GODDAMN IT EA!! NOT ANOTHER THING!!!

I would rather have hard copies of my games

kasrkin seath wrote:I would rather have hard copies of my games

Me too. Same with my Music.

TNine wrote:Finally, an actual point

A point I've already made several times in this thread.

TNine wrote:beyond "but i dun wanna pay EA for ther gamez!".

You mean "but i dun wanna pay EA for ther gamez that they was alredy paid for!" right?

TNine wrote:The gaming industry will adapt.

Adapt? Have you seen how the industry has adapted so far? There is a startling pattern within the industry. Publisher buys developer. Publisher fucks developer. Publisher discards developer like dirty whore and takes credit for developer's work. Publish profits, developer falls apart. And you think that by giving more power to the publishers, things will get better?!

TNine wrote:We still have Steam, which ironically does the exact same thing.

Hardly. While Steam does take away from game retailers, it does so as an alternative to game retailers. Steam does not make it impossible for game retailers to exist, because it is a game retailer. It ensures that game retailers have to keep their prices somewhat fair to compete with it.

TNine wrote:And i bet Steam-like distribution (downloading games online) will become more and more common, and i bet it will become the primary way of getting games in the next few years.

And I bet that everyone but Valve will ensure that their distribution mediums do not include third-party games that aren't guaranteed to profit, even if the games are awesome. It will be Double Fine Productions/Majesco but on a much larger scale. And as the publishers take more and more control, eventually Valve will fall, and the game industry will be defeated. And God, when that happens, I hope it just dies, because witnessing the industry stumbling around as an undead thing is surely far worse than at least having the consolation that at least it is in a better place.

Rotaratiblo wrote:

TNine wrote:beyond "but i dun wanna pay EA for ther gamez!".

You mean "but i dun wanna pay EA for ther gamez that they was alredy paid for!" right?

You are buying the game without EA recieving any kind of profit.

Rotaratiblo wrote:

TNine wrote:The gaming industry will adapt.

Adapt? Have you seen how the industry has adapted so far? There is a startling pattern within the industry. Publisher buys developer. Publisher fucks developer. Publisher discards developer like dirty whore and takes credit for developer's work. Publish profits, developer falls apart. And you think that by giving more power to the publishers, things will get better?!

Not the point, at all. I'm saying gamestop will still be there, cause games still need to be sold.

Rotaratiblo wrote:

TNine wrote:We still have Steam, which ironically does the exact same thing.

Hardly. While Steam does take away from game retailers, it does so as an alternative to game retailers. Steam does not make it impossible for game retailers to exist, because it is a game retailer. It ensures that game retailers have to keep their prices somewhat fair to compete with it.

But it is so painfully easy and much cheaper, the only real reason Steam isn't used is:
1.) People want hard copies, which, from what i can tell, is only a few people.
2.) Steam doesn't offer that many products.
3.) Steam is PC's only

I can't imagine Gamestop can compete with TF2 for $2.49 a pop.

Also, i don't know if you can consider steam a retailer, as it is not selling physical products. But i will not go down that path.

Rotaratiblo wrote:

TNine wrote:And i bet Steam-like distribution (downloading games online) will become more and more common, and i bet it will become the primary way of getting games in the next few years.

And I bet that everyone but Valve will ensure that their distribution mediums do not include third-party games that aren't guaranteed to profit, even if the games are awesome. It will be Double Fine Productions/Majesco but on a much larger scale. And as the publishers take more and more control, eventually Valve will fall, and the game industry will be defeated. And God, when that happens, I hope it just dies, because witnessing the industry stumbling around as an undead thing is surely far worse than at least having the consolation that at least it is in a better place.

1.) I can't see Valve falling, merely greedifying. They have a great lineup of awesome games and a large fanbase.
2.) The beauty with the online publishing is every game will profit (at least for the publishers). There is no reason to not support a game.

TNine wrote:You are buying the game without EA recieving any kind of profit.

Incorrect. EA has already profited from the game I am purchasing. I am buying a game that would otherwise be thrown away. And if this new policy spreads, that's what's going to happen to unwanted games: they'll be thrown away. EA was paid for one copy of the game, and that's exactly what they gave. It shouldn't matter who owns said copy, because at the end of the day, the number of copies on the market (piracy aside) do not exceed the number of copies EA received payment for.

TNine wrote:Not the point, at all. I'm saying gamestop will still be there, cause games still need to be sold.

Game retailers make jack shit right now. The only reason they're still alive is because they can buy used games for say $5 and then resell them for $35, making a $30 profit rather than the $5 profit they make on new games. The industry will adapt, yes. It will adapt so that game retailers go out of business and third party developers cease to be. The issue here is that you assume that adapt means "get better."

TNine wrote:But it is so painfully easy and much cheaper, the only real reason Steam isn't used is:
1.) People want hard copies, which, from what i can tell, is only a few people.
2.) Steam doesn't offer that many products.
3.) Steam is PC's only

And those are three BIG reasons. Frankly, the only two games I've bought over Steam are L4D and L4D2, and I regret not having hard copies. Also, people have doubts about putting their credit card information on the Internet. Not to mention that, without a credit card, no Steam purchases for you. And for some reason, there are quite a lot of people who loathe Steam.

