konnichiwa said:
Because visibility sells, I am pretty sure that having barely or none physical games in store make xbox unattractive for uninformed customers who wants to buy a console for themself or as a gift. Especially when they are trying to be informed and ask a salesperson who tries to sell those kind of customers a PS5 with disc or Switch because they possibly return and buy some physical games that stores get a cut from... |
Idk, I wonder if this is a fairly outdated view on things, visibility likely sold during the X360 era and whatnot but does it have much of an impact nowadays? The people who grew up with mass internet usage and playing these consoles now have kids of their own, their parents are largely more informed and hell, even kids themselves are way more informed than we were as kids.
You'd be surprised about just how informed kids are Tbh.
If I had a kid, I would not need to be informed at all by a salesperson, if any of my gamer friends had kids, likewise to them too, my teenage nieces and nephews have not once gone to a retail store for a game or console, nor had to be informed about anything from a salesperson on what they want. They're already fully onboard the digital only train and find games via other means but never a retail location.
And the thing is, Xbox already barely has any physical presence in these locations you're speaking of so it won't change much and even in their strongest markets, it's simply the way things are headed, consumers are voting for this at large, it does suck for those still wanting physical though but it simply is making less sense for both the manufacturer and the retailer.
Xbox is ahead of the pack here but it's coming to come for everyone, retailers are going to slowly stop stocking so much physical discs, starting with films/tv then moving onto gaming, Xbox will be hit first, Sony will be next, Nintendo won't be for a while. It's what basically all publishers in the industry want so it will happen eventually.
I suspect next Xbox will be digital only (50/50 on an optional disc drive) and I think Sony has one gen left before they follow Xbox, it'll be a domino effect which comes around to everyone because it's what everyone wants and they'll be certain pushes to make it happen too. Sony's 1st party physical sales are still pretty strong but 3rd parties are largely digital and them moving more digital will have a unintentional knock-on effect on Sony.
I'm a bit curious though, I don't know how it works exactly but why exactly can't retailers just stock their sections with digital codes instead of discs? I've just seen a Target full of digital Xbox codes on Twitter, Lol. And PC's are still stocked with digital codes despite physical practically being non-existent for PC.
