[EDIT: CONFIRMED FALSE] Starfield physical edition won't include physical discs.
This means you can't pass the game around to your friends or sell it afterwards, which completely ruins the purpose of physical media imo. I mostly play PC these days so this doesn't affect me, but it's a disappointing direction for console games. At least they could've used an empty disc that has proof of ownership.
EDIT: Bethesda has confirmed that only the PC version won't include a disc. Physical versions of Xbox will include a disc. Whew.
Physical media is dying a slow and painful death. Sad to see really. I'd say to make a fuss, but most people don't seem to care.
Honestly, No disc + always online DRM is making me turn to piracy more and more. I want to be able to buy a game and just have a permanent offline copy of it. is that really too much to ask?
Depends on the medium really.
The Criterion Collection is still kicking so its selected works are still getting highly curated physical releases. Vinyl records are growing in popularity for those enthusiasts.
It's video games that have the biggest issue, and it's saddening because they are the most in need of preservation due to patching, updates, licenses, DRM, etc.
Wish the big three would come together for some type of preservation goal at the very least.
It's sad, but I doubt this will happen if it isn't profitable in some ways. We need an external organization to do this, as it happens with the preservation of every other media (at least I think)
Not just vinyl but CDs and cassettes are coming back too. Crazy.
You’re going to run into video game preservation issues with or without physical media. I’ve been playing through the GBA/DS catalog and some of the games are selling at prohibitively high prices. Not that I needed a lot of nudging to find another way to play the games…
Playing on original hardware has its charms but emulation is often a better experience anyway. I have an N64 sitting in the closet collecting dust because a) it’s a PAL console (sigh), b) the analog stick is shot and c) my TV doesn’t support SCART. I know I could get an NTSC console, buy replacement gears for the stick, buy a RetroTink to get HDMI support, etc. At some point it’s just too much of a hassle for nostalgia’s sake.
Yep, I’ve had similar experiences with handhelds even for games that I own. I could play Metroid Fusion on my SP and get cramps in both of my hands trying to hold it.
Or I could just find a way to run it on the DSi.
I am not really worried about the discs or DRM as those will eventually get cracked. It is the multiplayer games without user hosted dedicated services that bother me.
This should be illegal.
Why? Not trying to argue, just genuinely curious.
You can resell a disk, not a code that is one time use.
Or maybe it should be possible to resell a code.
Probably need some way to track who owns the code in a robust way. I will not say what technology might come to mind.
The word you're looking for is "database"
Why would you need that? You don't have that with physical copies either.
The physical copy already has a tangible form which probably has copy protection built in. If a code would be transferred instead of copied, it would be necessary to know who owns it.
You would have to deactivate the game in the store before you got the code out. That deactivation would also delete the game files to clean up everything.
Maybe you made a copy somewhere else, but you'd now have to crack the DRM on most games.
Only if the game doesn't have DRM it relies on you honoring the agreement.
A similar situation would be processing refunds, where GOG allows refunds up to 30 days after purchase, even if you downloaded and launched the game.
That's the way it would need to work for Steam as an example, yes.
We shouldn’t have to rent everything. If you want free market economics (which corporations claim) then don’t hold the market captive. You cannot have it both ways.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine
What's the purpose of a physical version if there is no disk included? This is nonsense!
They are trying to appeal to collectors but also want to squash selling or trading your game. MS has been trying to do this for 10 years.
From the business side Pretty much just being able to give it as a gift. Also make it more discoverable to people who aren't able to buy it online for whatever reason.
From the personal side No damn idea
To make useless plastic cases to help the environment, of course.
We don't own media anymore
I never thought I'd write something like this but by pirating it and downloading it on our hard drives, we come closest to what we used to know as 'own'
this is why i dont spend money on games anymore. the network of pirates will always be stronger than steam's network of business men.
Idk, feels more comfy if the Games just work on the Steam Deck or Linux PC without needing to tinker.
i find developers/publishers are most likely to sacrifice your comfort first and foremost, and many of the games ive pirated have run worse for me or my friends when run legally. but i must admit i enjoyed the process of tinkering with windows on my steam deck, and the piracy workflow for steamOS is seamful.
It's more a combo of "Gabe doesn't care" and "Steam makes it really easy to add pirated games to your list"
Mmmmmm my torrents say otherwise. Can't stop me! Shit like this is why I torrent unless you've got tapes or wax for me.
(This message was brought to you bt Piracy.)
Pirate -> burn to disc
Congrats, you own a physical copy.
True, that's why I only buy at rent price.
apparently they deleted this right after, but its a sign of some bullshit either way
Some will never experience the wonder of intensively reading the manual of a game on the way home from a store. Discs are becoming as rare as Manuals now.
most people rarely read the directions (and it shows), but I recall loving reading the manuals to my Nintendo64 games
Remember the little note section at the end of some manuals to scribble your tips and codes?
Or cool nonstandard boxes. But retail hated them so now we get easily stackable standardized game cases and we better be happy about it or else.
Well, isn't that exactly where Microsoft wanted to go in the first place all those years back when Sony made fun of them in E3?
Yep, this is the same shit they were trying to pull with the Xbox and Sony out a bunch of commercials of them handing their games to each other to let their friends borrow the game.
This is dumb.
A lot of games haven't been released on disks anymore, it's a real shame really.
