One of the good things about having a massive European trade show like Gamescom is that SCEE President, Andrew House, makes himself available for interviews. Videogames industry website gamesindustry.biz got chance to catch up with House and grill him about all things PlayStation.
When asked “How do you feel about a publisher like EA making online play an extra payable component on PSN with the Online Pass for second-hand consumers?” House replied;
“On the principle of making online portions of the game available or unlocked from the disc-based release for a fee, we’re broadly supportive of that. And we’re exploring actively the same option for our own content.”
Of course Sony have already adopted this tactic with the PSP release of Modnation Racers, but this is the first indication that Sony would like to roll out the second-hand revenue generator across more of their release.
To my recollection this makes EA, THQ, Ubisoft, TakeTwo (through 2K Games) and now Sony backing the Online Pass as a method to attempt to generate revenue from pre-owned sales, leaving just Activision from the major players to show their hand.
Given that businesses are in the business of making ever increasing amounts of money and that it’s safe to assume that gamers want ever more stuff including in their purchase or free of charge, is Online Pass a good compromise? Let us know in the comments below.
Via Eurogamer.
Shakugan
What if someone haven’t used “Online code” and doesnt know how to connect PS3 to online after that he/she sell it back and I buy it.
Severn2j
Then lucky you, you get to use the code.. :)
squashme
this would take away the very thing that Sony advertised when the PS3 was announced that it is free to play online through PSN. If greedy developers and publishers start charging for online then your paying to play online through PSN so PSN wouldnt be free like everybody thinks it will be forever which Sony said it would be.
And many people already £40 a year for xbox live to play online making people pay even more to play online is just wrong this tactic will just not work with the 360
cc_star
It is still free online.
If you choose to buy a used game from a retailer you aren’t a customer of EAs, Sony’s or whoever, but instead a customer of GAME (or wherever)
squashme
well no not technically coz your paying to play the game online on supposidly free service if all games have this then Sony might as well charge people to play online through PSN like MS do with live
squashme
and if your already paying £40 for live then who is going to pay an extra £10-£20 to play a game online whehn there already paying for that functionality
heedbaw
Oh dear, this nonsense is going to go on and on. The way I see it is that the publishers want a slice of another pie, and an online pass is their ticket into it. There may be some that are struggling with making money back on their investment. But the likes of Sony, Activision, & EA? Just want more money.
The nature of the market is sell a competitively priced product that people want to buy, or go out of business. If companies are losing that many sales to the 2nd hand market shouldn’t they be asking why, instead of trying to tack on some pass to possibly make up for a few lost sales. I understand development costs have gone up etc. but any company that knows what they’re doing aren’t going to spend money on something if they forecast that they’re not going to get a return on it.
jimmy-google
They are and the conclusion is that 2nd hand games are cheaper and you get everything a new copy has.
Their answer is to take part of the game away for 2nd hand buyers. If you want all of it then it will cost you more. It’s turning the offline part into a demo for the online part.
If they introduced it to MAG then they would kill the 2nd hand sales of MAG overnight.
hazelam
if they do adopt this online pass i promise i will never buy a title of theirs with it new, preowned though? hell yeah.
i refuse to support this kind of crap, and if i have to go without online play to do so, well, that’s a sacrifice i’m willing to make.
i have no problems paying for games where they host, like mmos, i’m willing to pay to play dcu online, because they host the game on their servers, i paid to play wow for over a year.
i’m not running their game for them and then paying them for the privilege on top, no fucking way.
that’s exactly why i don’t pay for live, they just point me at other players and one of us hosts, i refuse to pay for that.
squashme
but devs n publishers do host the servers for all their games on PSN anyway that have multiplayer so what you said just dont make sense. Your willing to pay EA to play WOW coz its run on their servers but your not willing to pay EA to play Burnout Paradise online coz its run on their servers that doesnt make any sense at all
bunimomike
No they don’t. There are many games which are hosted by ourselves. However, cc_star raises some good points about what else goes on behind the metaphorical curtain when it comes to Xbox Live, as an example.
squashme
actually they do we may host the games we create in multiplayer but the dev n publishers still provide the servers in order for them to run on n we play the games we create thats 1 reason why devs n publishers have total freedom on PSN over Live Sony dont own, run or maintain the serves for individual games except the games they publish wheras MS own run n maintain the servers for games on 360 the devs n publishers dont
bunimomike
We may well have our wires crossed (apologies). What I’m saying is that the multiplayer game I play (with three friends) in LBP is hosted by the fastest connection out of the four of us. This is where huge pressure is taken off any Media Molecule servers because we’re hosting the online game.
hazelam
well wow is activision, but anyway, i’ll pay for an mmo where they run the game from their servers, often having thousands of players in the same world at the same time, i never mentioned burnout paradise, it
seems to me ea must host that so that wouldn’t fall under the category of games that are peer to peer and therefore user hosted.
most online games are hosted by one of the players, which means that player’s machine is running the game for everybody playing, that player’s machine takes in all the input from everybody else’s machines and then tells those machines what’s happening.
all the publisher’s servers are doing is telling your machine where the other players are and saving your ranks and scores and levels and whatnot.
an oversimplification sure, but that’s essentially what’s happening.
i would pay for dco or wow, but not a peer to peer game, and i don’t think burnout paradise is peer to peer.
i probably wouldn’t pay to play burnout online, but that’s because i wouldn’t play it online much, when i had it i hardly ever played it, let alone played it online.
