Sony Europe Boss Calls Digital Distribution "Overwhelming"

[Logan Westbrook]

Sony Europe Boss Calls Digital Distribution "Overwhelming"

Retail has existed for thousands of years, says SCE Europe head Andrew House, because it's so good at handling customers' needs.

Digital distribution is becoming an increasingly important part of the videogame industry, but House says it's got a lot of challenges to overcome before it stands a chance of rivalling bricks and mortar retailers.

House said that the reason that retail had existed for thousands of years was because it was it had a human component which was based on advising customers, and maybe even selling them extra items that they didn't know they wanted. He contrasted that with the experience of buying something digitally, which he said was impersonal, overwhelming and confusing. He said that until the browsing experience could be made more user friendly, there would still be a need for physical retailers.

You might make the case a slightly more legitimate reason that retail has done so well for so long is that it hasn't really had anything to challenge it until very recently, but that's really beside the point. What House is describing isn't a failure of digital distribution as a whole; it's a failure of specific distributors.

It's true you're not going to get the same amount of assistance online as you do in physical retail, but the likes of Steam or Xbox Live do their best to make up for it with an abundance of useful information like videos, screenshots, and even links to reviews. Obviously, some people will be more comfortable with buying things online than others, but the design of a particular online store can go a long way towards making the experience better or worse. It's in the interests of digital retailers to keep their stores as elegant as possible. If an online store is confusing or overwhelming, then it's probably losing customers.


Source: MCV [http://www.mcvuk.com/news/42206/Sony-Digital-retail-is-confusing]





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[DTWolfwood]

Never understood y everyone has to defend the existence of retail stores. Or y its relevant to ever compare the 2 methods of distribution. They both have their places and neither are going anywhere. <.<

 

[Exterminas]

Hahahahaha...

Oh wait, he seems to be serious.

When was the last time you met a competent person, selling electronics? I mean someone who could actually answer a question, more advanced than "So this thing works with electricy?"

When was the last time you could walk into a store and ask "Hi Sir, I liked Game X, this seems to be similar. Or is it more like game Y?" Or when you could ask: "I heard this game is a buggy piece of garbage. Is that true?"

There is a difference between helpful and competent advise and just trying to sell you more stuff. The latter one can be found everywhere, including digital distribution. The former however can be found nowhere, excecpt may be small basement shops that are about to be crushed under the game stop avalanche.

 

[Wicky_42]

Hahahahaha...

Oh wait, he seems to be serious.

When was the last time you met a competent person, selling electronics? I mean someone who could actually answer a question, more advanced than "So this thing works with electricy?"

When was the last time you could walk into a store and ask "Hi Sir, I liked Game X, this seems to be similar. Or is it more like game Y?" Or when you could ask: "I heard this game is a buggy piece of garbage. Is that true?"

I want to walk in to PC World and as them, "I was thinking of upgrading my old Nvidia GT9900 - what's going to give me the best bang for my buck? I'd like to stick with Nvidia, and I'm not looking for SLI or Crossfire or what have you, but I'm open to other brands if they're better at the same price range. Now, I do quite a bit of work in Maya - will a better GPU make any difference? How much difference does the card's memory make in gaming?" and see if they can do anything more than pick out boxes according to price.

I doubt it.

As for game, I've met a couple of game shop workers who games themselves, but at the end of the day they can't be telling you that a game you're interested in is bad cos then they start robbing themselves of sales (though the fuckers could have warned me about Earth 2160), and that's no way to stay employed. Then again, if they know games are bad then they should advise management to stock less of them and free up shelf space for the good ones, dammit!

 

[drbarno]

The advising part only applies to electronics like TV's and computers, and even then they weren't helpful, Especially when I was trying to get a laptop. I already found one I could easily get, but apprantely they were too busy trying to confirm the sale they could't answer any helpful questions.

At least with online shopping I can easily get second opinions via review sites and everything.

 

[Woodsey]

Retail is quickly becoming irrelevant when it comes to gaming, and this really isn't that true:

"Digital distribution is becoming an increasingly important part of the videogame industry, but House says it's got a lot of challenges to overcome before it stands a chance of rivalling bricks and mortar retailers."

Oh, you mean like Steam does already? And has been for the past few years?

 

[megs1120]

Hahahahaha...

Oh wait, he seems to be serious.

When was the last time you met a competent person, selling electronics? I mean someone who could actually answer a question, more advanced than "So this thing works with electricy?"

When was the last time you could walk into a store and ask "Hi Sir, I liked Game X, this seems to be similar. Or is it more like game Y?" Or when you could ask: "I heard this game is a buggy piece of garbage. Is that true?"

