Games Stay Behind Music as Downloads

Of course its a good thing. Fact of the matter is, regardless of what the gods of downloads think, is that people will always prefer physical product, especially so with games, which cost a lot to make and sell for a higher price.

While many in the industry still think the future is in downloadable games, I believe that's just going to be part of it, backing up the physical media. Sure, the powers that be don't like us actually owning anything anymore but that's a far off pipe dream.

Music or films downloads make sense with, but for games its a very jaded grey area. Small indies and developer games yes perhaps, but anything larger and top of the range, I doubt will all be going out the pipe like Steam.

people will always prefer phyisical product... tell that to EMI, the games mag publisers, tell that to all the hollywood film prpducers form the 1950's who mocked television because 'people kjust love going to the movies together'.

unless youve got some hard f**king figures for your tealeaf reading stop it, yeah?

Whoa! So harsh, ok so the guy doesn’t have figures to back this up but its true a tangible form of media is more appealing than a non tangible, but price is your issue here and always will be the lower downloads become the more enticing it will be for the consumer,

Oh and `People still >kjust< love going to the movies together`

At least the nice people in the Spong Underwater City (or wherever they live these days) can get a point across without swearing about it - try using a little wit instead of poor language if you're gonna get involved in a debate!

Games mags don't come into this at all - they provide news, reviews and, in some cases, media such as demos and videos - all things that can now be found online and for free. News is faster, reviews are intereactive and can be aggregated online to produce meta content (eg. average scores), demos are easy to download these days and game videos can be found in vast quantities at sites like Youtube. The chief point here is that people have stopped buying magazines for money because they are starting to become obsolete and beside, how many people keep the mags once read?

And the TV point is even more bizarre. Okay, so the film producers mocked the rise of television. And? Using TV to argue that people don't like a tangable product is really an exercise in shooting yourself in the foot. A large part in the rise of DVD as a format has to be the popularity of tv shows, both old and new - shows like Buffy and 24 owe a large part of their success to the people who want to physically own the shows. And correct me here if I'm wrong, but don't the film studios currently blame piracy and DVD sales for the slowdown in general cinema receipts? They themselves are saying that people aren't going to the cinema because people are obtaining the film through other means.

Anyways, I only commented because I hate it when you get people posting who choose to make their ill-informed points by swearing like fools.

it might be to you. i hate having crap like that lieing around the place.



oh good a lesson in typing aswell.
well An Introduction to Film Studies By Jill Nelmes states that in 1946 the avrage cinema audience as 31.5million for the uk. by the 1980's it was less than 1million

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=aQPFT5tqEbQC&pg=PA36&lpg=PA36&dq=movie+attendance+figures+1950s&source=web&ots=0bcp1hkPAI&sig=L7CiKtyAED9ihN_rpZdPJT-r-5Q&hl=en

so people >klove< it a f**k of alot less than they did.

Underwater Castle. We are shortly moving into an Underwater Flying Pub. But, yes, your point regarding making a point without swearage is a valid one. I never swear.



Mmm... I thought the point that our Frenchly-themed poster was making was in response to the 'people will always want physical media'. See, that's not really true. If it was then we'd all still be writing letters to each other rather than emails. People's preference is - as far as I can see, what with my experience of a person - for the convenience.

Nowadays it's also for the most immediate as well.



Not that there's anything wrong with swearing per se. It's a valid part of the language. Damn it.

Oh, that wasn't swearing, it was blaspheming. Damn you!

And that was cursing.

I'll get my coat.

Tim

funny that isnt less people going to the cinema in the 80`s isnt that around the time a tangible product called VHS came to the market? whats your point? contridiction means nothing to me!

You witless cesspit-full of bacteria-infested skid marks.

i did read the reference it also shows that between 1979 and 1997 that goers increased to an average 3.5 million per week,

In reply to Babylon 5 reject Zoot (look it up if you must), I don't need any proof to back this one up, one because its my personal opinion and two because its largely due to common sense and from myself being a customer of these media.

The physical vs digital debate will always rage but physical will always win to a degree. Why you ask? Quite simply because as humans we like physical possesions. We live and die with them and what we leave behind tell a tale of who we are/were.

Regardless of whether you are a 3000 year old mummy or the chap next door who died last week, we like to leave something behind, if not for siblings then to just show we existed.

Now while the digital games idea might appeal to the big boys, there are a few reasons it won't happen to rule the industry and replace the physical. I'll cover them below andmy thoughts

1: The second hand factor is one that the powers that be want dead, because they aren't getting their cut of cheese. If compared to any other second hand item you can think of, do the creators/manufacturers receive a cut of a second/third/forth hand sale? Of course not and it would be unrealistic for them to try and enforce this. While many trade in on the highstreet at Game, more sceond hand good are exchanged and sold unmonitored, at car boot/garage sales, privately, small media outlets and online via Ebay etc.

2: Convienience: Not everyone can afford to be online and thus download games. If this happened to become the absolute rule, many gamers would be caught outside the loop and have to possibly concede to playing their back catalogue, and maybe even opt out of games and gaming. I hear japan's online infrastructure isn't the greatest in the world, despite theirs game creation/playing prowess.

3:The handheld factor. While the idea of an iTunes for games is tempting, the main obstacle here would be size, price and portable storage (within reason. The DS is the closest to a good start but the online access still has to be ironed out.

4:Time and age: When I'm 50, I want to know that my copy of God of War IV will work on my well kept PS3, without my having to access a PSN server that may not exist anymore. This is the core reason why physical isn't going anywhere soon. To redownload requires a server and people to use it regular etc. If you look at PS2 games that were once online. Servers for many of those games have now shut down. Now expand your mind and imagine this on a console where you have to download the content totally. You'd be screwed totally, as you have no physical version to resort to, incase the server is dead etc. If kept in good conditions, physical media can last ages, and if needed can be converted to digital and back again. On top of that, hard drives can die on you, as has happened to several PC owners for years.

That's my view on it anyway.

Unless you're thinking of someone else, I suspect you meant Zooty, as in Rebo and Zooty, played by Penn and Teller in the series 5 episode "Day of the Dead". I didn't need to look it up; take that how you want. :-)


And yet the website I set up in 1995 is still available almost 13 years later. There's a difference between a file repository or a web site and an actively maintained, patched and moderated game server. One needs just a connection and disc space, the other needs staff and active development.

Not to say that it's a cast-iron cert that DLC will still be available 13 years after publication, but it's a lot more likely than the Halo 3 servers still being switched on in 2021.