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Topic: The future of buying games - Physical, Digital, Subscription, and Streaming

Posts 21 to 40 of 41

NEStalgia

@redd214 Not so much assumption but deductive reasoning. Even at it's absolute best, over the internet, there is noticeable latency. And going out over distance, you're going to leave the fiber loop and come out onto copper. Even in the fiber loop + latency for packet relaying and switching across the various internet "weigh stations" along the route, it's just not possible to stream real time interactive input without perceptible latency unless the two endpoints are geographically close so as to reduce the number of hops and the latency that even relay by light injects over distance. Thus, if there's no perceptible input/response latency, it's not really physically possible for you to be a meaningful distance away from the endpoint. The greater the distance, the greater the latency

Thus the joke of the all streaming future as the games companies race to imitate film. They will either have to offer widely different experiences to different customers purely by geographic location, where "Battlefront plays great in NYC, plays terrible in Cleveland where it ping pongs between equidistant NYC/Chicago servers, and is almost unusable in New Orleans", or the companies have to spend massively to get datacenters running their games in pretty much every city, or at least 1-2 in every state....just to cover the US adequately let alone the rest of Earth (or pay ridiculous fees to Amazon/Microsoft/Google to do it for them.)

Plus on top of that, a year or so ago Verizon was talking about how millennials don't want unlimited gigabit fiber anymore, they want mobile data plans for all their internet needs! And as a result they've slowed fiber rollout to pretty much a halt and are focusing on 5G wireless as the future of broadband. (and it's cheaper for them with no labor fees to dig yards and install/repair wires....and they actually stated that point blank.) Imagine the all streaming (or all digital gaming) future of 100GB/mo for only $149.99+taxes/fees/mo all with the "fantastic" latency of wide area wifi, all with a "type F" NAT on yor console due to carrier-grade NAT (that you swear wasn't an issue when you signed the contract!) Of course Netflix will buy in and be "unlimited streaming for free", but gaming will still eat your caps. The future of US broadband is very much being shoehorned into cellular/wide area WiFi instead of direct wire. That alone will cripple digital gaming in the US, but be more than adequate for almost everything else people want. Gaming is a niche outside the "mainstream" of internet usage patterns, and doesn't fit cleanly with the solutions that work for everything else (latency is irrelevant to most people but gamers and VoIP users.) and the games companies are going to find themselves left in the cold compared to infrastructure reality with their 100+GB downloads or low latency requirements with streaming they want to push. They should be shoring up their retail footprints, not fleeing them in favor of a digital future that is not likely to exist in a way that it would need to for their specific industry.

In all likelihood "perfect" final US internet is a complete 5G or 6G or 7G mesh of wifi pushing 2GBps + speeds......but it's shared, latent, carrier-NAT-ed and bogs down when congested, with weak/dead spots common, falling back on 4G/low frequency, and likely metered pay-per-gig usage (even with net neutrality that was coming.) Businesses would still be wired. From a telco/cost/consumer-cost, convenience of use, deployment, repair, reliability standpoint it makes the most sense, and is more than adequate for what pretty much everyone but gamers and businesses want in the internet. But that won't work at all for what the game companies want it to do either with streaming or with big downloads. Gaming is out of step with the internet, ironically enough.

NEStalgia

redd214

@NEStalgia thanks for the effort but no chance I'm reading that whole essay lol.

redd214

skywake

subpopz wrote:

Physical will always be a thing though. Music went mainstream digital with iTunes 17 years ago and there's still physical options for it. The same goes for movies and shows. Numerous ways to stream most everything, but you can still buy the discs.

It should also be noted that the way we consume movies, music and TV is kinda different to games. Even before Netflix people rented movies, people paid for subscriptions for TV and even those who brought discs would at least consume the content in the same way. The only thing that Netflix changed in terms of behaviour is that now you can watch an entire TV series all at once.

With music we can talk about how iTunes and Spotify changed the way we pay for music and it has. But even when we were buying discs people would make playlists and mixtapes. People have always listened to the radio and watched top 40 music video shows. And as with movies even if you still buy music on CD or Vinyl odds are you're still discovering content the same way everyone else does. Whether that's an automated playlist on Apple music or your local radio station, the end result is largely the same.

With games? The dominant experience has always been one where you sit down and play one game. Even if you have a massive library of games you don't shuffle through all of them in one sitting randomly. You don't collect the best moments and package them into a tidy playlists. You don't really sit down on a Friday night and say "oh Dark Souls, I hear that's a good game", play it for a couple of hours and then move onto something else. No. You pour hundreds of hours into Smash Bros, Fortnight, Rocket League, Skyrim or Overwatch. You play through the blockbuster of the month and then go back to something that feels comfortable for hours.

