I'm pretty indifferent about used games, but I personally buy them retail to support the developer.
penny arcade equates used games to piracy
- Thread starter rembrandtqeinstein
- Start date
Recommended Videos
While I disagree with the premise that buying used is like piracy, as buying used might lead to new buyers with the next game, I believe that Penny Arcade is more or less correct in its analysis. As it is, it might be better for developers to do as some musicians have done and release their games for free and tell people where to donate if they would like to. It might not get every available dollar from the consumer, but it would lend to more people viewing your game and a wider audience. Also it would get rid of this argument.
GameStop is a pawn shop for videogames.
You take your used game to GameStop, you sell or trade it to them, they sell it to someone else, and make an additional profit. This business model has been in existence for centuries, and other than refusing to provide new releases to GameStop and other new/used game sellers, I don't see how publishers are going to be able to stop them.
And that says nothing about used games sold on Amazon and ebay, which are probably better from the publisher's standpoint because the money is going straight to a consumer, instead of a corporation, and the consumer usually doesn't make a profit.
And frankly, I see only a rather tenuous connection beteween pre-owned sales and loss of new sales anyway, because if you are trying to buy a pre-owned copy of a popular new game the markdown is only going to be $5 - $10 tops (unless the game has been thoroughly abused). I think a lot of people would be more than willing to let go of that extra fiver for a brand new copy.
Personally, the only used games I buy are ones that are out of print or just really old. I pay a price for not buying brand new - I have to play games 1-2 years after their release. That works for me. If you want to play a hot new game right away, you have to pay full price.
Personally, I find this whole scenario really confusing. Yes, GameStop is gouging both their customers and publishers with used game sales, but I really can't see how it's as bad as they're saying it is.
You take your used game to GameStop, you sell or trade it to them, they sell it to someone else, and make an additional profit. This business model has been in existence for centuries, and other than refusing to provide new releases to GameStop and other new/used game sellers, I don't see how publishers are going to be able to stop them.
And that says nothing about used games sold on Amazon and ebay, which are probably better from the publisher's standpoint because the money is going straight to a consumer, instead of a corporation, and the consumer usually doesn't make a profit.
And frankly, I see only a rather tenuous connection beteween pre-owned sales and loss of new sales anyway, because if you are trying to buy a pre-owned copy of a popular new game the markdown is only going to be $5 - $10 tops (unless the game has been thoroughly abused). I think a lot of people would be more than willing to let go of that extra fiver for a brand new copy.
Personally, the only used games I buy are ones that are out of print or just really old. I pay a price for not buying brand new - I have to play games 1-2 years after their release. That works for me. If you want to play a hot new game right away, you have to pay full price.
Personally, I find this whole scenario really confusing. Yes, GameStop is gouging both their customers and publishers with used game sales, but I really can't see how it's as bad as they're saying it is.
I'm still not sure what your point is. If every publisher introduced strict DRM measures to cut off the secondary market, of course I wouldn't like it very much. I also wouldn't dispute their right to implement said measures or accuse them of "profiteering" or any such nonsense.Carlston said:
Believe me, if publishers could prevent resale at small cost, they would without a second thought. The problem is that people don't like, say, needing to be online to play Assassin's Creed 2 single player. When both pirates and customers have to jump through annoying hoops like that, it has a non-trivial impact on sales.
Also, the cost of resales is factored in to the sticker price. If there were no way to save $5 or $10 on a game by trading it in or buying it used, publishers could afford to price their product a bit lower due to the increased demand. Maybe 1% of my game purchases have been used GameStop games. I'd like to save that extra few dollars on retail if companies didn't have to price to compensate for the secondary market, but I'm not ignorant enough to complain about the fairness or morality of such a system.
Anyway, many publishers are moving in the opposite direction, adding extra incentives for retail customers rather than punitive security measures- EA, for example, with the extra game content delivered through Mass Effect 2's Cerberus Network. And some, like THQ, are locking away content to secondary buyers that many players expect to come standard. Sometimes the retail customer wins, sometimes they lose, and sometimes they're unaffected. Overall I'm content with the system as it is.
In the end, it's silly to sign away your rights or spend extra money in the present in an effort to influence the track of the industry. If you don't care about the manual or the box but insist on spending an extra few dollars on a new game, you're still spending it on yourself- you're just putting $55 towards the game and $5 towards a feeling of generosity or superiority.
