`Pre-owned games a bigger problem than piracy’

[Remy]

Wii Fit/Sports/Etc aren't exactly "shitty", there's a reason Nintendo's games sell so much better, it's because they're actually really good (even if they're not my particular cup of tea)

I never said they were, these games are in a completely differant league to petzz, carnival games, etc and I really wish people would stop equating them.

I have no problem with the wii sports resorts of the world, but I do have a problem with the conception that a game has to be casual shallow crap to sell well.

For an example of a game that is actually decent selling fucking gangbusters, look at red dead redemption, a game from a relatively unknown series, but coming from a welll known dev, selling by the fucking bucketload. it has no inherit family appeal, or casual appeal and is an ultra violent vulgar game about cowboys. it's actually decent and i expect good word of mouth is only going to fuel sales further.

Yeah everyone that bought CoD4 MW2 on day of release could be considered a fan of the MW series but I bet you over 50% of them never played one before CoD4.

yeah, but the maps still sold an amazing amount at a insane high price, which was my earlier point: casual gamers aren't completely retarded, they have the ability to buy things of the internet if it appeals to them. For another example.... the iphone. just in every way shape and form.

Urth Edit: I think I missed the early part of thread, my comment was only a reply to yours on fans, which you edited out XP

[SuperLink]

Part of the reason these games are selling so well is because of the advertising, notice what games are being shown on TV? It's always Brain Training, Super Mario Bros or Nintendogs still. It's because those are the brands the common person associates with.

Yes but people associate them because they've played the games and they love them. Those games aren't advertised anymore but they still sell heavily through word of mouth.

I never said they were, these games are in a completely differant league to petzz, carnival games, etc and I really wish people would stop equating them.

I have no problem with the wii sports resorts of the world, but I do have a problem with the conception that a game has to be casual shallow crap to sell well.

I'm not equating them, but Ubisoft with those games are trying to emulate Nintendo's success (and need I add, failing quite epicly), because unlike Nintendo Ubisoft don't understand that even casual games need a high degree of quality for them to be truly successful.

There are multiple demographics within this "casual" audience, and the CoD/RDR demographic is a completely different one to Nintendo's own casual crowd. I highly doubt little girls, parents and pensioners, Nintendo's "everyone" demographic they target for their own casual games, would pay for map packs on CoD by the bucketload.

[Remy]

There are multiple demographics within this "casual" audience, and the CoD/RDR demographic is a completely different one to Nintendo's own casual crowd. I highly doubt little girls, parents and pensioners, Nintendo's "everyone" demographic they target for their own casual games, would pay for map packs on CoD by the bucketload.

The girls will grow up to become girl gamers, or leave the medium entirely, the nannas and parents are already lost causes.

eventually, the nanna buying wii bubble will burst.

[SuperLink]

The girls will grow up to become girl gamers, or leave the medium entirely, the nannas and parents are already lost causes.

eventually, the nanna buying wii bubble will burst.

Nintendo don't care, they're making shitloads of money from an audience that no other company has successfully tapped into.

Which is the entire point, other companies want some too.

[Velotix von Skruviktorrius]

In the 1980s, this new games console called the NES came out. It was new and different to most people, so a lot of curious people gave it a try and had some fun. A lot of people found they enjoyed the system immensely and used it extensively, whilst others took a more casual approach to their use of the system. A bunch of fairly useless novelty peripherals were released to artificially extend the console's lifespan and retain the more casual and curious part of the crowd with varying levels of success. Then the SNES was released and whilst a great deal of people enjoyed this upgraded and more complex system, a large peripherary of people drifted away from something they felt was too complicated for them.

In the 2000s, this new games console called the Wii came out. It was new and different to most people, so a lot of curious people gave it a try and had some fun. A lot of people found they enjoyed the system immensely and used it extensively, whilst others took a more casual approach to their use of the system. A bunch of fairly useless novelty peripherals were released to artificially extend the console's lifespan and retain the more casual and curious part of the crowd with varying levels of success. Then they realised they were playing the same party game a thousand times over and whilst a great deal of people looked for a more involved experience wherever they could find it, a large peripherary of people drifted away from something they felt was going to be too complicated for them.

The Wii is simply evidence that the games industry has begun a rotating cycle lasting about a generation - twenty years - where it attempts to attract new customers and then enters an extended period of trying to retain them until the remaining customer base is too thin, at which point the cycle restarts. The details of each specific cycle are different but the general industry mood appears to fluctuate in the same way each time.

