I like physical copies but cannot deny the convenience of digital downloads.

[Lufia Erim]

There is nothing i love more than looking at my bookshelf and seeing the wide arrangements of videogames i have purchased across the years.

That being said i cannot deny the convenience of purchasing a game via digital download. No need to disc swap, an entire library at my fingertips.

I was wondering if anyone else would like to have the best of both worlds. I would love to see retail box games with a digital download code , to be able to have my box all while having the convenience of being able to play my games without the disc.

Console MMOs already do this where the disc in the box comes with just then game client installer and a code to activatw your account ( example : Final fantasy 14).

Here are my questions:

a): do you prefer digital download or physical copies?

b)would you like the see physical copies of games with digital download codes inside.

C) do you think this is a good idea and will ot catch on?

Edit: im talking mostly about consoles because i don't think PC games have hardcopy releases anymore.

 

[Kingjackl]

Funnily enough, until I left Australia I would have said the opposite of the thread title. I like digital downloads, but I cannot deny the convenience of not having to wait 3 hours to download a video game off primitive internet connections. Mind you, in this day and age where boxed releases usually have 16GB of updates before you can start playing, there's less and less difference between the two.

 

[dohnut king]

Physical copies for consoles, at least until they come with decently sized hard drives. Downloads for my PC. I recently bought a new PC and res-installing games from Steam was a comparative breeze.

 

[tippy2k2]

To answer all three questions; whatever is cheapest

That's about all it matters to me. If the physical copy is cheaper, I will buy it. If the digital copy is cheaper, I will buy it. I will generally lean physical copies only because I can borrow them to friends and/or sell them but I have no real preference either way.

My guess is that a case that gives you a digital code would be more expensive but if it is the cheaper option, I would buy it.

 

[dyre]

I don't particularly care about physical copies, but I do like seeing the cover art for the game sometimes. One thing I like about Origin and UPlay (actually, literally the only thing I like about them) is that you can see your collection in cover art format, in a sort of "coin collection" presentation style (google image EA Origin UI or something if you're having trouble visualizing my crappy explanation). Whereas Steam just lists it in one giant sidebar, which is a bit impersonal.

 

[remnant_phoenix]

For me it's physical copies unless the game isn't available on such or unless the digital version is SUPER discounted compared to the physical. For example, I got the Mass Effect Trilogy (including all DLC) on a PSN Sale for $10 USD.

For me, it's the preservation/archival factor. In fact, I wrote a blog about this concept yesterday...

https://sethjamesblackburn.wordpress.com/2015/11/12/what-makes-a-classic/

 

[Mister K]

I personally was always torn between the reliability of physical copies and convinience of digital downloads. But the I discovered Good Old Games, where I buy a game and simply download an exe file(s), which I can copy on my hard drive, for example.

So, for me personally, the preffered versions of the games are (from best to worst):
- GOG digital
- Console physical
- Console/Steam digital.

 

[RJ 17]

Pretty much what the title says, actually: I personally much prefer having a physical copy. It gives me a stronger sense of ownership over the game that I just dropped $60 on.

And yet at the same time, the convenience of digital downloads cannot be denied. Yesterday I heard about how Starcraft II has a "starter edition" which is basically like a free glorified download. Now travel back 6 years, I was super-pumped for SC II...until I heard that they were splitting it into 3 games. At that point I said "Fuck that!" and refused to buy it. Now that Legacy of the Void is out, they've released a complete pack of all 3 "games" for $60. So I could have either spent $40 a pop to get the games new...or wait till they're all out and spend as much as a standard AAA game for what is, in my opinion, a now complete game (1 campaign per race = one complete SC game in my opinion...such was the original SC and BW).

Now in the present, I finally got to play SC by getting that Starter Edition. I enjoyed it so much that I went ahead and bought the complete pack. At the press of a button, I now have all 3 campaigns for SCII. Gotta say that's pretty sweet.

 

[Recusant]

This is a question you can easily find the answer to (no, not my answer, the answer): head over to your digital distributor of choice and see how much a copy of No One Lives Forever would cost. Or the Virgin Shuttle Simulator. Or Emperor of the Fading Suns. If I want to play any of them, I just break out my discs (or disks, as the case may be); if you want to play them, you're pretty much out of luck, unless you get lucky in a garage sale or have a fortune to blow on Ebay or the like. GOG is wonderful, don't get me wrong; I've got a sizable library of stuff from them on my account, and I'm sure other similar distributors will eventually spring up in its wake, but even if they have the will to cover everything, money and lawyers can easily make that irrelevant. If I wanted to rent a game, I'd do that. If I want to buy it, I'll buy it.

And all the fancy PDFs and JPEGs you may have still aren't as cool as the 2'x3' quick-reference chart that hangs behind my computer.

 

[Zipa]

For PC I prefer a download over a physical copy, though a lot of the time there is no choice in it anyway as a lot of disks nowadays just link the game to Steam anyway. I do prefer to use GOG though wherever possible because I like to support DRM free. The other bonus is that I don't have to worry about storing and organising 294 different physical games.

For console I prefer a physical disk, mostly because digital downloads are often more expensive than a disk for some strange reason.

There is also the other issue that a lot of older games on a physical disk just don't work on modern PCs any more, leaving you little choice but to hope GOG have a copy they have modernised so you can play it again. That is one point in favour of consoles here, as long as the console functions and the physical media is in good condition then you don't have to worry about technology making them unplayable.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I prefer physical copies. They just seem more reliable to me.