You guys should really learn how products are sold.
developer makes game
publisher mass produces game
publisher sells game to retail chain at wholesale price
developer gets paid royalties by how many units ship from publisher to retail chain
retail chain prices & sells game
retail chain keeps ALL profit
retail chain buys used games
retail chain resells used games
retail chain keeps ALL profit
The loser? Retail chain hurts it's own new sales by retaining more stock at the warehouses.
developer makes game
publisher mass produces game
publisher sells game to retail chain at wholesale price
developer gets paid royalties by how many units ship from publisher to retail chain
retail chain prices & sells game
retail chain keeps ALL profit
retail chain buys used games
retail chain resells used games
retail chain keeps ALL profit
The loser? Retail chain hurts it's own new sales by retaining more stock at the warehouses.
I am a second-hand game consumer.
The real conflict here is based upon game publishers trying to gain access to profits being made using their products but outside of their immediate revenue steams and it's fairly easy to see why.
Taking one example from the UK market, HMV's Re/Play initiative has apparently been a strong contributer to their 17.7% profit increase over the previous year. Considering the size of HMV as a company, this increase is likely worth tens of millions of pounds on its own, money made simply by allowing space for second-hand games in their stores.
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/second-hand-helps-hmv-gain-market-share-in-games
GAME have also introduced and maintained a second-hand section, although they reported recent losses, attributed to falling sales of the Wii, ironically the highest selling console last year.
Considering that the worth of the used game market can quite easily be estimated at hundreds of millions every year, I think it's perfectly understandable that the publishers want to cash-in. It's part of their business to make as much money as possible from the products they produce, and even if they only manage to sell their £50 games second-hand for £25, they would still be claiming a profit that could quite easily have gone to highstreet resellers. Considering that each mass-produced product individually costs them very little, it's easy to see that they would literally be in the money.
It should really be no suprise to anyone that they're bitter, taking into consideration that the second-hand sales made by highstreet shops are around 90% pure profit. The fact that they shoulder none of the original costs associated with producing the products only serves to rub salt in the wounds.
In this light, THQ's brutal comments regarding second hand users become slightly more understandable when you learn that their industry profits have sharply declined over the past few months.
http://investor.thq.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=96376&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1458226&highlight
http://finance.paidcontent.org/paidcontent/quote?Symbol=THQI
Of course the corporate loss story is all too familiar to us, the only real difference being that it was the music publishing companies that were first complaining and doing their best to frighten us with tails of narcotic-funding music/film piracy (they make no effort to seperate non-profit casual file sharers from hardcore piracy rings that sell counterfeit products) and how it was ruining the industry for everyone and their child/uncle/grandmother when, in fact, their falling profits can more accurately be attributed to their outdated corporate model, including failure to adequately address and embrace emergent channels of digital distribution such as mp3 downloads.
Their lack of established presence and apparent determination to cling desperately onto CD sales as their main source of income spotlights a selection of companies that have been in a strong, unchallenged position for far too long. The lack of competition these big companies face has made them lazy and left them set so deeply in their ways that all they can do is sit back and whine as their profits inevitably fall.
So, you ask, do I fully agree with or feel sorry for the companies in question?
No.
With regards to their claims, anyone with a vague idea of how these companies operate, and indeed the practice of marketing as a whole, should find it difficult to believe that they are all being harmed by the second-hand market. Never forget that their products are always priced so as to provide the company with ample profits on each sale. One or two may be unlucky or make a loss (bad luck, THQ), but the majority will weather the storm with mere scratches to show. These companies are worth billions, after all.
Let us not forget that copies only become second-hand AFTER they are sold new. Logic thus dictates that, even if every available customer preferred to buy second-hand, it is numerically impossible for second-hand sales to outnumber (and thus make more money than) those first hand sales unless an additional markup is charged. This would never happen as it would totally defeat the purpose of buying second hand.
At this point we now realise that the only thing being damaged are company profits.
Also consider the generous markup placed on the new copies sold by highstreet stores in the first place. Looking at it from this perspective, it could be said that they are simply being made to share around the stupid amounts of money they make by effectively monopolising the market.
None the less, those in a position to make money from the industry would have us all believe that the £50 (realistic these days) we pay for a brand new copy of their product goes towards stringing out the life of their staff's broken old heating unit for one more harsh, biting winter; something for them to crowd around as the arctic wind blows through the broken windows of their condemned, asbestors-ridden office building. This is quite simply a blatant fallacy.