[Urtheart]

Yes but people associate them because they've played the games and they love them. Those games aren't advertised anymore but they still sell heavily through word of mouth.

Actually if you've seen any of the recent Ant & Dec trailers all 3 are still being advertised heavily.

But regardless this is not on topic!

Final warning, get back on topic or I lock it. You want to discuss marketing, make or find the topic it is related to.

[RainbowLizard]

Pre-owned games a bigger problem than piracy?

Okay, fair enough, i'll go download my games for completely free then if it helps so much = D kthxbai

Honestly though, how terrible and immoral of us to refuse to pay £50 for games that aren't even worth that price, and make a small dent in the £100 million plus profit from some games that the companies are getting. We should all be put to death for doing that. You know, it's so horrible the fact that gamers are speaking out against the clear rip-off that the games industry has become. We're all just horrible people aren't we?

[Urtheart]

Honestly though, how terrible and immoral of us to refuse to pay £50 for games that aren't even worth that price, and make a small dent in the £100 million plus profit from some games that the companies are getting.

Remember, making games is a business, and only worth doing if you are making a profit.

I also previously stated that an average game at its £50 price tag needs to sell at least a million to break even and start making a profit.

I think the last game to mkae that kind of a profit margin was Halo 1, while companies might make that profit, one single game achieving that has to sell along the lines of the Wii Series.

[Tornado]

Activision throws their hat into the ring. Of course, rather than do it the way Sony and EA have decided, Activision decided that, justified or not not, the actions of Sony/EA just didn't scream "oppressive dickhead" quite enough for Activision's sake.

Speaking in Activision Blizzard's Q2 investors call last night, COO Thomas Tippl said the firm was increasing the importance of its DLC to 'limit the supply' of content in pre-owned titles.

"We are still evaluating various possibilities for greater participation in the used-games business. What's been working the best so far is providing additional content and therefore limiting the supply to used games.

"So that's a proven strategy that we will continue. And any other initiatives, we will be talking about when we get closer to it."

Linky.

I still agree with the concept. Activision's execution is a complete fuckwad way of doing it, though. Also, check out the hilariously ignorant comments section for a good laugh.

Edited August 30, 2010 by Tornado

[Mollfie]

Makes sense to me. They don't get any money from pre-owned games, but the shops do and the consumer saves money. I know that at work we'll have games bought and traded in several times (people leave our stickers on which gives it away) so who knows how many times it's re-bought and re-traded in. I've no problem with making games downloadable instead, although it would put me out of a job >.>

I don't trade in games, mostly because I only buy games I'm sure I'll like.

Edited August 8, 2010 by Mollfie

[Unionhack]

Horrendous media freedom supression, you've done it again. I thought you couldn't be topped when you started banning manga scan sites, or when you began changing the file type for music into the MP3, making everyone have to but their music again.

Media control sucks.

[LunarEdge]

What about corporations and stores that allow you to rent? Wouldn't they be adding to this issue of "The Developers make no money." I'm talking about services like Blockbuster, Gamefly and etc.

[DistantJ]

The solution: Make your games good enough to keep and re-play, and stop charging so fucking much for them.

[Mollfie]

I thought you couldn't be topped when you started banning manga scan sites

But that would make perfect sense seeing as it's theft?

[Tiller]

But that would make perfect sense seeing as it's theft?

While a whole other topic, scanlations are things you can't get otherwise since no business has capitalized on rapid translation of new material like mangas. While theft in the sense that scanning a comic is true, there is no legitimate way person could obtain and understand something like a manga if they don't get it shipped overseas and happen to know Japanese.

I want to reflect a bit on the EA ordeal. I think what they are doing is also legitimate business. You buy new, you get these features from the retailer. Again, with a car analogy, you buy a new car and the dealer throws in new tires to sweeten the deal. Same thing here with EA: You get access to their upcoming DLC content for free if you buy new. If you don't buy the car new, you don't get the new tires. Same with the game.

[gim_gam]

The solution: Make your games good enough to keep and re-play, and stop charging so fucking much for them.

