Why i buy Physical games.

[S.Peelman]

Mummelmann said:

S.Peelman said:

Can't see your video, so I'll just say what I think, maybe you actually say the same.

I buy physical because because I like to actually own my games. I like to be able to play them indefinitely if I want to. There's no such guarantee with digital because you're enslaving yourself to the will of the publisher or service provider, you're paying full price for what in effect is a long-term rental. They decide to drop support for a certain system? Too bad, you're never able to replay something ever again. With physical, I'm forever in control. I still play NES or SNES games, and until I myself throw them into the fire, I can forever do so. That's money's worth I'd say. Then there's the added perks of having a real collection and nice artwork to look at.

Physical formats do not have an eternal lifespan, you know that right? Besides, when it comes to consoles for instance, the moment they stop producing the hardware, you don't really have any way of playing those if your console breaks (and they do break).
If a publisher drops support for a system, as in servers, updates and other features, you'll be just as crippled if you have the physical copy, there is literally no difference here, you also have to consider OS compatability in some cases (Windows Vista was notorious for not supporting older Win 95 and Win 98 titles, for instance).
Actually, through services like GOG, we've gotten a bunch of older, fantastic games that didn't work on moder OS' before, so digital games has in this case actually broadened the possibilities greatly.
Besides; between digital releases on Arcade stores and similar services, remakes and emulators, you can always play games.

The collection part, I can understand, but I stopped caring about that a long time ago, it's not like I'm going to show anyone my games and I haven't really liked collecting things during my adolescence either.
I'm also living in a small apartment and can't even have all my books here, so hundreds of games, movies, TV shows and other physical copies of things would simply not fit in my place.

Do you also buy all you games physical on PC? Because, more often than not, the whole physical vs digital debate is more habbits of PC gamers vs habbits of console gamers.

PS: I also own a bunch of physical copies of games and movies, especially for PS2 and PC (around 60-70 for PS2 and probably about 200+ for PC, and over 200 blu-ray movies and TV boxed sets), I just stopped buying them at some point.

I'll admit I was a bit colorful perhaps in my post, but the core is true.

Theoretically physical things also have a lifespan sure, but it's apparently a very, very long time as I've never, ever in the over two decades I've been gaming had a single game or console that stopped working for me so for now, they're eternal. I am aware of the fact that the newer the game, the shorter I can expect it to work (this also goes for hardware, but that's beside the point) and the greater the care I have to give it, but 2nd, 3rd and 4th gen games are indestructable. I am someone who is very neat and tidy, I take good care of my things, so I will get the longest possible life out of my systems and games.

There's always methods to still play something of which the service and distribution stopped, but the point is that if that happens, I don't have the game anymore obviously and need to repurchase it, while I never had any influence on the occurance besides 'hoping for the best'. Then, I payed twice for one game. Sure, this would probably be fairly rare and it could be as long as years or a decade after the fact, but if I can avoid it, and keep my game library's destiny in my own hands as much as possible, why wouldn't I? I don't care about the two or three cubic meters I need to store everything efficiently if need be. Needing to buy something twice could also happen to a game I have physically, yes, but there's just a much smaller chance and being the owner that decides a game's fate just outweighs everything else while being subject to the whim of digital services and publishers is just too big of a downside. Lastly, having it physically somewhere, increases the chance I might replay an older game or even finish one at all because they're more visible so I get way more of my money's worth.

I hardly buy any game on PC anymore. I'd say 90% of my PC games are from the '90s-first half of 2000s era, PC gaming's golden days are long gone. The last game I got on PC was Rome II Total War (retail as well) in like october 2013. If I do go out to get one, I try to find it physical and if that doesn't exist, I just don't buy it. I agree it does get harder and harder on PC to get things physically because everything is primarily distributed through Steam. I don't do Steam. The only reason I have a Steam account is because it made me make one with my physical copy of Empire Total War.

Digital does have one big advantage though, you have your most current library of games within an arm's reach and you can switch games without the need to swap discs and load times are better, so for that reason I like it if an option is there to install a game to a hard-drive, for the best of both worlds.