Has anyone gone all digital yet? What are your takes on it?

[Lugatti]

I hope that title makes enough sense!

 

So, for me personally - after going all digital in regards to no longer buying BRs/DVDs and going Kindle-only for books, I've been considering making the move to all digital gaming. This is specifically geared towards wanting to make the jump to Series X and eyeing the all digital version. I'm thinking of doing that somewhat so to save a bit of money, but also because I don't get as into having the big physical collection as I once did, especially when I was younger.

 

What is everyone's take on going all digital? Obviously Steam, Gamepass, etc has really started to usher in this era anyways.

[Craigsters]

Hard disk copy games died out  10 years ago, and Steam, and Ubisoft and EA all went digital, you can still buy used copy's of your favourite games at amazon , like the first Sims  or the Godfather 2 - Standard Edition, and scarface the world is yours   but they'll most likely be used or mace copied bad editions   

 

 

I have over 125 steam and Ubisoft games now and some of them go back to  2008 like fallout 3 or Doom 3  and Doom 3 resurrection of evil- 2004 

[Lugatti]

50 minutes ago, Craigsters said:

Hard disk copy games died out  10 years ago, and Steam, and Ubisoft and EA all went digital, you can still buy used copy's of your favourite games at amazon , like the first Sims  or the Godfather 2 - Standard Edition, and scarface the world is yours   but they'll most likely be used or mace copied bad editions   

 

 

I have over 125 steam and Ubisoft games now and some of them go back to  2008 like fallout 3 or Doom 3  and Doom 3 resurrection of evil- 2004 

 

What?

 

In all fairness - might've been best to say my question is more geared towards going all digital on console.

[Failed Again]

9 hours ago, Lugatti said:

I hope that title makes enough sense!

 

So, for me personally - after going all digital in regards to no longer buying BRs/DVDs and going Kindle-only for books, I've been considering making the move to all digital gaming. This is specifically geared towards wanting to make the jump to Series X and eyeing the all digital version. I'm thinking of doing that somewhat so to save a bit of money, but also because I don't get as into having the big physical collection as I once did, especially when I was younger.

 

What is everyone's take on going all digital? Obviously Steam, Gamepass, etc has really started to usher in this era anyways.

 I believe it's an individual choice.

Just to be clear the Series X Has a Disc drive, yet this does not mean it cannot go all digital

The series S , is the All digital version ( note PlayStation 5 has 2 versions of their premium ed. One all  digital, the other Both

 

I have the Series X, I only have a few games on disc, I kind of like, Not having to reload and load discs if I change games,

You do lose resale value going all digital, yet you won't be collecting stuff, that most likely you'll giveaway ..( that's me)

 

as far as Movies and Music, If you have High end  equipment I believe you will miss higher quality sound (Audiophiles will know better)if you stream( this may change with Tech always improving

 

Kindle books 4 the win, also I love digital audio versions of books read by Voice actors

 

Edited April 11 by Failed Again

[TwistOfLime21]

I can’t unfortunately. I live in the sticks and only have limited internet per month. Updates alone eat right into it. Even if I did have unlimited, I still don’t think I’d go digital. When I finish a game, I’ll usually end up selling it because chances are I won’t play that game again. Can’t do that with digital. Plus I like the look of a physical games collection.

Edited April 11 by TwistOfLime21

[Algonquin Assassin]

I was considering the digital PS5, but went for the disc version instead even if it was slightly more expensive because I like having both options.

 

I buy a lot of digital games mostly for convenience sake and when there’s a good deal, but I still like buying physical games. Same with movies.

 

[Mexicola9302]

I been all digital since Battlefield 2 lol, i gave away all games i had on discs, and threw out all my music cd's, because it all just takes up space.

 

Im a PC player only, and i store all my games, music, movies, series on harddrives now. I got around 32 TB storage atm. Larger HDD's get cheaper and cheaper each year with larger capacity, another few years and i probably got 100 TB.  

[Tacymist]

Digital is just more convenient. I never resold games anyway, I either just held onto them or gave them away anyway. So digital is the best option for me since now I no longer have to get off my ass to chance discs. 

