Sony joins EA and Ubisoft in considering limitations on used games

[BRiT]

But now the developer is spending money to keep the game up to date and someone who hasn't added funds to it are now profiting.

That's a meaningless point. As has been said before, if the original buyer keeps the game the entire time, there's no difference in the income to the developers or publisher. The developers have to keep the game up to date regardless of who owns it, the original buyer or the later buyers.

 

[Scott_Arm]

...
how are they a repeat customer if they are buying used. They aren't a customer if they aren't purchasing a game from the developer. But now the developer is spending money to keep the game up to date and someone who hasn't added funds to it are now profiting. If you buy a used sofa the sofa has physical wear and is not a valuable to you or the person selling it as a digital good that still plays just as good (or better dpending on patches and other things released since the original purchase) . The sofa could have dog piss on it , broken springs , pulled fabric a broke n leg.


I truely believe that it was doing this or charging for every type of content and bug update for online thus squeezing new buyers even more and still getting used buyers.

Ummm, I've bought many FIFA, NHL, Fight Night games from EA over the years, but I bought the most recent FIFA used. I guess I'm not a customer of theirs. I'd say I've bought ten or more iterations of NHL, and half a dozen FIFA games, plus three of the four Fight Night games. I possibly bought a Madden game along the way. But I just bought FIFA 10 used, so I'm not a customer anymore.

I'm starting to think a lot of you guys don't realize how great buying used goods is. Not everything that's used is a piece of shit. You can find near mint goods that are indistinguishable from new. Hell, there's a shop in town where I can buy vintage designer furniture from the 50s, 60s and 70s for a small fortune that looks better than all the stuff you find in high-end stores now.

This idea that games are different than other goods, or that they preserve their quality and value better than other goods, is wrong. As BRiT said, and I've said before, for someone to buy a used copy, someone has to purchase a new copy. There are never more players than there were new copies sold. Used gaming is not adding a huge burden to game support. The cost of supporting one copy for a single or multiple owners is the same for the life of the console. Are people that continually playing the same game for years cheating developers by forcing them to support the game for a long period of time?

 

[RobertR1]

Steam is very good for cheaper prices. At first its on par with retail but very quickly you start to see sales on new releases s much as $20 off . I think as long as retail continues to be the driving force of sales DD will be priced on par with it for awhile after a games launch. You might say hey what do pc developers care about it as dd is now half the market and growing. But most pc devs have console ports to worry about.

Steam sales are awesome. Huge discounts on popular titles routinely. Often dirty cheap not too long after release. That is also the problem. Since steam gives are DD only, there is no used sale market so what you end up is with people holding off for sales and bundles to justify the cost.

So the question comes, what's the net result? Am I better off selling X amount of copies at full price and dealing with the impact of the used market or selling X amount over an extended period of time via digital distribution sales but not being impacted by the used market.

Companies need to run these numbers for themselves and figure out what's best for them.

But here's the reality of it. Companies want the benefits of a DD product but with the profits reflecting full priced retail sales. That's not going to happen so they want to make the profit equivalent from the used market as they would from a discounted DD sale.

The question they're really trying to anwer is this: "how can I make money everytime the product changes hands.? That's a great corporate mentality but as a consumer, it's ridiculous. As always, it's a tug of war between corporate and consumer. However, hard core gamers are the largest group of pro corporate minded people I've ran across in any hobby.

There's some weird mindset that "if I don't bendover and take it, the industry will go away." In contrast, the industry will be forced to adapt, show creativity and become more efficient but to see that, gamers will have to stop showing up for pity parties for company X.

 

[NathansFortune]

Ummm, I've bought many FIFA, NHL, Fight Night games from EA over the years, but I bought the most recent FIFA used. I guess I'm not a customer of theirs. I'd say I've bought ten or more iterations of NHL, and half a dozen FIFA games, plus three of the four Fight Night games. I possibly bought a Madden game along the way. But I just bought FIFA 10 used, so I'm not a customer anymore.

I'm starting to think a lot of you guys don't realize how great buying used goods is. Not everything that's used is a piece of shit. You can find near mint goods that are indistinguishable from new. Hell, there's a shop in town where I can buy vintage designer furniture from the 50s, 60s and 70s for a small fortune that looks better than all the stuff you find in high-end stores now.

