In the computer games industry pretty much everything has been download only for some time as the assets are too large for DVD and BD never caught on for PC. Places like GOG provide unrestricted offline installers but the majority are provided via a storefront like Epic or Steam.
The worst case scenario for preservationists is for games to become a streaming service via cloud gaming, which publishers may like since it pretty much prevents piracy and allows them to charge a monthly fee rather than a one time license fee. For movies and music streaming exclusives aren't a new thing and improvements in network latency and bandwidth are making game streaming more and more viable.
Interesting point about PC going digital-only as Nintendo is a fascinating counter-example.
While they offer digital downloads on the eShop, their pricing actively discourages it.
Case in point: I just bought my kid a new first-party Switch game. Physical copy on Amazon was ~25% cheaper than the identical digital version on Nintendo's own eShop. Even my 9-year-old noted how illogical it seems, the physical version requires manufacturing, shipping, retail markup, yet costs significantly less than the digital bits that have near-zero marginal cost.
It strongly suggests Nintendo wants the physical retail channel to thrive, or values the perceived permanence/resale value of cartridges.
This context makes the Switch 2 "gamekey" cartridges (physical auth token, digital download) fit their pattern of valuing a physical artifact and retail presence, even if the data delivery shifts.
And physical, at least to date, retains resell value as well. If you want to play an expensive Nintendo release that effectively never goes down in retail value, it's reasonably safe to buy it, play it, and resell it if you don't want it indefinitely. Nintendo never lowering their prices helps anchor the value high even in the resell market most of the time.
I haven't read enough about this to know if the gamekey will kill this but it's certainly only a matter of time before they are all coded and bindable to only one account. Technically this has obviously been possible for a long time, they just haven't dared to pull that trigger yet. They clearly want to.
> And physical, at least to date, retains resell value as well.
That stopping being true as soon as the DS line started and they switched to flash memory that will degrade over time when they don't have power. People's DS games are already failing. The same will happen to switch games. Only a few hardcore collectors are going to pay money for a cartridge that doesn't let you play the game anymore.
That's more like antique value. Resell as meant here occurs within the first few months to maybe years after a game releases. Degradation that happens on a time scale of a decade or more will not be a significant issue for ordinary resale.
I believe it’s to ensure retailers want to sell the games.
When I go to virgin mega store, there’s a large section of Nintendo games, but nothing for any PC games.
If it was cheaper to buy online, why would I buy physically, unless I was really into it physical media.
And that segment isn’t big enough to cause retailers to put up a section in the mall, which not only works as a point of sale but also as a giant advertising banner.
Price discrimination. Digital is more convenient to the consumer, hence by nature they prefer it. Consumers who are more price sensitive can instead choose to put up with the inconvenience of a physical purchase in exchange for a cheaper price.
Nintendo has raised the physical prices for Switch 2 games more than the digital edition. E.g. Mario Kart physical will cost 90USD/EUR and digitally 80USD/EUR. Thus, their retail-friendliness has diminished with the new generation.
Fortunately for everyone, all of the "stream games as a service" initiatives failed completely. Consumers aren't really interested due to obvious drawbacks, and vendors aren't interested in provisioning enough or good enough hardware to solve those drawbacks.
Imo if Gamepass is allowed to survive, it's end game is a tier, or maybe included at no extra cost with some limitations, a cloud gaming component.
Gamepass is the biggest threat in turning games into subscriptions, and unfortunately a growing subset of people will only play games on Gamepass. We've dodged Gamepass exclusives for now, but for how long?
Game pass doesn't seem terribly popular. Xbox in general isn't doing very well compared to the other consoles. I think they'll keep pushing for games as a service though. It's too tempting to keep all that control out of the hands of players.
It seems fairly popular right now. If you are the kind of person who wants to play many new releases it's a great deal.
But I think it's not particularly sticky: it's a great deal for as long as Microsoft invests into it getting many titles immediately. If they stop doing that, that same audience segment doesn't really have a use for it anymore.
That doesn't mean much. And 40 countries is actually a pretty large amount for this sort of thing. Companies like this are accustomed to (near-)first-world unit economics and market dynamics and they struggle at best to adapt to conditions outside of that bubble. They likely have metrics showing very few potential customers, for various reasons like low ownership of eligible hardware or low exposure to relevant advertising or high rates of piracy setting the price to compete with near zero, etc.
There are logistical challenges that have to be solved, and both upfront and ongoing costs that have to be paid, for every new country that needs to be served, and often these are unlikely to be recouped. If they foreseeably reach 90+% of their potential customer base and revenue (or think so anyway) from those 40 countries then not expanding beyond them is a practical decision that doesn't extrapolate to not caring within those 40.
I paid for GeForce Now for a while. But that one's different because you play the games you "own" on Steam and they just rent you the hardware to play them on.
Eventually I got a gaming video card and canceled - for now.
The worst case scenario for preservationists is for games to become a streaming service via cloud gaming, which publishers may like since it pretty much prevents piracy and allows them to charge a monthly fee rather than a one time license fee. For movies and music streaming exclusives aren't a new thing and improvements in network latency and bandwidth are making game streaming more and more viable.