Future of Physical Media in consoles - end of disks?

[Cerebralbore101]

DPsx7 said:

Cerebralbore101 said:

I think in ten years physical games will be all but extinct on Xbox and Playstation. You'll have to special order them from sites like LRG and the like. That is if the Xbox Format X2-59-Alpha-Part-II-Series-ABC+D, and PS6 even have optical disk readers. Nintendo should still be able to hold onto cartridges for another 10 to 15 years longer than Sony/Microsoft. So by 2040-2045 even Nintendo will have given up on physical media.

I'm not too worried about it though, because it really looks to me like my hobby is changing for the worse. More and more games are just these multiplayer, MTX infested, Gatcha, forever updated monstrosities. You know, the kind of games that won't stay out of the news. Stuff like Fallout76, MK11, Genshin Impact, Fortnite, Fall Guys, etc. Some of these games are fun, but they all would have been infinitely better as standalone $60 releases, with some light DLC.

Anyway, I think gaming as a whole will move into a space where I no longer enjoy it. I'll stick around for the Marios, and Outer Worlds, and God of Wars, and the like. But I think as time goes on, more and more publishers will insist on injecting unfun grind into longrunning series for the sole purpose of pushing MTX in the game. Just look at Wolfenstein Youngblood for a perfect example. Or MK11 and its horrible tower of time grindfest. A game isn't worth collecting if 25% of the game is locked behind an additional paywall. A game isn't worth collecting if it forces you to choose between insane levels of grind and paying extra money to skip said grind. 

TL/DR: Microtransactions will make collecting games pointless long before physical media dies.

People have been predicting the death of gaming for longer. It's not gonna happen, nor will a switch away from physical media without some major adjustments.

Enh, the thing with FN, Rocket, Fall Guys is they're all free. At no point are we forced to pay a cent so I'm ok with 'em. They aren't going to replace my regular games but are good diversions as a break. MTX will only last as long as they find a few to keep buying them. If any game is too invasive, choose something else.

The thing I really don't like about a lot of these F2P games is that in order to get the full experience you need to pay way more than the standard $60 price tag. Even way more than the $60 price tag + $25 Expansion pass. League of Legends is the perfect example of this. I might have 1/5th of the champions in League if I'm lucky. I pretty much made that game my life for 3 years, and I spent about $300 on it to boot. That sort of time/money investment will buy you 5 full priced single player games, and get you the Platinum Trophy on 10 to 20 games.

I think a lot of these F2P games really need to slow down with the MTX. If you wind up spending 5 times more than that game would have cost then F2P is not a good model economically anymore. The real kicker here is that as more and more full priced games add in MTX, collecting or even buying games becomes pointless. The value proposition isn't there anymore. Heck, even as a completely free (No MTX, No nothing. COMPLETELY FREE) offering many games just don't have a good value proposition, because your time alone has value. If a game is full of tedious things that artificially lengthen the game, and don't respect the player's time then the game isn't worth bothering with.

And like I said before. This sort of "Add grind to the game, to sell MTX" model is going to kill my hobby long before physical media dies out.

Last edited by Cerebralbore101 - on 19 October 2020