Still doesn’t really answer the question? You used to be able to resell computer games on disc and they took it away. Yet I never really saw the outrage.
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Microsoft also shut down departments dedicated to bringing Xbox games to physical retail
- Thread starter HeisenbergFX4
- Start date
Evil Calvin
Afraid of Boobs
Goddammit MS....what is your fucking problem?
Sethbacca
Member
PC has multiple marketplaces and constant sales making it less of a risk.
killatopak
Gold Member
Because the alternative was developers abandoning the PC platform. Steam saved PC gaming.
Mr Moose
Member
What kind of dumb logic is this?
Fortuneelsewhere
Member
All publishers are pushing for digital. The margins are much higher and with the costs of development getting ridiculous high an all digital future is inevitable…
Even Sony will follow trough in due time…
Even Sony will follow trough in due time…
Rocco Schiavone
Member
HeWhoWalks
Gold Member
Basically.
GHG
Gold Member
Considering how dominant physical sales still are in Japan (and in some areas of Europe), no fucking chance.
Coincidentally those are two markets where Xbox has little to no presence.
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Punished Miku
Member
I think Nintendo is the most likely to stick with physical for one more gen.
Wizz-Art
Member
Because they use a SD card with the complete game on it.
But buying a disc which acts like a key to download most of the game, nah. I'm good it's 2024.
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ManaByte
Gold Member
Nintendo never will because much of their profit comes from the proprietary format they control for all their consoles.
Power Pro
Member
While a lot of this is just a big joke to some people, I am honestly pretty sad by a lot of this news. All I wanted was for Xbox to do better. As a piece of hardware, I've loved my Series X...but seeing all this crap go down, it just makes me worried what's gonna happen with the platform going forward. Sure I have a lot of games on Switch, and PS already...but I've also invested a lot into the Xbox ecosystem.
This all just feels so bizarre also after the Activision Blizzard deal...why buy it if they're just gonna reduce their market presence.
This all just feels so bizarre also after the Activision Blizzard deal...why buy it if they're just gonna reduce their market presence.
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GHG
Gold Member
My favourite defence is the one where a false equivalence is made to the PC digital market.
It's easy to tell who has no experience on the platform and doesn't understand the key differences.
bitbydeath
Gold Member
It’s not in the plans.
Vol5
Member
Fuck this. If Sony / Nintendo go all digital it's the day I quit gaming on consoles. I'm not being bent over a barrel to pay their fucking ludicrous prices on their storefront or pay for subscription to get a few £'s off.
We'll be here in 5 years paying silly amounts for games via their storefronts and thinking to ourselves how we let it happen.
I'm just hopeful that Nintendo / Sony are still seeing strong physical sales and this move from MS is simply because they aren't selling games anymore or going the publisher route.
Edit: anyone saying "it's inevitable" is a mouthpiece for these companies and something they actively work towards pushing into the mainstream.
We'll be here in 5 years paying silly amounts for games via their storefronts and thinking to ourselves how we let it happen.
I'm just hopeful that Nintendo / Sony are still seeing strong physical sales and this move from MS is simply because they aren't selling games anymore or going the publisher route.
Edit: anyone saying "it's inevitable" is a mouthpiece for these companies and something they actively work towards pushing into the mainstream.
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LavitzSlambert
Member
Bro do you even know Nintendo? They are candidate #1 to go digital, sub-only, and take the Disney vault approach to their games. The only reason they haven't done so is because they're bad at tech, and traditionally they have stuck to their core competencies as a "toy maker". It's clear they are modernizing their company and as they get further into other forms of media and expand their brand, I would not be surprised if they try to force digital-only games.
F0rneus
Tears in the rain
I really hope so. And I'm all physical on Switch and would love BC on the next console.
Papa_Wisdom
Member
With the inevitability that 360, ps3, PS4 emulation will reach levels of maturity where you can play all games from those generations on pc. Ms and Sony’s pc push I see no reason In the not too distant future to own any console anymore tbh. The amount I would save having to buy the systems and pay to play online and subscriptions I may just save up and buy a decent pc. Not bothered about it been absolute cutting edge.
The only thing I’d like is to be in a decent form factor like the Alienware alpha r2 etc.
The only thing I’d like is to be in a decent form factor like the Alienware alpha r2 etc.
reinking
Gold Member
This might be a case that Windows and Office became too big to fail.
