How Are You Towards Direct Download Games?

[Terramax]

I was thinking of starting a poll, but I'm guessing there's no real way of pigeonholing people's opinions regarding buying games via digital download, as opposed to physical copies.

Say 7+ years ago, this was almost something of a taboo subject. Especially with the shenanigans that DLC and DRM brought with it.

Since this time, however, we've seen Steam go from strength to strength, XBLA and (presumably) PSN proving they're very relevant in influencing the direction the industry is going and what games are available to us, whilst handheld consoles and the mobile phone market's game's market arguably taking a rather large chunk of the audience, and not just so called 'casual gamers' either.

Had I asked people back in, say, 2005, I'm sure a great many people would not be happy with digital distribution, citing it as being either too expensive, perhaps too inconvenient, and preferring to have physical games instead.

But have your opinions changed over the last number of years? Have you seen a change in the way you buy games, or has digital download affected the kinds of games you play?

As for me, 7 years ago I was dead against downloadable games. Even if I was paying only £4.99, the idea of not physically owning it and could not resell was something I greatly frowned upon.

Now however, with games I can only buy via download, and especially with wanting to play PSone games on my Vita, I've come to rather enjoy it. I don't need to lug CDs or cartridges around with me, and download speed is so fast where I'm at I can have the game on my system even faster than it takes me to buy milk from the corner shop.

However, I'm only willing to pay a much lower price for downloads. £4 for a PSone titles, £8 for a PSP titles, and maybe about £8 or so for a game on XBLA also. I'm still not paying full retail price for copies of AAA titles via digital, and I hope in time the market lowers the price of digital download as standard.

What are your thoughts people?

 

[ShinyCharizard]

I'm willing to buy download only games at a discount but not full price. At full price I want something physical in return for my money.

 

[Zhukov]

I've always been fine with downloading games. As soon as I learned about Steam I signed on like a shot.

I don't really understand the need for a physical object. If I can play the game then what does it matter if there's a disc on my shelf or not?

All I care about is:
a) Will paying this money allow me to play the game I want to play?
b) Is the price acceptable?

Steam satisfies both requirements, so I buy from them. Same for PSN.

 

[Rawne1980]

Used to be against it in a big way. Mainly because i'm a hoarder and like to have boxes everywhere, it annoys my missus and that makes it fun .... except when she gets mad.

But I bumped into the Steam sale in Autumn and now have a hell of a lot of games in my Steam account. Then GoG had a sale so I bought some older games. Now Steam has a sale again so my collections growing.

I won't pay full price though. No way in the burning hell am I paying the same for download than I would for retail, fuck right off ya rip off twats.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

I'm willing to buy download only games at a discount but not full price. At full price I want something physical in return for my money.

This. It had better be a steep discount, too -- the most I've ever paid for a single DD game is $10, and I don't intend to go over that. Even $10 is unusual -- I try to keep it under five. Reason being, you don't actually own anything you get from a digital distribution site. I figure if I'm going to get a rental, I'm going to pay for one. I save purchase price for actual purchases.

 

[TehCookie]

I still have a dislike towards DD games, but thanks to PSN it isn't as strong as before. Since that started to warm me up to it I figured I'd actually take advantage of some Steam sales. I'm never making that mistake again. Even if I warm up to DD, I'll still hate the broken piece of shit that's called DRM. Hooray for cracks!

 

[Sack of Cheese]

I'm willing to buy download only games at a discount but not full price. At full price I want something physical in return for my money.

We think alike!
If I have to pay more than 10 dollars for a game I want a physical box. I love to have them on display.

 

[Bostur]

I have mixed feeling on the subject. I prefer physical copies, because I like to own my games and be able to play them when I want to. Yes where I live, I legally own the media I buy, be it software, music, books or movies. I play a lot of old games and I worry that I may not be able to play my DD titles 10 or 20 years from now. I also like having manuals for my games, but even physical copies rarely include manuals these days.

On the other hand it's hard to actually buy physical PC games in my town, so it's convenient to buy digitally. It also gives me the opportunity to buy niche games or low budget games that may not be possible to distribute physically.

 

[Doom972]

Back in 2005, when internet connections were slower and Steam didn't function as well as it does today, I would've said that I'd always prefer CDs.

Since 2010 I buy almost exclusively on Steam. It go to a level wher its much more comfortable than buying CDs, and CDs have become almost useless, since whenever I want to install a game from a CD, I need an internet connection to download a patch anyway.

I would only buy a physical copy if I want a collector's edition.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Well downloading a single game back in the day would take me a month or more, that is if it finished at all because I remember they had a tendency to restart downloads that got interrupted, and that would be a month where no-one in the house could properly use internet... for a single bloody game.

