The Decline

[Zoop]

So, here's my opinion on the whole matter, now that I've got a few minutes to sit down and write it out.

Killing off the used games market is bull**** and the corporate apologists' justifications for doing so even worse.

So, why is the industry so excited about killing off the used game market? Because the used game market is one of the key issues facing their broken-as-**** business model. It's easier to try and destroy a symptom of your shoddy business model than it is to fix the shoddy business model in the first place.

What the hell am I on about? The cost of games. As a hobby, gaming is one of the more expensive ones you can choose to participate in. Games are pretty expensive. Now I know there are always arguments saying they're cheap on a value-per-hour basis and the like, but that's complete bull****. It took me roughly 48 hours of reading to finish each of the Game of Thrones books, but that didn't make publisher charge me R600 - R800 a book. It's the same with videogames. They're expensive. That's why the used market exists and that's why piracy is a major problem. Not everyone can afford to buy multiple games a month. It's also hard to justify spending R600 on a new IP you know nothing about. Especially if the games journalism industry is so flawed and you can't really trust reviews because the industry hands out 8s and 9s willy nilly.

And that's where the flaw in Kuchera's logic comes in and where the gaming industry is making a mistake. They seem to think killing the used game market is going to solve all the industry problems and cause a giant surge in sales. It's not. More than likely what's going to happen is people are going to buy less games. It's also going to cause an issue with the types of games people buy becoming more and more limited. Someone who buys used games might pick up second-hand games that he might not have bought at all otherwise, then enjoying those games might go on to buy them new next time. If it wasn't for the fact that me and my friends shared our games when we were younger, there would have been a lot of franchises I am a fan of, that I would likely barely have known anything of or cared about.

So how does this tie into poor business practices? The AAA industry is rotten from the core. Have you guys seen what the development costs of the average AAA game is lately? Of course you have. Bioshock Infinite allegedly cost $200 million to develop. That's ****ing ridiculous and it's only one case in many. Development costs are so overinflated that the industry absolutely has to do everything in their power to ensure they remain profitable. And what do they do? They don't try and see where they can decrease development costs. Absolutely not. No, they bitch and moan about people buying used games and try to justify the death of the used game market. Because supposedly that's magically going to fix all of their problems. The fact that someone like Ben Kuchera, in all his infinite wisdom, seems to think killing the used game market is going to have a domino effect that's going to lead to reduced prices of games is so ridiculous that I actually can't even laugh about it.

If the industry actually addressed the real issues and tried to look at why a game selling 1 million copies is considered a disappointment, maybe things would go better for them? Let's not even begin to talk about Dead Space 3 requiring 5 million copies sold in order to be considered profitable. I honestly can't fathom why the industry seems to be incapable of seeing that if they simply tried to slash their development costs, they would be able to remain profitable with much lower sales numbers.

So, yeah, that's pretty much my thoughts on the matter. The second-hand sales market is only as big as it is, because it's a symptom of an issue with the AAA industry itself. Removing the symptom isn't going to cure the problem.

[Squirly]

And all that talk about F2P and mobile games being the future - it's really a self-fulfilling prophecy because if you charge R600 bucks for a new game (that I'm not even sure I'll like) and I can't get it cheaper later or somewhere else, then I just won't buy it. In which case I'll find myself gravitating towards F2P (or at least the F2P that doesn't require me to sink money into it in order to be fun) more out of necessity than anything else. It's stupid.

[Zoop]

I came across this forum post on Giantbomb, which I think pretty much explains why people like Ben Kuchera think killing off used games is a good thing, while consumers actually pull the short end of the stick. I'm not going to repost the entire thing because it's pretty long. I'll just quote some of the better arguments he makes.

The line pertains to people that can sell anyone anything even if it’s irresponsible for them to buy it. And you better believe that all of the big corporations try to employ marketers like that, making the idea of “voting with your dollars” fruitless. Because even if you’re smart enough to avoid buying so-called “coin doublers” for today’s games, there is a dedicated campaign to convince others that it is a necessary purchase. So in the end you have a bunch of people who are slowly falling out of touch on why everybody is so angry about the state of gaming because for the last 5 or 10 or even 20 years every videogame they’ve ever had was either provided to them gratis or considered a business expense. “It’s okay if I go out and on a whim spend $400 on Skylanders toys because that’s what my job is.” And on some level I don’t blame them - I’m sure they’re not consciously letting it happen, and some actively try and fight back against it. But it’s still a growing problem.

The latest and greatest example is the reveal of the XBOX ONE, which was at best met with indifference and at worst, total revulsion. Here is a videogame console trying to fix a problem that to most consumers doesn’t actually exist - we want to pay less for today’s games, not more (re: “voting with your dollars”), and so used videogames have kind of risen up and given birth to a thriving second-hand market. The Xbox One wants to put an end to that, more than likely demanding that we spend full retail on everything - even games we borrow from friends. It is a plainly anti-consumer practice hiding behind notions that internet connectivity is “the future”. A wolf in sheep’s clothing. And you have people in the game’s press trying to spin this as a positive thing, with such lovely headlines like “You Don’t Hate the Xbox One, You’re Just Jealous”. But the one I want to touch on today is one by Ben Kuchera of the Penny-Arcade Report titled “The Xbox One will kill used games and control second-hand sales, and that’s great news (Really!)”

As if you couldn’t tell from the title, the article assumes that the used games industry is the cause of the problem and not a response to a greater issue at hand, and I really don’t think that’s the case at all.

Right from the word “Go” on this generation, you were hearing developers talk about increased production costs and how they could recoup their unsustainable business model. The “$60 and up” price tag was their solution. In response to this, and in response to the state of the economy, many consumers began to look for cheaper means of entertainment. Gamestop was more than happy to pick up the slack. With their plans foiled, game publishers have attempted to vilify these kinds of actions instead of identifying the real problem from within themselves.

The Xbox One isn’t an exciting prospect for the future, it’s Microsoft elevating the war on used games to the next level of DEFCON - a war that isn’t being fought for the consumers, it’s being fought for gluttonous developers who want to glue motion capture dots to a dog or hire the London Symphony Orchestra to perform for their game or spend a hundred million dollars on a World of Warcraft Clone that is only notable for having a lot of voice acting attached to it. As smaller, independent games are proving, that kind of stuff doesn’t actually matter as much as you would like to think it does, just so long as the game is fun and engaging. Did Mojang spend a hundred million dollars just so Kiefer Sutherland could lend his voice to Minecraft? No, but they certainly could spend that much on their next product, given how much they’ve sold.

The existence of the Used Games market isn’t my problem, it’s my solution. If the game industry wants to stop the Used Game market from existing, twisting a consumer’s arm isn’t the way to go about doing it. Publishers could be fighting the Used Game market RIGHT NOW, by lowering prices on games. They aren’t doing that, and clearly have no intention to start. Steam and iTunes thwarted piracy by making the act of buying their content as cheap and as painless as possible. Microsoft is just putting up more walls.

http://www.giantbomb.com/xbox-one/30...mes-a-1437743/

[Squirly]

Link?

[Zoop]

Oh balls.

http://www.giantbomb.com/xbox-one/30...mes-a-1437743/