| Lord Ciansworth said: I think the problem with the used games market is its sheer popularity versus other similarly priced second-hand items. You never walk into your favourite clothes store and see second-hand clothes selling alongside new clothes, you never walk into a book store and see second-hand books selling alongside new books. We've heard many reports from developers (I'm thinking particularly of Quantic Dream and Heavy Rain here) where they estimate the used games market has accounted for roughly a third of the total sales of their game. I would be shocked if the second-hand market accounted for a third of the total sales of a particular book, for example. I think games developers would worry less about the used games market if it mirrored other similarly priced second-hand markets in popularity. Seeing as the used video games market seems to be far more popular than others and, therefore, eats into their profits in a far more drastic way, they feel it is imperative that they challenge that market. I happen to agree with them and they are perfectly within their rights to do so. I think people comparing the used games market to other used markets are really comparing apples and oranges as the same rules do not apply across the board. |
Malarkey. The primary difference between used video games and say, used books, is that used video games are a better value proposition. They're above a certain threshhold of cost where saving anything is preferable to having a mint copy, which isn't usually the case for a $20 hardcover novel. Now, you get into the range of a $200 textbook where you can save 30% or more by buying used, and you'll notice that the used textbook market is absolutely tremendous in comparison to the standard used book market.
Neither textbooks nor (many) video games make a compelling enough argument for long-term ownership or buying a game new versus second-hand. If companies want to battle the second-hand market, they need to make their games something that people won't want to sell, or that they want to buy new. Offer the consumer a better value proposition, and that battle is already won.
