Is digital distribution really the future?

[remnant_phoenix]

There's a lot of talk about how the market for buying/selling physical copies of games will dry up in the near future. While I'm not categorically saying that it will not happen, I have a hard time buying into the idea, and here's why...

Since the mid-to-late 90's, people have been able to download music off of the internet. It's been a decade (a relative eternity in the entertainment industry), and yet people still buy physical copies of CDs. While the market for physical albums has declined, there are some people (I'm one of them) who like having a physical copy for back-up and posterity.

In the film industry, rental services have been the norm for many years. Nowadays, paid rental services like Netflix allow rental via mail and unlimited streaming via the internet. Services like Redbox allow vending machine style rentals. These approaches have revolutionized renting, made it easier and cheaper. On top of this, people can pay to download movies on iTunes (if they want a copy to keep) and it's cheaper and more convenient than going to a retailer. You can argue that the DVD/Blu-Ray offers a higher quality experience than a digital copy, but in my experience only serious movie buffs care about that.

Despite digital distribution, there is a strong contingent of people who like to have a physical copy of an album/movie for the sake of back-up, posterity, and the fact that it looks nice sitting on a shelf. The same is true for video games.

While the market for physical copies of console games will, surely, go down in the future (we already seeing it on PC) there is still something to be said for physical copies. If we ever embrace a fully digital distribution age, I believe that it is a good ways off. To reach that point, all people like me will have to age themselves out of being the core buying age in the market, and I'm only 26.

Maybe I'm just being hopeful (I personally don't like the idea of all-digital), but I think there will always be a market, even if it gets really small, for physical copies of games. IF we were to reach a all-digital entertainment age, I would say that its at least 20-30 years out.

Agree? Disagree? What are your feelings/opinions on digital distribution as the future of gaming?

 

[Catchy Slogan]

I think there is always going to be a place for both. It's just balancing the ease of downloading something, with the want to have something physical and they're always going to try and get people to fork out more money for a collector's edition.

 

[The_Raging_Tree]

I think physical copys will always stay if consoles still exist, at least untill consoles can get hard drives that can expand as much as PCs cn. I'm fairly certain the majority of console only owners will prefere having a disk due to the fact that PS3s and 360 don't have as expansive hard drives than PCs so I wouldn't beable to store 30 games on one console.

 

[JochemDude]

Bandwith is everything as long as we keep advancing in Digital distribution the better it is.

 

[Robert Ewing]

Why can't digital distribution and hard copies live side by side, coexists, thrive off of each other as friends?

 

[remnant_phoenix]

Why can't digital distribution and hard copies live side by side, coexists, thrive off of each other as friends?

That's my take. Many such as myself prefer physical copies, many others prefer digital distribution. As long as both groups exist, there is a market for both, even if one market grows to dominate.

The only thing that will really stay as it is are books. You can NEVER kill books

Physical copies of books/records MUST stay. I shudder when I think what would happen if we had all digital libraries full of our literature and history...and then BAM! E.M.P. attack!

 

[Avaholic03]

I would say digital distribution is the present. Honestly, in the last year I've not bought a single physical copy of a game. Steam has made it so I don't even need to get off my ass and go to the store. It will only grow as more people learn to trust the service isn't going to go away and leave them unable to play their games (among other paranoid reasons to not download your games).

 

[Epona]

I ran out of space for my games so I started putting the least played ones in a storage bin. I won't download Wii or 360 games that I can get on disc because of stupid DRM policies. I do download PSP games because Sony isn't so restrictive. PC games...well I download games when I can.

 

[Zhukov]

Yes, but not necessarily the entire future.

Digital distribution cometes with physical retail, but the two aren't mutually exclusive.

 

[Trololo Punk]

I still prefer buying retail for two reasons.
Don't like using credit card and there's something about having a physical copy that is so much better in my opinion...

 

[Stall]

Yes, it is the future. Physical media is on its way out. It's going to take a generation or two, sure, but I guarantee you it is going to disappear (I assume we are talking about an immediate future here). When we start getting into petabytes and exabyte, which will not take long at all (just think about how big your HDD was in 2000), paired with increases in net speed and availability, then its only natural that physical media will become a thing of the past.

And you know what? I wholeheartedly welcome these changes.

Why can't digital distribution and hard copies live side by side, coexists, thrive off of each other as friends?

What's the point of having both when a reality with 'perfect' physical media is a possibility? So the ever decreasing subset of the population who identify themselves as "collectors" can continue to feel warm and fuzzy? I really don't foresee a future where physical copies of games and such have any place. It just doesn't make sense to me to have both in a world where physical media has overcome its drawbacks.