In 2008, Activision reported their SIXTEENTH CONSECUTIVE YEAR of revenue growth with an impressive $2.9 Billion following their merger with Vivendi and Blizzard.
http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/ACTI/506706926x0x219409/95c866fa-e1c7-46e9-841d-aa4ece0c4794/Activision_08_AR_full.pdf
For the majority of companies, the reduction in profits caused by the second-hand market is just that; a reduction in PROFITS. They will continue to function and make money, just not the ridiculous amounts they are used to.
We, the consumers, can only hope that second-hand sales cause a significant enough dent in the flow of money through the industry that they will become less wasteful and more focussed on supplying original, high-quality products to encourage loyalty in existing customers and draw in new revenue!
...
HA. Almost fooled myself that time.
No, of course it is more sensible to assume that they will simply redouble their efforts to find ingenious new ways of coercing consumers into paying their inflated prices. THQ and Ubisoft's recent endorsement of single-use codes to access online features just serves to demonstrate their mindset. They will, of course, further develop their ability to release stripped down titles at the the same market price and peddle the additional (if you can really call it additional) content as a DLC a few months later.
They should instead be focussing on addressing what has driven their customers away in the first place. Game prices have slowly risen and now stand at all-time highs. This, combined with the increasing over-reliance on established franchises and endless churning out of stale, lifeless sequels (here's looking at you, Mario) has led to a distressingly un-original marketplace where customers are no longer drawn in by new, exciting games.
So is it really at all suprising that customers are now increasingly shopping second hand, trading the chance to get the games the day they come out in return for saving a little (or in some cases a lot) on their purchases? And why shouldn't they? That's called market competition. Solving it with one-use codes only benefits one group of people.
And guess what, folks? Big suprise!
It's not you.
The real conflict here is based upon game publishers trying to gain access to profits being made using their products but outside of their immediate revenue steams and it's fairly easy to see why.
Taking one example from the UK market, HMV's Re/Play initiative has apparently been a strong contributer to their 17.7% profit increase over the previous year. Considering the size of HMV as a company, this increase is likely worth tens of millions of pounds on its own, money made simply by allowing space for second-hand games in their stores.
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/second-hand-helps-hmv-gain-market-share-in-games
GAME have also introduced and maintained a second-hand section, although they reported recent losses, attributed to falling sales of the Wii, ironically the highest selling console last year.
Considering that the worth of the used game market can quite easily be estimated at hundreds of millions every year, I think it's perfectly understandable that the publishers want to cash-in. It's part of their business to make as much money as possible from the products they produce, and even if they only manage to sell their £50 games second-hand for £25, they would still be claiming a profit that could quite easily have gone to highstreet resellers. Considering that each mass-produced product individually costs them very little, it's easy to see that they would literally be in the money.
It should really be no suprise to anyone that they're bitter, taking into consideration that the second-hand sales made by highstreet shops are around 90% pure profit. The fact that they shoulder none of the original costs associated with producing the products only serves to rub salt in the wounds.
In this light, THQ's brutal comments regarding second hand users become slightly more understandable when you learn that their industry profits have sharply declined over the past few months.
http://investor.thq.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=96376&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1458226&highlight
http://finance.paidcontent.org/paidcontent/quote?Symbol=THQI
Of course the corporate loss story is all too familiar to us, the only real difference being that it was the music publishing companies that were first complaining and doing their best to frighten us with tails of narcotic-funding music/film piracy (they make no effort to seperate non-profit casual file sharers from hardcore piracy rings that sell counterfeit products) and how it was ruining the industry for everyone and their child/uncle/grandmother when, in fact, their falling profits can more accurately be attributed to their outdated corporate model, including failure to adequately address and embrace emergent channels of digital distribution such as mp3 downloads.
Their lack of established presence and apparent determination to cling desperately onto CD sales as their main source of income spotlights a selection of companies that have been in a strong, unchallenged position for far too long. The lack of competition these big companies face has made them lazy and left them set so deeply in their ways that all they can do is sit back and whine as their profits inevitably fall.
So, you ask, do I fully agree with or feel sorry for the companies in question?
No.
