Slashdot Mirror
The End Is Near for GameStop
kube00 writes "The rumor mill is saying the next generation of consoles might not play used games. What does this mean for retailers such as Amazon, GameStop, and Best Buy? Will gamers flock to the one console that can still play used games? GoozerNation speculates if the Mayan apocalypse draws near for used game sales."
... idiots. I've watched them give money hand over fist to companies that are screwing them blind. When games went mainstream shit went downhill, the fact that gamers put up with such onerous bullshit because they are so addicted and stupid is why we can't have nice things.
I'm not an insider or anything, but they seem to be pretty quick on their feet to adjust to the market. They're still going to sell new games and used games for PS3/360 for quite a while even after PS4/720 come out. They're also selling cards for your steam wallet and MS points etc. Probably still in the used system market as well, not to mention the nice margin on off brand controllers. If the end is coming, it'll still be a while yet.
So the article speculates that the prices of new games will come down if second hand sales become a thing of the past.
Yeah. Right. If you believe that, I have a special deal, just for you, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, you could be the proud owner of the Brooklyn Bridge for the low low price of $1000!
Publishers will sell the games for as much as they think the public will pay. They're not going to oh-so-generously drop the price of their product just because you can't resell it down the road. I guarantee you, prices will stay the same, or go up.
The rumor mill is saying that something might happen, and the question is about the possible consequences of this thing that may or may not occur.
This is too many layers of speculation to be useful for anything.
Please call me when someone knows something about anything. Thanks.
Kid-proof tablet..
> "If none of the consoles can play used games I could see the price of games coming down. AAA titles may come out at $45 or $50 instead of $60."
Computer over. Virus = very yes.
Gamestop is finished!*
*(Provided these unsubstantiated rumors hold true)
What happens if they succeed in killing preowned sales. Gamestop/EBGames don't make a lot of margin off selling new games and almost nothing selling the consoles themselves. I have seen the precession of independent game stores fold in my town it's not small but not big enough to support that sort of thing, this was before gaming was more mainstream. You kill their revenue you kill the store they start to close the less profitable ones and you get a run on till only the big city stores survive. Then you don't have anyone to sell your stuff.
Sure the big chain stores will carry Gears of Halo: Black XV on launch day but what about the niche stuff and they certainly wont hold a back catalog. I would miss being able to walk in to my local and talk to the people I know there and get my game on the day it launches rather than getting it from some online retailer. Maybe they need to switch to a system where the publisher gets a cut every time their SKU is sold new or old, Gamestop would hate that so they would need to offer something in return. The publisher could sell their new game to the distributor for less. This would give less initial profit and more long term sales. Gamestop would pay less upfront for more initial profit but would lose some traded game revenue.
That was sooo last Baktun.
I'm sure it's too much to hope that people would just not buy the new consoles...
There is nothing wrong with dumping the console and switching to smartphone and pc/mac games. The smartphone is the new console.
Developers/publishers *need* to fight back against pre-owned, as game retailers really started to take the piss, and it's really been hurting the people who make the games. This isn't about stopping friends sharing games or selling them privately on eBay, although sadly these users will suffer too.
This is to stop retailers going to great lengths to sell pre-owned *instead* of new copies. Mixing new and preowned stock on the same shelf was ridiculous enough, but Iit's got to the point where you try to buy a new copy of a game, and they're actively pushing pre-owned even at the checkout: 'Are you sure you want a new copy? This pre-owned one is $2 less!'
This directly hurts publishers and developers, who need the new sales and make no revenue from pre-owned. Publishers have been way to slow and scared to respond, they should have clamped down much earlier. After all, it's never happened to this extent with music or DVDs, and I expect that the music/movie industry would be very quick to stamp these sort of practices out if pre-owned sales were being pushed in the same way.