TNine wrote:I can't imagine Gamestop can compete with TF2 for $2.49 a pop.

Neither can I. Thankfully, TF2 is $19.99 a pop, which is a price retailers can compete with. In fact, I'm pretty sure that GameStop's price for TF2 matches Steam's price.

TNine wrote:Also, i don't know if you can consider steam a retailer, as it is not selling physical products. But i will not go down that path.

I consider it a retailer because it is selling a product rather than a service. Whether this product can be physically held in my hand holds no relevance to whether or not it qualifies as a product.

TNine wrote:1.) I can't see Valve falling, merely greedifying. They have a great lineup of awesome games and a large fanbase.

And when the entire industry is controlled entirely by publishers, Valve will eventually be given an offer they can't refuse, bought by a publisher, and the rest is history.

TNine wrote:2.) The beauty with the online publishing is every game will profit (at least for the publishers). There is no reason to not support a game.

Every game already profits. EA is just ensuring that they don't have to support games for long by cutting out resale options. Furthermore, even with new games, the publishers already take the largest cut. They don't need extra profits. The fuckers are already the richest, greediest sons of bitches in the industry. If anything, we should be trying to help developers, but sadly, since most of the developers are now owned by publishers, publishers get to suck them dry anyway. I mean, fuck, the publishers profit even when the games don't sell, because the retailers effectively have to buy them at $45 a pop.

So imagine that a retailer buys 100 copies of 10 games. The various publishers (and developers, if they aren't owned by a publisher) of these games walk away with a total of $45,000. Now imagine two are best sellers, three are mediocre, and five are obscure. The best sellers sell out, the mediocre games sell fifty copies, and the obscure games sell twenty-five copies. The retailer just made $875. Now, the retailer buys some games back from people and resells them. Let's say they buy half of the best sellers a few months later at $5 each. They now have made $625. But now, imagine that half of these used games are resold at $35. They're total profit shoots up to $1,500. Now they can afford to pay their employees and maybe their utility bills.

See the problem? The publishers already take huge profits from these games. To demand that they make more profit every time the game is resold is absolute bullshit, and in my opinion, is bordering illegal.

i actually prefer the digital copies of games, since it means i'll have it forever. I don't need to keep track of discs or do the old school act of switching discs, because its all virtual.

EA feels they need to do this obviously becuase they release the same exact game year after year with minor tweeks. my friends still played NHL07 for a while. and usually whenever i'm going to buy a sports game i go to a retailer and buy a used year old copy.

its like going to a store, and seeing two T-shirts made of the exact samematerial. One is 10$ and the other is 20$. they look exactly the same and the same company made them. now who here would choose the 20$ option?

If EA didn't release the same exact Product every year, after year, after year, then they wouldn't be losing money in the used game market.

its like if apple invented a new phone. then roughly a month later they take the surplus, paint it a diffrent color and sold it with a slightly diffrent name, usually involving a number at the end of it at full price.

EA wont be able to stop the secondhand market. people will just get into the habit of creating a new account that goes with the card. or people will stop buying the game without the card, or people will stop buying EA games altogether and profit will fall becuase less people will want to buy EA games and then say 2k sports games will go up EA may notice the fall in sales.

not to mention what EA is doing is technically illegal, by driving what could be competing companies out of busniness they are violating economic law.

KristallNacht wrote:i actually prefer the digital copies of games, since it means i'll have it forever. I don't need to keep track of discs or do the old school act of switching discs, because its all virtual.

What if your hard drive crashes, or your computer is ruined by lightening (happened to me once)?

PiEdude wrote:

KristallNacht wrote:i actually prefer the digital copies of games, since it means i'll have it forever. I don't need to keep track of discs or do the old school act of switching discs, because its all virtual.

What if your hard drive crashes, or your computer is ruined by lightening (happened to me once)?

the beauty of steam is that if you buy it off of steam, it stays in your profile. Sure, you have to reinstall it again, but how is that any different than a hard copy? Besides, you can't ruin a digital copy like you can a hard copy.

That's the beauty of Steam. The copies are saved to an online profile. If your computer were to suddenly explode, you could buy a new one and download Steam and there would be all of your Steam games.

Rotaretilbo wrote:That's the beauty of Steam. The copies are saved to an online profile. If your computer were to suddenly explode, you could buy a new one and download Steam and there would be all of your Steam games.

thank you for saying exactly what I said with a different wording.

When I clicked Post Reply, your post wasn't there. :S

kasrkin seath wrote:I would rather have hard copies of my games

I don't really mind having hard copies or not.
I just prefer having a legitimate version, on disk or not. Just as a preference.

i hate hard CD keys, i always lose them and i am forced to steal them from my friends.

PiEdude wrote:

KristallNacht wrote:i actually prefer the digital copies of games, since it means i'll have it forever. I don't need to keep track of discs or do the old school act of switching discs, because its all virtual.

What if your hard drive crashes, or your computer is ruined by lightening (happened to me once)?

um, both XBL and Steam store your purchases on their multi backed up servers so your purchase is forever.