Well if this DRM crap keeps up it will probably hurt the used game sales. It will never kill it though. I believe there will be more gamer backlash against the companies that are implementing more pass play/always online DRM (Activision-Blizzard, iD, Ubisoft, Capcom, etc). Seems like almost every company is jumping on board to terrible ideas. I understand them wanting to curb used game sales but forcing always online DRM only hurts their image (considering most gamers are smart enough to know that this doesn't curb piracy). So basically if you want your game to sale (as new not used) then make a good game and let it be... I pray that Nintendo never picks up any of these terrible ideas that other companies have come up with (they should still know that quality sells).

Slow broadband adoption means they have quite a bit of life in them. Doomed in the long-run? Yes, but given what passes for "broadband" in this country, it'll be a while until doom can be called

Yes they are, it's inevitable although in the case of Gamestop they are accelerating it.

Check Gamestop latest quaterly earnings report.
They made more money out of used games sales than new games sales and they are the number 1 retailer for video games in the US.

Publishers are getting more and more fed up with this ( a retailer shouldn't be more money out of a game than the people making the game) and the nail in the coffin won't be online pass, it's going to be digital sales.

I predict that next gen 90%+ of the game will be available as a digital purchase on day one at a reduced priced compared to retail.
And once over 50% of the sales have moved to digital the lower retail volumes will kill the stores...( the same way digital books just killed Border and they still represent less than 20% of overall book sales...)

What most people fail to realize is that you don't need digital to overtake the whole market ( which like some pointed out ain't gonna happen with slow broadband and others reasons).

It just needs to make enough inroad to reduce the volume of retail sales and then retailers whose whole business in based on volume will stop being profitable...( divide sales by two and retailers will have to asks themselves whether it's profitable to stock less known titles with low sales, some will stop and lack of choice will push customers away, same thign with used sales, divide sales of new games by two and retailers will have a slower pool of used games to work with and some titles will become increasingly hard to find used ( and as a result used price will raise).).

You'll still be able to order your titles online from shops like Amazon that don't have stock costs issues but it will be increasingly harder to find non mega-hits titles in your local stores ( exactly like what is happening to the books). You will always find the latest CoD or Mario kart at Wall  Mart or Target......

not in the short term but in the long term surely

they can't compete digitally as amazon will rape them


SONY and MS will have to open their own retail stores as if they go digital,these retailers will rebel which will create problem.

Nintendo will have problems as they are gaming based only

I just realized I didn't even touch on the digital distribution in my initial post.  I believe that eventually might make Gamestop close a decent amount of their stores but that won't probably happen till a few more generations (so I just stuck with what companies are doing now to discourage used game sales (the online and now single player pass).  I think I've read about 5-10 articles just this week that was in the technology sector on Google news talking about DRM and player passes.  Every article it seems to have nothing but negative comments towards those companies.  Seems like the major video game companies are out of touch with their consumers.  Most businesses usually try and please their consumers not piss them off.  I expect more mergers and bankruptcies for the next generation due to video game companies being out of touch with their costumer base.

I'd be willing to bet that, for the Wii U at least, no retail game will ever be made available as a digital purchase. I mean this is already happening on other platforms, but Nintendo will keep that total takeover from happening in this coming generation, as they are dragged into the future kicking and screaming yet again...

There are just too many advantages for digital for it not to take off.
Look at Steam, publishers can do daily deals and adjust the price based on sales
Well you can't do with the retailers because the big retailers that still has 50k copies of your games he bought at 50$ gets pretty pissed if you suddenly decide to drop the price to 30$.......

It will slowly follow the path of Hollywood vidoes but that won't happen until at least the 9th generation.

Do you realize that it took the Kindle less than 5 years to make the 500 years old book industry explode ?

And e-books sales are still a tiny part of overall book sales...

And book lovers are a lot more enamoured of their physical copies than gamers ( because they actually very often go back and reread old copies).

There are a lot of things Sony and MS can do to accelerate digital sales too once their next gen console is more adapted for it ( terrabyte HDD for starters, consoles not selling at a loss so not to be so dependant on retailers ( right now there is a kind of unspoken agreement where retailers agree on lower margins on hardware because they know they make it up on software, with the digital sales, console makers are going to have to raise the retailers margins on consoles as they won't be able to sell them on software sales offsetting those).

There are a lot of advantages in digital sales for Sony and MS too.
Digital sales work the same way than the App-store work for Apple.
You have to go through Sony or MS store. This means they will take over the retailers margin and make more money out of every game sold. And they can do this and still reduce the overall price for customers...( selling at game at 50$ on PSN probably brings more money to Sony than selling the same game at Gamestop for 60$..)