The future of Digital sales and Retail stores?

[Shifty Geezer]

Interesting development on future of downloads and retail chains - Sony confirms it will no longer provide full game digital download codes to shop.

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/...giving-shops-full-game-download-codes-to-sell

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Interesting development on future of downloads and retail chains - Sony confirms it will no longer provide full game digital download codes to shop.

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/...giving-shops-full-game-download-codes-to-sell

Interesting, that provides a small opening for MS to get stores to push their products if they allow digital codes for games.

For the end consumer I don't see it having much effect though. But it does feel like Sony wants to put console game stores out of business in favor of having digital cash cards everywhere.

Regards,
SB

 

[AlNom]

I forget if MS/Sony have gifting options implemented with their digital stores. Surely they're not ignoring that aspect of consumer purchasing?

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Interesting development on future of downloads and retail chains - Sony confirms it will no longer provide full game digital download codes to shop.

Confirming the news in a statement issued to Eurogamer, Sony said it took the decision "in order to continue to align key businesses globally".

Well that clears that up that decision.

 

[BRiT]

MS has gifting of digital titles.

 

[mpg1]

Weird...this is good way to gift games. No different than gift cards really.

 

[AlphaWolf]

Money cards are probably more profitable than full game codes. Some % of them always go unredeemed.

 

[AlNom]

Good point. I guess that could either push people to buy the physical game as a gift or let them choose some odd mix of money cards if the choice of game is difficult.

 

[Shortbread]

Confirming the news in a statement issued to Eurogamer, Sony said it took the decision "in order to continue to align key businesses globally".

Well that clears that up that decision.

More than likely to control game pricing and cutting off grey-market vendors like cdkeys or GMG from purchasing bulk codes from different regions then reselling them in others.

 

[tuna]

I think people would be pissed if they bought a game (card) for €30 when they could have bought the game for €20 in the PS Store.

 

[Malo]

This has nothing to do with physical games though, right? Just the digital game-specific cards.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Yes. They're not stopping sale of PSN credit and cards for IGC will still be available; only codes for specific games are being discontinued.

 

[eastmen]

If money cards will still be avalible then it doesn't change much. Perhaps they are doing this to cut down on costs. Easier to just ship lots of the same digital credit cards than it is to ship out different games.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

The weird thing to me is game cards being stopped but not IGC cards. I'd have thought it'd be the other way round. Does this mean IGC cards are what people buy most?

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Yes. They're not stopping sale of PSN credit and cards for IGC will still be available; only codes for specific games are being discontinued.

Maybe they just are economical. If I wanted to buy a gaming credit gift for friend of family, I'd give them generic credit rather than a specific game. That way they can spend it on whatever they like. I remember one birthday I got two copies of Bubble Bobble for the C64. Maybe Sony just decided to ease up on the rain forest murder.

 

[AlNom]

Or just allocate more store space to the cash cards.

Anyways, it invariably leads to people spending more than they need because prices don't always align thus having stuff sit in the online wallets (or psychologically getting people to just purchase online things because they've already spent the RealWorld money), which is more of an advantage for the digital store owner, I guess.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

How do score card prices align with digital store prices? I presume they are sold to the stores based on the current Online Store price, so if a game is new and £25 on PSN, it's sold for maybe £20 to the retailer who gets a £5 markup. If that game price drops to £10 on the digistore, it's a waste of money buying retail? So conceptually it's better value to buy credit and get the game online at whatever the latest price is; it's not like prices ever go up after time.

 

[AlNom]

Perhaps, but nominally the intent is for these to be gift cards (your father’s brother’s nephew’s cousin’s former roommate buys you a card because they don't trust you with their CC info).

The digital store gets the revenue early, which I suppose has some benefit in the context of fiscal year & inflation (in the case of unspent credit vs direct purchase, which is possible if the gift cards are bought in larger denominations than necessary) There are reasons for the wallet/credit over the years, although I suppose a large part is avoiding CC transaction fees for small amounts.

In the context of gifting, the credit is just more flexible where specific digital game codes are somewhat redundant if the person knows what they want and could have just bought it directly online.

 

[milk]

All this talk of physical stores and new ways to sell games and online content has got me thinking. And now I thinkI just had a brilliant idea.
What if they created little physical kiosks for buying loot boxes? They could be the size of an Arcade Cabinet, and have a big lever on the side to roll the next lootbox. You could place hundreds of these in a building, maybe by a bar and hotel. The advantage is you don't even have to bother with the boring online mach part of the game. Just sink your teeth right into the part that keeps on bringing you back.
EA, take note.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2019-04-02-pre-owned-game-sales-are-in-freefall-in-the-uk

Ukie - the trade body for the UK's games and interactive entertainment industry - released new data today revealing pre-owned software sales were down 30.8 per cent year-on-year in the UK, from a value of £98.2m in 2017 to £67.9m in 2018.

The significant drop in pre-owned game sales comes amid an uptick for the UK games market overall. Software revenues exceeded £4bn for the first time, up just over 10 per cent, and hardware was up 10.7 per cent to £1.57bn.

If people are less interested in 2nd hand games, stores lose even more relevance. I wonder if mobile has helped move folk towards digital downloads?

Edit: Actually, looking at comments on that story, it seems people are avoiding second hand in stores because of ludicrous pricing. 2nd hand sales may be robust on eBay etc.