Hopefully a resurgence in PC gaming, although, more likely an even bigger surge in mobile app gaming. Yuck.
both the US and the EU have some nice legal presidents with regards to the sale of "used" software. So if I buy a game I have an absolute right to resell it without restriction, and if I "licence" it, either through an online purchase or through a cash-transaction-that-looks-suspiciously-like-a-sale I still have the right to resell.
In the EU and especially in Germany it is allowed to resell used copies of licenses of software and games.
You are explicitly allowed to buy high volume licenses and resell them individually (e.g., oracle and windows licenses).
It's like MS bundling IE and Media Player with Windows in the EU. Either they pay high fines (900 millions or more) or they
comply with the law in the EU.
in the courtroom challenging first sale rights, click/shrink wrap licenses, etc. perhaps also format/device shifting, drm and circumvention of it to preserve customer rights... heck, even privacy and user tracking could be a part of it (that is one reason why the push to online-everything.. it's easier to track and report)
but the case will drag on for so long, that most of the readers here will be so old and arthritic they won't be able to play video games anymore anyway other than things like freecell.
when the supreme court does finally hand down a ruling, though, it _will_ be monumental (for the better, or the worse) and completely change how not only video games are sold, but also other software, digital goods (software, music, movies, books, etc) that are fast replacing physical ones, and the used/lending/rental markets for all of those (including ordinary public libraries and person-to-person lending).
Hopefully this leads to people (re)discovering the PC as a gaming platform, so PC gamers can stop being held back by these stupid console ports that are written for hardware that was commodity level 6 years ago.
Maybe if enough people switch back to the PC for all their gaming needs, we can finally get Valve to release HL2 Episode 3.
I think this is a bad move for Sony and Microsoft, and great news for Nintendo. It seems to me that if Sony and Microsoft take this approach, more people will move to the Nintendo Wii U as opposed to PS4 or whatever it's going to be called. I could be wrong, but that's my prediction.
The last time I was in a GameStop (on Market St. in San Francisco) I was surprised at the near complete transition that had been made. Sure, they sold games. But right in front of the store were a ton of used iPhones, iPads, iPods, Galaxy tabs... And I got the impression they were driving more interest than anything else in the store.
Here, have a few )))).
So, it will be just like with Steam on the PC?
You know you want it !!
Just like you get it !!
Otherwise you would not !!
BEN DOVER !!
That is what the title should be.
I do not play any games on consoles anymore. We have 2 XBox 360s but I wont play them. We also have had Wii's, N64s (a fav of mine) as well as other consoles.
I play all of my games on my PC. It has a better selection of games. The games are easier to deal with. Plus I refuse to use controllers when I have a mouse and keyboard that work so much better.
Microsoft is shooting themselves in the foot here. They are trying to get the XBox series to be their gateway into your living-room. Imagine the advantage they would have had if the XBox 720 (or whatever its going to be called) was the only console that did not have these stupid anti-consumer restrictions built into it.
Even the Ouya game system is dropping the ball. Sure it doesn't have all of the restriction the big boys have but I have to wonder, since it is powered by Android, why not include the Google store and all of its apps. If it had that I would buy it in a heartbeat. Then all I would need is a way to use Android apps on my Windows desktop.
Just wait untill the box is hacked and modded and all will be well.
Really? I think their main idea is to somehow get a cut from used games, let's say 20% for each game sold by consumers. They would have to be REALLY dumb loose this opportunity (not that I agree with, they have no entitlement stuff I buy).
You cannot prevent someone from selling their property and preventing them to do so by making the consoles not accept such property would land them in shit so deep with the courts they'd need a submarine.BUT ! Monsanto is trying to pull the trick with their so called roundup ready seeds . Bill G is one of their investors . Patterns emerge . We have to wait for the supreme court to decide on Monsanto to see what will happen to the software industry.
My guess is like usual , big money will win and the consumer , and farmers will be screwed. No wonder the republicans are so against consumer protection and try to shut or destroy all consumer protections. Their rich contributors benefit from it . We need to see what the Supreme Court says. I suspect they will side with their rich masters. USA , A government of the people , by the corporations , for the corporations. Thank God i don't live there.