This idea that games are different than other goods, or that they preserve their quality and value better than other goods, is wrong. As BRiT said, and I've said before, for someone to buy a used copy, someone has to purchase a new copy. There are never more players than there were new copies sold. Used gaming is not adding a huge burden to game support. The cost of supporting one copy for a single or multiple owners is the same for the life of the console. Are people that continually playing the same game for years cheating developers by forcing them to support the game for a long period of time?

This is where you are missing the key point. A used game is absolutely identical to a new copy. Most consumer goods depreciate over time, games by and large do not (bomba aside). The only time the value of a game is decreased from it's original price is either from bomba, or sequels - especially when it comes to sports games (though publisher level discounting on new copies is not uncommon for these categories).

The difference between a week old copy of BC2 being sold alongside a brand new copy but at a $5 discount is literally zero. They both play identically and enable the same end user experience. Think of it this way, it's like buying a used car then expecting the car manufacturer to give you the same deal they offered the buyer of the new car. I know when I bought my BMW new I got all sorts of stuff with it like car mats, iPod integration, free servicing for 3 years, insurance and road tax. A friend bought the same car as me from a used car dealer and called up BMW for his welcome pack like I did only to find it was for new car owners only (the whole lot is worth around £2000). He got upset with BMW, but I told him that's the difference between used and new, he got the car for £2500 less, but isn't entitled to the welcome pack. Game publishers are trying to do the same thing here, differentiate the new product from a used one, whether that means more launch DLC for new purchases or online codes is yet to be determined, but they have to do something to encourage people to buy new games.

 

[patsu]

This idea that games are different than other goods, or that they preserve their quality and value better than other goods, is wrong.

There is nothing wrong with the current consumer behaviour, whether you're buying new games exclusively, or used games exclusively.

There is also nothing wrong with games being different from other goods. What applies to vintage furniture may not apply to regular games universally. In fact, vintage furniture pricing model does not apply to regular furniture prices too, and vice versa. Different market, different rules. There is a "willingness to pay" factor to all these new and used goods though.

I feel this is just everyone arguing for their own benefits/gains/rights.

The original idea is to pay $10 (?) for online pass for used games. The fee will cover for online infrastructure and at $10/used game, I suspect may cover more than that. If it's transparent to the end users, most people probably don't care. If it's transferred to the consumers, then vote with your own dollars. I am sure businesses know their customers can always take the money and go elsewhere. But at the same time, the businesses will do whatever they deem "fair" to keep their positive customers, and cover for their growth.

 

[specwarGP2]

This idea that games are different than other goods, or that they preserve their quality and value better than other goods, is wrong. As BRiT said, and I've said before, for someone to buy a used copy, someone has to purchase a new copy. There are never more players than there were new copies sold. Used gaming is not adding a huge burden to game support. The cost of supporting one copy for a single or multiple owners is the same for the life of the console. Are people that continually playing the same game for years cheating developers by forcing them to support the game for a long period of time?

I agree with you, but we already see this happening with most consumer electronics. If you buy something second hand, the manufacturer typically will not provide warranty service even if it's still within the warranty period.

 

[aselto]

Steam sales are awesome. Huge discounts on popular titles routinely. Often dirty cheap not too long after release. That is also the problem. Since steam gives are DD only, there is no used sale market so what you end up is with people holding off for sales and bundles to justify the cost.

So the question comes, what's the net result? Am I better off selling X amount of copies at full price and dealing with the impact of the used market or selling X amount over an extended period of time via digital distribution sales but not being impacted by the used market.

That's not true at all. If you look at top 10 games on Steam, you'll see that majority of them are full-priced games. #5 at the moment is BF Bad Company 2, which already had numerous sales (including $20 deal on EA Store). It seems that people who are used to purchasing games on DD stores don't mind that the game might be discounted at some other time (that might be more true for multiplayer games - you don't want to wait until community disappears and only uberskilled players remain ).

In general, games that launch in retail tend to drop in price very quickly because retailer has to make shelfspace for newer products. On DD stores there's not so much incentive to drop prices. That's why retail games are often much better deal for the consumer (if he's patient). However, the publisher margins on these older discounted games is so low it's even pitiful to mention it (if anything). OTOH on DD stores developer always gets ~70% of the price, so temporary sales might be very lucrative as the spike in public awareness grows exponentially during that period (Introversion commented recently that going on sale on Steam saved the company).

