I'm just going to note my abstention. I've been away from the physical games market for about a decade now. Some of my early 3DS games are physical, none of my Wii U, Vita, or Switch games are. And my last physical game on PC was probably Europa Universalis 3 or some Total War collection.
Needless to say, my finger is nowhere near the pulse on this topic.
In my opinion, there's a value for physical games as it's another way to get the image on pieces of plastic distributed throughout physical spaces... on the other hand, digital only has really expanded the catalogue and distribution, and I find it way more convenient. I also always know where all my Wii VC, Switch, 3DS, modern PC, and Vita games are.
The big downside, though, is the threat of the databases being shut down... and this is a part of the industry that International law has to catch up with and I feel at some point it will... for example, in the future, products like Wii VC where a digital title has been purchased will have to maintain that digital copy for download indefinitely, even if the ability to purchase is gone... I don't even care if a small re-download service fee is charged for games that haven't been on the storefront for 5 years or something, just keep the access available. Anyway, I've not run into issues with this yet. I know Nintendo and Sony both claimed that they were going to shut redownloads down, but it hasn't happened yet.
I describe myself as a little dose of toxic masculinity.
