News THQ: No sympathy for second hand game buyers

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/2010/08/24/thq-no-sympathy-for-second-hand-game-buyers/1

 

Whilst I can understand game developers wanting to treat new game buyers differently from second hand game buyers (after all, you pay a premium for a new game which increases the profits of the developer), surely they must understand that second hand game buyers extend the life and popularity of a game?

The reason someone sells a game is because they have no interest in it any more, isn't it better to have a willing second hand buyer play the game rather than it not be played at all? They have already profited from the game (from the original sale) and have the potential to profit a second time from the second hand buyer purchasing DLC.

The most popular games have a life span far beyond the original development/release cycle.

Treating potential customers like they are second class citizens isn't going to make them many friends.

 

Dimwits. They'd also lose a significant portion of their first-hand customers without the used game market.

 

As usual developers don't seem to understand how a segement of the market works. 2nd hand demand actually drives new purchases. If a new buyer knows that if wants to get rid of the game in 2 weeks and its 2nd hand price is still reasonable he will buy the game new knowing his investment wont fall in value too much. Although a games value falls quicker than many other products a games 2nd hand demand is good for first time sales with buyers who want the game at release but wont hang on to it after a full play through.

The ten dollars or 7 quid or so in the uk for online and other content i don't find too objectionable as long as the game doesn't become gimped until this purchased. But this idea publishers are cheated by 2nd hand sales is myth they need to get over.

 

I really mean publishers not developers. Developers are often more in touch with reality than publishers.

 

I'm a game developer, we publish our own games and I'd never say anything like this, even if we did sell physical products. It's just plain bad PR, no matter how you look at it.

I guess there's a reason why studios and publishers keep going bankrupt

 

Good to hear another publisher talking out of their rear end.

I lot of people on low incomes will only buy second hand games because they are cheaper they new, if they could only buy new they simply would not buy them.

 

This. As long as the extra content is simply that (like ME2 for example) then I don't really mind.

 

I don't care about second hand buyers either.

I've only bought second hand when new has been absolutely out of the question due to availability.

 

Once again, the games industry does its spoilt little brat routine.......

When will these money grabbing shysters stop thinking they deserve special consideration in the free market...

Do you hear any other industry whining about 2nd hand sales of their products?.....

This is nothing to do with losing money, its to do with sheer greed.....and wanting to buy that 2nd Ferrari or that 3rd house.

This industry and its key players really need to grow up......

 

there is a reason why people buy 2nd hand, maybe they cant afford 1st hand or think it isnt worth the 1st hand price

in reality getting rid of the 2nd hand, forces people to wait to buy
without resell value, 1st hand buyers will wait till the product is cheaper, and 2nd hand buyers might become 1st hand buyers once it has dropped to this lower price (or may just live without it)

depending on the variables used you can calculate if its better or worse
and i assume the publishers have done their sums

e.g
based on 4 million people buying (i know these numbers arent accurate)
4mil * £35
= 140
or

1mil * £35
1mil * £25
1mil * £17
1mil * £10
= 87

 

I suspect most of the cash realised by first time buyers when they sell a game on is put back into buying new games, so I don't really see the issue here. Also, the second hand buyer has waited until the game was out for quite a while to pick up a second hand copy, so he's unlikely to have been willing to shell out £40 for a brand new copy at full retail price anyway. I really don't get why games companies make such a big thing out of this - movie studios don't complain (at least not so volubly) about the second hand DVD and Blu-ray market (actually they're just grateful if you're watching legit DVDs rather than pirate copies, as the games publishers should be); print publishers don't try to get every second hand bookshop in the land shut down; and nobody cares if I give an old CD to a mate. Why should the games industry be any different?

 

They should`nt make sh1te games that aren`t worth the astounding £45 price tag they put on their merchandise.

I mean they say good quality wwe titles? Talk about saturating the market.
Maybe bit tech could do a article on weather 45 quid is actually a decent price point for games? I`m still astounded by the fact that titles are priced so high, especially when the pc market is smaller yet still sells at around 30 quid. Then a AAA title comes along and is sold for a whopping 45£ price tag when they know there IP is gonna sell sooooo much more copies.

Bring down prices, make better titles!!

 

^ this. Killing the second hand market would lead to an increase in game piracy imho. What are they thinking?

Foot meet mouth...

 

As far as I know, this only applies to console games since stores are too worried about people pirating copies of PC games and is likely why the PC games market is thriving for digital distribution and falling in stores.

So it seems developers are stuck between a rock and a hard place, on the one hand they can create a plethora of console titles till the cows come home and have to content themselves with the reality of the second hand market.

Alternatively they can work on PC / MAC titles and take their chances versus the pirates.

Surely having people register their games online and for this to create a key unique to that user and their computers hardware is a simple step that allows the game to check with the companies servers on start up, much like steam does. Allowing some flexibility in this to allow the player of the game to register authorised machines on their own network for the purpose of LAN or Co-Op gaming would certainly help developers keep a greater measure of control and also help their target audience.

With such a large audience with an internet connection available and with connections being more reliable, requiring an internet connection is surely not that much of a requirement to ask for.

 

Absolutely not. Sure, internet connections are reliable and available to most people, but developers can't make their systems 100% efficient. I used to play wow for couple of years, and woe the raging I went through every time the servers had unscheduled downtime. And believe me, there use to be pretty much of it. Even scheduled maintenances starts to piss you off at some point when you start to think the amount of money you put into the game, every goddamned month.

Also, this was the point I stopped playing wow. God forbid me ever touching monthly subscription-based mmorpg filth ever again.

I have already had some trouble with StarCraft II, I'm definitely not amused by not being able to progress my single player campaign because battle.net has login issues.

Forcing broken DRM crap upon legit customers only promotes piracy.

 

...no sympathy for THQ then either.
...oh, and no money.

 

the games market does seem to be the only one really bitching about this. (granted its possible others do I just don't know about it because I'm not as interested).

One of the other effects i thought about with second hand markets is sequels. Quite a few people hear about a new sequel without having played the original, so will go and buy the first one secondhand for a cheap price, to see if they want to buy the second. And this would be much, much harder without a secondhand market.

 

This will be abused I think. Release a half made game (a demo with 2 levels) then download everything else. Kinda like Rhynair model. Personally the more of this tripe that goes on the more I prefer a steam based system. Sony have a similar model but as usual sony screw up with poor selection and stupid pricing.

 

I consider myself a gamer. I have spent hundreds if not thousands of hours playing games. However, I have never paid full release price for a game, and I never will. I might buy a game for £10-15, but if I can't get it for that, then I won't bother. My computer is not a £800 behemoth built to play the latest games.

The reason is simple - money. When I was growing up, money was tight. I simply didn't have much more than £10-20 a month. As I got older, I realised that limiting the amount of money and time I spend on gaming allows me to indulge my other hobbies and interests.

I know the game publishers don't care about me. And I don't care about them.

If a game doesn't seem like good value *to me*, regardless of whether it's new or second hand, and regardless of RRP, I won't buy it.