One thing that Ifind very interesting is that retail games that are also available on DD stores aren't usually the best value on DD store, but games that go DD exclusively are often exceptional value right from the go - Lara Croft is 8-10 hour game with very good graphics for $15 etc. But most developers even on PC side will continue to go to retail as well as downloading many gigabytes of data is a huge barrier for many consumers. Eventually though all games will go DD only making games very affordable for consumers and lucrative for publishers as margins will be much higher than at retail.

BUT while they continue to be at retail they should absolutely respect the customer, first or second hand alike. I bought Halo 1 used, but got so hooked up I buy every Halo game on day 1 since then. I bought Dead Space used, but am going to buy it now new ASAP etc. Buying used games is a cheap way to learn what new franchises are all about and I either like the game and will continue to buy future iterations new or I won't buy them anymore, new or used. I understand that makes things more risky for publishers but at least it's always some exposure that their IP wouldn't have otherwise. If a used game has significant chunk of the game blocked off, I might never get interested in a game.

Though the way this online pass thingy works is that you have access to online mode for 7 days before it's blocked? That's not that bad considering that you can learn the game during these 7 days and decide if it's worth to continue the experience.

 

[pcchen]

I still not quite understand game publishers' points. One claim is about server maintainance. Obviously used game sales don't generate any revenue for them, so that could be a problem. However, if there is no new sales at all, then they don't need to use larger server at all. Then their game price should already contain the price of maintaining the server for a reasonable period of time. Whether there is used game sales shouldn't change this. If server maintainance is really that expensive, then they should consider going for subscription model instead of one time sales model.

Another claim is that they constantly updating their games with new contents so they need a constant revenue stream. But this also makes no sense. If A sold his game to B, A is no longer able to play this game, along with all these updated contents. If A likes the new contents that much, he would buy another copy to play these new contents. So even with used game sales, it's still quite possible to have a constant revenue stream. Not to mention that these days most new contents are sold in the form of DLC.

I don't have problem with game developers/publishers making money. They do need to make money. But they should make money by making good games that people actually enjoy. In a sense, a well developed second hand market actually shows how a game fares among general public. A bad game generally has bad second hand price (i.e. you can find them very cheap in second hand game stores). A good game, on the other hand, generally has good resale value. By restrcting second hand sales, they essentially say that their games are probably not as good as they look.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I don't have problem with game developers/publishers making money. They do need to make money. But they should make money by making good games that people actually enjoy. In a sense, a well developed second hand market actually shows how a game fares among general public. A bad game generally has bad second hand price (i.e. you can find them very cheap in second hand game stores). A good game, on the other hand, generally has good resale value.

I imagine this is very true, but do we know of any actaul reports into this that have engaged in proper research? I recall complaints from the music industry about piracy hurting sales, but then reports showed a correlation between music sharing and increased sales. Someone somewhere must have investigated the realtionship between initial sales, second hand sales, and total revenues and userbase.

 

[eastmen]

I still not quite understand game publishers' points. One claim is about server maintainance. Obviously used game sales don't generate any revenue for them, so that could be a problem. However, if there is no new sales at all, then they don't need to use larger server at all. Then their game price should already contain the price of maintaining the server for a reasonable period of time. Whether there is used game sales shouldn't change this. If server maintainance is really that expensive, then they should consider going for subscription model instead of one time sales model.

Another claim is that they constantly updating their games with new contents so they need a constant revenue stream. But this also makes no sense. If A sold his game to B, A is no longer able to play this game, along with all these updated contents. If A likes the new contents that much, he would buy another copy to play these new contents. So even with used game sales, it's still quite possible to have a constant revenue stream. Not to mention that these days most new contents are sold in the form of DLC.

I don't have problem with game developers/publishers making money. They do need to make money. But they should make money by making good games that people actually enjoy. In a sense, a well developed second hand market actually shows how a game fares among general public. A bad game generally has bad second hand price (i.e. you can find them very cheap in second hand game stores). A good game, on the other hand, generally has good resale value. By restrcting second hand sales, they essentially say that their games are probably not as good as they look.

I think their point is this.

You havea game that sells 5m copies at $60 a title. But lets say gamestop buys back 1m of those. If the developer only gets $10 cut off retail when all is said and done then they are missing out on a cool 10m bucks of profit for the game thanks to gamestop cutting in.