With regards to their claims, anyone with a vague idea of how these companies operate, and indeed the practice of marketing as a whole, should find it difficult to believe that they are all being harmed by the second-hand market. Never forget that their products are always priced so as to provide the company with ample profits on each sale. One or two may be unlucky or make a loss (bad luck, THQ), but the majority will weather the storm with mere scratches to show. These companies are worth billions, after all.
Let us not forget that copies only become second-hand AFTER they are sold new. Logic thus dictates that, even if every available customer preferred to buy second-hand, it is numerically impossible for second-hand sales to outnumber (and thus make more money than) those first hand sales unless an additional markup is charged. This would never happen as it would totally defeat the purpose of buying second hand.
At this point we now realise that the only thing being damaged are company profits.
Also consider the generous markup placed on the new copies sold by highstreet stores in the first place. Looking at it from this perspective, it could be said that they are simply being made to share around the stupid amounts of money they make by effectively monopolising the market.
None the less, those in a position to make money from the industry would have us all believe that the £50 (realistic these days) we pay for a brand new copy of their product goes towards stringing out the life of their staff's broken old heating unit for one more harsh, biting winter; something for them to crowd around as the arctic wind blows through the broken windows of their condemned, asbestors-ridden office building. This is quite simply a blatant fallacy.
In 2008, Activision reported their SIXTEENTH CONSECUTIVE YEAR of revenue growth with an impressive $2.9 Billion following their merger with Vivendi and Blizzard.
http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/ACTI/506706926x0x219409/95c866fa-e1c7-46e9-841d-aa4ece0c4794/Activision_08_AR_full.pdf
For the majority of companies, the reduction in profits caused by the second-hand market is just that; a reduction in PROFITS. They will continue to function and make money, just not the ridiculous amounts they are used to.
We, the consumers, can only hope that second-hand sales cause a significant enough dent in the flow of money through the industry that they will become less wasteful and more focussed on supplying original, high-quality products to encourage loyalty in existing customers and draw in new revenue!
...
HA. Almost fooled myself that time.
No, of course it is more sensible to assume that they will simply redouble their efforts to find ingenious new ways of coercing consumers into paying their inflated prices. THQ and Ubisoft's recent endorsement of single-use codes to access online features just serves to demonstrate their mindset. They will, of course, further develop their ability to release stripped down titles at the the same market price and peddle the additional (if you can really call it additional) content as a DLC a few months later.
They should instead be focussing on addressing what has driven their customers away in the first place. Game prices have slowly risen and now stand at all-time highs. This, combined with the increasing over-reliance on established franchises and endless churning out of stale, lifeless sequels (here's looking at you, Mario) has led to a distressingly un-original marketplace where customers are no longer drawn in by new, exciting games.
So is it really at all suprising that customers are now increasingly shopping second hand, trading the chance to get the games the day they come out in return for saving a little (or in some cases a lot) on their purchases? And why shouldn't they? That's called market competition. Solving it with one-use codes only benefits one group of people.
And guess what, folks? Big suprise!
It's not you.
*ahem* game developers make enough money anyway with DLC and $60.00 retail prices i find it very difficult to find any spot of pity for any developer.
besides, if a gamer is looking to buy used, it's likely they can't afford or are unwilling to pay for a new game
besides, if a gamer is looking to buy used, it's likely they can't afford or are unwilling to pay for a new game
No offense, I see what your saying, but that seems a little too much like an excuse for piracy. You could just say that you weren't going to buy any game and use that to justify pirating any game you desire. While you are saying you don't do that, when applied towards the masses, that philosophy is just asking for corruption.BiscuitTrouser said:
I personally don't see anything wrong with buying used games. As said by several before me, the problem in that area is the fashion that GameStop marks up the used games and such, but that isn't something I really get into. I, however, love to support the developer whenever I can for obvious reasons. I buy all of my games new, and if they are good enough, I tend to get them when they come out. Hell, when I sometimes buy a collector's edition from a developer I like, I consider my desire to support them further a bullet-point for me getting the edition - it's just the way I feel about those developers.
Bingo, and we have a winner.MR.Spartacus said:
When you buy your copy of Madden 11 used, you are not EA's customer. You are GameStop's customer. EA owes you fuck all, and it's well within their right to charge you ten bucks to play on their servers. That way, you become their customer, and they owe you the bandwidth you eat up on their servers.