The only thing that will really stay as it is are books. You can NEVER kill books

Once e-book readers become SIGNIFICANTLY cheap (i.e. to the point where nearly every household has one viably), then yeah, I think you can kill books. I can totally imagine a world where newspapers and your magazines are streamed right onto your e-book reader, and "bookstores" no longer sell books.

 

[illas]

It's cheaper, faster, more secure and more convenient.
So: Yes.

 

[Woodsey]

Yes, eventually.

That's just how things work.

 

[dickywebster]

Personally i hope we never have only digital games, much as i like having a hard copy so i can play the game whenever, if you needed to be connected to where ever you got you digital game from and the servers crashed, you cant play your game.
I know some people have had this issue on pc and thats not even meantioning origin...

 

[badgersprite]

I think it's going to become more important, and may end up exceeding sales of physical copies, but I highly doubt physical copies are ever going to become completely redundant for a few simple reasons: copy protection; not every average person has space to download all their games especially as they become bigger and take up more and more memory; physical copies are likely to come with additional incentives and rewards, not to mention the fact that you get used copies cheaply and can trade them back in, which you can't do digitally, which sucks if you hate the game; physical copies can also be rented rather than bought; imagine how difficult it would be to get non-tech savvy parents or grandparents to buy games at Christmas for kids if they can't walk into a store and buy it.

I could go on. Yeah, I do think digital distribution will eventually become the primary method of getting games, and I'm already on the bandwagon for digital distribution, but merely being the main means of purchasing games does not mean it will make physical copies completely obsolete. Especially not in this current generation.

 

[Get_A_Grip_]

Well seing as the average home broadband speed in Ireland is 300kb/s and most ISPs throw a very limited download limit in with that of 10-30 gb a month, I don't see digital distribution taking off here anytime soon.

 

[Lilani]

Everyone says it will but I doubt it.

I have 82 PS2 games, I'm not sure my PS3 could store all of them and I'm definitely sure PS2 era technology couldn't give me enough space without being ludicrously expensive.

Yeah it's nice to have some games be on the console without needing a disk.

But the size of games is increasing so there's gonna be a limit to how much you can store.

Besides I kind of like my tower/bookshelf of games.

Tell me: What's the number one thing that people do these days to replay the old games of yesteryear? The games that were on the NES, SNES, Atari, N64, Commodore 64, and whatever else you care to mention? Do they track down a console that plays them and buy the cartridges? Hell no. They use emulators. They may not be legal, but it is by far the most popular way people seem to enjoy their classic games.

So what is preventing PS2 era games from eventually hitting this point? Computers have improved just the same as consoles over the years. It may seem far-fetched right now, but emulators for PS2 games already exist (NOT an endorsement, simply stating a fact) and I guarantee they will only continue to improve both in performance and their game libraries. Hell, maybe one day Sony, Nintendo or whomever will realize people like playing their old games and will make their own emulator and classic game store. It's possible--if there's one thing that is always guaranteed to make a buck, it's nostalgia.

As for your thing on game sizes increasing, don't forget storage capacity is improving too. Remember just a few of years ago when you could still buy flash drives that held 128 megabytes? And anything over 1 gig was like $30? Now even the cheapest ones hold at least 2 gigs. I think there is but one major threat to digital distribution. And it's this:

Well seing as the average home broadband speed in Ireland is 300kb/s and most ISPs throw a very limited download limit in with that of 10-30 gb a month, I don't see digital distribution taking off here anytime soon.

Yeah. That sort of bullshit is going to hinder digital distribution very quickly. And not just video game digital services--streaming/downloaded movies, TV, cloud storage, online communication...unless the both the users and companies that provide these services call the ISPs out on this, their businesses are going to be hurting BAD because of bandwidth caps very soon.

 

[F4LL3N]

I disagree. Publishers can make more off of digital sales by excluding the retailers. Once it becomes completely viable, they'll continue to push it until hard copies are completely gone. The only ones that'll remain are perhaps special editions.

Not only will they make more money from excluding the retailer, but it'll be less of a risk because they won't have to manufacture the CD, booklet or case. Which means they can exclude the manufactures too. That'll essentially eliminate all but the console manufacture. Why wouldn't they push it?

That's on the publishers side. Then we get to the consumers side, where people want fast, cheap and safe entertainment. Taduh. Digital distribution. It'll be somewhat safe for the consumer, as they'll also push Cloud computing. Why? Because that turns the 'product' into a 'service', which equals more control for them.

We may even see a future console without a diskdrive. But first they'll have to wait for a faster worldwide average internet speed, and of course, the consoles to support it.