My thoughts on next generation gaming

[Gamerforlife]

I always sorta thought that RE4's gameplay would've suited the Dino Crisis series far better than the Resident Evil series.

Just imagine it...

I don't have to. I've played Dino Crisis 2

[RCBH928]

Exactly. It's all in their favor. Not the consumers.

But think about who else that impacts. Retailers. The consumer still has to buy the console from a retailer. But are retailers going to want to sell just consoles? They lose all the money they make on games. Brick and mortar stores are already losing money to digital content like music and streaming movies. Downloadable content is putting Blockbuster out of business.

.

Yeah, but who cares about retailers?
Think of it,
if I can sell directly to you , why should we care about what the middle man thinks?
more money to me and less expensive to you

[Jrecee]

Exactly. It's all in their favor. Not the consumers.

But think about who else that impacts. Retailers. The consumer still has to buy the console from a retailer. But are retailers going to want to sell just consoles? They lose all the money they make on games. Brick and mortar stores are already losing money to digital content like music and streaming movies. Downloadable content is putting Blockbuster out of business.

.

Yeah, but who cares about retailers?
Think of it,
if I can sell directly to you , why should we care about what the middle man thinks?
more money to me and less expensive to you

Except that's not how it works out. Retailers are in a constant battle with eachother to have the lowest prices, or the best sale. Typically when a new game comes out, I can find it on sale for $5 to $10 under msrp from Fry's. If the only place I can buy an Xbox game from is. . . the Xbox store, where's the incentive? If you take the retailers out, that's gone.

For example, I can download GTA IV for $30. Or I can buy a physical copy of it for. . . $30. Or I can buy a used copy for $20. And If I don't want it anymore, I can sell either one of those. The digital copy costs the same or more, and I'm stuck with it. Oh, and what happens 10 years from now when my Xbox stops working and microsoft is no longer hosting the hundreds of downloadable games they do today? How do I play that game again? That game I spent $30 on.

[RCBH928]

i don't know ,
I get the feeling that game prices will go down when they are downloadable
I really don't think they will be $60.

Maybe $40 for soft copy and $60 for a hard copy?

But I am wondering, with download there will never be over-stock
so will soft copies price ever go down?

[Jrecee]

i don't know ,
I get the feeling that game prices will go down when they are downloadable
I really don't think they will be $60.

Maybe $40 for soft copy and $60 for a hard copy?

But I am wondering, with download there will never be over-stock
so will soft copies price ever go down?

My question is why do you think the prices would go down? If every car company but Ford went out of business, do you think Ford would drop their prices? At best they'd stay the same.

If gamers prove that they're willing to pay the same amount for a digital copy as a hard copy (which by my gta IV example, they have) then why would Microsoft drop the prices?

[RCBH928]

because I got a feeling
that once things go digital

no one will see much point in buying a copy, because there is no physical part of it or a sense
of ownership. Customers won't justify paying the same $60.

You might pay full price, but as a whole, how many people are willing to do so?
they might was well get the real copy to resell it

[Jrecee]

And that's why things most likely won't go 100% digital.

[Limewater]

You might pay full price, but as a whole, how many people are willing to do so?
they might was well get the real copy to resell it

Where would they buy a real copy? I thought the point of this discussion was the idea of download-only. Remember cutting out the middle man?

[AppleQueso]

The fact that Steam games still cost just as much as boxed retail games kinda blows your argument up a bit I think. That's not how business works, you charge as much as you can get away with, nothing less.

[Flake]

I'd love to see someone take on the consoles, by creating a strict 2D console

shouldn't be too much of an effort, if you ask me

and it'd be hell of a lot cheaper than anything Microsoft or Sony throws at us

one can always dream, no?

I would be first in line to buy three of 'em. The anti-2D mentality of the 32-bit era has really come back to bite game design companies in the ass. They insisted to gamers that 3D was the only way to go...now they are stuck in a graphics war.

Meanwhile, I still just want to play Secret of Mana.