Human Written Article (Summation on last line): "Personally, I think GameStop will still be around for years to come no matter what happens to console gaming."
Resultant hypetard Slashdot headline: "The End Is Near for GameStop"
Yep, bout right.
... they are addicts
Gamers act pretty much the same way drug addicts do ...
No matter how many times they were screwed by the dealers, them addict will always go back to the dealers and buy more drugs
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Dear Console Makers,
Let me be crystal clear. I will NEVER buy a console that is incapable of playing used games, PERIOD.
If I am capable of buying physical media for my console, I should have the right to lend / sell / trade that media with others including companies who may resell it.
If I am capable of downloading games for my console, I should have the right to save those games to external media and play them on other consoles. Not copy them to the other console, but merely play them.
I am fundamentally opposed to the DLC model because it encourages companies to sell games that are incomplete or to sell advantage to those willing to pay for it.
That's my $.03. when it comes to Consoles.
Yes Francis, the world has gone crazy.
And addicted degenerate gamers are no exception.
They will buy whatever console gives them the best experience and will fork over fistfuls of money for both the console and the games that they can no longer buy or sell second-hand.
Hold out for a price drop or three. Few things depreciate like last year's games.
That's redundant, what else is on Slashdot these days? :)
none
When I walk or drive past a gamestop, I seldom see people browsing, even when they are doing a big sale on used games. However they frequently have big banners up telling people to pre-order Halo 17, Half-life 12, or Fifa soccer 2020. It appears that they make more money from the new stuff than the old, from what I have seen from walking or driving past any number of gamestop locations in my area.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
As someone that has loaned friends optical discs and gotten them back scratched, I can see a silver lining...
"Sorry, I'd love to loan you this game, but it only plays in my console!"
That being said, I do think making used games unplayable is a greedy money grab.
Depending on how they implement the "no used games" feature, it may be contrary to European law. There was a ruling against Oracle last year saying it is perfectly fine to resell second-hand software:
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-09-16/second-hand-software-sales-set-to-soar-on-oracle-ruling
because a lot of the used stuff is stolen.
As in "a lifting of the veil", not "the end of the world."
Oh, it may be the end of the world for Gamestop: a chain built on used contemporary games that caters to the contemporary gamer. But the few used-game stores not bought up by Gamestop during its boom survived without even having to pivot all that much: now they work with retro games -the stuff Gamestop doesn't carry- and modern merchandise. You can't build a mega-chain on that (yet, though we'll see what the death of used games does to that), but you can survive, and these places are pretty much already where they need to be when all used games are retro by definition.
Game prices will come down, due to new consoles.
Gas prices will come down due to new regulations.
Insurance costs will come down, due to new requirements to buy insurance.
Garbage service costs will come down, due to new contracts that require the replacement of all the trucks.
All prices will come down. That's what everybody keeps saying. Pay attention!
I for one will not be buying a new game system specifically because of this. Games don't have to be 'new' to be 'new to me'. This is just a ploy to make people pay more for media then they would typically have to. I say drive them out of business.
I start pirating Console games. If it hurts them then I am happy.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
It sure hasn't taken us very long to go from "the customer is always right" to "screw the customer."
In most industries, screw the customer over is now the norm. I think it's directly related to companies going from a belief in making good products to a belief in increasing shareholder value.
As far as Gamestop goes, and the used market. It's about dang time it gets a shakedown. sure it sucks that publishers are sucking the lifeblood from us by eliminating used game sales. Imagine if car manufacturers did the same for used cars... But... Have any of you gone to a gamestop in the past 2-3 years?