[Mister Pink]

I'm very slowly moving to digital. I'd say my digital purchases are 80%-90%. I do like physical copies for my favourite games but really, It's more of an emotional/sentimental decision than a convenient/logical decision. 

 

I don't resell games, so I think I'll just continue as I am. 

15 hours ago, Lugatti said:

This is specifically geared towards wanting to make the jump to Series X and eyeing the all digital version. I'm thinking of doing that somewhat so to save a bit of money, but also because I don't get as into having the big physical collection as I once did, especially when I was younger.

 

Thankfully we know Xbox are somewhat commited to boosting old games (auto-HDR, frame-unlocks etc). So, if you buy digital, games should be preserved. We're yet to see.  

[Grichka Bogdanoff]

I'm a console player, PlayStation & Switch player of all things, and I like to actually own my games.

There's no benefits for me to go full digital considering how scammy the digital world is how there's literally no benefits, not even in price, over going physical.

 

I never sell games though. The only one I sold in 15 years was Far Cry 5 because I hate it THAT much.

[Jason]

Been a PC player for a long time where physical games have been all but extinct for over a decade now, so on PC I've been all digital for a long time, my last PC had it's disc drive unplugged for years and my current PC doesn't even have a disc bay in the case, lol.

 

For console I slowly started to move to digital towards the end of last gen (PS4) and now, after switching to an Xbox Series S I'm full digital on console. If/when I pick up a PS5 I'd buy the digital PS5 as well.

 

Due to what is IMO bullsh*t reasons for the rising cost of AAA games I've also now go zero issue with using the more grey market key sellers such as CDKeys - not the shady stores like G2A and the like mind you, f*ck that - so these days I'm getting games cheaper than I would in the past, even on console. I'm also a big user of Games Pass which is also lowering my spend on games throughout the year.

 

I do understand why people want to stick with physical though and while I expect physical media for games is going to end up being dropped one day I hope it's not for a long time. For many reasons including game ownership, preservation, download speeds and more digital only has to continue being a choice and not mandatory for as long as possible.

[dieseltech20]

Have been all digital for years now and I like it. Less mess around the house and less physical possessions that my family will have to dispose of when I die.

 

The only good thing about an actual game disc is that it can be sold to Gamestop for a dollar or 2.

[roo_fus]

My biggest issue with 'digital marketplaces' is that often your ownership of media is completely beholden to the servers of some company and your user agreements with them. Many people take for granted just how tenuous this relationship is and don't realize you are basically renting something you are supposed to "own" and one bankruptcy or destabilizing event could disrupt you getting to enjoy your own media. Of course if you actually manage your own digital storage you don't have to worry as much about this... plus discs were just downright flimsy technology I'm fine parting with.

Books are the only thing I want to keep physical, if for no other reason that I stare at a screen 90% of the day and would like a break. Also if the apocalypse happens I'll get to enjoy something. 

Edited April 11 by roo_fus

[Mexicola9302]

5 minutes ago, roo_fus said:

My biggest issue with 'digital marketplaces' is that often your ownership of media is completely beholden to the servers of some company and your user agreements with them. Many people take for granted just how tenuous this relationship is and don't realize you are basically renting something you are supposed to "own" and one bankruptcy or destabilizing event could disrupt you getting to enjoy your own media. Of course if you actually manage your own digital storage you don't have to worry as much about this... plus discs were just downright flimsy technology I'm fine parting with.

Books are the only thing I want to keep physical, if for no other reason that I stare at a screen 90% of the day and would like a break. Also if the apocalypse happens I'll get to enjoy something. 

I hardly believe Steam, Origin, Ubisoft Connect, Rockstar Games Launcher etc. ever gets shut down. So i don't worry too much about that user agreement.

 

But i think books, newspapers, magazines etc. won't exist in like 15-20 years anymore. I mean downloading like a megabyte of a server to read a book, is better for the environment, than printing thousands of copies of it. It's a total waste in my eyes, sure it's nice having a book in the hands, but it's not needed anymore. But the sad thing is, most probably around then also cash currency in paperform won't exist anymore, for the ultimate surveillance.

 

The future looks bad.  

[TheSantader25]

I still like to buy those once in lifetime games physically because it feels much better. But I rather buy the average game digitally.

