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How Politics Interacts With Games
Crispy Gamer sat down with Hal Halpin, president of the Entertainment Consumer Association, and had him explain how the games industry interacts with various aspects of the government, such as lobbying efforts, the supreme court, and particular politicians. A related editorial suggests some things President Elect Obama can do to bring change to the industry. "We also need to rein in the used games market and not with DRM. It is fundamentally unfair that developers are being robbed of profits for work that they've done. If the ESA will not offer a mandate, then we'll need the government to do so. Publishers and developers should be entitled to at least half of the price from the sale of every used game." Kotaku has a response which points out flaws in the author's arguments.
I really have to say it, that's a darn tunnel visioned statement. I don't know a single creative work where the resulting work cannot be resold legally, and the original work's creator gets even a dime off that used sale. So, what exactly makes games the special case?
No one is "robbed" of profits by used game sales.
The number of new copies sold of a game is a complex function of popularity, marketing, and quality. The number of used copies on the market is a function of the game's longevity, popularity, and quality. If the demand for the game is high, the number of used copies will be low. If the demand for the game is low, the number of used copies will be high.
If you don't believe me, go to the local used games store and ask for a used copy of Chrono Trigger for the SNES. There might be one. It will be like $100. Now ask for a used copy of Madden 08. There are five of them for $9 each. The author is arguing that game developers should be rewarded extra money for producing games that are less desirable than successful games. If you produce a horrible game, and then have EA market the bajeezus out of it, you will find that in three months the bargain bins will be full of this game. Should we now reward the bad quality of this game by forcing retailers to pay out of pocket? It is some sort of "mediocrity tax" that goes against everything that is good about free market economics.
Not only that, but the entire idea stinks of government directing the flow of the economy, something the Soviet Union discovered does not work so well. If I purchase something, I become the owner. Part of my rights of "life, liberty, and property" include "property", which means I own things that I buy and can in turn sell them to someone else. The author is, in a sense, arguing against the idea of ownership. You don't really own anything. You are just paying EA a fee to use it, and when you are done using it, you have to give it back.
If game developers want to stop being "robbed of profits", they should stop making boring games that I can beat in a week, which have no further interest to me. People are bored of spending $60 on a game that has $3 million worth of graphics content and $.35 worth of game. You know what games I sell used? Crappy ones with no replay value. You know what games I still own? Kick ass games that I still play from time to time, even though they may be old. Games that I enjoyed so much that, even though I don't play them anymore, I just love having them.
If they stamp out the buying and selling of used games, they will discover something interesting: The sales of good games will not increase, and the sales of bad games will actually decrease, because people are risk averse to something they can't sell once they've ripped through the 9 hours of expensive art content with no challenge or depth whatsoever.
"developers are being robbed of profits for work that they've done" This is absolutely brilliant. [/sarcasm] How about developers come up with content that will hold users' attention long enough so used games won't directly compete with their new counterparts? A lot of people I know hold on to the good games they get because they might want to play again in the future. By the way, can I return a game after I have installed it because I'm not satisfied with its features? Like, when I don't like how the game responds, or because it has below standard artistic value, or simply because the game isn't nearly as fun as it was advertised to be? The game industry gets away with too much bullshit already. I'm not about to have them milk me for money like I'm some dairy cattle.