Would gamestop get a retailer fee per dlc they sold? lol

loves2splooge, I must say, I actually enjoyed sparring with you. You know your stuff. I gotta respect that! It's been a while since I felt inclined to debate instead of posting one or two sentences. Thanks for that. We must do this again, sometime! I sincerely mean that.

The family is finally asleep so my watch says it's FF13 o'clock. Later, dude!!

The reason why GameStop sells any copies of used games at $55 is because they don't have to keep new stock on hand.

The reason for the aggressive pre-sell policies is so that they only have to order numbers to match reserved copies, plus a handful of non-reserved copies, with the knowledge in mind that many of those reserved copies that are purchased WILL end up back in their store.

Without offering any averages on how often the average shopper is unable to pick up a new copy, only to be told the store currently only has used copies that are "good as new, but $5 less" I'd say it's common enough to keep the used copies selling at $55 rather than just burning up space on store shelves.

Shopper has the option of going somewhere else, or just picking up the "almost new" copy of recently released big title while they're already at GameStop.

It's instances like this that are the ONLY reason why shoppers would pay $55 for a used copy of a game that was recently released. Not because $5 off is a great bargain. Anyone who's bought a game from Amazon knows that they typically discount $5 off new games, no tax and offer a free shipping option.

But the $55 used games at GS cater specifically to those who don't want to wait and GS counts on these consumers to keep their lucrative used trade business moving.

To make matters worse/fuzzier is the universal practice GS has of "gutting" new inventory, in effect, making it used inventory, played or not (often, new inventory is in fact played by employees on new releases). The key difference being it is still returnable as "unopened" merchandise as long as the sticker they used to seal the case is intact.

But in the mind of the consumer, when you buy a "new" game and you see it being pulled from a disc binder, same as any used game and placed in the case at the counter, it is NOT the same as going to say Target and getting a sealed copy from the case that you can see is new.

It's for reasons like this that I pretty much never buy new games from GS unless they have GS exclusive promotional items to promote a new game release.

"So, bottom line:  People (myself included) do buy used games.  Used games mean that the developer gets nothing while the buyer gets a full experience.  Game makers have the tools to fight it.  If gamers refuse to buy a used game because they want the new game experience AND they don't buy the new game either, the only people losing out are the buyer and the used game seller.  The developer can either get a new game sale or miss out on a used game sell that they wouldn't have gotten a single dollar for, anyway.  Boobies rock."

LMAO

Yeah I figure that would be the only way those $55 used games are able to sell.

Hopefully the anti-used games crusade doesn't turn console gaming into just like PC gaming. If they start bundling serial keys with console games and require online authorization (with that bundled serial key) to tie the game to your account (effectively killing off the resale value of that game), I'm gonna have to stop supporting the game industry and find another hobby. I don't think console gamers would allow this to happen though. The trade-in/used game and rental culture is too strong with console games (unlike with PC gaming).

Serial codes are a bit too sketchy for consoles as it's a given that installations, if implemented, must be unlimited. You must be able to install your media based game on as many consoles as you have. Not everyone upgrades drives meaning installations must be considered temporary, to be reinstalled at a later date.

But even this has been blurred with PSN titles that have a physical limit of 5 consoles. Good and bad here.

Good being that games aren't tied to individual accounts and as such can be abused by installing purchases on other people's consoles (abused when 5 players "go in together" to buy PSN games).

Bad being that any limitation is still a limitation. Install your PSN games on 4 friends' consoles, lose your console before deactivating it and you just lost your single download tied to the missing console. Of course, that's on you for trying to take advantage of the system.

So the other options for physical retail games is tie games to individual accounts (not so good since PSN uses a flexible system that makes it easy to make new accounts without cost), or have limited activations (say 5 consoles) that must be then reactivated if that number is exceeded (like Crysis Warhead, which was extremely annoying for anyone who doesn't install once and then leave the game on a drive forever).

I don't see either option going over well with most gamers who use or maybe even switched over to consoles to avoid such complications.

About the only thing consoles can use activation codes for is bonus content not on disc. Naturally, those who exclusively shop used will cry "foul" even though it's already been done often by high profile releases without uproar by the used market consumers.

People that buy used games just to save ~$5 aren't exactly the types that'll shell out for DLC.

According to our district manager, GameStop plans to have kiosks where you can directly purchase and download games in the future.

They've already begun selling PSN cards dedicated to specific games.

Studios have no trouble selling 2-3 hour movies for $15-20. 

The current issue is that there is no other industry in which the used market is so well organized and deeply entrenched.  GameStop has created a very effective method to push used sales over new, and it's something that simply doesn't impact other industries as seriously.  Hell, GameStop even entered into the used movie business only to fail miserably, eventually selling off what used stock it had in "buy one get two free" sales.  GameStop had issues moving used product for <$5, meanwhile they can sell used games for $55 with relative ease.

Definitely agree that comparing DVDs or even BDs to games in terms of used sales really is a bad analogy.

For one thing, with the average price of a DVD being closer to $10 than $20 and new releases rarely going for over $20, there just isn't much resale value left to make used movies a worthwhile endeavor.

The same thing more or less happened to used CD sales, shortly before iTunes and MP3s became the primary means by which the average consumer bought music.

But, when you still have media retailing for $50-60, there's still quite a bit of room for offering more than just a few dollars on a trade in that will in turn be flipped for maybe a 100% mark up or more.

As for the whole number of hours to cost argument, the movie analogy does put things a bit into perspective on the assumption that people don't buy movies just so they can watch them one time, which is a waste of money. But if the same movie were to be watched multiple times, it makes more sense than renting.

Same applies to games. If you only plan to play through it once, and in many cases, players won't even put 10-20 hours into a game before they move onto another, maybe renting is the "value" prospect.

For those who like to revisit games or play at their leisure and tend to play many games simultaneously, few have issues with paying $60 for a game, even if it doesn't give them whatever random number of hours a given person considers to be "good value."

Is there a magic formula? $60 game should equal what; 6 hours of play at $10 an hour compared to say a $20 DVD which is about 2 hours long being $10/hour? Or are games supposed to offer cheaper entertainment at $5 an hour meaning a $60 game should be what, 12 hours long? Still too expensive? A game should be $2.50 an hour meaning any game that can be completed, never to be played again under 24 hours is a terrible value to the point of ripping off the consumer? Ridiculous.

People that measure games in this fashion should probably stick to rentals and get over the "but then I don't get any residual trade in value!" fixation.

Yes, there is a point where a game is simply too short to warrant a $60 price, which is why there are PSN and XBL DL games as well as discount titles that are priced well under that $60 upon release.