I love project ten dollar, and you should too. Instead, everyone will just ***** and whine about what they are owed and entitled too. Hot tip, nobody owes you shit if you don't pay your own way.
It's this kind of misinformation that leads to people making baseless statements about the video game industry. Hell, about any industry. I find it hard to take anything else in that post seriously.TallmanMike said:
It's called inflation. The price of almost everything trends up over time if you just compare stickers. Thanks to Moore's Law, however, producing technology becomes exponentially cheaper every couple years. That's why computers cost several hundred dollars today rather than several thousand thirty years ago, even though a modern computer is several thousand times more powerful.
Most SNES games cost anywhere from $50 to $80. That was back in the early '90s. Today, that would be more like $75 to $115. $60 today is more like an all time low.
Penny Arcade isn't comparing anything to piracy. They're saying if you want to support a company,buying used games won't help.jasoncyrus said:
And they don't pander to corporations. They're one of the few who will call companies on their bullshit.
Or how about garage/yard sales. I hope the ludicrousness of this line of logic is becoming clear, if it wasn't already.superbatranger said:
Is that so? Well this is one of the biggest shovel fulls of bullshit any corporations ever tried to dish out and I don't see Penny Arcade calling them on it.PureIrony said:
I have been beating this same drum for ages (and putting my money where my mouth is---I haven't bought a used game* since I was in high school buying used games on the SNES). As one of the devs said, "there are no used games on Steam".
It can be really, REALLY hard to understand that doing the right thing often means inconveniencing oneself---I could, if I so desired, just pirate everything that I could get my greedy little paws on. It's not challenging. I could buy used (well, not for the PC, but I have a DS on my nightstand). I could do a lot of things. But I do what's right for the developers of the games I love, for niche houses like Paradox Interactive and mainstream devs like Bethesda Game Studios alike.
You've all played Fallout 3? You know that whole bit about "sacrifice"? In the name of keeping my moral conscience clean and my platform from which to argue this point firm, sacrifices have to be made (it doesn't hurt that my budget for games is quite low because 95% or more of games that come out don't interest me, but that's beside the point.)
*I'm not counting out-of-print games that can only be acquired through channels other than retail/traditional money-to-developer. I'd gladly delete my Aerobiz Supersonic ROM if Koei made the game available through some other means, for example, and I deleted my Chrono Trigger ROM when the game came out for the DS and spent the money.
It can be really, REALLY hard to understand that doing the right thing often means inconveniencing oneself---I could, if I so desired, just pirate everything that I could get my greedy little paws on. It's not challenging. I could buy used (well, not for the PC, but I have a DS on my nightstand). I could do a lot of things. But I do what's right for the developers of the games I love, for niche houses like Paradox Interactive and mainstream devs like Bethesda Game Studios alike.
You've all played Fallout 3? You know that whole bit about "sacrifice"? In the name of keeping my moral conscience clean and my platform from which to argue this point firm, sacrifices have to be made (it doesn't hurt that my budget for games is quite low because 95% or more of games that come out don't interest me, but that's beside the point.)
*I'm not counting out-of-print games that can only be acquired through channels other than retail/traditional money-to-developer. I'd gladly delete my Aerobiz Supersonic ROM if Koei made the game available through some other means, for example, and I deleted my Chrono Trigger ROM when the game came out for the DS and spent the money.
Furburt said:
Exactly, thats how I feel. Both are working fine and if game retailers wanted to stop used game sells, then they should stop charging so much for their product. As it is I try to buy new games for disc quality when I can. But I can't always do that, and as Phunky said, some games aren't available any other way.PhunkyPhazon said:
If they want to limit used game sales or at least get a slice of the action, there are two options. One is to put your own games on sale. In other words, once a game is several years old release a "commemorative edition" or something. Basically the greatest hits thing that Sony did for a while. Re release your game, but at a far, far cheaper price. While it's not new, I would prefer to buy a new copy at a cheap price over a used copy if I could.
The other option would be to price games based on content and playtime. I just got Mirror's Edge, and while I love it, I would have been rather upset if I'd paid the full 60 bucks for it. It's a great game but it has about as much content as Portal, if not less. If you release a short game with little content that is still otherwise a great game, why not charge less for it? More people will buy your game, we get more money to save for games we want, and used copies won't be a much better option then buying new. The problem with this is of course if they developers are the ones deciding the content to price ratio, we'd be right back where we started.