Sanepar
Member
If they have the option to at least buy the game I'm fine. But MS doesn't want u owning the license from anything. They want u restrict to rent.
GHG
Gold Member
If they have physical BC I'm all in on day one for whatever they have coming next. Pretty much all my switch games are physical since purchasing the switch last year.
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TransTrender
Gold Member
Yup, it's a value thing.
No physical = no value. $15 is the best I can do.
I pay for and download digital music, but with this I have backups in case whomever goes tits up, and it's easy to proliferate across my devices without logins and other bullshit.
I don't engage with key resellers.
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Killjoy-NL
Member
They can't even compete in the US/UK.
Luigi Mario
Member
There isn't any logic to it, just wishful thinking on his part.
Topher
Gold Member
There wasn't really any "they" making decisions for the entirety of the PC platform. PC is completely open so publishers can do what they want. Piracy was a factor and so PC game publishers were constantly seeking better ways of fighting it. Eventually Steam became the default solution to many issues in the PC gaming space. There was no outrage because there was no one company making all the decisions. The market simply moved in that direction on its own.
Punished Miku
Member
I mean, I buy tons. If they restrict buying, I'm not for that. Currently, they invest more into preserving BC than Sony or Nintendo. Xbox owners didn't have to rebuy Red Dead 1 because it's still there and still works. They spent money on making it still work. I can only go off what I see currently. So far, it's all there for purchase and they have frequent deep sales like Sony used to last gen. Just got Gear 4 a couple months ago for $5 digitally.
Currently Nintendo is the main one restricting buying with Nintendo Online BC games. Every BC game is sub only on Switch right now.
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ManaByte
Gold Member
Do you know Nintendo? I don’t think so.
The only reason the PlayStation even exists is because Nintendo so obsessively controls and protects their proprietary formats that Yamauchi killed the deal with Sony when Sony wanted to control the Super-CD games.
Nintendo has ALWAYS created a proprietary format that they 100% own and control so they can tax third parties for the right to publish a game on their console. Even the Wii and Wii U used a proprietary disc format Nintendo created.
reinking
Gold Member
Sony and Nintendo are not going to let the third place console maker force them into a bad decision. They will only go there when the market demands it. I believe Nintendo (Maybe Sony too) are getting closer to the 50% range. Even if it hits 50%, that is not enough to risk alienating half of your customers.
March Climber
Member
The people answering "because PC has more sales" haven't looked at console sales in years so they don't know that times have changed since mid-PS4/XBO gen. Literally every month there's a new run of sales on console storefronts. So that's not the real answer.
The real answer (that actually only matters for PS and Nintendo), which is: Where would their digital games go if they left the console business?
They're against digital because they don't trust these companies to do the right thing in regards to their libraries and licenses.
However, the real problem here is the volatility of the console business, not physical vs digital or the out of touch 'sales' answer. Steam will arguably live on even after everyone here dies of old age. All it takes is one or two bad generations for Nintendo and Sony to leave and you're left holding onto a digital library you potentially can't access.
That's their problem.
Now what the physical owners don't understand is that they've already lost this war. Quite a few discs this gen are just day 1 download queue coasters that people will convince themselves is a real copy of the game on disc, and not just a key with half of the necessary data/broken game on it with the other half being in that initial huge patch.
Killjoy-NL
Member
It's already retarded to think the crashing and burning company in third place is somehow ahead of the curve and knows the industry better than the two dominating companies that have been trashing them for a long time.
rodrigolfp
Haptic Gamepads 4 Life
Another reason is on PC you can get the games back one way or another once the original store is gone/fuck us. The community preserves it. On consoles you lose the game, if the console is not hacked. That is why I bought a digital console game once. Once.
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Frwrd
Member
chromatic9
Member
That's tough for the ABK customer support team, their reward for doing a good job and reputation is to be fired and have their jobs done abroad. Well done to the cheerleaders I guess.
Larivel
Member
Now you can attach a disc drive to a previously digital-only console, and I would argue that it is even better for the future of physical copies than what we had at launch. Before when you bought a digital PS5, you were locked to the PS Store.
Jigsaah
Gold Member
I complain about not having the option to buy physical, but 95% of my video game purchases are digital as a PC Main. Last physical game I bought was Breath of the Wild.
