What "threat" is being posed here? It's only a threat if they are saying that "Heavy Rain" didn't make a profit. That extra million sales is simply them looking at them and saying "wow, imagine the money we could have made if those people all bought the game new". Of course the flawed assumption here is that those people could have afforded the game new and would have bought the product. It's also assuming that the people who purchused the game new would have still done it if they couldn't have traded in the game.
This is pure greed, and there is no way to sympathize with it. The gaming industry is making billions of dollars, and has grown to the point it is at now largely because of a business model which has included things like game trade ins.
In general when a game company sells a product, they are promising to support it for the life of that product. Even the arguement about someone who didn't buy a game new demanding support doesn't hold any weight, since there is no differance between a guy who bought the game demanding support for 10 years or whatever, and a series of new users demanding the support over the same period of time.
The game industry might be able to deal with the used game market to some extent by lowering their prices and trying to make it up through volume sales, but that isn't an option from their greed-crazed perspective. In general we only hear about the industry saying "whelps, we really need to raise prices, increased development costs... which means increased demands for pay and perks from developers and producers, are leading to us to want more money to meet those needs. Bobby Kotick isn't content to just have one private Jet, he wants to have a fleet of private helicopters and support facilities in the major cities he regularly visits so he doesn't have to drive to meetings like a normal person and can show off... and that means we need to raise prices to meet that new goal".
I mean stop and think about that with the prices of video games. I'm all for capitalism but at the same time I think it can get ridiculous. Activision has been one of the companies spearheading more expensive games, and crying about rising development costs, but they have been making buckets of money. Bobby Kotick really does have a private jet, and was involved in a sex scandal (of sorts) with his personal stewardess. This is a guy who is involved in video games, not some real estate mogul or Rock Star or whatever... whenever you hear this "woe is us, we need more money" garbage keep that in mind.
Of course to be honest a good part of the problem is us gamers, as a group we do not have the willpower to just slam on the brakes and say "enough" while ceasing to buy overpriced games. If Bobby was to demand the price of the next "Call Of Duty" go up $10 so he actually could buy helicopter fleets (perhaps with bungee harnesses underneath because he can't bother to fly to meetings like a normal person in the seat), gamers would complain but still buy the game in unprecedented numbers saying "well, it's a good game". I think gamers need to look at the business practices and the overall problem and understand that something being a good game is not enough, and the prices, and gimmicks like going after used sales, and "project $10" garbage, and of course draconian DRM, are just going to get worse if people continue to spend the money.
While a side point, let's say you hate Ubisoft's DRM... the guy to blame for that kind of thing, and other companies supporting it, are those who bought their products while continueing to complain. "Assasin's Creed" made enough money to justify a continuation of the frachise and it's protaganist becoming increasingly iconic, this in spite of the DRM that everyone hated and complained about. Complaining, while you buy a product, does absolutly nothing, and leads to the industry figuring "ahh well, gamers will complain but do whatever we want and give us their money"... and be correct in that assessment. We're the ones who have been supporting "Project $10" gimmicks, always on DRM, and services like STEAM becoming absolutly nessicary to access our games.
