Tee hee hee. You're good.

Where does most of these used games get sold at?  That's right, gamestop.  That is the problem.

Fact is studios has been shutting down all generation and many are focusing on mobile phones now.

theres a difference  many years ago most used games where sold in in car boot sales , markets , secondhand stores , places like that , then what happened was they began to be sold in speciality game stores  mostly old gen stuff ,then it expanded till you have it today, where  you take a new game to the counter to buy it and they will check for a used version to sell to you even though you would have bought it new , it's not like the old days where most sales where  stuff you missed out on or found cheap , a big focus is now on selling you a used game with it's large profit margin in place of the new one , something that doesn't happen in libraries .

So if retail is such a liability nowadays, why doesn't every game that isn't COD or something of that caliber just go strictly digital? Problem solved.

So if gamers don't sell their games after they play it, how the hell greedy publishers gonna make money off of second hand sales?

We all know that they're jealous because Gamespot posts astronomic profits at the end of every fiscal year and they want a cut of that. If sales of used games is hurting the industry so is collecting games.

So is local co-op. Two or more people playing for the price of one. I bet they'll kill that next...

Oh, wait.

I've bought a lot more games this gen then any other, and have taken more risks on new games due to the second hand market. It actually gets me to spend more money then I would have otherwise as it seems more tempting with the discount of a trade in and I end up with 2 new games instead of 1.

The second hand market is a safety net for me. Take a risk week 1, don't like it, well at least it still has some value. Sometimes it works out, for example Enslaved, stayed on my shelf, sometimes it doesn't, for example Remember me, traded in for The last of us. Without the second hand option I wouldn't have bought either.

Yes, I can also wait until the price of a new copy drops, but then I usually end up skipping the game as all the hype is gone and something new is grabbing my attention, or I eventually get it for $4 on a Steam sale.

Anyway can you explain what the real reason is for digital not to undercut retail? The consoles and accessories will still be sold at the best buys etc. Why keep Gamestop in business. Publishers can compete already with the second hand market with digital downloads, yet they refuse to do so. Cutting out 2nd hand only removes competition, the opposite of an incentive for more competitive prices.

Instead of competing with bigger budgets, maybe publishers should try a different strategy.

Btw if you don't want DLC or micro transactions, don't buy them.

I always love when people blame used games for "loss of sales". Yet no one bothers to look at the revenues these giant publishers bring in, just to see them profit practically nothing because they don't know how to keep budgets under control.

Nonsense. If they care that much, why dont they buy the used copies from us to resell themselves? But noooo, they want a cut but arent willing to reemburse us like the retailers do. Its nothing but greed.
Too bad, they arent gonna get it, and they arent entitled to it. Great business when you want to sell the same copy multiple times. Imagine Ford wanting a cut for every time one of their cars gets resold used! What a riot.

This only happens on todays greedy videogames industry.

The Last of Us is a new IP and it seems to be doing quite well.

What about 3D Dot Game Heroes and Demon's Souls? Atlus published them, but it doesn't mean they got the publishing rights for free. Atlus even said they only expected 25,000 from 3D Dot Game Heroes and 150,000 from Demon's Souls, yett instead, sold 160,000 for 3D Dot Game Heroes and 360,000 for Demon's Souls.

Not a new IP, but Castlevania Lords of Shadow. If you've played the game you'll know how well developed of a game it is. Beautiful grahics with a massive amount of detail, great combat system, well voiced. They even had Patrick Stewart voice Zobek and you know he had to cost some money. He probably cost more than the entire game took to develop. Mercury Steam stated in an interview that initial sales were better than Konami expected, better than any other Castlevania game and immediately had them work on a sequel. This is a game that has less than 1.5 million lifetime sales.

Keep thinking of Lords of Shadow, an absolutely amazing looking game and then look at Tomb Raider. Still an amazing looking game, Tomb Raider is one of the best looking games in this generation, but you can't deny that some of the visuals in Lords of Shadow looked incredibly amazing and well detailed. So how is it that Lords of Shadow can sell 1.5 million across both consoles, and then Tomb Raider sells 2.5 million yet is a flop? Or a game like Hitman Absolution graphically doesn't look that great,, gameplay I dunno not a fan, and sells 3.21, and it's a flop?

I don't believe it's an issue with used game sales. I think some companies have terrible management of their resources and really bad sales projections which cost the publisher way more money than if they had reasonable expectations.