And the really huge concern was what if the company takes all your shit and leaves, now Steam has proven itself trustworthy but the power to do that remains, any time they have a problem it is your game collection on the line and you have absolutely no power over the things you own.
For the most part this isn't problematic with Steam but recently they busted out the "can't sue us" TOS and anyone that didn't agree got instantly banned without the possibility of recovery, they will still ban you on false hacking flags and it takes weeks before you get the account back.
Next to that we got Origin that started off with TOS that legally allows them to remove your games after a year, and let's not even get into their banning policy.

So internet got better, Steam somewhat proved trustworthy, but most importantly gamers got old / lazy and just don't care about anything, thus downloadable games are now acceptable.

 

[Vault101]

its fine

BUT I still want my physical copies, downloading games just isn't an option for me

 

[srm79]

I still have a dislike towards DD games, but thanks to PSN it isn't as strong as before.

I've almost completely shaken my dislike of them now, thanks almost primarily to PSN. I have quite a few games now bought via PSN store - there are quite a lot of bargains on there if you look. If you subscribe to PSN+ there are a lot of decent discounts too, not forgetting the free shit they give away every month. Admittedly, they charge waaay over the top for new releases (£50+ for FIFA 13? Fuck off...), but there are plenty of older games that can be hard to find preowned retail, or indeed still go for a hefty price retail. I saw Dragon Age: Origins in GAME for £20 the other week, and bought it from PSN+ for £15. Also, as a die hard petrol head, I was delighted to pick up NASCAR for a fiver when it never even got a retail release in Europe!

So yeah, I've pretty much embraced it. It's a long way from completely replacing physical copies but they complement each other nicely. And there's no chance of my tight fisted mate who never buys his own games bugging me to let him borrow my digital copies!

 

[Joccaren]

I've always been behind digital downloads, provided they are cheaper than in store copies. You had a problem with spending $5 and not being able to sell it on [For what, $3?], but in store that would cost $40-$60, or more over here.
Of course, this only applies with sales. Sometimes I'll do a digital download of a game instead of buying a physical copy just 'cause I'm too lazy to head out and buy a physical copy, but mostly it depends on the availability of the game, and if there really is anything with the physical edition that I'd want.

 

[Gennadios]

I personally loved the idea of DD ever since Direct2Drive started up. ALOT of people prefer physical copies of games, but for me, having them readily available for download at will and not having boxes clutter up my living space was a massive boon, worth the lack of resale ability.

TBH though, I'm not as financially well off now than I was 2 years ago, so I find myself regretting, or at least not being fully satisfied with most of my full price purchases and the lack of trade-back is starting to hurt.

Easily solved by not buying games at full price though, even if it did take me nearly 6 months of waiting for Skyrim to go on sale.

 

[Headdrivehardscrew]

Yeah, well.

Thing is, of the five online download 'stores' I frequent, only two are a true pleasure and treat to browse and actually buy stuff. The three other high-profile, highly frequented 'stores' are scammy shabby aberrations. Most games still cost significantly more that physical copies, and it makes me wary... and it makes me loathe and despise and very, very strongly dislike all the brand names and publishers included.

Let's just check right now...

OK, AAA first person free roaming game, released a month ago. It costs twenty bucks more as a digital download than it does when I go shop it in disc form downtown. It costs twice as much as the average played-through-once used physical copy. It doesn't make sense. I don't like to do business with people that randomly set prices that high. This is not some souk bazaar, where you can at least walk away or haggle, these are official stores linked to your console, country of residence and account. It's personal.

What the melonfarming melonfarm is there to justify such behaviour?

 

[Esotera]

I'm for it now but expect constant access to the game, and for it to be cheaper than a physical product. Increased internet speeds have also made it bearable compared to a few years ago.

The CD is pretty much dead as a media format, which is slowly being recognised as CD drives disappear from new computers like the Macbook.

 

[Strazdas]

really now. the only difference is internet speeds (with america being exception with them being stuck in the 80s when it comes to internet speeds).
internet download is cheaper for both parties - yes in most cases, only to seller in some.
internet donwload is more convienient - would you wait 5 minutes for a download or go out, drive to the store, buy the game IF they stack it, drive home and only then be able to play it?
physical copies: do you REALLY need them? how many of those do you actually just put down to collect dust?

 

[Shoggoth2588]

If my only option is to buy a game as a digital product (such as with Mark of the Ninja or, Trine 2) then I guess that's the only way I'll be able to play those games. I haven't played either of those games! When I spend money, not just on games but on just about anything, I want to have something to show for it. I absolutely dislike buying something if it isn't physical. I don't own or plan to own a kindle, the PSP Go was the worst idea I've ever heard of for a console, etc. I just don't think I'll ever get used to the idea of paying for a game and having nothing to show for it. It isn't that I don't plan to play games that you can't get physically it's just one of those things that I would really rather not happen.