Gamers push back: 71% say they’re not ready to let physical games die as PlayStation and Xbox move toward a digital-only future”
https://www.windowscentral.com/gaming/gamers-push-back-71-percent-say-theyre-not-ready-to-let-physical-games-die-as-playstation-and-xbox-move-toward-a-digital-only-futureOpen linkView original on lemmy.today
199 replies
That number lines up almost too perfectly with the sales data Sony lied about when presenting the reasons for cutting disc production
I would be fine with digital only, but only if there was no DRM.
And alternative stores with alternative servers so I don't have to buy a subscription for online capabilities and the ability to install whatever software I want... I guess a PC will do just fine.
IDK, second market games are cool.
I mean, yes that would be ideal, but its never going to happen, unfortunately. Even physical media has DRM and has had it for a long time now.
If it was possible to lend/borrow and resale digital media that would solve most of the problems. You could still have DRM that makes sure the game is only installed on a single console at a time and what not.
Another problem would also be that the servers could shut down which would mean you can't download the game indefinitely. But that is kind of already the case, even with physical media, as a lot of games already require Day 1 patches to be playable. So its a related and also important but somewhat separate issue. I hope Stop Killing Games is successful in that department.
The difference isn't digital vs physical. Either medium can have DRM. It's whether you own your copy or not.
Physical DRM like the classic dial-a-pirate is owned by you. You can choose to hand someone a copy of the game and the physical DRM, and they can play it. Nobody can take that right away from you.
Online DRM will always have the flaw of someone being able to take away your rights, for any reason. Thus, you don't own a copy of the game. Since digital games can't have physical DRM, the only way to truly own a digital copy of a game is DRM-free.
"Gamers push back." Just like they pushed back against $70 and $80 games by lining up around the block to buy a Switch 2 so they could buy $70 and $80 games to play on it. Like Rockstar will make a mint selling $100 copies of GTA6.
Push back but won't boycott. Tread on me harder daddy.
This is the song of the world, a ton of angry voices but then the vast majority of them still buy (in both meanings) the thing. People want to be mad but never inconvenienced. They'll spend so many hours being angry both internally and externally but then still use their vote, be it a political or wallet one, for that specific thing they're angry about. "I'm mad this costs so much, that it's so bad, that it doesn't align with my views but there's no way in hell I'll miss out on it".
Fucking cowards.
Yeah if they aren't ready we would see GTA 6 flop hard. Personally I'm not getting it until pc release, and even then we'll see if I have to buy on their shitty launcher.
I hate Nintendo as much as the next guy, but I'm pretty sure they were the last to adopt $70 games. Then you had Mario Kart World at 80, which is indeed dumb. Not as dumb as shitty yearly sports titles being $70.
And it'll STILL be $80 20 years from now.
I suppose if any game is worth $100 it'll probably be a game from Rockstar. Personally I'm waiting for reviews since there's literally no point pre-ordering.
Thank you for providing us an object example lol
Nah, not all of us. When switch 2 came out (and because I wanted a hand held) I looked at it, poked at in the shop and decided to buy a DS instead. $80 vs $650. If I'd been feeling more generous, I would have gotten a Retroid pocket 5 or something. I didn't need it.
The switch 2 is shiny, but it didn't fill any niche for me that one of my other rigs couldn't do (Wii, Wii u, $100 emulation box I built).
"Bigger, better, faster" is a mug's game. It cannot be won and it's the lynchpin of capitalism. The way to win is to not play.
Gaming is a luxury good. If the big players are going to go full retard, let them. Let it all burn while you find greener pastures.
This goes for all tech (and luxury goods), IMHO. Do more with less.
Reject the status ladder → identify the actual function → satisfy it with the smallest tool that works = you win.
Then enjoy the absurdity of $650 Switch 2 (and marvel at the cost of Switch 1 increasing in price. Lol no).
Steam on pc shows that gamers can be okay with not having physical media - as long as they trust the vendor that the thing they pay for actually means a persistent access to the game.
Unfortunately this move also gives much more power to the vendor. Once he decides to withdraw access to the player, the ownership of the paid-for thing becomes useless (until a lawsuit were to be filed and won).
Physical media without mandatory internet servers (like in pre-internet consoles) means true ownership - after buying a game, the vendor has no longer any control.
The key point to me is not directly the difference between physical disk or cloud download, but between truly offline versus online-required games (or goods in general).
PC gaming all digital is ok because it's not a closed ecosystem. I can install whatever platform I want, and buy games. And there are huge sales.
Also there are drm free shops like gog, a huge community with emulators, mods, and in the need pirated copies of the games I bought.
Trust is one thing, but monopolized market is another.
edit: today I found the List of DRM-free games that has many games that DRM free from many PC platforms (1867 games in Steam and 604 in Epic). Meaning that you can launch an installed game directly from the .exe and even make a zip the installed game as backup.
This is the crux of the issue. I have a few games in my library that have been de-listed from the store but my access to those games is unaffected and I can still install and play them, and it's a problem that Sony's approach isn't analogous to this.
Leave PCs out of this console nonsense. On PC you can write whatever you want to whatever media you want by yourself, without kissing some Nintendo-Sony ass.
For now, yes. Microsoft is already well on it's way to a closed ecosystem where you'll only be able to run signed software on "your" PC.
Haven't used anything Microsoft in a decade but I do remember that there were some certificates for executables... Are they mandatory nowadays?
PC gamers accepted the inability to sell and loan games and to have extensive DRM on a large number of games. The console players are the last holds against this anti consumer practice. Just because PCs has multiple stores it doesn't change the fact Steam is a near monopoly and while its relatively consumer friendly we still don't own games on it, they can not be passed to others in any way legally. People have a weird love for Steam but the basic facts are the same, it uses DRM, you can't sell or loan games and you have a licence and don't own them, you can't pass them to someone else in a will. Steam is pretty anti consumer on the big items here compared to disks on the consoles.
PC gamers haven't pushed back as hard because the basic facts are NOT the same. The ecosystem is entirely different. I'm not interested in defending Steam or its use of DRM, but the fact that something is illegal doesn't mean it can't happen. Piracy is one of the big reasons PC gamers aren't nearly as affected by the lack of physical media being sold: you just make it yourself. I've even pirated games I already own just because it's the easiest way to have an unmodded install alongside a heavily modded one.
But the lack of options for console gamers doesn't stop there. Not only are the hardware and software environments completely locked down, but demographically, a much greater number of console buyers are going to be those with bad or no internet. They can't just download whatever from wherever. If they lose the discs, they may lose access entirely.
People pirate a game they own just to not have the launcher or unskipable opening movie.
And one of the reasons for that is that the DRM can be removed from a large number of games. 🏴☠️
Steam voluntarily let you have family sharing, without a monthly fee, so that removed the biggest problem without having actual lending.
Folks like me love Steam because I have a huge backlog, and don't care if I play the latest thing as soon as it comes out. Combine that with their sales every few months let me pick up older games at a steep discount, without having to deal with a Gamestop.
In practice doesnt everything basically get leaked/mass disseminated anyway regardless of the vendor/developers anti-consumer shit or best legal efforts/public meddling?
My backlog is big enough and I'm old enough that I don't see a need to buy a new game for a long time.
Fight the establishment by getting kids addicted to old games.
Shit man I'm old and would've dropped a good chunk of money on a complete, single-player GTA6 physical disk, at launch.
I might've even gone and bought a PS5 as crazy as that sounds. I already have a great PC and haven't gotten a console in a decade but I've gotten so much enjoyment from the franchise I'd feel pretty safe buying.
But the lack of a physical disk might actually be the thing that makes me completely reverse my decision. I tolerate it on PC because there are so many indie games it doesn't really make sense to have a physical copy every time but with a huge AAA title from a proven money hungry powerhouse like R* it's completely unacceptable. I want to be able to dig that disc out in 20 years and play forgotten games. I want to take my console out into the woods and play the game completely disconnected from the modern world if it suits me.
If we're going to transition to digital only, a couple things need to happen.
When we purchase a game, we own it. This is not a long term rental.
If we want to sell it or trade it, we can.
The Corps called they said no and fuck you.
Lol, never going to happen.
I know, but it's what should happen. People hold the power to make it happen but don't have any restraint to follow through.
You could have legislation, just make it so that they have to keep a download button for people that already have something purchased. The real issue is that like if Sony doesn't have the rights to something anymore then the rights holder can go after Sony. You just need a rule that they can keep something and can't be suedby others for providing downloads to customers even if Sony lost the rights, so that only applies to new sales.
Both Microsoft and Sony had this exact infrastructure built ready to go for Xbox One and PS4 prior to launch.
We were going to get full digital collections with a marketplace that would allow entitlement sales AND the ability to loan entitlements to friends for set periods of time.
When Microsoft announced the plans at E3 2013, a whiny minority of "core gamers" kicked up such a fuss that Microsofts stock tanked and they backpedalled... Sony hadn't made any announcements yet and presented the EXACT opposite of Microsoft's plan literally 8 hours later despite the fact that their existing hardware DevKits and system software functioned exactly as Microsoft had described. Sony got to look like the "hero" while both of them then scrambled to completely reengineer their hardware and system software prior to launch...
We lost a bright future that day.
Why is it ok for PC to be all digital? I don't remember the last time I've even seen a physical version of a PC game. Everything is through steam, While console it's not ok? I can't remember the last time I purchased a disc version for xbox.
Like I used to have the physical versions of Deadpool and both marvel ultimate alliances but I lost the discs in a move I wish I could purchase them digitally again but that's about the only downside I've encountered with digital only is some license rights gets a revoked
I've been thinking about this since the announcement from Sony. I see alot of friends complaining when I fully know they have massive steam libraries and no optical drives.
And I think it comes down too we have Steam. Steam is run by Valve a non public company with no shareholders. And Valve not only says but does. They keep things open and accessible. Game removed from Steam, that's file you can still download it and play. Things like GoG where you can get an offline installer. And we can pirate probably fits in There some where
But console you only have the maker and not a single one can be trusted. Sony removed movies and TV shows a couple times at this point.
And if you try to modify your console, they'll fuck your shit up.
You dint need optical drives specifically. Gog style drm free zip is better than a disc. If you put it on a thumb drive it's physical.
Movie licensing is legally different to running a game platform. Are there any examples of games being removed from people's libraries?
PT immediately comes to mind.
There have been others that I don't remember the names of offhand.
A few things.
One is that steam frequently has actually cheap games more readily than the console digital stores.
Another is that if I'm buying a digital entitlement anyway, I'll go with the ecosystem with the greatest track record for long term compatibility. A game purchased 20 years ago on steam is still generally playable in brand new system. A PlayStation game purchased then is not playable on a new Sony system. It is in fact only playable on PC through emulation, so PCs have been covering for console incompatibly.
Once upon a time, consoles brought some unique values. Easy to plug into TVs, consistent gamepad experience, and just turn on and play.
Nowadays PC operating systems and console operating systems act the same, tv output is just HDMI, gaming controllers are well supported on PCs... The last reason to bother with the console gaming was the physical media. So while sure, they can go digital only, but then why bother with a console at all? They've already lost every other advantage.
Then there's the fact that there may be 2 computers left out there with any type of disc ROM device.
Great points you make, I hope more people understand.
I only just removed (and saved) by bluray drive because I moved HW into a new case w/o a 5.25” bay. Still have a USB disc drive when needed and can always run a sata out the side temporarily.
I applaud you, and I do mean that. I have a BR player attached to the family room TV at home and so many movoes, but absolutely no way to read any type of data disk.
I do have a LOT of software DVDs from yesteryear stored somewhere (not all of them 'legally obtained'), so maybe I should get one of those external BD-ROM USB devices.
PC hardware is not vendor controlled. They can't delete your game because sales of the sequel are low or a license agreement ran out. Buying is owning on a pc where the game can be backed up, reinstalled on new machine etc. without any need for the agreement or permission of the publisher. You bought it. Can't do any of that on console. Cant back up to your own systems, cant copy and if the console vendor decides to withdraw it from your library and delete from your device, you cant stop them (short of never connecting the device to the internet again) Historically console physical media has had a good second hand market, no such thing without physical media.
You'll hand your money over, own nothing and have no recourse.
The arguments are all over the place but in quick. You can't resell digital games. Also PC is an open platform, Xbox and Playstation are not. Steam might feel like a monopoly but they have to keep in mind the competitors like Epic and can't rip you off too much.
Just looked at my physical games. The last game I possibly purchased was either red dead redemption 2 or halo mcc.
Thinking back to PC the last physical game I purchased was unreal tournament 2003.
Speaking of Unreal really should make a comeback. Also a CnC red alert 4
I really wish it would. Epic was working on a new one and then canned it when fortnite took off.
I remember being pissed off when I bought The Orange Box and it only came with a key I could enter in some platform called Steam.
I'd be more fine with it if it translated to lower prices for the consumer but I have doubts the shareholders will allow for even the tiniest hit to their profit margins.
I’m not sure there’s a great argument for why it’s different that’s not just vibes but the case for owning a console is getting smaller.
A console is basically a single purpose computer. The reasons to own one are that they’re cheaper, plug and play, you can buy and trade physical games, and the exclusive games. Seems like they’re converging towards PCs to the point that the only real benefit next gen will be ease of use and exclusives. And both of those reasons are fragile. Steam has pretty much solved the barriers to getting games running.
Nintendo figured out how to sell consoles based on exclusives but I don’t know that Sony will be able to make the transition. Third party developers will just go elsewhere if Sony can’t sell the hardware. As a child of the 80s/90s, I like the excitement around consoles. The hardware is cool, having a shelf of games is fun, I like going to GameStop and trading in old games and finding weird used games to buy. But the kids now don’t have that nostalgia. They have a Nintendo Switch and a gaming PC.
Maybe I don’t understand the vision but it seems like Xbox tried the whole “it’s just a computer! Play on your computer too!” and people said “good idea, I don’t even need an Xbox.” I need a computer to do computer things but I don’t really need a second computer that doesn’t do computer things besides games. Maybe I’d consider if I could install Linux on the PlayStation 6.
But I think a lot of the backlash is from people who like to buy consoles and remember how fun it was to own an N64 or PS1. Are consoles fun anymore? It feels like they get a bit worse every generation. Maybe the master plan is to ruin the business so they get out of making the PS 9 with the butterflies that fly in your ear, if anyone remembers those commercials.
The reason I'd buy another console is because of the controller environment.
I enjoy shooting games. I enjoy sitting on my couch.
Yet if I play on my PC with a controller it's going to be an awful experience.
I don't want to sit at my desk with proper posture.
I just want to relax and have fun. Console gives me that.
I use to be big into Overwatch. The difference between PC and Console is huge in that game, the whole vibe of the game changes. Personally I enjoy the chaotic nature of less precise aiming. Creates interesting scenarios where you have to adapt and overcome. I'd hate it if every game was "I hope our sniper can point and click their sniper first"
It is also impossible to store a lot of these games on CDs because of the size. That said, as someone else said, the companies that make these consoles have shown they will screw over consumers any chance they get, so at some level I get it. But I am mostly a PC gamer and most of my library is old games I emulate anyways.
They aren't closed ecosystems to the extent that consoles are. PC gaming isn't just Steam, and you're generally free to do what you'd like with the files once they're on your computer.
You can chase sales, modify and fix games, play online without a subscription, use your preferred controller, buy DRM free (or bypass DRM if you so choose), share and revive old games, etc.
I doubt I've covered everything, and (respectfully) I'm genuinely surprised that so many people still ask this question.
I don't really game anymore after having almost a 40 year run. However, I used to regularly recommend going digital only up to several years ago. Then, store delisting started becoming more common and affecting games I previously played, so I completely gave up consoles and retracted all my recommendations.
Maybe it's ok, because it is not "Everything is through steam". I have digital copies from different stores. It's basically the same fight against closed platforms in the mobile ecosystems. And I am really curious whether the EU will force Sony to open up their platform as well.
I wish I could still buy physical PC games. It took me a god damn month to download Doom 2016.
::eyeroll:: 71% percent of people we asked an obvious leading question, but mostly already buy their games online and will mindlessly buy all their yearly copies of FIFA, Maden, and CoD regardless.
I mean, I hate Sony and this BS too, but the stink over this "change" is complaining about a horse that left the stable years ago.
Yeah, I can't think of the last time I bought a physical copy of a game. Hell, I haven't had a PC in over a decade that could load a physical CD/DVD any longer.
DRM is the issue not physical. No drm means I can just keep replicating my product when physical fails
Yeah that's my problem with it as well. People keep going "but steam does the same thing" but with steam I actually have the install on my computer, a computer which valve does not control and they cannot take things off me after the fact.
I believe you are thinking of GoG, not Steam.
Yesnt. Steam can absolutely remote remove your library.
They never did and probably won't do it. But they could
They can take a game off sale but they can't take something from me that I've already downloaded.
In most European countries yes. They can't legally. But they can technically.
They cannot if you back it up to a folder outside of the steam directory. Provided of course the game doesn't use Steam's DRM.
How can they do that? I'm curious
Damn dude, thanks for the insight
Removing options is an issue
The whole point of a console is ease, I pop in the disk, I play. If you take away that ease, it becomes just a locked down PC… why would you want that when you could just have a full PC?
Isn't it easier to turn it on and simply select the thing you want to play?
Yes. This is mixing up console advantages. The "game just works" one will still exist - in fact, it will pretty much be the only advantage left. Not worth the much higher cost of games and playing online.
Even at $100, it's still cheaper than games of yesteryear. If you take an average PS1 game, most sold for $50 in 1996, so $110 today. Games themselves are cheaper than ever, and consoles still have major advantages of just hooking it into a TV, and it simply works.
That whole "adjusted for inflation" thing is BS because the average wages haven't kept up.
That's part of the "game just works" thing. It's not worth the higher cost of games and playing online to me, but you do usually have to have some tech-savvy to use a PC that way.
Depends on how you take it, but wage growth has matched for core services and grown. Now if you are talking about education or housing costs, then no, they have went beyond wage growth. But electronics and energy? Wages have outpaces their costs and inflation quite a lot.
Okay, general cost of living, then. How much the average person can afford to buy has not kept up.
Depends on what you are talking about again, because in general Americans are able to afford more 'stuff' than they ever have.
Actually, most of them were sold when they dropped the price to $20 or less a few months later. Only the hard-core fomo crowd bought at full price.
I don't want to make digital seem better, but for this argument it is... you don't even need the disc, you just turn on the console and select the game. All from the comfort of your sofa. Hell, you don't even need to go to a store or wait for a delivery in the first place, all those bytes just come to you.
I think something to realize here is that A.) The above is why the majority of people just use digital at this point, and B.) Inserting a brand new game disc into your console still requires downloads, installing and often being online to do so anyway. Modern games rarely even fit on one disc, so the disc is less useful that it was in the XBox OG and PS1 days. It's more like what Nintendo is doing with the Game Key Carts.
I think the point us more tied to the eol for the ps3 when everyone lost all their digital content, whereas the same player on pc would still have all their titles playable on steam or gog.
THIS 100%
Modern game discs are literally just Mountain Dew Verification Cans™
That's deliberate on their part too, though. New storage formats have been coming out once a decade going back to the dawn of electronic computing. Pioneer demonstrated a 400Gb optical disc exactly 8 years ago to the day. The technology exists, they're just choosing not to mass market it.
The massive post-install downloads thing is also a commercial decision, not an immutable fact.
You are correct. Which is why at this point you might as well go PC. Console games used to be playable without internet, just pop in and enjoy. I am not referencing the terrible experience it has become today (guess I am old). Nostalgia I suppose for an era that did already die.
Sorry, no. My video drivers fucked up while installing somehow and I had to blow them out with DDU and reinstall everything to get normal functioning back on my PC. I've had countless random errors, performance hangs, and more due to just random stupid Windows 11 shit that had to be identified and solved by repeated web searches and in a few cases obtaining and running specialized tools to cleanse my system of the filth W11 is full of.
NONE of this is part of the usual console experience. Exceptions exist, yes. And technical support when they occur is dramatically simpler because they're all the same.
I think you're forgetting just how fucking stupid the average person is, and how lazy they are. We're in the era of cognitive surrender to chatGPT. You think these drooling morons want to web search how to fix a driver installation somehow getting corrupted?
You're conflating the PC experience with the Windows experience.
You think Linux is going to be a better experience? What do you think someone will think the user will think when they encounter a program or game that simply refuses to run on Linux?
You're too deep in the sauce, man. I have to reiterate that the average gamer is both horribly stupid and extremely lazy. You gotta keep that in mind. People smart enough and dedicated enough to go through the hurdles associated with gaming on a PC are likely already using one as their primary or sole platform.
I've never experienced any problems with gaming in Steam on Bazzite. Never a game that fails to run.
Pretty much all of the big live service games demand kernel access for their anticheat, which typically isn't allowed on Linux, so those games simply won't work.
As someone who daily drives Linux since '96, I can say that while it's a much better OS and way less enshitified, driver issues, hardware issues, compatibility issues, and everything else above is just part of PC gaming as a whole. The problems I've had to fight with over the years most people would have given up and installed windows.
Console gaming is definitely way less problematic and when problems do arise, much simpler to troubleshoot.
There are no driver issues. I've had zero problems when it comes to gaming in Steam. Just load the OS power it on and away you go.
Umm, I mean you just turn on your console and play the game. Even easier than popping in a CD/DVD and zero worries about scratching and having to rebuy the thing.
They ain't gonna be working offline though at all.
Because a console will still be plug in and play.
Console gamers should just try to bully these companies into apologizing and pulling back
Bad take. They'll give you an install disc and then make you enter an account locked code to access it anyway.
Demand digital rights instead, before a big player goes bust. Because at some point that will happen, and you'll lose more than a handful of discs.
I have sold my PS4 after what I felt an unjust price hike for PSN and built a pc, didn't buy a console since
Video cards are just so expensive.
Because of fucking idiots with their meme coins and their AI girlfriends. Every day I feel ten years older.
I quit shortly after the PS3...
Actions speak louder than words. And money screams. 71% absolutely do not buy physical media.
The number is actually closer to 25%
People voting with their wallet will decide how this ends.
They already have. Physical media sales are a small minority of game sales.
They will like PC gamers swallow all the DRM and digital downloads as we see everytime there is complaints about Denovo or the latest game has been withdrawn on Steam gamers keep going back and buying more. It will end the same way on Playstation.
I'm not aware of Steam ever having removed a purchased game from a library.
If you have a reliable source that says otherwise please link it.
Technically they could do that of course.
But it would be bad for their business and have people do more business with gog.com.
Steam gets chosen over gog.com for convenience.
If purchased games disappear that will be even more inconvenient.
edit: I mean "Steam ever having removed a purchased game from a library" in the sense of for no good reason.
Following legal requirements or being dependent on external resources (e.g. game servers) outside the responsibility of Steam are different things and I wouldn't blame Steam for it.
There's a reason for the trust people have in Steam.
And there are plenty of reasons for not having trust in Sony.
What if the publisher decides they no longer want it to be available? Is that a "good reason"? It's outside the responsibility and control of Steam.
Steam removes it from the store. It's still in my library and I can still download it anytime.
That's been my experience.
Your experience is not reality. Steam has completely removed several games.
My experience is not reality? lol what?
Can you show my where this is not the case? I have several games in my library that are no longer for sale on the store because the publisher removed them, yet I can still download and install them.
I am willing to say there probably is an exception to every rule, so go ahead, do you have a library item that no longer can be downloaded?
That's good to know.
Thank you confirming what I was hoping for.
In my book it is.
It's still bad and a reason to strive for the ability to fully own games.
But Steam's fault? Nah.
It's certainly a ways away but Gaben won't live forever. I'm assuming there's a clear succession plan in place and hopefully that everyone lined up are on roughly the same wavelength but... well, there're no guarantees.
Legislation should force all digital marketplaces to allow selling and gifting purchased media without a middleman taking a cut.
They knew before they started, either people took it lying down (unlikely) or there was backlash and reversal... Followed by announcement that disc version of next console is now $500 more expensive than digital, and physical discs will be produced, just at 1/10th the volume and doubled the cost of current.
Yup. It’s always by design. Corporate bullshit has been playing the long game.
That's pretty much what has been the case since the release of PS5, you pay a 50% premium to have a disc drive on your console and the disc games cost a lot more.
You can easily download a game in minutes Vs finding a physical copy online, ordering it and waiting for it to arrive.
It's obviously a lot cheaper to distribute a game online rather than using discs.
85% of PS5 game sales are digital with physical game sales reduce year on year.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1202234/global-playstation-game-unit-sales-digital-downloads/
Those Stats end in q42025 but this year's stats are widely reported to be 85% digital.
By all means people should be able to keep their disc drive but you have to accept these days it is an expensive luxury.
To the "obviously a lot cheaper" point. With the economies of scale these orgs operate at, that is a weak argument beyond, yes, technically slightly cheaper. And hospitals would be more profitable if buildings didn't have to incur the expense to purchase, install and maintain windows. And doctors would technically have more take home pay if they didn't have to buy shoes and wear them during surgery.
I know it's lighter in your message and you're mostly on the side of good I believe, but stop FUCKING pre-complying. Nobody has any sympathy for these "every year is record profits" fucks. Show me some YoY break even or loss and we can discuss hardship and necessary reduction in service. Until then, have ZERO patience for their boo hoo bullshit. There is a concept called the cost of doing business, table stakes.
Now internalize that.
P.s. and to "you can easily download a game digitally" - they can "undownload" it as easily, that's the problem. They need to ship a minimum viable experience that can't be taken from the purchasing person post sale. The toaster needs to maintain the basic function of toasting the bread that I supply. You can try to add RGB light shows and subscriptions to custom toast tones, but I hold the right to refuse those and toast my fucking toast in perpetuity.
Should be an "85% day one, year one" viability rule - meaning in the case of games, you sell a product day one that contains 85% function and features that are available within a year from original general retail on sale date. Incentive to ship finished products. Should that percentage drop within year one window, manufacturer is required to make available a physical expansion disc to those who purchased. And to protect truly small creators, rule is triggered by certain business size or revenue threshold exceeded.
Do you think you need to be so toxic? Genuine question.
Digital games are cheaper for people buying them because it is cheaper to produce and distribute than a disc, that's a basic law of economics.
85% of console game buyers agree.
Keep digging, bud.
What is that random percentage claimed? What's the source? What numbers is it conflating? And how would it change anything I said about the economies of scale and the fact that these companies have been working to engineer a slant to digital only for years?
92.4% of dentists agree that your random percentage expecting some kind of appeal to perceived authority is ineffective... And, my percentage here is actually higher than yours, so that's pretty embarassing for you.
If you are going to have a conversation about it at least do some research.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1202234/global-playstation-game-unit-sales-digital-downloads/
Those Stats end in q42025 but this year's stats are widely reported to be 85% digital. Any disagreement that can be solved with a 15 second internet search doesn't sit well with the person that started it (you).
I think you need to reflect on your attitude.
I've given you all the stats but you obviously aren't reading them. Or do you not understand?
Now you have a choice. Be a better person and apologize or continue to be a toxic fuck.
I'm waiting for your apology.
Non-response just raises the percentage - you're up to 96.5% now...
I've spelled it out to you and provided sources. Where you so resistant to evidence?
Are you a bigot?
If I was a console gamer I would have already stocked on all older consoles with all the disks, hacked a secondary console just because and move to PC for main online gaming. Let them suffer. Let them loose money.
But that would never happen. People will not stop buying. Sadly.
i don't think it matters though tbh. they will go ahead with the plan anyway.
The only thing that would make them consider changing course is if a significant portion of gamers refused to buy games unless they come in a physical format. Sony knows that'll never happen. People will complain to their heart's content and then happily plonk down $80 for the next big digital only game release. Capitalism largely works the way it does because people don't want to go without.
yeah i agree.
Which is gta. And yes, they will waste our time bitching about this and buy it anyways.
people already weren't buying physical media.
A SIGNIFICANT portion of people who buy video games already have already abandoned physical media and don't care...
Excluding Nintendo, ~5% of total video game sales are physical media.
Huh their own survey doesnt even say people are not ready to let physical games die. It just says that 71% of people say they miss physical games but doesnt suggest any intention to buy physical games. There has been no time to miss physical games so the only reason you'd say that is if you werent buying them when they were available.
Actually kill me, this must hell. An entire subreddit dedicated to windows updates and xbox updates. I cannot think of anything more depressing. These people have had a rough decade https://www.reddit.com/r/windowscentral/
Actually revive me, most of the comments are people saying they've switched to linux and only use windows because they're forced to for work. Sanity restored.
wont this just push people to getting steam/valve
Yeah the big advantage of disc is Sony can't randomly take it away. And given the fact that they have literally just done that with a bunch of movies it's kind of a problem.
It would be trivial to add online only drm with a killswitch to physical media. If that's the problem, discs aren't the solution. What we actually need is legal protection for consumers.
I was already planning to abandon Sony even before they shot themselves in the foot (or leg? groin? time will tell I guess)
I bought the PS5 solely to play one specific game, but I still expected to get some other games. And I've gotten a few at least: The Finals is amazing, Baldur's Gate is amazing, Battlefield 6 is great... and that's about the end of my list.
The one specific game I bought the PS5 for, No Man's Sky, has tons of stuff you can do with mods and save editing. Same for Baldur's Gate as far as mods go. The Finals and BF6 are FPS games so no mods, but still... 100% of the games I like could just be played on PC instead, and 50% are significantly better for doing so.
In the last few generations of consoles / handhelds, Sony has:
There's so many reasons to ditch them even separately from the disc drama
Ahh yes, steam renowned for its physical media.
Hopefully it just keeps them using old consoles and punishing them by not buying the digital games.
But we all know everyone will just roll over.
The problem isn't digital the problem is digital only.
Obviously they mean that in a digital-only world, consoles are not worth it and gamers should just switch to PC.
As long as you still have tens of millions of people pre-ordering GTA6, nothing is going to change. People bitch and whine but they keep eating the slop.
Fun fact! PlayStation Plus, Xbox Live, and Nintendo Online subscriptions go directly to them and none of that supports the server costs game developers have to pay to host online games. This is why most online games are forced into the games-as-a-service model, which makes zero sense to me as a game developer. It's also why most indie games do not bother to add online multiplayer support as it's far to expensive to pay for server hosting, let alone the cost of development.
Lol ask this same question on Tiktok and Instagram it'll probably swing 71% the other way
No one on those platforms buys games anyway. They're too busy playing mobile games.
You mean that corporations are going to collude to do the thing that nobody fucking wants?
No way.
Really overblowing this aren't you
I mean... No? How am I overblowing this? That comment wasn't even extreme in any way
I almost never play games but I've bought a bunch of physical copies of games I want to play. There's already SO MANY good games I haven't played yet that If new games are digital only I'll either go back to older consoles or piracy.
I also almost never play games, but when I do, they're very cheap. I recently got into Subnautica for like $7, so I have no problem paying that for a download.
I'd much rather have a physical copy for a game that's like $80, but I don't think I'll ever buy an $80 game
old games? https://www.romsgames.net/
used to play these free years ago. ymmv
"I'll miss buying physical games" is not exactly a measurement of outrage.
Sony and Microsoft say bad luck we are doing it anyway, and we know you will still buy our consoles.
Reselling isn't a thing with any PC game store I know. Which is the only drawback for me. Is it possible to sell my old PS game discs or are they attached to my PS account?
You can sell your old PS* discs. There's a few used stores around here. That said, you probably won't get tons for them, but it's worth a look, I try to buy used games if the new ones hold their value too long.
When I got my PS5, I picked up like 5 PS4 titles I always wanted but went from 3 to 5. Got 5 pretty popular triple A games for like $30-40 at the time when it would have been like $100+ for them all new.
Discs are not attached to any account.
This is why we have governments and regulations. The current situation is one for consumer protections to step in. There needs to be a legal way to "burn" any game onto a physical media for archiving, preservation and transfer purposes. This needs to be written into law and enforced.
Without copyright and patents, none of this would matter at all.
Cannot wait until Sony comes out with a study that shows 100% of gamers ( a small handful of people guaranteed not to care about pjydical media ) don't want it so they can gaslight tge general public into thinking nobody wants it.
Maybe they should have bought physical games instead of going almost entirely digital then?
They voted with their wallets already, and digital was the winner.
It's probably more accurate to say Sony is misrepresenting the data.
