Codemasters CEO Rod Cousens has added his voice to the discussion of pre-owned games. Whilst he has not made an outright claim to a percentage of the revenue from the sales of pre-owned games he has used some rather flowery language which means practically the same thing;
“What cannot be underestimated is the impact of pre-owned software, which needs to provide a participatory benefit to creators if innovation is to prevail.” he said.
Mr. Cousens is suggesting that the second hand market will deny us games such as The Last Guardian or Flower, leaving gamers with yearly updates to established titles. It’s an interesting theory but perhaps the Codies CEO is underestimating the general public. Games such as Heavy Rain have exceeded sales expectations, and if we look at movies, the film ‘Inception’ which – shock horror – requires you to think, is number one in the box office across the globe.
Was the gaming world ready for Ico in 2001? Probably not, but if it was re-released this year I would suggest it would be a hit. Back in 2001 we wanted to kill things with laser guns, now many gamers are in the 30s and 40s and are willing to embrace something a bit different.
Perhaps it’s the games industry that needs to have a rethink. ‘Concept’ games such Heavy Rain, Braid and Flower have been huge hits whilst shooters such as Singularity have barely dented the charts. If publishers started taking the odd risk they may be pleasantly (and financially) surprised.
Source: MCV
cc_star
Retail need to find a way to cut devs/pubs in, if not retail will die as devs/pubs make a relentless push to digital only
Tuffcub
Whats wrong with that then?
Forrest_01
I like boxes!!
cc_star
nothing, why?
Tuffcub
oh nothing.. I thought you were suggesting that was bad :)
tonycawley
This whole pre-owned argument is really starting to do my nut. Everything that can be said about it already has been said. My main thoughts on it are, like every other product, once a person has bought it, if they want to sell it on afterwards that’s their choice. Car manufacturers, movie makers etc, nobody else gets a cut from pre-owned sales, so why should game makers. There’s still plenty of innovation in the car industry, so what’s he talking about? The only reason pre-owned games should ever get any money for the makers should be if they run a dedicated server for online games.
cc_star
The car industry is heavily reliant on after-sales service and parts etc… therefore the car industry makes massive money from pre-owned, its the worst analogy anyone can use when talking about games, especially as you’re buying a licence to use the content on the disk, not buying the content itself (as with all creative media)
tonycawley
Well if you’re going to be like that then, in terms of your own analogy, the car would equal the console, and the parts would equal the games. So if i want to buy a second hand car part, then the manufacturer gets nothing from that, and that’s my choice. There is nothing in the licence that says i can’t sell it on after i’ve used it is there?
stonyk
The car analogy sounds right then as after sales does make a difference to publishers. They must make more profit on DLC than they do on Disc games as it is all digital and the majority of development/design has already been done. This higher profit product can then be purchased several times on the basis of 1 sale, same as a car being sold once with different owners buying parts.
tonycawley
Besides, that should be disc, not disk. There’s a distinct difference between the 2.
cc_star
Actually unauthorised resale isn’t allowed, but its obviously unenforceable.
And yes there is a difference between disk & disc but historically it’s only a spelling difference and in recent times it has become part of branding only, initially of the compact disc etc this has led to an assumed spelling of disc being correct, but it was originally just branding.
This is from an earlier discussion, as like you said… On the subject of pre-owned everyone has already said everything about it:
If you buy a fairly new second hand car, there’s a high chance you’d get it serviced at an official dealership who, even if not directly owned by the manufacturer, are most probably franchised or licensed, so indirectly the manufacturer carries on receiving some form of revenue to keep your used car on the roads. Even if you service your car independently, or yourself, you at some point may need to buy official parts, which again sends some money back to the manufacturer (and very profitable that area is too).
Publishers seems to be taking a version of the used car model, in that, yes, you’re free to sell it on to whoever you want, but to keep it “on the road”, the new owner may need to pay them some cash.
So the used car market has a every long tail for the manufacturers in the same way as publishers would like to cut in to the deal in some way in the gaming world
hazelam
and what big budget game has come out recently without dlc nearly from day one.
how often do games get within six months of launch without dlc plans already being announced? seems to be getter rarer all the time.
so to say they don’t make anything from preowned sales is just a fallacy
hazelam
another reason why the car analogy is inappropriate, car manufacturers don’t deliberately design cars so that an important feature stops working if the owner sells the car on, i’m not sure such an action would even be legal.
you seem to believe gaming deserves special rights do do just that, yet they’re just like every other industry when it comes to getting tax relief, that would surely be a benefit for the industry, at least in the uk it would.
why the double standard?
either it’s just like every other industry and should therefore be subject to the same rules or it’s not, so which is it?
are you opposed to the tax relief because it would only benefit developers in the uk?
Nauraph
I think they actually have a point. But at least they don’t have to worry about pirated (ps3) games, which would be a much bigger problem.
webby_15-0
it should be made possible to sell your game back to the people who made it and then they can then sell it as a preowned game and make money on it rather than shops.
Cerberus64
Very rich developer bemoans not being more rich – what a shocker!
djsunna
if you buy a game brand new the dev’s and pub’s will have made a profit on that sale as well as the retailer .If you then take that game back to the retailer who sell it as preowned and make a profit on the resale maybe dev’s/pub’s should see some of that profit. but what i don’t want to see is dev’s/pub’s issuing codes in the box to play a game then charging x amount for another code if someone bought the game preowned. ive bought a few games preowned but i buy the majority new and if it wasn’t for the preowned market i would never have bought uncharted 1 and missed out on a great game but because i bought it preowned and loved it i bought uncharted 2 brand new.
stonyk
This could depend on how the public respond. I will definately not buy any games new with multiplayer aspects unless it is Unchartered 3 or Call of Duty etc as I know they will be of a certain standard at full price and I will not take risks with other games as I might if it was second hand. I bought Modern Warfare 1 second hand and loved it so automatically bought number 2 day 1. This will no longer happen with other games for me.
rossthebassist
This debate will continue, if i was a publisher i would ask why do retailers sell pre-owned in the first place, and the answer is always MARGIN. some small game shops make about £1 from a new title compared to 10+ for a pre-owned one.
make the supply of games more affordable and see the pre-owned market decline.
punishing people for buying your game pre-owned is just silly and greedy. EA said we are charging for pre-owned because those customers have not paid to use the servers etc etc. i call bull on that because if i buy it new i can play my game forever without paying another dime. but if i sell it im selling my PAID for server use.
i sympathise with the creators, but the publishers need to start getting real.
beeje13
why not give the discs away for something like £5, so the retailer can earn a couple of pounds, then the game has to be connected to the internet to play, then you pay £15-20 to the Pub who gives a percentage to the dev.
Cheaper for us and the devs make the same money per head, but alot more heads!
Zephyre
Another dev making the same assumption – that every pre-owned sale is one lost to a new game. The only sensible reason to buy pre-owned is you can’t afford new, so there’s absolutely no sale lost to the dev/publisher. In fact the reverse is probably true ‘cos the guy trading in is almost certain to buy another title, driving sales up.