+1

Preowed games allows games to be avaliable to the masses rather then just those that have lots of money This must have its advantages somewhere

Surely sequels sales benefit from people being able to get hold of cheap copys of the orignal. I know it has done for me in the past

Edited August 16, 2010 by gim_gam

[Tornado]

Disregard pretty much every thing I said in this topic. I made a really fucking stupid leap in logic, so most of the stuff I said was wrong. Having recognized this, I'm now pretty much completely against all forms of these used game taxes.

Also, here's an article.

Edited August 30, 2010 by Tornado

[Phos]

Tycho sounds like he's looking for favor with big publishers. Big publishers that might then come to PAX.

I find it kind of hilarious that publishers spend so much hot air complaining about used game sales when they pay Gamestop tubs of money for the shelf space. They keep feeding the beast, hoping that it will stop eating them.

[Chooch]

I agree entirely with the Bitmob article. Used game sales are nothing at all like piracy and it's an absolutely absurd comparison.

I'm not much of a pre-owned buyer myself but I see absolutely nothing wrong with things as they stand now.

[pooshoes]

The solution: Make your games good enough to keep and re-play, and stop charging so fucking much for them.

This, more than anything else.

This is old news, but Gabe Newel spoke about Steam sales data, and how reducing the prices of games lead to crazy increases in generated sales. According to Gabe, a 75% reduction in price resulted in a 1,470% increase in sales.

Mental.

One of the problems with the industry at the moment is that big publishers rely on massive first day and week sales, which drop off drastically in the following weeks, so that in 6 months time, sales are almost dead, yet the price for a new copy stays the same. Of course, this is done to allow the next big title to do the exact same thing, and so the cycle repeats. But still, it's pretty fucked up.

[Scar]

If people have such a huge issue with entering numbers into XBLA, PSN or WiiWare to download some games, why don't the console developers simply put in a scanner on the console.

Then sell Top-up cards, which just need to be scanned to work.

Still don't understand how hard it is to enter in some numbers.

But thats completely unrelated to the topic at hand.

Second hand and so forth, are troublesome to all industries, as the reseller has no intention on forking out royalties to the original developer/maker.

I don't oppose EA's system as such, but I do think they are over-charging, $10 is way too much.

There is nothing you can do about it though.

Most other industries have done fine without that extra bit of profit, namely the Car industry (rarely, are people's first cars brand new).

[Doctor Sοnic]

I tend not to buy many second hand games myself, and most of the ones I do buy are for retro consoles that I couldn't get first hand anyway.

I can see where video games companies are coming from but EA is going over top. In general I think video games cost too much anyway, I'm sure most could lose £5 or more from their retail price.

Edited September 1, 2010 by Doctor Sοnic

[pooshoes]

If people have such a huge issue with entering numbers into XBLA, PSN or WiiWare to download some games, why don't the console developers simply put in a scanner on the console.

Then sell Top-up cards, which just need to be scanned to work.

That is a completely ridiculous solution to a problem that doesn't exist.

[Aquaslash]

That is a completely ridiculous solution to a problem that doesn't exist.

I dunno, I kinda like that idea for shear ease. Buy card, sign in, scan card, get points. Sounds pretty sweet to me :/

[Jetronic]

http://www.destructo...us-183882.phtml

A court ruling over the sale of a software package has set a disturbing new precedent that could effectively be used to outlaw used games in the United States.

Software developer Autodesk has successfully won a case against defendant Timothy Vernor, blocking him from being able to legally sell a program called AutoDesk on the grounds that the software's End User License Agreement "significantly restricts the user's ability to transfer the software and imposes notable use restrictions."

Similar EULA warnings can be found in videogames, with Electronic Arts explicitly stating that it grants you the right to play a game, it does not sell you the game itself. If EA worked up the balls to take GameStop to court, there is now a precedent that suggests EA would have a strong leg to stand on in blocking the sale of secondhand games.

While this is a worry, I'd be surprised if any publisher would be stupid enough to take GameStop to court and risk getting blacklisted by the biggest games retailer in the US. However, even if a publisher did try it and succeeded, the destruction of the used game market would have serious implications on the industry. Removing trade-in credit, and the ability for many gamers to buy more than one game a month, could cripple the industry, not to mention encourage a new black market.

I'd urge publishers to seriously think long and hard about the potential long-term downsides of ending used sales, as opposed to just rubbing their hands together with glee at the thought of potential short-term profit.

http://www.gamasutra..._Used_Games.php

It just got better guys....IT JUST GOT BETTER! D: