Pre-owned market is "defrauding the industry"

[rocketpig]

starcraft said:

rocketpig said:

Secondly, where are the complaints about how consumers are getting fucked through digital distribution? No disc, no packaging, no retailer to split profits... Yet we get charged the same price for it. In typical form, these business owners are profiting from the new business model through digital distribution and then complaining that 100% of things aren't going their way because they also lose money from used sales.

I'm largely going to stay out of this argument.  But I will just say that one reason online distributed games cost the same as other brick and mortar copies and other games completely is so that retailers don't get undercut and have a bitch.

Oh, I fully understand that.

With that said, why are developers looking out for retailers over consumers? Oh, that's right, money. They don't seem to have a problem screwing the consumer and helping retailers when it helps them financially.

Yet they bitch when the consumers get a leg up by using retailers through a different method...

Really, I can't believe anyone would defend this attitude. Sure, Gamestop charges too much for some used games. I fully acknowledge that and GS will not get a dime from me in situations like that. Also, selling used materials as new is illegal in pretty much every country I know of so that company should be reported on ethical grounds. Still, at the end of the day, Gamestop and their ilk provide a valuable service to consumers in an industry that often forgets they serve the customer by putting out redundant, short, offline games that offer little value for our $60 buy-in price. If developers don't like that, they can go fuck themselves. Period.