DRM is starting to effect the PC market in an even bigger way than ever before. Its only a matter of time before the same kind of thing spills over console games.

So what if a game developer like Epic decides that for Gears of War 2 you only get one free activation of the games multiplayer mode in the box and if you sell the game the next owner has to shell out $10-20 to activate the games multiplayer mode?

It sounds crazy, but whats even crazier is that with the game developers wanting a slice of the used game market pie they could do just that. The big issue is that the possibility just fits right in to the realm of what they might consider acceptable. Sure multiplayer is a big part of games, but its one that you have to go online to use anyway so its not something that would effect your average offline user.

All I can say is danger.

Someone is going to try this.

... That actually sounds very, very likely. Oh damn.

If that were to happen I believe Gamestop wouldn't take the games back to resell, but don't quote me on that. I just know because I tried to get credit for a sealed DS web browser and they wouldn't take it, even though it was sealed, because it worked on a password confirmation that came in the box. They may take the same policy with games like Squill mentioned.

well whichever company starts this first (i'll put my bets on EA games) will hopefully get boycotted until they realize its not worth it. Doing something like that would destroy companys like Gamefly and all that which would just suck. not everybody is rich enough to buy brand new games. and its not like game company's don't have enough money either...they are for the most part just greedy corporations.

In all fairness, if I were a gamedeveloper and looked at the number of people willing to pay for a service like live that should be free I'd think about it too. The market itself gives out a strong vibe that it's willing to pay for anything and starts defending their choice with empty phrases like we see with Live now.

If this does happen, we owe it all to everyone who is willing to pay for those services in the first place. Without them, their would not be a market to build on afterall.

That does seem likely. Though instead of the activiation part, I think retailers would just refuse to accept trade-ins on those titles. Kind of like how Retailers (at least where I am at) realized people could get the code and install it then return it too back the store to get it for free, and stopped allowing returns for said games.

What about the used games that cost nearly as much as new?
Their costs would be put over new titles a a result...

Meh, good for them. They are loosing massive amounts of money to Gamestop like stores that take games in cheap and then sell them at a massive profit but still cheaper then their new games. Let them figure out how to make people give the people that made the game money and not some store chain that figured out how to sell the same game over and over and over again for massive gains.

I'm sorry Lemmiwinks, run that by me again? Are you saying that selliing used copies off trade in's hurt PC titles in particular?