Why do people buy used games?

[Idlemessiah]

Pretty simple really. I'm still buying PS2 games since are titles I've yet to play and series yet to finish. These games are no longer in production and I have to rely on pre-owned copies or I'll never get to play them.

Regarding trade-ins, many game stores offer more value for store credit than cash trade-ins, so as long as you intend on buying another game it's better value than selling it to your mate.
For quality, you check everything when you get it over the counter, not when you get home.

Now the reason it's a big deal for many gamers is because many gamers rely on the pre-owned market to be able to afford new releases without breaking the bank. Gaming is entertainment. Entertainment isn't cheap and a lot of people are willing to wait a month or two after launch if it means saving a bit of money.

 

[Something Amyss]

Or, for the less inclined to think out there, it's almost impossible to create a system that only eliminates second-hand sales through a company like Gamestop.

More so because they still opt to cater to Gamestop, though.

There would never be any "Oh look, I found this game lying around, I'll give it a shot" that there might be if I found an SNES game in my closet today.

Which is true, but game publishers are quite myopic and see any game not sold new as a lost sale.

1. It is much cheaper than buying a new copy.
2. Sometimes it's the only way to get a game when the publisher is no longer producing new copies.

It really is as simple as that. I may not like getting games that have scratches on them, but I don't always have a choice.

....there certainly is the case where a game just isn't being produced any more and the only way you can get it is to get it used, but that's a different topic altogether.

This. This is when I buy used. There's also the whole "First Sale Doctrine" thing which we as consumers are legally entitled to.

The OP's statement revolves not around whether it's right or wrong, but around why one would do it. He attests specifically that new games are cheaper if you "just wait for a sale," paraphrased because I'm lazy.

In short, First Sale doctrine doesn't apply to the question and the assertion that used gamers are cheaper is apparently met with "nuh uh."

 

[The Enquirer]

I almost never buy new physical copies of games. I wait for the reviews to come in to see if it is worth my money, wait a little while for the game to actually go down in price, then head over to a Play & Trade (another smaller video game chain that sells a ton of older games too making it worth going to for me) and buy the copy. I mean a new console game is 60 bucks. Buying used a few months down the line could save me 20 dollars I can put towards something else. 20 dollars is still 20 dollars.

In addition to what a lot of people have been saying, if publishers stop making a game or offering digital downloads of it, you'll never find it again unless a friend has a copy. If it wasn't for the used game market there are so many rare gems I never would have played on my ps2 and gamecube. I mean when was the last time you ever saw a copy of Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance or Timespliters? Great games you would never be able to find again because they aren't made anymore. But the used game market makes that all possible.

 

[FoolKiller]

Let me tell you a story.

A man bought a game called Lorderbands used for $10 on his Ybox1080. This person loved the game so much he bought the game of the year edition brand new for himself so that he may get all of the extra content too. He then gave his girlfriend the original used game. She too loved the game and bought the DLC so they could play together.

He then had friends who play PC games but didn't own a Ybox. He purchased a 4-pack on Nozzle's digital distribution system, Smoke, so that his friends could play.

Finally, he pre-ordered the sequel for his Ybox, and also got it on Smoke so that he could enjoy the new and wonderful game. He also bought two season's passes, one for his Ybox and one on Smoke.

In total, he spent $10 on a used game and ended up spending a couple of hundred on "new" content because of the initial purchase. This is the reason used games are good.

The End



As for other reasons:
1. I can't find a new copy when I want to get the game.
2. I don't think it's worth $60
3. It's a yearly sports title, that while enjoying the game really falls into part 2 again.
4. It curbs piracy.
5. I don't know what to expect from a game so I want to try it without too much investment.
6. I want to continue playing a story I'm invested in, but refuse to give the publisher a penny. (I don't care if I'm punishing the developer. They chose to be published there, I didn't.)

The basic fact is that this is the golden age of video gaming. The market is simply super-saturated with content. If you like more than one genre of games, you probably have a backlog. I could not possibly afford all the games I've played if I wanted to buy them new. Content creators are making it impossible to financially keep up with their pace. I gave up trying to buy a new Assassin's Creed for $60 when they started mailing them in as a yearly franchise and then withholding DNA sequences to be sold to me later.