It sucks. It's a shop of despair and crushed spirits. You go in and there's a line a mile long for people trying to sell their used games at $10 or so a pop. The wait for a clerk, so you can buy a game, you know, "give them money", is eternal. Service is slow, it sucks and now with Amazon and Best Buy and all these other places selling games there is no need to go there any more. Gamestop is nothing more than a Pawn shop disguised as a retail outlet. They charge $50 for a used game, that may or may not even have a manual and $60 for the new game that is complete. I prefer to pay the extra money. Sure for some of the older, hard to find games like the "Persona" series, gamestop may be a gem, but those situations are so far and few to mean anything.
In the end I do pray Gamestop changes it's business model, provides marginally better service, or priority over those who want to make a purchase. I've many times dropped my items right where I stood and left the store. I don't need launch day games. I can wait another week or two. Most games are just not fun anymore. they provide no challenge, then there's Capcom, the only game maker that doesn't appear to cater to the mentally numb. Dragon's Dogma, is a gem on the line of the Dark/Demon Souls line. and the original god of war. These gems are too rare.
Why is this still coming up. NEVER going to happen. Trust me. Better yet don't. What I'm saying is if you think this through and put a little logic behind it, M$ would never shoot themselves in the foot this bad. To me this seems like one very good troll.
I don't buy many games anymore, only 3 in the last years, but 90% of my purchase for this generation consoles have been used games. Be it through ebay/local ads website, or the local videostore getting rid of multiples copies of older games. So maybe it's less a sacrifice for me then others, but I will never buy a console that tries to remove my right of first sale, especially when new games clocks at 60$ and more for 10 hours of gameplay. It seems I'm one of the few left remembering games like Phantasy, Star Control 2, The Magic Candle, all the "X Quest" and SSI Gold boxes providing a solid 70 hours of gameplay or thinking for 25-30$. Those are the games that still come to mind when someone ask me about "fun" games. Anyway, boardgames and kickstarter projects that provide a DRM free game will continue to get my money in the coming years.
Hopefully everybody will go back to an old lesson, and that is: "You already have a computer, so why should you buy something else also?"
This lesson was learned back in the 80's. I refuse to pay for a console game system. If it does not exist on the PC then I'm not interested in it.
They didn't make Battletoads available for preorder. What a stupid mistake!
...is the resurection of PC gaming and indie developers is upon us. While big publishers build ever higher walls around their console gardens, small PC developers reach out to the community and actually adopt models that keep everyone happy. Popularity of Steam sales, GOG.com, Humble Bundles, push for Linux gaming and self-publishing sucess of Minecraft speak for themselves. On the other hand we have the decreasing sales of huge franchises, big publishers aggressively pushing for legal protection of their revenues, quality of games suffering from the complecancy of big developers (we'll never forgive you, Gearbox! Signed, Aliens franchise fans).
In the creative and technology industries, with games industry drawing from both, there is a saying: "If you stand in one place, you'll be left behind" and what big players are doing ATM is trying to maintain the status quo, by supporting obsolete distribution models and trying to carve their business principles in stone by lobbying for legal measures. The problem is you can't make people buy stuff. You can't make people choose you over the guy who does the same cheaper and better. They will be left behind and the guys who really love doing what they do will only grow stronger by it.
So what the future holds (let's say, the next 5 years) is actually the failiure of the next gen console sales to meet their targets, big development studios going bust or being shut down by the publishers, even more legal struggle in terms of DRM, IP and curbing piracy being brought by big publishers, and finally the second golden age of PC gaming, and quite possibly a game developer market bubble. And if any of these predictions prove to be incorrect I'll eat my own pants. Oh, and I think Apple will have a big fight on it's hands to maintain their position in the market, but I'm not betting on that one since no one really knows what SJ left written in his business testament...
