| fordy said: If the optional service was free for publishers to use, it comes down to "would you publishers like more money?" which very few would probably say no to. |
Well, it's not that cut and dry. I definitely don't expect publishers to think this way, but it won't necessarily translate into more money for them any more than eliminating piracy would translate into more sales. A lot of pirates are younger kids who either don't have money, or who spend all of their disposable money on games and then pirate the rest. So they're tapped out and there is literally no way to make them into paying customers. A lot of people who buy used games and trade in their old games to buy new ones are similarly young people without a lot of money, and making it difficult or more expensive or outright impossible for them to trade in their old games will just further limit the amount of new games they can purchase in a year.
I understand why it's frustrating for publishers and developers to see a place like Gamestop making money on transactions that they're not getting a cut of (though, again, this isn't entirely true because of the economy of trade-ins facilitating purchases of new releases), but they have to tread carefully here. The nothing-but-AAA(A) games high wire act they've been performing is already incredibly precarious, and this could be what knocks them off it. And at a time of market stagnation it seems incredibly stupid to erect higher barriers for your customers rather than lowering existing ones.