Basic math lesson:
Let x represent the amount of disposable income I have set aside for video gaming. If there are 2 new games this year I want then I can only spend x/2 on each of them. More likely with my diverse tastes, I am interested in 50 games this year. Now I can only spend x/50 on each game on average. The used market helps fill this gap.

And finally, if the Xbone really cared about the customer (because this is where everything leads to), they shouldn't have restricted the reselling to specific retailers or a 1 time gift. They should have had two fucking brain cells and enabled a used game market that eliminated the middle man instead of being complicit with them.

It should have been like the Rock Band license transfer, only between accounts:
Person A is sick of the game. Person B wants the game. Person A sells person B the digital rights to the game at whatever he wants and there is a very small percentage that goes to the dev and publisher. And it wouldn't be a fee, just a cut. So if I sell it for 20 dollars, dev/pub get 2 dollars or something like that. A minimum of 1 dollar would be the cut to deter people from selling it for nothing. And you could do it right over Xbox Live with MS acting as Paypal. Fuck!

Sorry, I'm tired and was sick all week. But that is how MS should have handled it.

 

[Olas]

Why wouldn't people buy used games? Why do people buy new games? Okay, I guess somebody has to buy it new first before it becomes used, whatever, if given the choice between them though I'd never not go with used.

It's a digital disk, not a teddy bear.

 

[Anthony Corrigan]

First, it is one of the last bastions of ownership in this industry. If you can't sell your games then the producer officially holds all the chips. DRM becomes more pervasive and the concept of ownership slowly dies. It really becomes about them selling you a license to play their game. You no longer own anything. You are purchasing a service.

Secondly, games like SMT: Nocturne are ridiculously expensive to buy new. New copies of games become scarce after a while and used becomes the only way to buy them.

Very true. Hell, even used copies of games like "Xenoblade Chronicles" are incredibly expensive now (around 100$).

OT: I buy used games when I miss out on a game or don't have the money at the time for it. Examples being: Neir, Ace Attorney series, and Professor Layton series.

You should see the price of a used 64 cartridge of Zelda, currently around $150 or more

 

[Anthony Corrigan]

Where you look because I would love to pick one up for that price? Majora's mask at gametraders was 150 last time I was in there

 

[deathzero021]

people like the option to sell their game. that's a right in many countries that we aren't willing to give up.

secondly, games won't stay brand-new forever. about 99% of the games i own were used before i purchased them. unless your buying games day one, than i would suspect that games wouldn't sit on those shelves for very long without used games.

used games are cheaper. when you buy directly from people, the price is almost negotiable. For Gamestop, it is usually 15% cheaper and their discs always work for the current generation games. (not to mention, you get rewards if you have membership, plus a further 10% discount) Now if you are talking about one-time-deals than yeah, a new game CAN be cheaper, occasionally but not the majority of the time.

i agree that it can be tough for some publishers, with their enormously careless spending, to break even in the mainstream gaming market. is this due to used games? i don't think so. i agree with Nintendo's philosophy that developers should be working harder on making games that last instead of trying to kill off used games and our right to sell games. Removing used games is not the solution here and it isn't gamers' fault that these publishers aren't "making enough money."

 

[Patathatapon]

For me it's because every penny I can save is helpful. I'd love to help publishers, but most of the time I can barely afford games.

One of the reasons why I tend to use Steam.

 

[WhiteTigerShiro]

What happens when a publisher stops producing a game? No other option except to buy it used if you ever want to try and play it.

Pretty much this right here. Roughly 90% of my used games are simply because there was no buying new; which even includes some games that hadn't been released that long ago. Developers/Publishers can complain about the used games market all they want, but when they publish such a limited run of a game that it can't be found new within months of release, they're kind of giving those sales to the secondhand shops.

