Rage Cuts Single-Player When You Buy It Used

[Thyunda]

I like how everybody is reading this and then throwing their keyboards on the ground in disgust. How dare a developer expect to make money off their own product?! This is extortion! If I want to exclusively support retailers who make money where developers don't, the developer should go out of their way to cater to me!

Come on. Drop the attitude. I don't see anything wrong with this. At all. At the end of the day, you're losing practically nothing. It's an add-on. Almost a DLC. You want to buy a game at a fraction of the cost, be grateful you're not even losing a fraction of the full game. You're just getting 100%, whereas the new-copy buyers are getting 110%.
You want the extras - bloody pay for them. Stop whining. It's pathetic.

I thought like that not too long ago. Then something hit me: only triple-AAA publishers are being dicks about this. You know, the ones who stand to make the most money. You don't see publishers like NIS and Atlus pulling this crap and they stand to benefit the most from a system like this because their sales are already going to be very low. Any profit for them is good. So this is just basic greed.

I don't see how it is greed if you're asking for a fair cut of the profits from something you devoted a lot of time and money to.
And the reason why only Triple-A publishers are doing this is because they're the only ones who can really stand to lose as much from making games. They have more money, they put more money in. If they start getting less money back, they'll be suffering bigger losses than a smaller company. A corporate giant can collapse faster than a corner shop once it gets hit.

Here is the thing: they were paid. Someone bought the game. Now they want to get paid a second time.

Really - it doesn't sound bad. You don't have to be online all the time, you just have to enter a series key once and that's that.

I'm going to say you people are whiners and leave it at that.

One problem: I don't have LIVE (I can't get it to work). So even if I buy it new, I still get locked out of content. I imagine that I'm not the only one. Fun.

No. They want to get paid for each customer that buys their game. Every time somebody buys a used copy, it's been chosen over a new copy. Therefore, the developer has lost out.

But, your second issue is a legitimate problem, and I won't try to argue with it. There needs to be a more convenient way of doing this.

I don't see their problem. Used things are bought all of the time. What makes their product special? And it is faulty to assume that "used game sale=one lost sale". There are people who wouldn't have ever bought it new anyway. But say they trade in a game and a used copy is sitting there and they have store credit. And it can be annoying. I couldn't activate Shale in DA:O or Kasumi and Zaheed in ME2 because I couldn't get online to activate the codes that I paid for.

Hah. You highlighted your own flaw. If these people buying it used would never have bought it new, they clearly don't care for what the full price would have offered. They're not looking to get the 110% RAGE experience, they're looking for a cheap FPS to pass the time. So, the developers allow these people this cheap FPS to pass the time, but for these RAGE 'fans', they can either pay the full price or not get the bonuses.

 

[bombadilillo]

This always fucks people like me who rent games first. Especially on a new IP. I've been burned too much to buy blind. So I will honestly still rent it and specifically not buy it in protest to this crap.

Used game sales exist because people bought your game and immediately sold it because it sucked.

 

[Joseph Alexander]

in 20 years that entire game will be legal abandonware.

ment to quote someone.

 

[RedEyesBlackGamer]

I like how everybody is reading this and then throwing their keyboards on the ground in disgust. How dare a developer expect to make money off their own product?! This is extortion! If I want to exclusively support retailers who make money where developers don't, the developer should go out of their way to cater to me!

Come on. Drop the attitude. I don't see anything wrong with this. At all. At the end of the day, you're losing practically nothing. It's an add-on. Almost a DLC. You want to buy a game at a fraction of the cost, be grateful you're not even losing a fraction of the full game. You're just getting 100%, whereas the new-copy buyers are getting 110%.
You want the extras - bloody pay for them. Stop whining. It's pathetic.

I thought like that not too long ago. Then something hit me: only triple-AAA publishers are being dicks about this. You know, the ones who stand to make the most money. You don't see publishers like NIS and Atlus pulling this crap and they stand to benefit the most from a system like this because their sales are already going to be very low. Any profit for them is good. So this is just basic greed.

I don't see how it is greed if you're asking for a fair cut of the profits from something you devoted a lot of time and money to.
And the reason why only Triple-A publishers are doing this is because they're the only ones who can really stand to lose as much from making games. They have more money, they put more money in. If they start getting less money back, they'll be suffering bigger losses than a smaller company. A corporate giant can collapse faster than a corner shop once it gets hit.

Here is the thing: they were paid. Someone bought the game. Now they want to get paid a second time.

Really - it doesn't sound bad. You don't have to be online all the time, you just have to enter a series key once and that's that.

I'm going to say you people are whiners and leave it at that.

One problem: I don't have LIVE (I can't get it to work). So even if I buy it new, I still get locked out of content. I imagine that I'm not the only one. Fun.

No. They want to get paid for each customer that buys their game. Every time somebody buys a used copy, it's been chosen over a new copy. Therefore, the developer has lost out.

But, your second issue is a legitimate problem, and I won't try to argue with it. There needs to be a more convenient way of doing this.