Gaming can't really be thought of in the same terms as movies, music and TV. Music lends itself to streams and playlists, movies and TV work well with subscriptions and rentals. Gaming loves a single product in a box whether it's physical or otherwise.

Edited on by skywake

Some playlists: Top All Time Songs, Top Last Year
"Don't stir the pot" is a nice way of saying "they're too dumb to reason with"

NEStalgia

@skywake " You don't really sit down on a Friday night and say "oh Dark Souls, I hear that's a good game", play it for a couple of hours and then move onto something else. "

What....you don't? checks play time "Dark Souls III: Less 25 minutes" "Bloodborne "1 hour", Nioh "4 hours", Forza 7: "45 minutes".......oh...okay....

NEStalgia

MasterJay

@NEStalgia That's how i feel sometimes, i have a huge backlog to play through until lets go and smash bros come out

Well excuuuse me princess

My Nintendo: MasterJay | Nintendo Network ID: SuperSnapshot1.5

Buizel

Personally, I prefer digital for two reasons:
(i) Convenience. No need to constantly be changing discs / game cards. Don't have to worry about storage at home or on the go, or losing games. When remotely accessing my system, I have access to all of my downloaded games (although I don't often do this because...streaming).
(ii) Cross-compatibility. Digital downloads are independent of any physical media. I can play my PS1 games on my PSP, Vita, or PS3, despite differences in media drives. I can play my PSP games on the Vita. I can play my PC games on any PC I have, despite lack of optical drives. For some systems, I can log in to a friend's system when away from home and still have access to my library.

I can see the advantages of physical, and I think physical should always remain an option, but it's something I've put behind me, personally.

Subscriptions I'm open to, but I have such a backlog that I don't think I'd personally benefit from a subscription system.

Streaming I'm very much against. I don't mind it as an option, and I like the idea of remotely streaming from your own console if you're away from home, but as many have mentioned I don't think the technology is there for it to become a primary means of playing games.

Edited on by Buizel

At least 2'8".

EvilLucario

Physical and digital for me depends on the Switch. Physical is great for single-player games to invest a ton of time at a time into while reaping cheaper prices with Amazon Prime. Digital is best for multiplayer games to just pop in whenever you feel like it at a whim's notice, especially local multiplayer with the Switch itself. But overall I lean more towards digital now.

On my PC, digital 100%.

Subscriptions, it depends. Game Pass looks awesome, but Origin? No way.

Stream is a hard pass.

Metroid, Xenoblade, EarthBound shill

I run a YouTube/Twitch channel for fun. Check me out if you want to!

Please let me know before you send me a FC request, thanks.

Switch Friend Code: SW-4023-8648-9313 | 3DS Friend Code: 2105-8876-1993 | Nintendo Network ID: ThatTrueEvil | Twitter:

Harmonie

I'll buy physical or digital. I usually try to avoid digital, but it can be hard since I can't drive. So I usually just opt for digital.

Subscription services are exactly what I DON'T want. I'm fine with subscription services for some forms of media such as movies and TV shows/anime where I don't get a lot of reuse out of them, but for mediums such as music and video games, I want to own them and not have them tied behind some continuous bill that could go away someday if I don't have the money or if the business shuts it down.

I suppose subscription services could be a good supplementary service. Especially since games are not legally freely available online to try. It's just funny though, with music services like Spotify who want you to subscribe, the music is free to listen to either way, making me not even have any reason to consider paying a subscription fee.

Harmonie

Nintendo Network ID: WoodwindsRock

skywake

@NEStalgia
If you're buying it on sale or something sure. But the bulk of sales are still at launch even with the heavy discounts. Both of which, again, are things games have that movies and music don't have to the same degree

Edited on by skywake

Some playlists: Top All Time Songs, Top Last Year
"Don't stir the pot" is a nice way of saying "they're too dumb to reason with"

RenderSpotlight

TV and Movies I typically only watch once. So I do not mind streaming.
Music and video games I will play/listen more than once. So I would want to own that.
But if I only plan to play a game once and then never again, I guess a subscription option might be fine. If I end up really liking the game, then I will buy it.
But if I can ever see myself playing the game anytime in the future, then I want the option to own it outright.

RenderSpotlight

Cen

I doubt I'll ever stream a game. I've got alright/pretty good internet but still, I just can't see myself streaming a game. I will buy digital games if that's the only way to get a game I really truly want, such as Pokemon Silver and the such, but I love owning the physical cartridges. I like to collect things and there's just something about being able to hold the case and cartridge in your hands, looking up close at the box art, popping it open and inserting the cartridge into your system.

