What if GTA V is the last... in a box?

[Magic_Al]

The industry is moving toward digital delivery: EA expects its digital sales to overtake boxed games

 

I don't have a big problem with the idea of GTA being only a download someday, but I think it will mean the loss of classic GTA box art.

 

A downloadable game's "cover" is more like an app icon. A simple image that's recognizable at a tiny size. The classic GTA multi-panel comic strip/collage won't survive because it has too much detail for something that's not going to be printed.

 

The simpler, more ordinary style of Rockstar's art for TBOGT DLC may be the future.

[Audiophile]

This will probably piss people off, but I ain't even mad. I already buy the majority of my games off Steam. No box art for GTA is a shame tho. They always have awesome box art.

 

Also EA's Origin sucks. They still find a way to overcharge you even on there. I bought BF3 from there and seriously, they still charged me taxes as if I was buying the game in a store. Doesn't happen on Steam.

[Spider-Vice]

It eventually will be the future of gaming as generations pass. Solid media will start to get "old" and people will start to prefer downloads, all games will suffer from this and I guess GTA isn't an exception. The artwork could be kept to the in-game menus and general art, but eventually all games will lose their "box art", people start to prefer downloads.

There's a lot of parts where artwork can go to keep the GTA feeling so maybe it wouldn't be such a big problem.

[kid23455]

First off, that prediction WAS by EA, and we all know how great their "Worst company in America 2012" predictions are.

 

Second, until everybody has the kind of high speed connection that will be needed to download 20GB+ games in a reasonable amount of time, Retail isn't going anywhere.

 

That said, I'm willing to accept GTAVI as digital distribution only, IF publishers stop making DD such a rip off. They need to make the games cheaper (As production and shipping costs are completely nonexistant), and give us some kind of backup plan if their system goes down.

[The_Anti-tragedy]

Are they changing the box art for the consoles too? PLEASE TELL ME THEY'RE NOT CHANGING THE BOX ART FOR THE CONSOLES!

[Johan]

Pretty sure they will still sell the physical copies either way, they'll do it both ways and I'm sure other companies will do the same.

[BlackLightning]

That would be awesome because I'm sick of exclusive preorder bonuses. Digital distribution can't come soon enough.

[Finn 7 five 11]

Well hopefully nobody is shocked by this because it's been coming slowly for a long time.

Yes one day we will probably not have discs, or they will be a rarity, gaming stores will be gone, a thing of the past, they are dying out as we speak with a few that have gone under recently.

 

But we won't be totally disc-less for a long time yet, there is still a large number of people who don't have access to the internet.

 

In 2011 78% (if this Source is to be believed and i read it correctly) of North Americans had access, that is the highest rate in the world, and it only decreased from there, only 60% of Europeans, and only a mere 26% in Asia, according to these stats only 32% of people in the world have internet.

 

Yes many people who do not have internet would not have consoles anyway, but those stats are only the number of people of who have internet. I bet less than half of those people have the internet capabilities to be able to download games, hell in Australia (a developed first world country) only 30 minutes outside the capital city the best available runs on average 2-3Mbits, costs close to a hundred dollars a month and you end up with about 12GB of downloads per month.

Only By 2020 or later (I can see delays in a government funded roll-out plan costing billions) that started 2 years ago will be completed rolling out premium internet to all Australians. Peak speeds on the Fiber-Optics will be 1Gbit and 12MBPS average wireless for everyone else. Here in Australia at that time downloading whole games online will be a 100% viable option and perhaps discs will be phased out here and in other countries that may be doing similar things. This is for a country with only a 25million population (but large distances) and is fully developed and it is taking more than 10 years to complete, other countries that are less developed probably won't have decent enough internet until even later down the track.

 

So once the Digital really starts to take over they will probably cut-out the use of discs and box-art in countries that are actually suitable for all digital, and then do the same with the rest of the world, but it's going to be a damn long time, i could see myself being 30 years older before that happens, so this won't be the last GTA with Box-Art, let's assume the next GTA is 2016 or 2017, or somewhere in that time frame, it will probably still have a disc version.

 

Font Colour opinions? White seems so bland.

Edited August 14, 2012 by finn4life

[73duster]

LOL, Box art is the last thing i'm worried about. The REAL impact is going to be on USED games being sold second hand. THIS will be the reason that drives game companies to go with downloadable only products. This will also virtually eliminate Gamestop, and other video game outlets.

[Acetaminophen]

It's not.

[Wayne Daniels]

I hope not, I love flicking through the pamphlets looking at the fake funny adds. And it smells so good when its new =)

[j.hunt]

who cares

[ll rdny ll]

Making games 'Digital Only' severely neuters potential sales. I doubt that we will see this happen within the next 10-20 years. There will always be an option to choose between digital and physical, at least for AAA titles.

 

Not everyone who buys an Xbox/Playstation/PC/Nintendo will have an internet connection. Unless these systems are going to be offering some sort 3G/4G/Whatever type of wireless service with the system. And then what do we have? A whole lot more hate about how we're paying even more for video games than we are now.

