Games-On-Demand line-up revealed

thegoth

Hi All,

I just want to throw this out there. I think that the upcoming games on demand feature will be very bad for consumers in the long term.

I fear that if take up of this service is high, it will drive both online and traditional stores out of business, and we will have to pay whatever the gaming companies demand. Over the weekend I found an old PS2 game I had with the price sticker still on it. The game was bought in 2001 for £50. Since then, prices have fallen alot, mostly thanks to online competition. Also, the second hand game market has exploded with traditional stores such as xtravision and gamestop, as well as ebay. For example, this weekend gone by, I was in gamestop in finglas. I saw race pro and the official MS steering wheel. I decided to treat myself, but it was €140 for both new. I ended up getting both second hand for €90 with a guarentee. If this games on demand experiment works, we can kiss good buy to such deals.

I for one intend to support either the online or traditional stores for the above reasons.

Opinions anyone

wayhey

If there was a monopoly of ONLY an online on demand services then maybe that would be the case. But that'll never happen. I've an Xbox nearly 2 years and only got Live there a few weeks ago, mainly cos of broadband. Most people aren't that stupid that they won't shop around first for deals or whatever. I mainly buy secondhand and like yourself always check there isn't one already before forking out top dollar. It can only bring competition and I'd be all for the downloads if they're cheaper.

Has iTunes destroyed HMV?

Kinetic^

There was an exact duplicate of this thread halfway down the page, no need to start another.

RAIN

Steam has been around for ages, this is just something that Msoft are doing to get a foot in the downloadable title market. Why would I pay 30 quid to download Mass Effect with no box art or anything when I can walk into xtra vision and get it 2nd hand for a 12 quid.

This will balance things a bit but it aint going to take games off retailer's shelve's....yet, imagine trying to download GTA5 on the release day?? Live would probably start screaming out through your xbox.

Currently developers and publishers make nothing from the 2nd hand market, this isn't really the consumers problem but its also a bad thing for small independents trying to put a good title out and get as much return as they can so as they can make another game. When you download a game its on your harddrive and cant be traded in, it also give's Dev's more chance of flogging DLC if you have the game on your drive. There is a lot of stuff to iron out before we see Games on demand take over from retail releases.......Gamestop is safe enough i rekon :P

Snakeblood

RAIN wrote: »

Steam has been around for ages, this is just something that Msoft are doing to get a foot in the downloadable title market. Why would I pay 30 quid to download Mass Effect with no box art or anything when I can walk into xtra vision and get it 2nd hand for a 12 quid.

This will balance things a bit but it aint going to take games off retailer's shelve's....yet, imagine trying to download GTA5 on the release day?? Live would probably start screaming out through your xbox.

Currently developers and publishers make nothing from the 2nd hand market, this isn't really the consumers problem but its also a bad thing for small independents trying to put a good title out and get as much return as they can so as they can make another game. When you download a game its on your harddrive and cant be traded in, it also give's Dev's more chance of flogging DLC if you have the game on your drive. There is a lot of stuff to iron out before we see Games on demand take over from retail releases.......Gamestop is safe enough i rekon :P

I think you're right but for stuff like GTA5, they might do it like Steam, where you preload the game before the release date, and then send you an activation key on the day. It'll probably drop anyway, but yeah.

RAIN

Yes your right actually, wasent using my brainbox !

Preloads ftw

bmdmac

Just got the download, all the listed games are there for 30 quid what a joke really. Getting screwed if the americans are gettin it got 20 dollars a pop.

James Howlett

wayhey wrote: »

If there was a monopoly of ONLY an online on demand services then maybe that would be the case. But that'll never happen. I've an Xbox nearly 2 years and only got Live there a few weeks ago, mainly cos of broadband. Most people aren't that stupid that they won't shop around first for deals or whatever. I mainly buy secondhand and like yourself always check there isn't one already before forking out top dollar. It can only bring competition and I'd be all for the downloads if they're cheaper.

Has iTunes destroyed HMV?[/quote]

Are you kidding me?
I agree with a lot of what thegoth says. Long-run this is a very bad thing.
I could rant bout this for so long on local employment alone but it doesn't really belong in this thread.

corcaigh07

i think itunes has hurt HMV and such quite a bit actually, almost impossible to find rare albums in stores now.

Gunmonkey

bmdmac wrote: »

Just got the download, all the listed games are there for 30 quid what a joke really. Getting screwed if the americans are gettin it got 20 dollars a pop.

Poor aussies have to pay 6000 MSP for a single game Ya think this would be their saving grace as game prices are massively inflated due to shipping em over to there.

James Howlett

corcaigh07 wrote: »

i think itunes has hurt HMV and such quite a bit actually, almost impossible to find rare albums in stores now.

Indeed, stores can only afford to stock items that are a guaranteed sell, like generic pop stuff and anything HSM related. Rare cool stuff gets brushed away as its too much of a risk to have dead money on the shelves.

Befroe someone asks "what has this to do with games?"

Well imagine you want to buy great game like ICO but can't because stores can only afford to stock Fifa.

Ri_Nollaig

ShaneU wrote: »

€30 is a complete joke, I can buy assassins creed at play.com for €12.

just look at steam!
most games are still 40+ euro
I think cod4 is still 49.99 while I picked it up for PC about 2 weeks ago for 19.99...

Batesy

Is there an option to use MS points to pay? I can just see the price set at €29.99.

At least with points you could buy them online at a discounted price.

rizzla

Batesy wrote: »

Is there an option to use MS points to pay? I can just see the price set at €29.99.

At least with points you could buy them online at a discounted price.

I think when you select to buy it an option will be displayed saying change payment option. Should be able to switch it in there. I'm not 100% and just going on speculation.

Ricky91t

mailrewop wrote: »

no sign of any price structure yet and with my 2mb connection i don't know if its worth it seeing as it takes forever to download a demo thats 1gig. i'll give it a go anyway.

Really?
I'm on a 2mb connection and have already download 20% of a 1.13gb demo in 15-20 mins,Leave it download over night maybe?When contention is lower?

Edit : Took me 1 hr 15mins to download 1.13gb on my 1.98mb(usually) should be fine!

Gamer Bhoy 89

Now, is Games on Demand only gona be planting old (but good, of course) games from like 2006-07? or will they be eventually adding new releases?

Probably too soon to tell, I get curious about things like these lol

bucks73

Ms already said new releases will not be on there. Only "recent" releases. How recent they are is another thing.

Shammy

29.99 for a game that you can pick up for under a tenner is a rip off