Why does the XBox One still require discs?

[Karen Parker]

i think the real question should be why do we need disks period.
pretty sure usb sticks have established themselves as the preferred medium of data transfer

i don't see why no one's done this yet, honestly. you could easily have a 10GB game written to a flash drive, heck, it'd basically be like going back to the old cartridge days!

 

[Roxor]

And let's not forget two important demographics that downloads don't work for:

1) Impulse buyers - Hard to appeal to these folks by demanding that they be at home in order to shop for games. They may have felt like looking for a game while they were at Walmart, but by the time they get home, they'll be thinking of something else.

Obviously you don't use Steam. I try to stay out of the Steam store because every other time I visit it I end up buying something on special.

2) Parents of gamers - May not be as comfortable spending money on something that has no tangible existence as they would a physically packaged game.

This, however, is a good point.

i think the real question should be why do we need disks period.
pretty sure usb sticks have established themselves as the preferred medium of data transfer

i don't see why no one's done this yet, honestly. you could easily have a 10GB game written to a flash drive, heck, it'd basically be like going back to the old cartridge days!

Damn right. You could make it so that the users can use flash drives to distribute the games and save a fortune on bandwidth for downloads.

"Hey, that looks like a fun game. Can you copy it for me so I don't have to download it?"

 

[DoPo]

i think the real question should be why do we need disks period.
pretty sure usb sticks have established themselves as the preferred medium of data transfer

I guess because they are more expensive than disks. I dunno. I'd really like it if we used USB stick more often, though = they are so much faster. And quieter. Last time I had to use a disk I got a bit freaked out at the constant spinning sound. I've not done disks a lot lately.

 

[Brotha Desmond]

Truth be told I prefer physical copies to prove that I own it, but in this case it might as well be all digital. However there is an obvious reason to have a disc drive. They want you to use it for movies as well. With no disc drive you won't be able to play their DVD's.

 

[TheSteeleStrap]

"Hey we finally jumped on the Blu-ray bandwagon!" That about covers it.

 

[Maxtro]

i think the real question should be why do we need disks period.
pretty sure usb sticks have established themselves as the preferred medium of data transfer

i don't see why no one's done this yet, honestly. you could easily have a 10GB game written to a flash drive, heck, it'd basically be like going back to the old cartridge days!

I thought about that too.

With games on flash drives, you wouldn't need to install the game at all. Yup, It would be just like the cartridge days.

I think the main issue is, that no matter how cheap flash media has gotten, it's still cheaper to produce discs.

 

[lechat]

i think the real question should be why do we need disks period.
pretty sure usb sticks have established themselves as the preferred medium of data transfer

i don't see why no one's done this yet, honestly. you could easily have a 10GB game written to a flash drive, heck, it'd basically be like going back to the old cartridge days!

I thought about that too.

With games on flash drives, you wouldn't need to install the game at all. Yup, It would be just like the cartridge days.

I think the main issue is, that no matter how cheap flash media has gotten, it's still cheaper to produce discs.

i'd say it's a combination of cost and anti piracy but i personally would rather pay an extra 4 bucks (about what a 16 gig stick would cost) to have better performance and a more reliable storage medium

 

[DoPo]

i think the real question should be why do we need disks period.
pretty sure usb sticks have established themselves as the preferred medium of data transfer

i don't see why no one's done this yet, honestly. you could easily have a 10GB game written to a flash drive, heck, it'd basically be like going back to the old cartridge days!

I thought about that too.

With games on flash drives, you wouldn't need to install the game at all. Yup, It would be just like the cartridge days.

I think the main issue is, that no matter how cheap flash media has gotten, it's still cheaper to produce discs.

i'd say it's a combination of cost and anti piracy but i personally would rather pay an extra 4 bucks (about what a 16 gig stick would cost) to have better performance and a more reliable storage medium

Well, yeah, you can pay extra 4 bucks easily but the creators need to pay several thousand times that to get the flash drives in the first place. And there is probably the anti-piracy as you suggested - they'll have to fit something on there to prevent copying which would be an extra cost. Possibly other stuff, too.

 

[endtherapture]

We still have brick-and-mortar retail outlets, so naturally they require physical copies of games to sell, right? Personally, buying a game on Steam, having it download after 7 hours and then after trying to play it having to wait even MORE hours for the fucking thing to download 4 gigs of updates is pretty damn annoying.

Steam downloads the entire game as fully updated as it comes.

 

[DSK-]

We still have brick-and-mortar retail outlets, so naturally they require physical copies of games to sell, right? Personally, buying a game on Steam, having it download after 7 hours and then after trying to play it having to wait even MORE hours for the fucking thing to download 4 gigs of updates is pretty damn annoying.

Steam downloads the entire game as fully updated as it comes.

Well, either it used to do it in the past, or it was with particular games. Either way, I know what I saw ^_^.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

One reason I feel flash drives are not a great answer, aside from upping the cost of games, they have a larger margin for failure. All it takes is a small surge to fry a cheap flash drive which would be the most likely type of flash drive they would use. Discs aren't always physically stable but if you take care of them the right way they can last a long damn time.
Basically there are two main things that kill discs, overheating drives (saved by installing content on the hard disk) and scratches (either dirty lenses or mishandling by the consumer).
Cheap flash drives fail more frequently and like I said before I seriously doubt publishers would choose to go the more expensive route.

 

[Shoggoth2588]

I can't help but think that Microsoft is putting games on discs a bit reluctantly. As other people have said above, it takes a lot of bandwidth to download a game. I think Microsoft is hoping to drop discs entirely if the XBone makes it to its third or fourth year.

 

[Atmos Duality]

Because:
1) The mass-market still loves buying games on discs enough to warrant that as a distribution method.
and...
2) It acts as an alternative that saves Microsoft bandwidth.

Saving 10GB of downloads via disc is 10GB of traffic Microsoft doesn't have to deal with (besides authenticating the game, which shouldn't take much traffic). Multiply by the number of users who still do the brick-and-mortar route; it's not hard to see the benefits.
Especially when some of those games start rolling out with Always Online DRM; then M$ is really going to want every bit of bandwidth it can spare unless they're interested in re-enacting the disasters of Diablo 3 and SimCity.

 

[The_Lost_King]

We still have brick-and-mortar retail outlets, so naturally they require physical copies of games to sell, right? Personally, buying a game on Steam, having it download after 7 hours and then after trying to play it having to wait even MORE hours for the fucking thing to download 4 gigs of updates is pretty damn annoying.

Steam downloads the entire game as fully updated as it comes.

Well, either it used to do it in the past, or it was with particular games. Either way, I know what I saw ^_^.

Maybe if you got an f2p game with a launcher, that is all that makes sense. It has done that for every non-f2p thing I have bought on steam and I have 88 games.