I don't know if I have the moral ground to complain. I still say it sucks, but I'm a hypocrite if I lean too much into this.
Sorry guys.
I don't know if I have the moral ground to complain. I still say it sucks, but I'm a hypocrite if I lean too much into this.
Sorry guys.
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Fbh
Member
Is this really surprising?
The most popular SKU of their console is digital only
The refresh of the Series X is reportedly digital only
Their core strategy moving forward is Gamepass: A subscription for digital only games.
I actually remember people weren't really thrilled about Steam at first.
Either way I think digital on PC and consoles is different.
-PC is an open platform which allows multiple stores to exist as well key resellers. On console digital only means being locked into a single store monopoly.
-PC is essentially an evergreen platform with a good track record of forward compatibility for software. Even if you upgrade your hardware you take your entire digital library with you over time. On console we can expect backward compatibility moving forward but it's never guaranteed. The digital PC games you bought in 2010 are still easily playable on your current computer (for the most part), a lot of the digital games you bought for Ps3 are locked to it.
-Even with the recent increases in places like Argentina and Turkey, digital games on PC often still offer good regional pricing in developing countries. Meanwhile in my country PSN games are often around 15% more expensive than physical ones.
- I think to some people piracy sort of works as a fallback plan. If for some reason your digital PC copy of Elden Ring or Cyberpunk gets taken away from you it's fairly easy to go get an "alternative" version. If your digital copy of Elden Ring on Ps5/SX gets taken away from your for some reason there's nothing much to do.
Additionally PC games used to be cheap as fuck compared to console games. PC games often launched cheaper than their console version and went on sale really fast (those old Steam sales were pretty insane) which helped people be more accepting of the digital only format. Meanwhile digital console games are often still more expensive than their physical version (specially in regards to sales and price drops).
The most popular SKU of their console is digital only
The refresh of the Series X is reportedly digital only
Their core strategy moving forward is Gamepass: A subscription for digital only games.
I actually remember people weren't really thrilled about Steam at first.
Either way I think digital on PC and consoles is different.
-PC is an open platform which allows multiple stores to exist as well key resellers. On console digital only means being locked into a single store monopoly.
-PC is essentially an evergreen platform with a good track record of forward compatibility for software. Even if you upgrade your hardware you take your entire digital library with you over time. On console we can expect backward compatibility moving forward but it's never guaranteed. The digital PC games you bought in 2010 are still easily playable on your current computer (for the most part), a lot of the digital games you bought for Ps3 are locked to it.
-Even with the recent increases in places like Argentina and Turkey, digital games on PC often still offer good regional pricing in developing countries. Meanwhile in my country PSN games are often around 15% more expensive than physical ones.
- I think to some people piracy sort of works as a fallback plan. If for some reason your digital PC copy of Elden Ring or Cyberpunk gets taken away from you it's fairly easy to go get an "alternative" version. If your digital copy of Elden Ring on Ps5/SX gets taken away from your for some reason there's nothing much to do.
Additionally PC games used to be cheap as fuck compared to console games. PC games often launched cheaper than their console version and went on sale really fast (those old Steam sales were pretty insane) which helped people be more accepting of the digital only format. Meanwhile digital console games are often still more expensive than their physical version (specially in regards to sales and price drops).
Dorfdad
Gold Member
2024 is the year of digital.. Microsoft already showed this in leaks And Sony is doing the same but with a slower pace as they are releasing only new Digital consoles with optical drive add-ons as a stop gap.
Expect PS6 / NextBox to be dominated by digital sales and streaming.
Physical media's days are numbered. Fight all you want it won't change the future.
Expect PS6 / NextBox to be dominated by digital sales and streaming.
Physical media's days are numbered. Fight all you want it won't change the future.
S0ULZB0URNE
Member
You meant spending billions.Cutting jobs... after making billions in acquisitions.
graywolf323
Member
I have a Series X and I’ve been all-digital since the end of the 360/PS3 gen, that doesn’t mean I can’t recognize this is a bad thing
the same damn thing happened when Microsoft announced the Xbox One DRM plans, we had a lot of people defending it saying Sony was going to do the same thing at E3, just wait & see
the ‘evangelists’ haven’t changed their tune at all in the past decade
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