[Jason]

26 minutes ago, roo_fus said:

Many people take for granted just how tenuous this relationship is and don't realize you are basically renting something you are supposed to "own" and one bankruptcy or destabilizing event could disrupt you getting to enjoy your own media.

 

This type that of opinion is raised around many things with games today, that people don't realise what is actually happening or something along those lines. I think people do know, they've just instinctively weighed up the pros and cons and decided it was worth it to them. I'm in the same boat, yes I understand the exceptionally small risk of MS, Sony, Steam or whomever goin bust and thus losing access to my purchased media but that's not exactly something new either, I've been losing physical media since the day I first bought them through damage or just losing them. This isn't to downplay the importance of game preservation and ownership and ultimately the reasons for losing physical media are ultimately your own rather than say servers going down, but the result is the same.

 

Though it should also be said that for Steam in particular that Valve are on record saying that if the extremely unlikely scenario that Steam shut down happened, they do have measures in place to make sure customers still have access to their purchased games. I don't know if MS or Sony have similar things in place but I imagine they'd be able to handle it if so, but the reality there is they aren't going to fold ever, and more so MS are perhaps the most forward thinking out of the major console players when it comes to game preservation having invested a lot in backwards compatability.

 

So while it absolutely is a very valid reason to choose to stick with physical media and for physical media to continue as long as possible... it's honestly simply not a concern.

 

For the continued existence of physical media I think the reasons for really should have nothing to do with any of the potential pitfalls of digital and instead for reasons that are unique to physical, aka reselling of media, something which is hella important for many people who can't afford to drop $60-$70 on new games at will. Physical media is also another avenue that helps game preservation as well, which is another important thing for me.

[roo_fus]

2 hours ago, Mexicola9302 said:

I hardly believe Steam, Origin, Ubisoft Connect, Rockstar Games Launcher etc. ever gets shut down. So i don't worry too much about that user agreement.

 

But i think books, newspapers, magazines etc. won't exist in like 15-20 years anymore. I mean downloading like a megabyte of a server to read a book, is better for the environment, than printing thousands of copies of it. It's a total waste in my eyes, sure it's nice having a book in the hands, but it's not needed anymore. But the sad thing is, most probably around then also cash currency in paperform won't exist anymore, for the ultimate surveillance.

 

The future looks bad.  

 

1 hour ago, Jason said:

 

This type that of opinion is raised around many things with games today, that people don't realise what is actually happening or something along those lines. I think people do know, they've just instinctively weighed up the pros and cons and decided it was worth it to them. I'm in the same boat, yes I understand the exceptionally small risk of MS, Sony, Steam or whomever goin bust and thus losing access to my purchased media but that's not exactly something new either, I've been losing physical media since the day I first bought them through damage or just losing them. This isn't to downplay the importance of game preservation and ownership and ultimately the reasons for losing physical media are ultimately your own rather than say servers going down, but the result is the same.

 

Though it should also be said that for Steam in particular that Valve are on record saying that if the extremely unlikely scenario that Steam shut down happened, they do have measures in place to make sure customers still have access to their purchased games. I don't know if MS or Sony have similar things in place but I imagine they'd be able to handle it if so, but the reality there is they aren't going to fold ever, and more so MS are perhaps the most forward thinking out of the major console players when it comes to game preservation having invested a lot in backwards compatability.

 

So while it absolutely is a very valid reason to choose to stick with physical media and for physical media to continue as long as possible... it's honestly simply not a concern.

 

For the continued existence of physical media I think the reasons for really should have nothing to do with any of the potential pitfalls of digital and instead for reasons that are unique to physical, aka reselling of media, something which is hella important for many people who can't afford to drop $60-$70 on new games at will. Physical media is also another avenue that helps game preservation as well, which is another important thing for me.

I'll admit I'm being kind of a doomsayer, but I do want to mention that there are more plausible and subtle situations that come up with digital ownership - for example, one day I find my digital download of GTA4 has a different soundtrack than my physical copy and I no longer get to hear the badass King Ring because of license agreement outside my control. It's a minor issue easily fixed, but there are more egregious examples (see: Blizzard) and it makes me a bit uncomfortable when I get these little reminders that these are not really my own possessions and I don't have full control over them. Like if I walked outside and found my car was suddenly a different color. 