I don't see their problem. Used things are bought all of the time. What makes their product special? And it is faulty to assume that "used game sale=one lost sale". There are people who wouldn't have ever bought it new anyway. But say they trade in a game and a used copy is sitting there and they have store credit. And it can be annoying. I couldn't activate Shale in DA:O or Kasumi and Zaheed in ME2 because I couldn't get online to activate the codes that I paid for.

Hah. You highlighted your own flaw. If these people buying it used would never have bought it new, they clearly don't care for what the full price would have offered. They're not looking to get the 110% RAGE experience, they're looking for a cheap FPS to pass the time. So, the developers allow these people this cheap FPS to pass the time, but for these RAGE 'fans', they can either pay the full price or not get the bonuses.

Cutting content is still a douche move. I don't see how they can justify that. We are going to have to agree to disagree.

 

[Treblaine]

Wait... so game developers wanting to stop piracy is okay, but them wanting to hamper the used sales market, which some studios have claimed to be just as damaging to them as piracy if not more so, is BAD?

What the fuck?

Is buying clothes from goodwill the same as shoplifting? Is buying a used car the same as stealing one?

Well why the hell do you think cloths are stitched so lightly to fall apart after a few years? That car companies deign their cars to only last a few years before they fall apart? Or with cars need a constant supply of expensive proprietary replacement parts every service?

Jeremy Clarkson did an experiment, bought a second hand sports car for cheaper than a family car and declared he'd beaten the system. Then a week later a part broke and the only replacement cost: £2'200 putting his 2nd hand car WAY more expensive than the new family car.

Games have a much faster cycle than they could possibly expect DVDs to dissolve from use, so they find other ways.

You want shoes that will last? You have to pay through the nose.

You want a car that will last, you have to shop around and get the right guarantees.

My main worry is 20 years from now. When people look back at this era and a copy of Rage sells in some auction, will they still be able to track down the DLC to unlock the whole game? Or will that be lost... forever. XBL won't last forever to keep giving timely updates.

Rage is a big name game, but when everyone begins doing it I guarantee the hidden gems will suffer in the long run.

 

[Stealthygamer]

But what about Rentals? Will there be special rental copies with this section intact?

 

[NLS]

they should at least release a demo and I think I,m the only one who agrees with this plan.
PS
unless this requires a 24/7 internet connection (which is utter BS) I get one-time activations but 24/7 is annoying resulting in a HUGE piracy backlash.

since I,m primarily a PC gamer I might get the PC version that is probably going to use Steam making this not a big deal for me.

PPS
if you want consumers to buy your game new add a OST and kick ass poster with every new copy reward the consumer don,t punish them!

Wait a second. Bethesda are rewarding their consumers by giving them the full game. The only ones who are "punished" by this are the ones by are not per definition customers of id software. The original customers are not punished in any way.

 

[sunami88]

When asked about the section that would be cut for aftermarket buyers, Willits said, "[M]ost people never even see it. I can tell you, some people will buy Rage, download that, and still never set foot in those things. They just won't. I think that's fair. It's cool. It's outside the main path. We're not detracting from anything. But I know some consumers, when you can't avoid it, then you get a little touchy subject."
(snips made, emphasis mine)

What the hell is he talking about? "It's cool, we're removing part of the game for some customers. But we're not taking anything away. Except for the part I just said. But it's cool! It's not at all mainstream!".

How disingenuous.

 

[Floppertje]

this guy makes no sense.
first he pulls a dick move by locking part of the game for people who buy it used, which I'm assuming is a new and interesting take on reskinned enemies in the same sewer level we've seen in pretty much every shooter ever made and then he downplays the same dick-move by saying that it doesn't really matter anyway because most people aren't even going to see it in the first place. does he even know what he wants? (I'm gonna take a wild guess and say: money)

 

[DataSnake]

Wait a second. Bethesda are rewarding their consumers by giving them the full game. The only ones who are "punished" by this are the ones by are not per definition customers of id software. The original customers are not punished in any way.

Not exactly. "you pay for a game, you get the game" isn't a REWARD, it's how things SHOULD BE.
"You pay for a game, you get part of the game" is a punishment. "You pay for the game, you get the game, the soundtrack, AND a cool poster" is a reward.

 

[Fewell]

As Bethesda is involved, I wish they'd lock the bugs out of used copies instead.
I don't get this at all. The devs got paid when the copy was bought new. They let it out of their hands for a price they were willing to accept and now its gone. It belongs to someone else now. Oh, they just sold the license. Why, because they said so? A game disc sure as shit looks like a product to me. Don't like it, sell digital downloads only and you can stop whining about the used-game market.
Never got the online-pass thing either. The argument I saw most when this was new that the developers/publishers pay out for servers and the like and don't get anything in return. That's just bullshit, what you get is that more than ten people will buy your game. Try and pitch an offline shooter or sports game to a large publisher. What do you get for your server costs? You get to compete in a world with online gaming.