The vast majority of games that get released these days are digital-only, indies, or semi-indies that never get a physical release in the first place. And it's not reasonable to trust that Sony isn't including these purchases in their reported stats. If they were giving us figures that included only games that got a physical and digital release, I imagine the narrative would be different.
The gaming industry wants licensing to be universal and ownership to be a thing of the past so it's easier to price-gouge as they like.
Every single publisher has shown that the vast majority of their sales are digital. Sony themselves are one of the lowest digital percentage sales wise since they bundle their games heavily, and bundled games, even digital ones, count as a physical game sale.
Even if Sony are misrepresenting the numbers, Sony are in the money making business. If physical sales made up any significant amount of sales, to the point where they wouldn’t make as much money dumping them, they wouldn’t. It wouldn’t make sense.
Now ask them if they'll buy the next console.
This just in the newest os update of your maybe getting bricked..
The opposite of "digital" is "analogue". Disks are just as digital as data downloaded from the internet.
yells-at-cloud.gif
I'd be more ok with digital only if I had options for where I could buy codes.
If the next generation is digital only, it will be the first generation in which I do not participate.
Just need to play on a system that allows you play digital games without DRM, whether intentionally or by force (PC).
Console modding is pretty fucking great for exactly this.
I mean, at least on the PC, I haven't bought a physical game in 10+ years. I don't even have a CD/DVD player. Digital has always been easier and no worries about damaging physical media.
Will they boycott?
I already did. If i cant find it on PC at a reasonable price the high seas will provide.
The VAST majority of gamers don't identify as "gamers". They don't read gaming media, they don't engage in online discourse about video games, and they don't give two shits about any of this sensationalist nothing burger fear mongering.
If YOU are a "concerned gamer"; physical media is dead. Acknowledge that you are an INFINITESIMALLY MINISCULE minority and get over it, or find a new hobby.
A couple thousand chronically online whiners don't get to decide the future of the industry.
It's important to remember, there's no point in fighting against a worse future. Especially if you are in the minority, since you'll lose anyway. Resign yourself to things getting objectively worse because nobody likes a whiner.
The commitment to physical media has crossed the line from nostalgia into change resistance, driven by manufactured conspiracies. This transition is in the best interest of the majority of gamers; the vocal minority is just out of touch with how the broader community actually consumes that media.
For millennia, non-static art (song, theater, performance, and oral storytelling) existed purely in ephemeral mediums without physical storage. The concept of "owning" a physical piece of interactive software is a historical anomaly that has existed for barely forty years.
Economically and technologically, video games are the cheapest and most accessible they have ever been. Simultaneously, the depth, breadth, and quality of content are light-years ahead of what was imaginable in the 80s. We are living through the golden age of the medium, yet critics are lamenting the hypothetical loss of the 99% of games they were never going to replay in ten years anyway.
Like it or not, software IS fundamentally a service now. A modern video game is not a static painting or a collectible display piece like a Funko Pop to put on your shelf; it's a dynamic, adaptive, and interactive ecosystem shaped by ongoing player data and developer iteration. Holding a plastic disc hostage provides no value when that disc only contains an unpatched, broken, Day 0 build of the game at its literal worst.
The romanticization of physical games is no different than audiophiles insisting that vinyl is the only "pure" way to experience music. It is an aesthetic preference masquerading as a consumer rights crusade.
I don't think that's entirely true. I know I'm in the minority, but there are legit reasons to resist recent changes with video game hardware, like how manufacturers have made it so they can brick people's consoles remotely.
Can't remotely brick my PC.
I do agree that some people are over-wrought about it, but pretending that all of their concerns are unfounded is itself a tad silly too.
First off, your PC can 100% be bricked remotely, go read up on Stuxnet...
The problem is the assumption that there is nefarious intent behind this move.
Sony and Microsoft tried to give us digital entitlement resale AND friend loaning with Xbox One and PS4 and a whiny minority of "core gamers" kicked up such a fuss during E3 2013 that Microsofts stock tanked and both of them backpedalled... It was senseless then, and it's even more senseless now.
Man, I couldn't give two shits. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. What good is a disc when you're dead? I'm here for a good time, not for a collection of plastic boxes with shiny round discs in them, uh, time. I mean, who earnestly gives a flying fuck? These days most game discs are as good as a game-key anyway as you can't play the game before installing a massive day one patch.
It's only 8:00 where I am so it's possible I will read a more stupid less informed comment today, but I wouldn't put money on it.
Have a nice day. Try not to get angry for no reason.
Don't make more moronic comments and I'll be happy
Your happiness is very fickle.
Most gamers have steam libraries and not a single disc to show for it. They're not sad about it....
You should burn your faux outrage to a goddamn disc and add it to your priceless collection. Im sure it will look great between your Star Craft II box and some cobwebs.
Better than the padded cell you belong in
Lol disagreeing with your perspective is insane? Alrighty....
No just observing your insane behavior