Tanis said:
IF this was done, I wouldn't buy that console.
IF all current game consoles had anti-used game software, I would sit out that generation and hope the next one corrected said mistake.
I'd be right there with you.
What I think some developers don't seem to realize is that doing away with used sales could actually hurt their business if they continue with the current pricing models they use on consoles. As it is, games rarely fall more than $20 below their original price until after the first year or so of release. Sure some less popular titles will drop a bit faster, but $40 is still a pretty common sticker price at the end of year 1, and that's with pricing competition from used games. What happens when they get to decide when they drop the price?
Perhaps even more importantly to their bottom line, most gamers aren't like me. I'll buy a game and hold onto it until the day I die. I don't usually trade in a game unless there's absolutely nothing enjoyable about it. But because of that, I have to either buy used on occasion or buy fewer games, because I spend a lot of money on this hobby and I never get any of it back. But a lot of people who are going out and buying games like COD or Madden every year the day they release are only willing/able to do so because they went in and traded stuff they don't play anymore for store credit. What happens to new sales if people can't do that anymore? I think developers like Volition would actually stand to be the hardest hit if your average gamer now has to buy fewer games because they can't trade anything.
Services like Steam get around this by having frequent sales and deals, even for newer titles so they can tap into those customers who don't want to spend $60 on a game even sooner. But that's not as easy to pull off in a retail setting, in no small part because you have so many people grabbing for a piece of the pie and you're less able to coordinate. And if companies like Gamestop were to find their bread and butter sales disappear, how long do developers and publishers really expect to be able to reap the benefits before they start pressuring them into contracts which favour the retailer even more?
But perhaps most importantly, this kind of speculation isn't new. It was a rumour that was going around about the PS3 almost 10 years ago and it turned out to be a load of crap then, just as it will now. Because all it would take is one company not limiting used titles to absolutely kill the ones that do. None of these manufacturers are Valve, and they are not entering a market with zero competition. If they decide to cut used titles, they may as well bow out now.