Once gaming goes completely digital and/or streaming, well let's just say I'll be saving a bunch of money because I won't be buying much.

All hail the mighty Glow Cloud

erv

I'm all digital, never lose or break a thing again. Also, convenience.

I think the future of streaming is the future of network architecture. There will be a day where our latency is deceptively low. That day will enhance the possibilities for streaming.

It's not my thing as I'm a heavy gamer. So my purchases get proper time, so to speak. Yet, people watch others do stuff they want to do while, when or if they don't have the time or opportunity for themselves at a certain point (twitch, xxx sites, periscopes, youtubes etc). Those people will not have the time for all the purchases they made either. Streaming will fit in nicely within a society that moves faster, increases accessibility and has more enriching points than available time for everyone.

It'll probably not be the one thing out there though. Yet the games you can get streaming will surpass your wildest dreams as no hardware in the home will ever get close to that.

Don't be too quick to discard streaming. It's not made for now, it's made for the future.

Switch code: SW-0397-5211-6428
PlayStation: genetic-eternal

Nintendo Network ID: genet1c

InnerClimb

I'm perfectly fine with digital purchases. All my games on the Switch were purchased on the eShop.
But I will never buy a subscription to play games and I hate the thought of streaming.
Maybe consoles will do that in the future, I don't know, but that would mean I'm out.

I believe there will always be the option to purchase games digitally but separately on PC. It would be unsustainable for small indie studios otherwise.

InnerClimb

skywake

erv wrote:

I think the future of streaming is the future of network architecture. There will be a day where our latency is deceptively low. That day will enhance the possibilities for streaming.

Don't be too quick to discard streaming. It's not made for now, it's made for the future

Min Latency = distance / (c * refractive index)

There are real physical limits to this that no advances in tech will overcome. What will change is how much power we have in our pockets, how much storage we have and how much bandwidth we have. The latency won't really improve that much, especially across countries.

The future for games is more like the Switch++ than Netflix for games. Why stream when can you have a beast of a machine in your pocket with a multi TB SD card?

Edited on by skywake

Some playlists: Top All Time Songs, Top Last Year
"Don't stir the pot" is a nice way of saying "they're too dumb to reason with"

MasterJay

So, in response to Nintendo's announcement about pokemon let's go and ssb ultimate having physical versions with download codes, does anyone like that more than just digital?

Well excuuuse me princess

My Nintendo: MasterJay | Nintendo Network ID: SuperSnapshot1.5

skywake

MasterJay wrote:

So, in response to Nintendo's announcement about pokemon let's go and ssb ultimate having physical versions with download codes, does anyone like that more than just digital?

The main reason why I still often buy physical copies is because of pricing. I couldn't care less about the box itself but if and when it is possible to buy a code in a box at discounted price vs the digital store? I'd probably go with the digital option in most cases. For me personally the convenience of digital is going to be pretty much always worth more than the ability to share the game.

It's just that the discounts on physical are usually bigger than what I value that convenience. For example Captain Toad just launched and one local retailer is selling it for $49AU, the eShop price is $60AU. Even taking into account the gap in My Nintendo discounts that's still ~$8.50AU. For some games that extra convenience is worth paying a little bit more for. For a lot of games it isn't.

Edited on by skywake

Some playlists: Top All Time Songs, Top Last Year
"Don't stir the pot" is a nice way of saying "they're too dumb to reason with"

Illusion

I get physical for two reasons:
1. Cheaper with amazon prime preorder
2. Saves space on Switch
If its not available physically or some weird special edition for way too much $ I'll be getting it digitally.
I'd get my xbox one games digitally if not for the prime savings. Least I have a big external hard drive for them. I bought my Switch a 128gb sd card last black friday for $30 that I'm hoping will last its lifecycle. We'll see.

Illusion

Banjo-

I can understand why gamers that only play on Nintendo consoles are afraid of anything that is not physical but that's just because of Nintendo's shameful management of digital rights and user accounts.

On Xbox you can buy Xbox, Xbox 360 and Xbox One digital games and play using your account on any Xbox One console. On Wii U, 3DS and Switch I always think carefully if it's worth buying digital.

Banjo-

Banjo-

@MasterJay On Game Pass if the subscription ends or the game is removed you can still buy a license to keep playing the game.

Banjo-

Banjo-

@Heavyarms55 Your comment is very interesting. I don't think that a physical game is really that good today. On Xbox and PS4 a physical game is an early build sometimes, on Nintendo it doesn't include the whole game sometimes, on all consoles it doesn't include DLC. What rights do you really will have in the future with a physical game from 2018? You are still missing patches and DLC.

It's also worth mentioning that an old cartridge from the 90s might not work today either for different reasons.

Banjo-

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