Poll of the Day > My opinion about physical gaming becoming obsolete

(+) Yeah! (+)

Yes, I think physical gaming (discs, cartridges, etc) aren't fully obsolete, but they are headed that direction fast.

The PS5 has started the idea of an entirely digital system that does not use any physical inputs, but rather uses downloaded games.

I say give it one generation - physical gaming becomes completely obsolete (if not unknown) in two generations.

---

It's possible there could be a resurgence of physical gaming in terms of the toy market, where you could literally make a cheap hand-held arcade of something like Street Fight 2 or Gauntlet or any number of singles where it would sell better as a toy for mark up than as a digital product

---

The main two problems i have with digital is that the games normally cost more while not going down in price quickly or as much as physical and the fact it obviously takes a while to download a digital game and storage problems resulting in potentially having to re-download games in the future if you want to play them again.

Jake Johnson posted...

Yes, I think physical gaming (discs, cartridges, etc) aren't fully obsolete, but they are headed that direction fast.

Eh, physical DVDs/Blu-rays still exist for movies/shows.
And there are still plenty of regions with horrible internet. Some places don't even have reliable, or any internet. Not to mention data caps.

Not saying it won't happen at some point, but it would definitely alienate some customers.

Jake Johnson posted...

The PS5 has started the idea of an entirely digital system that does not use any physical inputs, but rather uses downloaded games.

For consoles maybe. PC, phones, and even the PSP Go existed before PS5.

Xfma100 posted...

For consoles maybe. PC, phones, and even the PSP Go existed before PS5.

hasn't there been a digital only Xbox as well already?

---

Mead posted...

hasn't there been a digital only Xbox as well already?

You're right.
The Xbox One had an all-digital version.

jkdarlow posted...

The main two problems i have with digital is that the games normally cost more while not going down in price quickly or as much as physical and the fact it obviously takes a while to download a digital game and storage problems resulting in potentially having to re-download games in the future if you want to play them again.

I'd agree with all of this, but add in things like games being de-listed causing them to become almost impossible to acquire after-the-fact. There's also the fact that digital sales prevent loaning games to friends and used game sales (which is why publishers are so hot to push the idea), which essentially fucks the consumer over even more.

I'd also add in annoyances like games being tied to servers, so that your ability to play the game is inexorably tied to the willingness of the publisher to continue maintaining the servers - but physical media doesn't really stop that (a lot of games released on physical disc can no longer be played because the servers were eventually shut down). If anything, it's mostly just an argument to avoid online-only games or "live-service model" games (which I generally do!).

Over the last couple months I've played multiple games from the early 2000s - most of which would be pretty much impossible at this point if I didn't own the physical copies.
---

The generation that goes digital only will be the generation I stop buying new consoles.

Digital-only consoles are terrible for archivability. There's a reason why we can still read books from thousands of years ago or watch TV shows and movies from dozens of years ago and that's because they made sure that their stuff was released physically (not a single online market place from the pre-1900s era is still around today).

I still like playing old games; I'm not going to support a business model that tacitly refuses to let me do that by guaranteeing that my means to buy and play games is dependent on the whims of a multinational conglomerate.

---

Jake Johnson posted...

Yes, I think physical gaming (discs, cartridges, etc) aren't fully obsolete, but they are headed that direction fast.

You're definition of fast isn't mine as folk have been saying this for years. The fact we still have physical media in other entertainment tells me video games will be physical media for a long time. I see no reason to have all digital anyway.


---

To put it bluntly, I don't ever see it happening. Anybody who thinks we're going full digital is living in a fantasy land. Fuck, we still sell CDs. CDs!! That's physical copies of music. Physical copies roughly two decades after Napster, etc, became a thing.

Jake Johnson posted...

Yes, I think physical gaming (discs, cartridges, etc) aren't fully obsolete, but they are headed that direction fast.

They're not. At all. Gaming is also fundamentally different from other offerings because of the size of games, where they often simply take up too much storage to be viable as a download. As for streaming games, Microsoft lost a generation when it tried to push gaming you needed to be connected to the internet to use.

Jake Johnson posted...

I say give it one generation - physical gaming becomes completely obsolete (if not unknown) in two generations.

Poe's Law at work. I can't tell if you legitimately believe something this stupid or if you're mocking people who believe something this stupid.

Xfma100 posted...

For consoles maybe. PC, phones, and even the PSP Go existed before PS5.

And we all remember what a smashing success the PSP Go was >_>

darkknight109 posted...

The generation that goes digital only will be the generation I stop buying new consoles.

Likely the same. Even the 3DS's e-shop going out bothers me.

darkknight109 posted...

Digital-only consoles are terrible for archivability. There's a reason why we can still read books from thousands of years ago or watch TV shows and movies from dozens of years ago and that's because they made sure that their stuff was released physically (not a single online market place from the pre-1900s era is still around today).

tbh, if consoles ever tried going full digital, the console industry would die right then and there. You can kinda get away with it on PC because platforms like Steam exist where an entire generation can't go obsolete at once and things in theory carry forward (although in practice a lot of games have been lost).

---

i prefer physical media so i can show my clutter to mommy :)

---

DirtBasedSoap posted...

i prefer physical media so i can show my clutter to mommy :)

Bragging rights are important.

---