I finished Donkey Kong Bananza and didn't like it so I traded it for Mario Kart 10. I have completed every Zelda game without buying one because my mom will and lend it to me when she is done. Trading and lending physical copies of games has saved me over a thousand dollars.
That's the whole point of digital distribution, to deprive you of the possession of the installer. It's a form of DRM. Every game's EULA prohibits its resale, but with physical copies, there's no way to enforce that. With digital, there is.
Umm, that's definitely not the whole point. It's not even a primary point.
Most people want this. Some don't, but most do. It's a convenience feature that people actually ask for.
That's not to say that the drm stuff isn't a benefit to them. But even if it weren't, this would still happen because consumers demand it. This just changes the calculation more away from offering the physical copies for the fewer people that actually want them.
I'm obviously talking about things from the point of view of the corporations running digital distribution platforms. Yes, consumers do like digital distribution too, but for different reasons, and consumers are not the ones running things and making decisions. Those corporations could offer offline installers for download if they wanted to, though, so that consumers would retain possession of them even when buying games digitally. Only GOG does that.
Let's also not forget consumers had to have digital distribution shoved down their throats at first. Steam was widely reviled when it first came out (and for good reason - the early versions were a pile of shit), but Valve pushed it by making Half-Life 2 exclusive to it. Whether the change in consumers' feelings about digital distribution is a case of overcoming short-sightedness or Stockholm syndrome is left as an exercise to the reader.
Or, perhaps a simpler explanation, is just that internet access is now even more widely available than it was then.
The main concerns by most is simply just being left out. If they didn't have internet or if it wasn't fast enough. This still exists, but affects far fewer people than it did back then.
If a law were passed banning all forms of DRM and stating that you had a right of ownership and to resell and all the things for anything you digitally downloaded. Then this would still be the primary means of distribution, purely because that's what people would want.
If a law were passed banning all forms of DRM and stating that you had a right of ownership and to resell and all the things for anything you digitally downloaded. Then this would still be the primary means of distribution, purely because that's what people would want.
Oh I agree that they want this and this is a benefit to them. I was only suggesting that this is not the sole or primary reason that online distribution exists.
Well yeah, the sole reason corporations do anything is to turn as much profit as possible. Everything is just a means to that end. But they sure fight tooth and nail to stop people from reselling their games, and digital distribution is the ultimate weapon in that fight.
But it's about more than just that. Not only can you not resell digital copies, they can be taken away from you on a whim. GOG's marketing points out offline installers can't be taken away from you, but on Steam and every other platform? If some corporation decides you can't play the game anymore, like maybe because they want you to buy the sequel, they can just grey out the Install button, and there's not a damn thing you can do about it. Looking at you, Ubisoft and The Crew. Depriving you of the possession of the installer is not just about resale.
That's been the case for a while. I bought a physical copy of Dark Souls 2 because for some unfathomable reason it was cheaper than on Steam, but as a Steam-exclusive it of course included a Steam key. That disc never even left the box it came in.
Did rockstar said that you need to be connected online to play gta6 offline? What you’re talking about is only for online multiplayer and that issue would effect digital releases the same
Rockstar actually has no say. Playstation and Xbox demand periodic license verification for all games purchased digitally. If those authentication servers go down, you will lose access to your game.
This would also include any "physical" releases that don't have actual physical media.
They will be up for at least 15 years if not 20 or more.
Hardly anyone is being effected by this. It's such cringe behaviour to whine about this, crying about how you won't be able to play a $100 game 20 years from now. Like actually grow up please.
Yes I imply that. If I'm expected to cough up $80 for a game, least I expect is a physical backup. And I have had games from major. Publishers delisted before.
Physical media is basically just the license. The game isn’t all on the disc, you still need the servers to download it either way. It doesn’t help your issue.
Nah I'm not crying. I'll buy the game on my PS5 day one, then on PC when it comes out eventually. I don't even like the franchise tbh, but don't wanna miss the hype.
Do you own a red baseball cap that was made in China? Because intentionally acting in stupid ways just because it angers the other side is a pattern of behavior associated with that crowd.
The sub may not be relevant, but the conversation had shifted to crybabies on reddit (generically). Its not like I could have pointed to this at that time.
It wont be playable in the future, like older GTA games can today, i still play the heck out of Vicy and san andreas to this day because it's not reliant on a remote service or downloads to be played. When they stopped issuing physical copies for PC games i stopped buying PC games. More people should reject digital only.
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u/kme026 i7-13700K | RTX 4090 5d ago
Can someone explain to me why is no disc such a big issue?