When many gamers were little, there was always a decided excitement from running into a store and beholding wall upon wall of video game boxes. There were always different reasons for this, be it the exquisite cover art that stood out, causing many youths to beg for the latest and greatest titles or perhaps it was the potential of what lie in the box. It simply could have been the possibility of the fun we as young gamers could be having should we be able to get our hands on that box and the video game goodness inside. However, over time, things have slowly begun to change for those boxes containing small potential worlds for players to enjoy. The ability to download content digitally presents significant growth potential for both gamers and the gaming industry. While Xbox Live wasn’t the first service to encapsulate on the idea of ‘Games on Demand’ the service is certainly taking off by leaps and bounds. By making provisions for integration between the service, marketplace and consoles, Xbox Live offers the ability for gamers to have the content they want, when they want it. Regardless of how this competes with retail sources like Gamestop, who market heavily in used games, it should be interesting to see how retailers continue to function in a world where digital content is steadily becoming a reality. Therefore, the technological potential for gamers to download all of their content directly from publishers and developers as opposed to buying from retails could revolutionize the video game industry from the ground up.
There are few things more exhilarating than those first few moments of tearing the plastic wrapping off the box of a sealed, brand-new game. It’s still one of my favorite moments, before putting the game into the system and booting it up for the first time. Furthermore, when I do go that extra mile and purchase a special edition of some kind, I just can’t wait to open the box and behold the goodies that lie inside. Perhaps it is a holdover from my childhood, but speaking as an older gamer; if offered a box I usually will take a box. After all, a box allows me to choose which retailer I ultimately want to take my money to, so I can choose which facet of capitalism I wish to support. If Gamestop doesn’t have what I want, I can go to Amazon and so on until one way or another, I have the game I want. But, with Xbox Live, if I want to start playing a game piecemeal to see if I like it, I can do that. The same goes for downloadable content in the form of expansions or add-ons to keep me playing the title forever. Conversely though, if I want to see what the arcade or independent sections have to offer, I’m just as able, at any time day or night that I happen to have a 360 controller nestled in my hands. Succinctly, it becomes a question of access to a particular title at a specific time and that is where digital downloads of content make the most sense.
As a huge supporter of Steam, Playstation Network and Xbox Live, I love the idea that if I want to sit down in the middle of the night and download a game, it isn’t any more difficult than a few deft motions. Seriously, I think the most complicated factor in the entire process is actually turning the television on. And while it has become the norm for smaller titles from the arcade and indie sections to be easily and quickly downloaded, the ‘Games on Demand’ section has seen a great deal of interest as well since it’s premier on Live. It’s feeding the gamers insatiable thirst for consistently fresh and new content that makes a service stand out and remain head and shoulders above its contemporaries. Needless to say, if a new title didn’t premier to Xbox Live ever Wednesday, it would seem a bit arduous for Microsoft in the way of keeping gamers interested. However, by allowing gamers to have a small experience with a title, as is the case with Fable II available episodically on Xbox Live, this allows for a greater degree of people to try the title as opposed to retail where you have to pay for the entire experience upfront, absent of the knowledge as to whether or not there is enough there to keep you interested. Suffice to say, nothing says, “buyer’s remorse” more than opening a package and discovering that your only recourse is store credit or trading it in. But that is the only option retailers like Gamestop make allowances for.
Going into a retailer used to be a somewhat enjoyable experience for gamers, overtime though it has slowly become a test of will in the ways of not getting completely screwed. Not to say that all retailers are out to screw you, but it certainly feels that way sometimes. From the moment you walk in the door, you’re hounded upon by so-called ‘experts’ who have a quota to meet for trade-ins, sales, reserves and magazine subscriptions. To quite appropriately add insult to injury, it then essentially reduces your shopping experience to a wholehearted struggle as you attempt to not be price-gouged by people who couldn’t be more enthusiastic to do so. This is especially the case when it comes to games. Sure, you can purchase them, but when the return policy is better on a product that is used, which could be missing instructions, packed in DLC or is scratched to the point of being unplayable, it makes buying new difficult since the price point has become so high. This is why digital download has grown so exponentially in the past several years as to provide users with a simple, easy experience to purchase games directly from those who make them, ripping the middle man out of the equation.
Ultimately, it is a situation I can happily deal with in just about any case or random occurrence of events. A future where I can have my content anywhere, anytime, simply by logging into my online profile makes me excited for what the next few years hold in the video game industry. True enough, a box is nice to hold and the sexy metal cases to be had in a few select collector’s editions is even better, but lugging them around can become a bit burdensome and the worry about damaging a case or disc can just become too much. Furthermore, digital content allows for just about any content to become episodic allowing for gamers to get a drastically better feel for the prospective game they wish to purchase. Additionally, removing any sort of constraints placed upon gamers by retailers is really the greatest plausible reason for the video game industry to go completely digital in their offerings given the capabilities of the currently available systems. Conclusively, as long as there are large enough hard drives to accommodate the content gamers want to play, none of us will eventually have to walk further than our living room couches to play the games we want to ever again.