[Zello]

https://www.theverge.com/2022/4/10/23019235/playstation-digital-games-ps3-ps-vita-expiring-sony-chrono-trigger

Stuff like that gives me nightmares.

 

I'm against it but I have bought a couple digital games. I like the convenience of not having a bunch of game cases everywhere making my room a nightmare, accidently losing a game, or a disc getting scratched but physical is always better. Being able to buy and trade physical games is something that digital would never be able to do I like to trade in my old games that I don't play anymore even if I only get $3 for them hey, $3 is $3. With digital stores the prices are always gonna be an issue games that are old are in some cases still listed at $60 or $30 even if it was a flop while that same game a physical copy could cost $10 or less.

 

Sure there are occasional sales but those are only for the popular games if you're into some niche titles well you're outta luck even worse when they are removed from the store. I'm currently going through a retro gaming phase and busted out the Xbox 360 I had a digital version of San Andreas on a hard drive but I made the stupid decision of buying a new hard drive from Amazon it ended up being one of those chinese knockoffs well I transferred it to that one and I can't play it because those hard drives are unable to play OG Xbox games well I ended up getting an official hard drive but when I tried transferring it I could not and it's no longer listed in the Xbox store or in my account since Rockstar released the remaster way back in 2014 the OG Xbox version is rare.

Edited April 12 by Zello

[Stahli]

I would still like to buy my PC games physically, but since you have to activate everything on Steam anyway and download hundreds of patches, it hardly makes sense for a few years now. I don't like all these launchers anyway. I'd rather buy everything on GOG DRM-free but they rarely have current titles. I find the games that you buy on Steam, Epic, etc belong to you only as long as the service is active. Should Steam unlikely times go bankrupt you have your games probably no longer.

 

For movies, I like to buy the Blu-rays to have the best possible picture and audio quality. But I would also be willing to buy digital, if I really have the films physically on my hard drive and DRM-free. But unfortunately there is no such thing.

 

For magazines and documents I have switched to digital for the most part. I scan everything possible.

[Mexicola9302]

48 minutes ago, Stahli said:

I would still like to buy my PC games physically, but since you have to activate everything on Steam anyway and download hundreds of patches, it hardly makes sense for a few years now. I don't like all these launchers anyway. I'd rather buy everything on GOG DRM-free but they rarely have current titles. I find the games that you buy on Steam, Epic, etc belong to you only as long as the service is active. Should Steam unlikely times go bankrupt you have your games probably no longer.

 

For movies, I like to buy the Blu-rays to have the best possible picture and audio quality. But I would also be willing to buy digital, if I really have the films physically on my hard drive and DRM-free. But unfortunately there is no such thing.

 

For magazines and documents I have switched to digital for the most part. I scan everything possible.

Yeah the only way to have Blu-Rays in digital form, is to download a pirated copy of it, without any compression but also without any extras, like alternative endings, behind the scenes and such. it does exist, that's how i do it. Im not feeling guilty at all doing that, all these filmstudios are rich enough.

 

I got a few of those, the latest James Bond movie 72 GB, latest matrix movie also 70 GB. The problem is it uses a ton of storage, wasting 700 GB for just 10 movies or something is not very efficient. Sure the quality is perfect, but it's not good to make large collections.

 

Same goes for collecting music, in the FLAC format or another lossless format, sometimes having an album that takes 1.64 gb (Tool - Fear Inoculum 96 KHZ 24 Bit FLAC 1 Hour 26 Minutes) or something is not very efficient.

 

Most efficent format for videos is MKV X265 atm, but it comes with quality loss, and for music it's probably still simple 320 kbps MP3's, or maybe OGG 500 ish kbps.

 

Quality just costs a sh*t ton of storage.

[Jason]

8 hours ago, roo_fus said:

I'll admit I'm being kind of a doomsayer, but I do want to mention that there are more plausible and subtle situations that come up with digital ownership - for example, one day I find my digital download of GTA4 has a different soundtrack than my physical copy and I no longer get to hear the badass King Ring because of license agreement outside my control. It's a minor issue easily fixed, but there are more egregious examples (see: Blizzard) and it makes me a bit uncomfortable when I get these little reminders that these are not really my own possessions and I don't have full control over them. Like if I walked outside and found my car was suddenly a different color. 

