Next Xbox to ban used games?
Linked by Thom Holwerda on Wed 6th Feb 2013 13:29 UTC
Games "Sources with first-hand experience of Microsoft's next generation console have told us that although the next Xbox will be absolutely committed to online functionality, games will still be made available to purchase in physical form. Next Xbox games will be manufactured on 50GB-capacity Blu-ray discs, Microsoft having conceded defeat to Sony following its ill-fated backing of the HD-DVD format. It is believed that games purchased on disc will ship with activation codes, and will have no value beyond the initial user." Crap like this should be illegal. If I can't buy second-hand games at my local favourite game store, Microsoft can shove this new Xbox where the sun don't shine. Which it obviously doesn't do in Redmond if they can come up with this kind of user-hostile bullshit. You can pretty much guarantee that they have made a silent agreement with Sony to implement similar anti-user feature on the next Playstation.
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snowbender
Member since:
2006-05-04

Because there is only one distributor. If you don't like the price then you can't go down the street and buy one cheaper.

Used games act as pricing pressure by allowing customers to go elsewhere.


Ok, right. But a couple remarks: a lot of games that are available right now in traditional shops, are also tied to a Steam or an Origin account. When you install those, you are already forced to use those services, and that means there's no way to resell those either.

That might be another reason to hate Steam, but I'm saying this because it doesn't necessarily mean that when you buy a game in retail that you're free of Steam.

I really have no idea how much of the price goes to the original developers of the game, to the publisher of the game, and to the distributor of the game. So I wonder who has the biggest influence on those prices.

Well it should bother you because it doesn't work which means you are accepting limitations for .... ???

Steam's DRM is a joke, have a look at piratebay if you don't believe me.


Don't need to convince me about that. I hate DRM and I believe that any DRM or copy protection scheme will be broken, given enough time. And I extra hate it because we as consumers have to pay for the cuffs they put on our hands. And about breaking DRM/copy protection: that is why I like the pc platform, because it's a platform where we as a user are "still" free to do what we want. However, I am worried that in the future this might no longer be true either.

Yes they have sales on games but I already pointed out that they will sell games like Black Ops 2 at full retail price (without the disc or used sale rights) if they can get away with it. They also currently are under pricing pressure from consoles and do not exist in a completely locked market. If Sony and Microsoft go the same route then it's just a few steps away from these 3 companies having zero reason to lower prices. It will be just like with cable companies in locked markets that decide "going rates" of entertainment and there won't be a goddamn thing you can do about it except for turning it off.


But honestly... what if the major game publishers decide to higher prices? There's nothing we can do about it either.

I respect your opinion and admire your persistence. ;) But personally, I've given up resistance against Steam, because like I said, I think it works nicely and is easy to use. There are 2 games I wanted to play but at first didn't buy because of the always-on internet connection requirement: Driver San Francisco and Diablo 3. In the end, I got both as a present and ended up playing them anyway.

The only thing to my defense, is that I only buy games on (big) discount: if Steam can sell a majority of games at 75% off during sales periods, that means indeed that they must have big margins, and that means I'm not willing to pay full price and always delay buying until the sales period. And in my case, that means that I actually pay less per game than I would in retail stores.

Edited 2013-02-07 07:35 UTC

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