I think its purely math. 5m copieswith $10 profits would be $50m bucks. 10m is 1/5th of that and isn't chump change to a developer. It can make a title go from a bomb to a good seller.

Then you have to think of it this way That used market is cutting off price cuts. They can't drop to $50 because gamestop was already their first and the same goes with 40/30/20/10/5.

THere should be nothing stoping mw2 from selling along side mw3 at $20 or $30 this holiday except that the used market is preventing that.

 

[BRiT]

Bullshit.

It's not the second hand market preventing aged titles from selling cheaper, it's the greed of the publisher and developers.

For instance all the LEGO game titles release for anywhere from $60 to $40 and then gradually drop down to around $20 new in about a year. Contrast this to Activision still selling COD4 for $40 nearly 3 years after it's release and years after franchise follow-ups were released. There's many more titles I could list that fall in either camp.

It all comes down to greed.

 

[aselto]

It's not greed, it's business. They don't run charity to give away games for free, they sell games for maximum possible price for said games to remain desirable by the audience.

 

[eastmen]

Bullshit.

It's not the second hand market preventing aged titles from selling cheaper, it's the greed of the publisher and developers.

For instance all the LEGO game titles release for anywhere from $60 to $40 and then gradually drop down to around $20 new in about a year. Contrast this to Activision still selling COD4 for $40 nearly 3 years after it's release and years after franchise follow-ups were released. There's many more titles I could list that fall in either camp.

It all comes down to greed.

Except thats not the full truth. The only new copies of cod 4 are game of the year verisons that do retail for $40. However you get the $10 map packs with that game. So the actual price of the game has droped further than msrp has claimed. Not to mention that the online community is very big. Some titles can retain value much longer.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

It's not greed, it's business. They don't run charity to give away games for free, they sell games for maximum possible price for said games to remain desirable by the audience.

One can also point out that wnating publishers to drop the price can be considered greed by the consumers, who want more for less...

 

[Yemeth]

Here are my points: ". . ." Ok, here is my rant:

If we ignore statements like "developers want to get paid" (as opposed to whom?the rest does not?) and "greed from publishers" (as opposed to the buyers who want to pay extra,just because they are very altruistic), it all comes down to this:

The publishers can make what they want, either they will produce the goods the buyer wants or they will fail. But when I read certain comments, it is almost like the games industry is in a separate universe.

It is really simple, for all I care Activision can make Sam & Max (BTW, Telltale adapted to the market, it did not try to adapt the market for their needs, bit easier in the end run) like episodes where every level is rented and only can be played if you charged your online account. EA Sports can close down their online servers after three minutes and Ubisoft can put in vouchers that are limited.

I am also for a game price increase, because games should cost 500$ because of all of the inflation (lets ignore all the other factors, as consumers are dumb and cannot think/calculate anyway).

The more they choose this way of thinking/acting sooner we will have a new "lets dig a hole in the desert and drop our unsold games" . Maybe after that someone will remember how to attract and care for customers.

I am all for buying a good product and that the ones who did it make some nice profit, but if the one who is producing acts like the one who buys from him should adapt to him, then I start looking for screws on the floor, because several seem to have gotten loose...

The game industry exists a few years (I am a consumer since I am a kid since about 1984 or so) and it should rather start behaving professional (e.g. ensure good working conditions for developers (Read Dead Redemption is such an disgusting example) etc., look around what the customer wants and profit from it etc.) then doing stupid witch hunts (if used games will ruin a company, they should rather switch to baking cakes - there is no used cake market out there), but this is just me...

Sorry for the rant but I just had to type this . Take care and good luck to all of you!

 

[-tkf-]

Not to mention that the online community is very big. Some titles can retain value much longer.

Thanks to people picking up the game a long time after the release.. thanks to 2nd 3rd and 4th hand shopping..

Now imagine that you had to pay a fee in order to get online with a used game... the number of players would drop and the community would hurt, the "buzz" about the next game in the series would be less...

 

[patsu]

I still not quite understand game publishers' points. One claim is about server maintainance. Obviously used game sales don't generate any revenue for them, so that could be a problem. However, if there is no new sales at all, then they don't need to use larger server at all. Then their game price should already contain the price of maintaining the server for a reasonable period of time. Whether there is used game sales shouldn't change this. If server maintainance is really that expensive, then they should consider going for subscription model instead of one time sales model.