 

I just want to add that this post isn't biased, because I have a great internet connection and plenty of harddrive space. I honestly believe Microsoft/Sony/Nintendo/What-have-you, will be shooting themselves in the foot by making home consoles digital only. (and in turn making Games DD only)

[redx165]

I hope PS4 doesn't do that. The thing I like about Discs are that you can just put it in the game and be done with it. Instead of waiting to download. The only good thing about this is no more special DLC preorder.

[Cha Boy Jesus]

I wouldnt mind digital. But hopefully the costa will drop since the dev will get the majority of the money. Theyll just have to pay, say, microsoft for putting it on digital download. So no having to pay to get discs printed and etc...

[mrsurferdude]

I hope not. I don't give a sh*t to downloadable games. I'm ok with DLCs but i do prefer to have the damn game on my hands. i don't want to buy a license to play a damn game from their servers. Let's say that you can save it in your HDD. So what??? if you burn the HDD you'd have to download the game again and i know that you won't find it anywhere. Simply cause it takes space and money to keep material available online. It goes again making profits. If it goes digital then you'll buy the license, play the game and kiss it goodbye in a year or so. There will be no replay value cause it's not available anymore. They can even make you pay monthly to play the next amazing GTA.

 

Download the next GTAVII free and pay the monthly $99.99 to play it. Kiss my @#$$% AS!!!!

 

Edit: Oh by the way they WILL NOT drop the prices. If anything they will raise it cause:"it costs more to keep the servers updated with all the games..." Stupid

Edited August 14, 2012 by mrsurferdude

[GrandMaster Smith]

I honestly hate digital media.

 

Yes it is nice to be able to download a game from your couch, but what about when you get tired of that game?

 

You can't trade it in, you can't swap it with a friend's game.. it just sits there being completely useless.

 

 

This is the industries way of taking out our option of trading games for cash or other games.

 

 

Honestly, f*ck you EA. You're the biggest whore to video gaming ever. FFS in skate 3 they made you pay ten bucks so you could play party play, a feature that was in Skate 2 and Skate 1 I believe for free.. They even have it now so you have to pay for a code if you buy a used game to access online features. Once again hitting below the belt for the second hand gaming business.

 

They are sluts only out for money. They love money so much they would cheap shot their own loyal customers who without, they as a company wouldn't even exist. Once again, f*ck you EA.

 

 

 

[Chukkles]

The industry is moving toward digital delivery: EA expects its digital sales to overtake boxed games

 

I don't have a big problem with the idea of GTA being only a download someday, but I think it will mean the loss of classic GTA box art.

 

A downloadable game's "cover" is more like an app icon. A simple image that's recognizable at a tiny size. The classic GTA multi-panel comic strip/collage won't survive because it has too much detail for something that's not going to be printed.

 

The simpler, more ordinary style of Rockstar's art for TBOGT DLC may be the future.

I like some of the XBLA titles but these full game downloads take up too much space on HDD, it will never be advantageous to make these big titles download only because people will limit themselves to what they can fit on their Space (wether thats 8MB card or 250MB HDD). If thats the way next gen consoles are going they better have tons more space.

[mrsurferdude]

 

I honestly hate digital media.

 

Yes it is nice to be able to download a game from your couch, but what about when you get tired of that game?

 

You can't trade it in, you can't swap it with a friend's game.. it just sits there being completely useless.

 

 

This is the industries way of taking out our option of trading games for cash or other games.

 

 

Honestly, f*ck you EA. You're the biggest whore to video gaming ever. FFS in skate 3 they made you pay ten bucks so you could play party play, a feature that was in Skate 2 and Skate 1 I believe for free.. They even have it now so you have to pay for a code if you buy a used game to access online features. Once again hitting below the belt for the second hand gaming business.

 

They are sluts only out for money. They love money so much they would cheap shot their own loyal customers who without, they as a company wouldn't even exist. Once again, f*ck you EA.

 

I agree. I do understand the argument that the brick and mortar (gamestop, play N' Trade, etc...) stores cash in the used games and the Dev and publishers don't see a single penny of it.

 

i believe a better solution to this issue would be to have the stores pay a percentage of the revenue back to the Devs. That would force the retailers to rethink their prices, i mean if they charge as much as a new game we, or at least I, would buy a new one. It would make the big ones like EA shut the hell up about loosing revenue.

 

 

EDIT: Now i do apologize for my post being so out of topic. I do still think that digital games is a horrible idea.

[Exkabewbikadid]

That said, I'm willing to accept GTAVI as digital distribution only, IF publishers stop making DD such a rip off. They need to make the games cheaper (As production and shipping costs are completely nonexistant), and give us some kind of backup plan if their system goes down.

Well there is the cost of servers, bandwidth and the percentage taken by the digital distributor like Steam and Amazon. But yeah, it's still cheaper than the cost of printing discs, covers and booklets and the cost of shipping supplies.