 

[DataSnake]

Never got the online-pass thing either. The argument I saw most when this was new that the developers/publishers pay out for servers and the like and don't get anything in return. That's just bullshit, what you get is that more than ten people will buy your game. Try and pitch an offline shooter or sports game to a large publisher. What do you get for your server costs? You get to compete in a world with online gaming.

Another point on that one: when someone buys a used copy, someone else must have sold it. Say a game sells 10,000 copies. Then 2,000 of those buyers sell the games to someone else. The total number of people using the developers' servers is still 10,000, EXACTLY THE SAME AS THE NUMBER OF COPIES THEY WERE PAID FOR!

 

[Appleshampoo]

To all the people who are saying things along the lines of - 'Oh, shut up and buy it new, the companies are suffering and this will be the best generic shooter ever made blah blah' think of it like this -

This is the FIRST instance of something like this happening, right? The single player being cut to prevent used sales I mean.

Now, if the used sales they hate SO much that they need to take part of the game away in an attempt to grab more money, then why didn't they go bankrupt years ago? How is it these companies who are apparently being damaged so much by this used market are able to release game after game after game with no sign of even slowing to take a pee break?

Yes, used sales hurt their profits a little, but when's the last time you saw one of the companies who are trying to cut used games out file for bankruptcy?

Also, what the fuck is this RAGE game anyway. Saw a few ads, looks like Modern warfare after half the cast got hit by napalm.

 

[RobfromtheGulag]

As always, buying PC games isn't easy if you're in the market for used copies. So this doesn't affect me.

However I've no doubt the pirates will find a way around it anyway. They always do.

 

[Wintermoot]

they should at least release a demo and I think I,m the only one who agrees with this plan.
PS
unless this requires a 24/7 internet connection (which is utter BS) I get one-time activations but 24/7 is annoying resulting in a HUGE piracy backlash.

since I,m primarily a PC gamer I might get the PC version that is probably going to use Steam making this not a big deal for me.

PPS
if you want consumers to buy your game new add a OST and kick ass poster with every new copy reward the consumer don,t punish them!

Wait a second. Bethesda are rewarding their consumers by giving them the full game. The only ones who are "punished" by this are the ones by are not per definition customers of id software. The original customers are not punished in any way.

I consider the requirement of having a 24/7 internet connection a punishment also let,s say your system breaks down you would need to re-buy the game /DLC to play the SP Steam has the possibility of being activated on a infinite amount of computers.

 

[NLS]

Wait a second. Bethesda are rewarding their consumers by giving them the full game. The only ones who are "punished" by this are the ones by are not per definition customers of id software. The original customers are not punished in any way.

Not exactly. "you pay for a game, you get the game" isn't a REWARD, it's how things SHOULD BE.
"You pay for a game, you get part of the game" is a punishment. "You pay for the game, you get the game, the soundtrack, AND a cool poster" is a reward.

Yes, "you pay for the game, you get the game" is how it should be, and how it is implemented as well. New customers are not punished in any way.
However, when you buy used from someone else, you are not a customer of id software. You only pay a part of the full sum and none of the money goes back to id software. Yes "You pay for a game, you get part of the game" might be a punishment, but it only applies to those who I've already mentioned, are not contributing anything to the developers, and are not customers of id software.
If you want additional soundtrack and posters, you can support them by buying the special editions.

 

[Nurb]

Next time I want to buy a used Mercedes, I'll call official Mercedes dealership to ask them if they're gonna cut my brakes if I don't give them a piece of that action.

This is fuckin' stupid. Stop punishing gamers already. This kind of behavior can only increase piracy.

Or you could, you know, buy the game new and actually support the developer? Rather than the, "Fuck you, I want to buy your game at a cheaper price, and not let any of the money go back to you, and you're a piece of shit for wanting to make a profit off of the sale of one of your games." attitude you've got going now.

I don't get why people are all up in arms about this. RAGE is going to be a massive game by the way all of the news stories seem to say about it, if it's a good game it'll be worth the money to buy it new. If you really want to save money and buy it used, then you're paying for a lesser experience. I see no issue in this.

You really want to blame somebody: Blame GameStop for not giving a portion of their 100% gain on a used game being sold back to the developers.

No, he had the right analogy but used it wrong. There's no way people would let car manufacturers demand a cut of used car sales.

Cutting singleplayer is a shitty thing to do to gamers on a budget who buy used games regularly, and with Id supporting "always on" DRM, it's obvious they're being greedy bastards that want us to pay full price to "rent" their games from them considering the amount of time peoples' net goes down so they don't deserve to be supported

 

[D0WNT0WN]

ID you used to be cool.

Well im not buying it anymore.

 

[bitCrusher]

misleading title. VERY VERY misleading title

 

[Robert Ewing]

ooooh, so close to preordering. Nevermind. I think I'll miss this one and play a game that doesn't screw you over so much, like ET.

It's time like this when pirates / hackers / modders are needed to crack this bumscrewery.