Jaffe: Some publishers would 'sell their mother to the Taliban for profit'

God Of War and Twisted Metal creator David Jaffe has claimed that some publishers are "very greedy" and would "sell their mother to the Taliban" for a quick buck.

However, the Eat Sleep Play boss has still defended the majority of publishers in the ongoing row over pre-owned revenues.

THQ, Activision, EA and Ubisoft have all spoken out against the pre-owned market - from which they and their developers make no money.

Yesterday, the pressure on retailers selling used games in the US ratcheted up a notch - with the news that the Court Of Appeal had ruled in favour of Autodesk preventing a consumer from re-selling his copy of design software AutoCAD.

The ruling sets a precedent, in the US at least, that would mean games developers could take a similar approach with licensing agreements on their own software that would effectively render the re-sale of games illegal. 

Jaffe suggested that publishers should use the ruling to 'force big retailers who sell used games to cut them in on the deal'.

Writing on his blog (where you can read his full comment), Jaffe said:'Happy to see the the recent legal ruling over used game software. I'm excited about what it could mean to console game makers if game publishers step up - as a group- and make some demands of the retail giants (Gamestop, Best Buy, Toys R Us, Walmart,etc.).

'Now don't misunderstand. I'm not opposed to used game sales. I NEVER have been (contrary to what some will tell you). I think used games help the market - to an extent- and I think gamers should always get the very best deal they can get when buying ANYTHING.'

He added: 'I'd like to think this legal precedent could/would be used instead to either:

[a]- Motivate publishers to force big retail into sharing profits with publishers on used titles (i.e. 'hey, you want to keep breaking the law big retail store? Fine...then cut us in'). This is the ideal solve so publishers win, big retail wins (a bit less than they win right now but they still get to make gobs of cash), and gamers themselves never have to feel ANY change to their game buying habits. Check it: everybody wins!

- Motivate publishers to force open a window where games can not be sold used OR rented for the fist X months of release. THEN once the window closes, the games can be sold used and rented and the publisher gets a cut. In this case, everyone wins but the gamer who buys used or rents and thus- annoyingly- has to wait a bit longer to play. But this is the movie model and it seems to work fine for those folks.

'A common, obnoxious game fan insult thrown at any game maker who voices that they don't like the current used game market system is that game makers are greedy. I hear that a lot whenever game makers bitch about used games. I hear that AND I hear the stupid 'first semester on the debate team' quality analogy comparing used games to used cars which simply doesn't hold up if you think about it for 5 seconds. But on the greed insult, it goes something like this:

'You game makers are greedy f*cks! You charge 60 bucks for your games- which is way too much- and they are never worth that much anyway. How much is enough for you? You just want all of our money!'

'Now sure, some game makers are very greedy and would sell their mother to the Taliban if they could turn a profit (and we all know who I'm talking about here). But most are not. Yes, publishers want to make money and lots of it. But that's just business. That's not greed.

'And the consistent decline in game sales shows that business is not so good. Some attribute it to longer games- ala RED DEAD and COD4:MW2- keeping players from buying more games (aka if a game can last you 100+ hours, you don't need to buy another game for a good long while). Some say it's the free stuff to play on the net (why pay for anything when I get just as much fun- for free- from AddictingGames.com?!?) . Some say it's iphone and ipad games (that are not tracked with the NPD). These are all valid- and in some cases wonderful- reasons the core console business is struggling.'

The most readily supported business model to combat pre-owned by publishers is an 'online pass' system - which ensures consumer pay for a portion of new digital content even if they buy a game second-hand.

THQ trialled the model with UFC 2010 earlier this year - and will use it again in WWE Smackdown! Vs Raw 2011. 

The firm's Cory Ledesma told CVG last month that pre-owned sales "cheat" developers and that he "didn't care" if second-hand buyers were upset by measures to curb the market.

EA was the pioneer in the area, implementing its controversial Online Passacross its Sports portfolio - which also requires gamers to enter a one-time code for important in-game content.

Meanwhile, Ubisoft has publicly supported the idea.