marrow from their bones.... but they never seem to want to put the effort into it to solve the root of the problem.
Instead you get hamfisted DLC/DRM and contrived almost Machiavellian schemes to undermine the used market, while simultaneously dodging the core issues that drive that market they so despise.
i heard portal 2 sold better on PC than consoles. mostly that's not the case though, but it's not because of piracy, it's because console gaming is cheaper (at least in the minds of most gamers) and more convenient than PC gaming.
the more restrictive crap the console manufacturers shove into the next gen hardware, the less convenient console gaming will become, and the barriers to entry of PC gaming will seem so much lower that i imagine many will happily jump ship.
What about the fact that in order to get that concession, Amazon had to give publishers a kill switch for it, and in fact the majority of mainstream books are NOT lendable? (and the ones that are.. only lendable for fixed periods and only once)