squashme
lol well LBP is a lag magnet online but that still dont do the game much good as theres still alot of lag in it thats why I rarely play it if at all. but the point to the guy is that hes willing to pay EA to play online for WOW but not willing to pay EA to play Burnout Paradise online which are both run on EA’s servers which they maintain no one else regardless of who host the games that just dont make sense to me
squashme
But hazelam both WOW and Burnout are run on EA’s servers we only host Burnout games not run them EA’s servers do that both games are run off of EA’s servers so why are you willing to EA to play online for WOW but not Burnout which are both run on EA’s servers so how you pay for 1 but not the other. I dont think Burnout’s P2P as its drop in drop out with a easy unique system to do that I think its all off EA’s servers with all the cars and everything
hazelam
yeah i know, but where did i mention burnout?
if they decided to charge for something like burnout then it would be different to charging for a game where i, or another player, would be hosting.
i also don’t think burnout is peer to peer which is why i never mentioned it.
and WOW is a blizzard title and blizzard are now part of activision, they say they’re equal partners but it’s clear they were just acquired rather than entered into partnership with.
heedbaw
Oh lol, hypocrisy much. From THQs boss man on cloud gaming ”The concept of lowering the entry barrier to consumers for gamers to get into our games by not having to shell out for the hardware is a tremendous potential opportunity.”
dee
If they’re gonna charge does it have to be so expensive?£10 is a bit steep
solidsteven
that is BS who would pay to acess a feature just because they brought it 2nd hand.
Charmed_Fanatic
Grrrr do not like this
tonycawley
Comparison to used car market, game = car. Dlc = parts. If games manufacturers want to make money out of 2nd hand games, they should produce more quality Dlc. This has 2 purposes. 1 – they obviously make money out of Dlc. 2 – it makes a lot of people hold on to their copy, in the knowledge that Dlc is coming, instead of trading it in. I keep games that i’ve enjoyed if i know it’s getting good Dlc, then i buy the Dlc. If i didn’t enjoy it, or it’s not getting Dlc, then i will trade it in, simple. Stop saying there isn’t a comparison to the used car market. There is, as i’ve highlighted above.
cc_star
Jeesh
– Dealer network, therefore car manufacturers are making money directly off pre-owned sales.
– Spin off sales like warranty etc…
– Service… in addition to supplying part the service charges are the most profitable part of the transaction
There is no comparison, not even slightly
Car companies have a monopoly on new sales, through their dealer network. The equivalent would be EA, THQ, Sony etc setting up their own shops and customers having to pay whatever they want to charge, look at digital Vs physical pricing to see how that will go.
Add-on sales like expensive warranties come into play, as another revenue stream for the car company
Once that sale is made, there will be a network of stores selling used cars/games, but if you want to trade it for another new car/game you would have to do it at the publishers shop, ensuring they get the 2nd bite of the cherry. Keeping the relatively new used cars within their eco-system creating more revenue streams.
As the used product gets older it may fall out of the dealer owned network, and into a whole host of independent companies, this is where it is similar to the car industry however the car industry has already had 2 or 3 sales of the initial product by this point.
but there is still the element of servicing, parts could be compared to DLC but anyone who’s ever had any work done would know that extra charges like labour will make up the bulk of the transaction, and is actually the most profitable part of the whole lot – again this leads to more money from that initial sale.
but there is zero comparison between a car & a game sale.
You could compare game sales to other forms of media, but for some reason people love comparing it incorrectly to cars…
bunimomike
Let’s compare it to DVDs and Blu-ray films! :-) Then handle the online component separately. Like they should (but won’t). Well, unless they’re really smart.
bunimomike
Oh, and did you really just say the word “Jeesh”? Say it out loud. It makes me smile.
tonycawley
You can’t say there are zero similarities, it may not be exactly the same thing, but then 2 things never are. A game gets made and sold, a car gets made and sold, direct comparison right there. A person uses a game and gets enjoyment out of it. A person uses a car and gets enjoyment out of it. Another direct comparison. There are used car dealers in no way connected to manufacturers, as there are with games, another direct comparison. Car manufacturers make profit on 2nd hand sales in ways you’ve highlighted, so game manufacturers need to do the same thing. Dlc is a great way for them to do this, as the 2nd hand buyer is getting additional enjoyment for the extra money. Charging extra for online is not a good way.
heedbaw
If there is a comparison, it woul be that the manufacturers make most of their money from aftersales. Cars – parts, Hardware – software. So that would only be applicable to Sony, MS, and Nintendo. Publishers/developers would be akin to pattern parts suppliers.
hazelam
ok forget cars, what about other media?
nobody else charges users who buy preowned.
ok so those other media don’t have an online component, except some bluray discs have bd live, that’s not tied to the first owner, and dvds have been having web links to extra content for years that wasn’t tied to the first user.
come to think of it, i’ve got cds that link to exclusive web content that isn’t tied to a single user.
and they don’t have dlc to sell either.
jimmy-google
You can compare DVDs to games but if you watch a film you get 2 hours for about £10. A normal game is about £10 for £40 (more if you have online). Based on that they should put game prices up to £50 minimum. RDR would cost the best part of £100.
You can say you’ll watch a DVD more than once, you can play a game more than once as well.
Maybe a fairer comparrison are box sets but they recieve other revenue by selling the rights to show them on TV around the world. Films gain money from cinema ticket sales as well.
Then they’re music. They’ll sell you a single and then sell you the album with the same song on it. The second hand market isn’t that much cheaper than new copies either. More and more music sales are online now too which blocks the second hand market. They gain money from other areas too like air play, adverts, games etc…
Other media all have a variety of ways to make money out of them not just selling a physical disc to the consumer, its no suprise games are going that way too.
Another thing worth looking at is how many specialist music and dvd shops you see now. I have none where I live. They never had the second hand market to fall back on and now they are almost gone.
bigdon_23
although i have been a gamer all my life , the direction that the industry is heading i think il be finding alternatives to spend my hard earned cash on