 

[stroopwafel]

b) Nope, considering those download codes are reliant on servers that might not exist in the future I'd like to be able to play my game in 30 years please.

In an age in which games come with day 1 patches you can ask what that's really worth. If the servers that host the patches go down you're basically left with the incomplete code on the disc. Either way pretty much every game is reliant on server support nowadays.

Modern games have absolutely zero collectors value with their flimsy boxes and lack of manual. The packaging for cheap chocolates have more effort put into it. Add the fact that the disc itself hosts an inferior game without the patches and really..the difference between 'physical' and 'digital' have become non-existent.

For new releases I still have a fair amount of physical copies but that is only because for some weird reason the digital version is always a standard 10 euros more expensive(well that and physical copies often tend to ship a few days earlier than the official release date. )

 

[Something Amyss]

I was wondering if anyone else would like to have the best of both worlds. I would love to see retail box games with a digital download code , to be able to have my box all while having the convenience of being able to play my games without the disc.

I've been suggesting this since the last gen's " Project 5 dollar" and the Xbone's proposed install setup were things. We already see this with movies and sometimes with music. More on that in my answers, though.

a): do you prefer digital download or physical copies?

I prefer physical except in one important category: real estate. I live in a small apartment and too many boxes aren't going to help. So I go mostly digital.

b)would you like the see physical copies of games with digital download codes inside.

Yes.

C) do you think this is a good idea and will ot catch on?

Short answer: No.

Long answer: Not until there is some incentive to do so. Movies do it to incentivise buyers, because sales are down. As much as game companies have bemoaned how they need to make money, games are still fantastic sellers and people are going to buy them. People will even buy digital at full retail price, undercutting one of the main advantages of the medium. Hell, people are willing to buy limited edition digital content.

 

[Hairless Mammoth]

a) I prefer physical when it comes to consoles. The space limitations are one thing, but the whole account system and server issue is another. Sales and discounts are much more common with brick and mortar stores, as well.

One day, they will shut down the download servers to old systems. That might not matter if you have all of your games to a obsolete system on its HDD, but what happens when the HDD or the whole console goes out. You can't just buy a used console from somewhere and pop the HDD in that one and expect it to allow you access to your games. The companies also have limits on how many console can have a game without being connected online, or deleting a game's license off a console. (I have a dead and lost PSP on my Sony account, with a couple games linked to it. With my working PSP, I only have a couple slots left. I think you are allowed only one game download per PS3/PS4.) Customer service might work with you to get things working on a replacement system, but that could be a big hassle and might require shipping the broke console to them or something.

Also, used games/trade-ins/lending a game to friends and family. Harder or impossible to do with digital downloads.

At least on PC the distribution companies are usually more lenient on multiple systems, and I would even trust Origin and Uplay to still host ollder games.

b) Buying a physical copy that is just a download code negates the whole point of a physical copy, that download the code redeems will still be permanently linked to your account and will have to be redownloaded again if the game is deleted. The only exceptions to that are if the physical code is offered somewhere at a lower price than the online store's price or the physical code comes with some collectible. I don't see any point beyond those two exceptions.

And there's no way most publishers will let you run a game installed from a disc to the HDD without that disc in the drive, not without going back to the draconian terror the xbone almost unleashed. That means we won't ever see a concept like that "digital copy" stuff that Some Blu Rays and DVDs come with.

c) People who want digital downloads want the game preloaded and ready to go right at launch or at least don't want to go out to the store to hunt a copy down. Why bother when the game will be downloaded either way? Fans of physical copies want a disc and the benefits that come with those. We might find a system that combines the pros and cons of each someday, but I don't see it happening soon.

 

[Gennadios]

That's all I've seen on the PC shelf at Gamestop recently, the few times I could be bothered to go recently.

Eventually everyone on the fence about digital downloads hits the point where they wonder what the point of driving for 40 minutes to a game store is when they can just spend the hour downloading a game.

The only really logical reason for hardcopies nowadays is the few people that still live outside of broadband areas.

 

[Vigormortis]

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Why even create a distinction between physical and digital?

Every single digital game I've purchased on Steam or GoG is stored either on a storage harddrive or a physical DVD, or both. Whenever I purchase a game from one of those storefronts I immediately download it and proceed to create a backup of it on an external/internal harddrive or burn the files to a disc. Hell, Steam even has an in-built utility for making backups of your games.

This way, regardless of whether I have internet access or not, or even if either respective service becomes unavailable for some reason, I will always have a physical copy of the game.

Honestly, I've never understood the desire to view digital downloads and physical copies as vastly different entities. With the tiniest of effort you can have all the benefits of digital downloads and all the reliability of physical ownership.

:/

 

[Keoul]

a): I prefer physical copies, granted I don't have that many but if they were affordable I'd have a lot more. Plus I like being able to share games with my friends like I did as a kid, just lending them a few ps2 games or whatever. It's the freedom to do what I want with the game that I enjoy, plus like you said, having the box there is pretty nifty.

b)Hell no, I would just buy the game online if that was the case, why the hell am I paying full retail physical copy price for a box with a code in it? If my lust for boxes were that extreme I'd go buy empty boxes in bulk and print out box art covers myself.

C) I think it's a terrible idea but it will catch on which is pretty stupid in my opinion but whatevs, they can do whatever I'll just not take part.

 

[DoPo]

but what happens when the HDD or the whole console goes out.

Erm, what happens if a disk gets scratched beyond readability or it breaks? How is it that only DD is in threat of your game never being playable again, yet a physical copy is seemingly immune to this fate?