I'll put this simply, I'm pretty sure Chevy doesn't get a cut of my old car when the lot sells it as a used car. I don't have to take some money out when I sell my old couch and send it to the manufacturer. Samsung doesn't get anything when I sell the old TV at a garage sale. So why do these game companies think they should get something and why do they think they have the right to muscle the consoles into doing something like this. The reason is simple, because the companies that make the consoles MAKE FREAKING GAMES! Its all about protecting their exclusivity which is akin to attempting a monopoly. Its not good for anyone. The large companies are straining to maintain their old man outdated business models in a society that has outgrown them. All media is doing it. Its not about addiction or anything else, its about money pure and simple. Their analysts have drawn up predictions that if they do this they will more money in the long run. They don't care about you, they never do. They care about profits and they can't understand how they could possibly continue profiting with used games out there. Basically someone pointed out that they don't get a cut of this fairly large industry of used games and they blustered and coughed on their $100 cigar smoke and spit out the 12 year old brandy.
Amazon sells everything from zippo lighters to ass lube - I think they'll be okay. Best Buy sells refurbished, used and returned electronics through their stores and Cowboom site, but I'm pretty sure they don't even sell used games.
GameStop, well, if used games comprise a large portion of their business - sucks to be them. People don't seem to be much interested nowadays in going to a store to buy/rent something that can be delivered electronically. Seems like their fate was sealed sooner or later regardless of their ability to sell used games. I don't have a Blockbuster nearby anymore, either.
---
DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
Why include Amazon, Gamestop and Best Buy? Best Buy is and has been dieing for awhile now b/c of online retailers like Amazon. Gamestop pretty much only sells videogames. Amazon sells pretty much everything. I think videogames could go away completely and Amazon would be just fine.
I dunno, go outside and have fun in the real world for a change?
How much of the current tendency against outdoor recreation is due to "stranger danger" hysteria among parents? And how much is because the gift-giving season is in a part of the year when temperatures are too cold for vigorous outdoor recreation throughout much of the developed world?
After a year or so the prices come down, the bugs are as fixed as they're gonna get, and word of mouth will tell you whether the game is worth the time. There's nothing that says you *have* to play the latest and greatest games the moment they come out.
While following that strategy on a Sony console, I've never been able to get online play to work. All I've been able to get is an error message stating that "this software title is not in service."
Tambo was talking about Master Chef for DS.
Make games so good that people want to keep them
This worked for, say, the Super Smash Bros. series. But I guess publishers assume that people who are still happy with playing the previous game are people who aren't buying the same publisher's newer games. Solution: turn off older games' online play.
(Oh, even at $0.99, games bitch and moan about games being too expensive, too... the fun of being a mobile developer...)
How much of that is due to Android phone manufacturers having launched their phones in countries where Google didn't yet have a payment infrastructure? That's what happened with Android Market in the early days of Android: ad-supported became the norm because so many countries were shut out of paid applications entirely.
But right in front of the store were a ton of used iPhones, iPads, iPods, Galaxy tabs
None of which can play used games.
I agree that it would suck if the used game market was removed. I guess the question is would new game prices be cheaper out the gate? Would Microsoft start the price at $50 while Sony is charging $60? From my point of view you have to provide something to the consumer in exchange for making it impossible to sell my used games. If you cannot provide something in return then Microsoft will lose as all the customers will go buy a Sony system.
Just about every video card from the last decade is able to utilize OpenGL no matter the OS.
Which doesn't help if your game is targeted at a newer version of OpenGL than the user's video card's driver supports, or if a necessary extension turns up missing. Should a PC game be prepared to drop to Dreamcast-class class graphics if that's all the video card supports?
They have the same capabilities for development on pc's as they do on consoles. They just don't use it.
If one console supports a particular texture format, they all support that texture format. What texture compression method is guaranteed to be supported on all PC video cards that support OpenGL?
But there is still a core functionality that every PC will have (as long as it's at least semi-current), about equal to a console.
A console will typically be connected to a much larger screen, and the player will typically be sitting farther away.
So why do game makers then complain about it being hard to make use of all the extra bells and whistles on the PC, when those things don't even exist on consoles.