Because the current user base also don't want to be charged for online gaming. Many of them believe that vendors are overcharging for peer to peer server gaming.

For used game sales, the concurrent user statistics probably doesn't change (if at all). However the registered/persistent user data management cost does increase. I reckon there is no way for them to know if player A has loaned his copy to player B, or sold it to player B.

Another claim is that they constantly updating their games with new contents so they need a constant revenue stream. But this also makes no sense. If A sold his game to B, A is no longer able to play this game, along with all these updated contents. If A likes the new contents that much, he would buy another copy to play these new contents. So even with used game sales, it's still quite possible to have a constant revenue stream. Not to mention that these days most new contents are sold in the form of DLC.

I don't think this is a problem. DLC is a new area, I believe the vendors are still learning how to harness the channel properly.

I don't have problem with game developers/publishers making money. They do need to make money. But they should make money by making good games that people actually enjoy. In a sense, a well developed second hand market actually shows how a game fares among general public. A bad game generally has bad second hand price (i.e. you can find them very cheap in second hand game stores). A good game, on the other hand, generally has good resale value. By restrcting second hand sales, they essentially say that their games are probably not as good as they look.

It wouldn't matter to them at that level since they don't get any $$$ for resold games. A good game sold with high resale value means a lost sale to them. In any case, a good game does not necessarily sell well. So if we peg game quality to $$$ performance, it is unclear if we will always get "good" games (We will get popular games !). They may need extra cushion for experiments and additional risk taking.

I think the gaming businesses are making incremental changes and gathering data as we speak. I think this is an area where we all need more data points.

 

[eastmen]

Thanks to people picking up the game a long time after the release.. thanks to 2nd 3rd and 4th hand shopping..

Now imagine that you had to pay a fee in order to get online with a used game... the number of players would drop and the community would hurt, the "buzz" about the next game in the series would be less...

I bought cod 4 day one and I still play it online. Never traded it in.

If i imagine that someone has to pay a fee to play online with the used games , i wouldn't think the community would drop becaus epeople still want to play games. If anything people will be playing longer as the cost of entry decline would be pushed to a longer time frame.

I also don't see the buzz for the next game being less. If people bought cod 4 used then they are more likely to buy used games which means they are more likely to buy mw2 used and mw3 used.

 

[pcchen]

It wouldn't matter to them at that level since they don't get any $$$ for resold games. A good game sold with high resale value means a lost sale to them. In any case, a good game does not necessarily sell well. So if we peg game quality to $$$ performance, it is unclear if we will always get "good" games (We will get popular games !). They may need extra cushion for experiments and additional risk taking.

I think the gaming businesses are making incremental changes and gathering data as we speak. I think this is an area where we all need more data points.

But I think a healthy second hand market is actually a very good tool for them. Piracy issues aside, I think used game price is actually a better indicator for the total value of a game. That's because second hand market is not controlled by the publisher, so the price should reflect "market price" more closely. If a game is not very good, or has little replay value, in theory more gamers who bought the game would sell them. This would drive second hand price down. On the other hand, a good game with good replay value results less second hand sales, so its second hand price go up.

Here in Taiwan, many console game stores buy and sell used console games. You can find them sitting on a special bin with reduced prices. Generally each game has their own price, and they reflect the popularity and replay value of the games pretty well.

So market-wise, at least to me if a publisher wants to limit second hand sales of their games, then they are actually telling me that their games are not as good or has much replay value as other games. This is pretty bad because I may decide to not buy their games simply because of this. I believe many people think the same way. So in this sense this policy could actually make their games less profitable, not more profitable.

Of course, one can argue that, since their main object is to maximize profit, it's still possible that the loss by restricting second hand sales is still smaller than the additional profit of reduced second hand sales. This will be up to them to decide.

 

[patsu]

I don't think the game businesses are denying the benefits of used games market. I suspect, when push comes to shove, they may prefer cash first. Once they get one of their toes in the used game value chain (now they are out of it directly), the system should rebalance itself via traditional market forces. e.g., retailers taking less share of the used game price, and go look for new income sources; or the whole thing blows up.

If all goes well, the used game benefits will still help them, but perhaps with a smaller base, or if businesses hide the cost, retain the same base.

If it fails, people may go casual gaming (cheap cheap !). Regardless I do think we are missing the data.