 

Yea this is what I mean by game preservation, we can preserve games through both digital and physical means but two methods are better than one.

[60017 Silver Fox]

I'm about 90% buying digital now and though I still enjoy the feeling of holding a game case and having my collection from the SNES and Megadrive II up to the Xbox One and Switch on display for the nostalgia, I can see the benefits in going digital and personally have little objection though thats mainly because I don't really do much gaming anymore so It doesn't really affect me since i'm getting like one game every few months and am sinking any gaming time I have into an oldie like City Skylines. My only major gripes and concerns are like the previous posters have said already but alot of that is also just modern gaming in general. It's a bit like the online world as a whole. The modern world wants me to use my PC and internet to do everything from shopping to banking to job interviews and clocking in and out of the workplace whereas I would rather it be used purely for hobbies and entertainment like Youtube videos.

 

For books i'm very much still buying physical because it just feels right to read a book or magazine that way. I tried digital but I find myself just skimming through most of the time whereas I give the paper form a lot more focus.

[Zello]

Another thing I don't like is the size of these games. 100GB or more so you gotta choose which one to uninstall and which one to keep.

Having a collection like this on a hard drive ready to play without deleting anything would be impossible now.

Edited April 14 by Zello

[Tycek]

Depends on the media in my case. I don't buy movies or TV series anymore, due to easy access to streaming services. In case of music or video games I like to buy physical albums and games, for the sake of my collection. 

 

If I get some good discount for game that I would like to play, but I don't care that much about it, I will usually buy it digitally, but these titles I like or care about I prefer to keep in a box along with some goodies (like maps, booklets if applicable of course). 

 

And there of course aspect @roo_fus mentioned, when DRM means You don't own anything at all. So far it happened mostly with R* games, but can anyone assure me that one day I won't start a game finding its content completely butchered, due to some expired licence?

 

I like to have a choice and jumping between both physical and digital releases allows me to pick the best one for me and be somewhat safe about content of my games.  

Edited April 15 by Tycek

[trip]

I'm all digital for movies and games.  I've been that way since around the birth of the Xbox One.  I Kindle disposable books, but I still buy physical books...so I can look smart.

 

Being old enough to predate video games and home movie players(VHS etc etc) - I have boxes of old (nearly unusable) media when it comes to games and movies.   Digital for me feels like a godsend.  I sense digital licenses will be easier to move around and preserve.  Not so easy with physical VHS tapes.

 

*live shot(just a sampling)...all unplayable and useless to me today.

 

e:

One thing I loved when I slapped this together is that blank VHS tape is still factory sealed.

Edited April 15 by trip

[Mexicola9302]

Why keep this stuff, why not just throw it away? Floppy's, VHS lol. Such a waste of space.

[trip]

44 minutes ago, Mexicola9302 said:

Why keep this stuff, why not just throw it away? Floppy's, VHS lol. Such a waste of space.

I know.  I've gotten way better over the years.   Just me and my wife in an old Victorian house...no space issues here.  But still...

 

 

[DODI3OG]

I went digital since 2015.

 

I used to game on PC and we used to rely on dial-up, then cheap DSL. Since we moved to entry-level fibr speeds, it affected my decision-making regarding digital or physical.

 

All my PS3 games were Physical. But, the only Physical games I had on my PS4 were GTA V and The Last of Us remastered.

 

I know a lot of people here who buy Hong Kong copies of Playstation games because they're cheaper than US-based copies. But, we don't have physical video game retailers/gaming hubs nearby where I live. So, I just started utilizing our internet even if it took a while to download most games.

 

I also don't buy games I don't plan to replay. But I'd take some for "free" like a few PS Plus games I had, but never really touched. So, reselling my physical copies if I had one is out of the question. I wish I could have my Playstation library sorted out like "Open-world games with great plot" "Linear games that play like a movie" "Action-adventure games with great storytelling." "Great fantasy setting."