In order not to generate a disproportionate tech support burden, PC games have to be able to scale down to an Intel GMA while still looking good on the latest piece of AMD or NVIDIA kit. It's like having to include the Wii, Xbox 360, and PS3 versions of a game in one box. And a PC game can't just store pre-compressed textures (due to patents) or pre-compiled shaders (due to architecture differences among Intel, NV, and AMD).
The problem here is one of philosophy.
When you buy something and pay for it, should it be *yours*.
Shouldn't any valuable asset be just that, a valuable asset?
This is going on all over, some companies want you to buy their new products, sometimes for thousands of dollars and if you later on decide you don't want/need it you should destroy it rather than put it on ebay and sell it to someone who does. Barracuda products come to mind.
I for one don't believe in buying anything that has *no resale value*. I insist things I buy have value. I don't buy from any company that tries to interfere with that inherent value.
Every asset should have value. If a company through their policies or through technological means tries to interfere with that inherent value you should avoid buying their worthless stuff. They want you to buy it from them but they later on try to take the value away from you, the solution is to not buy from them!
It's no different in the game industry. If you can't sell it if you don't want it, you should just not buy it in the first place.
The company would then have to change their business policies or go out of business.
If the Xbox 720 is going to prevent your assets from having value, just don't buy it. Maybe rent it, like World of Warcraft.
.
If both Sony and Microsoft both implement this sort of destructive always-on DRM simultaneously, doesn't that sort of reek of collusion? I mean, if only one of them implemented this sort of thing, everybody can just switch to the competitor. It only really works if they both implement it simultaneously. Maybe I'm overly optimistic, but I keep thinking that neither company are planning to implement this awful DRM. Maybe Sony keeps bringing it up to try and get Microsoft to go for it - and thus destroy themselves.
I've been waiting for the video game industry to collapse for a while now.
When companies introduce anti-consumer, anti-capitalist policies (such as you dont own the game you just bought) then I welcome their bankruptcy with arms wide open.
Besides, I am all grown up now, and I stare at a glowing rectangle for 8 hours a day. Last thing I want to do when i get home is play video games. And I say that being raised by the Nintendo Entertainment System when I was a kid...
Now, my gaming habit has evolved into board games. There is a wealth of really cool board games out there, you OWN the games you buy, you can RESELL them if you desire, and (to me) they are just as fun as video games.
We read books. And books work just as well today as they did then. Even better, with the web you get reviews and instant delivery.
Nintendo prevents reselling of used games by making the games so good that few copies make it to GameStop. Often times a used Nintendo game sells for more at GameStop than a new copy anywhere else. Why? Little supply. As the saying goes, Nintendoes what Sony and Microsoft don't.
Your fact for the day.
... which is "rule by capital", and has nothing to do with a free market.
Like most (or all) other isms and capitalism is there to benefit the rulers. Period.
And yes, democracy is also an ism -- proletarianism. So are -- for you few Limbough purists out there -- a democratic republic.
Having said that, I'm going to blow everyone out of the water with my next statement. I actually prefer rule by Christ, because he benefitted the least of those around him, instead of himself. Moreover, he did this more in his days of strength than in his days of weakness. Thus, in my book He is worthy to rule. All other rulers are worthless, or worse.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
Tablets are great for video games that intrinsically involve pointing. This could be pointing at objects on the screen (e.g. Duck Hunt or Bejeweled) or pointing at locations on the screen where an object will be placed (e.g. Missile Command). They're not so great for video games whose input consists of a direction and trigger commands. How would one play, say, Mega Man on a tablet?
so if your console breaks you also lose all your games?
If your console breaks, you send it back and get another console with the same serial number so that your games will work. At least that's how it works with Wii Shop games: the Wii console you get back is authorized for downloads of already purchased games without charge on Wii Shop.
I used to be a heavy gamer, but now I just don't have the time. The games I DO play now are usually games I can pick up and play for about 5 or 10 minutes at a time. My PS3 has become a media server, and I just turned on my XBox for the first time in about a year.