 

[Iron Gix]

pretty simple answer to why buy used..it's the price.Why pay 60 when you can pay 40 and so on and also for those few games that are hard to find and not easily available to find on the open market. So again,in short..price

 

[GodzillaGuy92]

Used games aren't that cheap. I've gotten "new" copies of old-ish games for less than a used copy would cost, pretty much all the time. I just keep an eye on deals. I got XCOM Enemy Unknown for $15 from Best Buy brand new in sealed packaging. Currently on amazon, the cheapest used copy comes in at $16 plus shipping. On gamestop, it's a whopping $38. It's free on PS Plus right now. I saw Far Cry 3 on sale at either amazon or best buy a few days ago for $20. Far Cry 2 is maybe a five dollar difference between used and new. Same for Fallout 3.

For one thing, not everyone is as on top of the various available deals as you seem to be. Even for those who are or could be, sometimes it comes down to convenience over price; sometimes not having to wait until the opportune moment to buy a game is worth a few extra dollars. If the person in question wants the game enough, whether it be out of sheer excitement or paranoia over copies of the game eventually running dry, the best immediate purchasing option for the price is nearly always a used copy.

Of these two mentalities, I'm much more like you; case in point, I've passed up buying FTL when it's gone on sale on Steam for 50%, because I'm waiting for it to go 75% off - as if I'll ever in my entire life miss that extra $2.50. I just can't help it. But that example roundaboutly demonstrates the answer to your question. When I was a console gamer, used games were a cheaper alternative to new ones, and more convenient than waiting for new ones to go on sale. Now that I've taken up PC gaming, Steam (along with GOG) is both cheaper and more convenient than the used game market (even without the sales, in most cases), and as a result I doubt I'll buy a used game ever again. People buy used games because they will invariably go with whatever choices they perceive to be best for them.

 

[Not Matt]

First of all. It's cheaper. And being on a student budget, I can barely afford anything.

And secondly. Say I want a game that came out a few years ago and wasn't a success (like the saoutuer or naughty bear...etc) then it is much easier to consult the gamestop at the mall rather that empty my wallet for Amazon shipping fees

 

[Archer666]

It's cheaper. How else can I maintain my video game hobby along with my 40k addiction and weekly social drinking events? Not with 60 euro games, thats for sure.

 

[Entitled]

I think that once you already can't afford to buy new games from the publishers, then even pirating the rest is less harmful than selling and buying used ones.

The result is almost the same, you get to play a few of your games without rewarding the artists, but at least in that case, instead of giving part of your gaming budget to Gamestop, you are keeping it in your pocket, for the possibility of spending it on other new games later.

Used games are more like those old-fashined "warez" piracy sites, and disc-bootlegging, that people had to pay for, not even just skipping the publishing industry, but draining away potential business from it.

 

[DeadRise17]

Gamers support used games mostly because they are the only way to get at least some return if you buy a game that isn't good enough to keep. It is also supported for the fact that publishers tried to destroy it. The right to sell your games is one of the few rights gamers have. Trying to destroy that right makes support for it stronger.

 

[TallanKhan]

Well I think it is less about actually buying used games as more about the extent to which you own what you buy. The idea that if you buy something it is yours to resell if you so choose, not something that you are grated permission to dispose of, in the approved way, with the "corporate overlord" taking a big cut of the transaction.

Yes I am aware that with all the licence agreements and terms of service you accept to play a game everight now that there are question marks over the reality of ownership. However, the practical reality of the present system is that as long as you have an original (non-pirated disc) in your possession you effectivley own that game and can play it whenever you want, and can give it away or sell it on whenever you want.

Also if you restrict used games in the way that was being proposed for the Xbone there is a huge question mark over how you go about aquiring a hard copy game after a few years once the publisher has stopped producing new copies and the stock of used games available is diminished due to the "only transferable once" rule. Even further down the line you have to consider what happens in 10 years or so when Microsoft stop supporting their approved trading in system altogether, then what happens?

 

[Iwata]

Just today I bought Black Ops 2. It cost me ?20 used. The same game is still on shelves at ?50 new. That's over 50% discount.

If I can buy cheap, why the hell would I pay more than double for the exact same game? I work hard for a living, I have a wife and baby daughter to support, I'm not going to be spending more than I have to simply because the publishers don't like it.

I buy games new, mind you. I have two games on pre-order coming next week. But I decide what to buy based on my budget, the industry doesn't decide for me.