 

Digital distribution has its pros and cons. It may potentially destroy the second-hand market, but not if the EU Court can set a precedent.

 

For me personally, Steam has made gaming a lot simpler and accessible. It's so easy to buy games on sale and have them sit in my library ready to download whenever I get around to them.

 

But when it comes to things like printed artwork and box covers, about the only substitute is if developers offer an ebook featuring artwork for the game, although in this day of DLC madness, don't be surprised if they include it in a "deluxe" version and charge you extra for it... I'm looking at you Mafia II.

[krspkbl]

I simply wouldn't buy games anymore if they were download only. We need to keep physical discs.

[ayyob]

it's a bad idea, did they thought of people who have a slow internet speed like me what are they gonna do ?

[krspkbl]

it's a bad idea, did they thought of people who have a slow internet speed like me what are they gonna do ?

Exactly! On my PS3 the most I get is 1mb. The hardware is so old and sh*tty. I dread downloading game updates never mind a full game itself!

 

It won't fully take off until the internet gets much faster. Wasn't Max Payne 3 about 30GB on PC? My computer would explode if I tried downloading that!

[cowabunga]

I always said it. The online is the way to control us.

 

I like to look at my shelf and see all the games in their original boxes.

[Adriaan]

It certainly is worth bringing up given how things are moving. I remember this same question came up for GTAIV, and the possibility of how GTAV's midnight launch will be more easily accessible by download at midnight. Look at Steam, where it allows you to preinstall the majority of the content pre-release, and then have the final activation come street date to avoid long waiting periods.

 

That said, though, even if the majority of the industry moves toward that, when it comes to blockbuster titles like these you'd always have great demand for a physically packaged good. Look at the return of Vinyl Records where fans buy the vinyl record and cover of a music album.

 

The other thing that's also important is the used games business. Given your job, @OP, I'm sure you are aware of how big this has become for GameStop. There are some very interesting stats highlighted in this article that makes me think the physical packaged versions of games will remain for some time to come: http://www.ign.com/articles/2012/08/02/wha...your-used-games

 

...especially the part that says "70 percent of income consumers make from trading games goes straight back into buying brand new games."

 

 

So even if GTA VI is delivered digitally six years from now, which would no doubt seem like an attractive option to any publisher, I think it's still very likely that it would still be released as a packaged version. The newer tech from Sony and Microsoft just wouldn't dare strip out optical discs just yet.

 

Even if you strip out the download issue, and think that most connections would be able to handle streaming services such as OnLive, I just don't think those companies have the physical bandwidth and capacity to carry a GTA launch on its own - and consumers will realize this.

 

 

With regards to EA, that's just the nature of their Origin business. They're much more diversified than Rockstar or Take-Two and have a greater variety of titles offered digitally, plus their subscription models and micro transactions. Globally there's just so much more PC gamers and if you think of how nations such as India and Brazil are expanding enormously in internet penetration it ends up being a numbers thing.

 

Take-Two and Rockstar is different in that they have these major blockbuster IPs that takes six years to make, and is not really just another game you casually download or try out and buy more hats for your avatar.

 

 

I know you own a retail store in the biz, so I hope the reaction you have gauged now from these responses from others will make you feel at ease . Think of well the disc version of EFLC and GTAIV Complete did relative to all the download versions. Same goes for physically packaged Undead Nightmare and Red Dead Complete, which still remains very well ranked on Amazon last I checked.

Edited August 14, 2012 by Adriaan

[gtamann123]

I wish games wouldn't be download only but sadly it will probably happen. I like having the solid copy. I never download games because my Hard Drive is only 20gb. The only thing I have downloaded is dawnguard. So if games do become download only then I hope the next gen consoles have huge hard Drives so you aren't limited to only like 5 game at a time.

[Pyrrhic]

[...]

I don't have a big problem with the idea of GTA being only a download someday [...]

I do. Although I have an Internet connection, many people don't have a PS3 or Xbox 360 Internet connection and that would amass to an enormous loss of cash by R*

[asitsaysinthebook]

I'd miss the maps and posters and booklets. To me, those were the very first thing to read when I had gotten a new game.

[Raynos]

Font Colour opinions? White seems so bland.

It's better than red, thats for sure. Nice and gentle on the eyes, I feel like my eyes were in a 5-star spa resort whilst reading your post.

 

Anyways, OT. Very true, American companies and american assholes think that since they have high speed 100gb/sec internet, that the rest of the world is on the same level.

 

Well no, we aren't and there's sweet f*ck all we, as individuals can do about it.

 

I'd still, always want physical media, it just feel better, having something to hold, cherish, tressure and sell when it becomes rare.

Suikoden 3, you bitch!

[Hy2RoGeN]

imagine someone that wants GTA VI (if it comes out) but he has slow internet and u can only get it online through steam or whatever.. it'd take a whole damn week to get a game that large..