Strangely, I still pick up games from time to time. Gamestop is my friend - I rarely pay more than $10 for a game. I play games so rarely, in fact, that usually a demo of a game is fine for me (I still play the DBZ demos on PS3).
If a system is going to restrict me from playing used games, then I simply won't buy the new system. I don't play enough anymore to justify paying $60 for a new game - the only games I bought new in the past 10 years were Duke Nukem Forever and Alice Madness Returns (strangely, they had the same release date) and those were for the PC (because those games need keyboard and mouse).
I just found Fable 3 the other day at Gamestop for $8 so I will probably go back and pick it up - I like the Fable games.
So yeah, with about how often I play, I am usually picking up games that are 2-3 years old at least.
Now, if you want to offer me a dowloadable copy or a "Greatest Hits" package for under $10, then I might consider buying a game new (I have actually bought a couple of classic games on the PS3 and my Wii before it was stollen that were under $10).
Let's just say that if you are going to lock out used games, you are going to drive away casual gamers like myself.
personally i'd be done , i wouldnt buy any console that i can't buy a game for USED and significantly reduced in cost i.e a 5-15$ a game ~ I myself am patient and tend to buy the games when they're nearing the EOL for the system because even the awesome games are so cheap or able to get so cheap.
If you're willing to buy a locked out console that you'll hafta hack to work the way you want to and fork out hundreds of $$ for that by all means but i don't comprehend how thats legal for them to do so? it's gotta be against FAIR USE? and Monopolization ? yes
perhaps you should have went with a prebuilt system from one of the major manufacturers.
Do they advertise affordable machines in cases that aren't the typical 8-inch-wide tower that sticks out like a sore thumb next to a TV?
And, you know, game makers, since a more stable and known platform to make things for makes for less development headaches for supporting whatever bizarre way people could have their PC set up for.
For smaller game makers, navigating PC hardware diversity has often proven easier than navigating the console makers' developer and game approval bureaucracy.
I have a 55" HD LCD in my living room connected to a surround sound amp, and I can game from my recliner.
Any PC will support that setup as well. All PCs have VGA out, and newer PCs have DVI or HDMI out. All LCD HDTVs have HDMI in, which is compatible with DVI signals, and most LCD HDTVs have VGA in. So except for a few edge cases with a VGA-only PC and an HDMI-only TV, you can still game from your recliner with a PC, a gamepad, and a TV. And I'd bet there are more games for PC that aren't on Xbox 360 than there are games for Xbox 360 that aren't on PC.
Between sending me an email offering me a whopping $75 trade-in bonus for the new "white" (?) PS3 and one of their salesmen offering me a $5 discount off the full price for a game that didn't have the original case or manual but he assured me was brand-new. I refuse to do business with those fucktards ever again. I'd rather go to Walmart.
Netcraft confirms it.
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
Ugh, when will this ever end. People, really? Trust me, it's not going to happen. End of discussion!
The funny thing is that people that makes comments like yours DON'T have children
You are correct that I have no children of my own, but I have babysat my aunt's children.
I have 3 registered sex offenders that live within 2 miles of my house
Did these people become registered sex offenders for unwanted sexual contact with another person or just for urinating in public? And is there a reason parents can't just teach their children to stay away from sex offenders' residences rather than just playing indoors all the time?
I think that it will actually boost short-term revenues. New consoles will bring new games, new interest and perhaps even new market share (more casual gamers). Used games can still be big. Even without revers compatibility people will still buy new games, finish them and want to exchange them.
it will likely leave a vacuum for indie developers to come in and not have to compete with the large development shops that are currently entrenched there.
But will it leave enough of a vacuum that people will become willing to buy a PC and hook it up to the TV? Until people are willing to do that, or unless Ouya happens to catch on in the way that things like GP2X didn't, only the entrenched large development shops will be able to release games in genres traditionally played with multiple gamepads on a big-screen TV.