I want to walk in to PC World and as them, "I was thinking of upgrading my old Nvidia GT9900 - what's going to give me the best bang for my buck? I'd like to stick with Nvidia, and I'm not looking for SLI or Crossfire or what have you, but I'm open to other brands if they're better at the same price range. Now, I do quite a bit of work in Maya - will a better GPU make any difference? How much difference does the card's memory make in gaming?" and see if they can do anything more than pick out boxes according to price.

I doubt it.

As for game, I've met a couple of game shop workers who games themselves, but at the end of the day they can't be telling you that a game you're interested in is bad cos then they start robbing themselves of sales (though the fuckers could have warned me about Earth 2160), and that's no way to stay employed. Then again, if they know games are bad then they should advise management to stock less of them and free up shelf space for the good ones, dammit!

Hahaha, oh, man, that takes me back to the last time I shopped at Best Buy.

I was in the market for a 3d card and was considering a Voodoo 3 (which tells you how long it's been since I've stepped foot in a Best Buy) but asked if there was something else I might want to look at. The guy stares at me and says "Do your own research."

I ended up buying that Voodoo 3, from a different store.

 

[mjc0961]

The first thing Sony needs to overcome is making the damned Playstation Store update at the same time every week. The Xbox Live Marketplace updates at 5:00 AM EST on Tuesdays for DLC and Wednesdays for new games. The Nintendo stores even update at 12:00 PM EST every Monday. And yet the Playstation Store updates Tuesdays, but whenever the fuck the people at Sony get their thumbs out of their ass and put the updates up. Sometimes it's 5 PM, sometimes it's 10 PM. Terrible customer service! I've started buying all multiplatform games that are likely to get DLC for my 360 over my PS3 just because Microsoft doesn't put me through the ringer every time I want to buy something.

And no, I don't want to hear any excuses for Sony like the constantly lame "just wait until it's Wednesday to buy new stuff." The updates are on Tuesday, I should be able to get the stuff without trouble on Tuesdays. If Sony wants me to wait until Wednesday, they get the finger and I buy it from Microsoft on Tuesday instead. I mean come on, even Nintendo, the company that thought friend codes were a good idea, can do it. Why can't Sony?

 

[Tom Phoenix]

Retail is quickly becoming irrelevant when it comes to gaming, and this really isn't that true:

"Digital distribution is becoming an increasingly important part of the videogame industry, but House says it's got a lot of challenges to overcome before it stands a chance of rivalling bricks and mortar retailers."

Oh, you mean like Steam does already? And has been for the past few years?

Keep in mind that this only applies to certain countries, such as the US (and I think UK and Australia as well). In mainland Europe, for example, Steam isn't very competitive with retail due to it's awful pricing. The fact that retailers over here actually stock a decent amount of PC games doesn't help either. This is the reason why in countries such as France and Germany, DD represents a mere 15% of the PC gaming market.

Also, I disagree with the notion that retail is quickly becoming irrelevant. It might become irrelevant in 15, 20 years, but old habits die hard. Plus, not everyone is comfortable with forfeiting their ownership rights in exchange for convenience, especially with used game sales being at an all-time high.

 

[thedeathscythe]

I can understand his reasoning, but the people that work at the gamestops in my city don't recommend you anything. They don't say hi when you walk in, they glare at you while you look at the games, and then they seem like they're being inconvenienced when you buy a game and they have to get up from some box their sitting on behind the till. If digital distribution is "overwhelming", then physical retailers are "underwhelming". I go to different stores now; I mainly use this local game shop. But all in all, I could almost agree, but all 5 gamestops in my city have left me feeling like "I don't want to go back there.." and so I haven't.

 

[Jumplion]

I've said this time and time again, and I will keep saying it time and time again.

Digital Distribution will never completely overtake Physical Media. They can only compliment each other.

There are still many things that DD must overcome before it will ever be "common place", and I doubt that will happen for many, many years.

 

[microwaviblerabbit]

I agree with his statement that many digital distribution stores have a long way to go, and that they can be overwhelming, confusing or just poorly designed. However, I disagree with him about the experience of retailers versus buying online; most stores do not specialize in games, and even places that do rarely have any level of expertise.

Secondly, I think he ignores an interesting aspect of Digital Distribution - social networks. Services like steam or battle-net also serve as a social gathering, and the potential for interaction has only been lightly touched on. The success of facebook as a platform seems to be related to this interpersonal connection; wouldn't you be more likely to buy a game if your friends are playing it?

Additionally, games are one of the few products that don't require a physical presence. There is no downloading of apples or a box of cereal. All a game requires is a machine and a program, so the distribution method of games really is of personal taste.

I would argue the largest roadblock to digital distribution is the parity in cost between a downloaded game and a disk. If companies priced digital downloads at the level of used games, they would increase direct profits and combat used sales - killing two birds with one stone.

 

[airrazor7]

I wonder if digital distribution, or internet commerce as a whole, will grow to rival the likes of department store giants (ex: Wal-Mart) and specialty stores (ex: Gamestop)