I understand that games have gotten bigger, but they could always ship with a really cheap'O USB stick for the people who really want a true physical copy.
Since the 360 we've had install discs for sizes above Disc 1.
I recently got a ps3 from a friend and have been buying cheap games and having a blast, this will be impossible with the newest consoles
The fact the tweet this information came from has since been deleted could mean it's false info. We'll see if Godd Howard clarifies in the coming days.
Perhaps they meant it will contain the disc AND a code? But either way it’s hopefully a mistake
Even if it includes a physical disk, it will most probably only have the launcher or a downloader on it.
I can't say I'm surprised but its a testament of the slowly dying state of physical media
I think they have already done this back in the days of Fallout 76
It's a 125gb game, what kind of disk were you expecting it to ship on?
An Ultra-HD dual layer blueray disc can hold nearly 100gb of data. It's not especially complex to have a game with 2 physical discs that encompass different parts of the game. They've been doing it since PS1 (FF7 was 4 iirc).
Yeah, but back in the day, a CD cost a lot less than a dollar. Have you looked at the unit cost for a 100gb disc?
And if it comes with a single-use registration code 80% of the people in this thread would still be pissed off. So, it's now more expensive, and still deeply flawed.
Because the not use of registration is the whole point? It needs to be optional, how it worked very well for years on PC.
Multiple install disks? That I can still install in my basement without an internet connection many years later like we did with games on floppy disks?
Just 26 DVDs or a mere 178 CD-ROMs
One that carried the game key, making it portabaly transferable.
Yeah, so the issue here isn't "omg how can they sell a case with no disk" it's "hey, I want to own my game", which is totally fair. Seems like people focus on the most superficial part of the whole issue, a literal shiny piece of plastic.
okay, clearly only a switch/indie gamer but 125gb for one game? I'm sure it's for the assets but isn't this just pushing costs and resources onto the consumer?
It wouldn't have been the first game to have multiple discs to install it.
Did the same with Diablo 4 as far as I know. Companies are getting horribly greedy the past few years
The only reason they didn't go down the path of serialized discs was the digital market being on the horizon. They were always going to nuke the second hand market.
FYI: The Xbox version will still contain a physical disc. It is just the PC versions which will not.
Not that you should preorder in the first place, but before someone cancels their Xbox preorder over the news, figured some clarification would help.
So it's like Fallout 76. Welcome to the future, gamers.
Apparently, they're saying this only applies to the collector's edition and not the standard edition.
When I was just a lad looking for my true vocation
My father said "Now son, this choice deserves deliberation
Though you could be a doctor or perhaps a financier
My boy, why not consider a more challenging career?" ☠️
I'm really curious who the target audience for this is. I guess if you have gift cards for Gamestop, although huh, this kind of turns them into a key reseller with extra steps.
This is really what NFTs were/are for. reselling digital content
I haven't bought a physical copy of a game in a while but don't they all come with a key that you must associate with an online account nowadays?
When there's a disk you can use it to preload a large chunk of data so you don't have to download everything. Useful for remote areas or areas with low bandwidth.
Nope, most of them do have a disc inside where you can just plop it in. You have to install the game from the disc and usually download a day-one update, but at least you don't need to download the whole game.
Yeah but OP is upset about not being able to share or resell the game, which isn't possible after using the key, even with the physical copy...
I honestly don't get the obsession with physical media. That's a thing of the past, my PC doesn't even have a drive anymore.
The only benefit I see is a reduced download size, but with day one patches sometimes being 40+ GB that's also not always the case.
It's not like you own the game, just because you have a physical copy of it. Once the licensing servers are shut down that disk becomes a paper weight, and that is if it doesn't require a constant connection to begin with.
On the other side you could argue that it's better for the environment if we finally get rid of all disks. Is it a huge impact compared to everything else? Probably not, but it is a step in the right direction.
Selling the game after you're done is the biggest one I heard. If you're playing a single player game that you don't expect to want to do another run of, you can recoup some of the money. Similarly, some people prefer to buy somebody's copy for 80% of the price they would pay on the digital version.
But just you then just buy a worthless piece of plastic nowadays, because the license key was already added to Steam, GoG or whatever?
I mean, sure, but the discussion isn't only about PCs, the question in the screenshot was about the series X. You can find pre-owned discs for consoles sold on gamestop, for example.
Ah, I get it now. I was so locked into PC gaming that I wasn't aware we are talking consoles.
Yeah, the argument gets a lot better on consoles, but I guess physical console games are a dying breed as well.
I don't think that's been possible for years, has it? Games had activation codes since long before downloading games became the norm, and I thought that meant you couldn't resell them?
Sure it is, just Google "pre-owned games" and you'll probably have hits from whatever the main game supplier js in your country (GameStop, GAME etc.).
Ooh are you talking about console games? Because it's not the same for PC games.
Ah, hadn't realised you were on about PC gaming.
Physical editions for PC gaming for me died a long time ago as I pretty much exclusively use Steam.
Consoles however I always try and get physical where possible.
You haven't walked into a Gamestop in the last couple years?
For Playstation, I believe you can play most games from disc without an Internet connection. It would just be the 1.0 version unless you've previously patched.
Pretty straightfoward. And understanable IMO.
If I have a physical disk of something, I can put it in a compatable system and play/watch it regardless of whether my internet is out or just shitty in general, even years down the line (as far as I'm aware, the devs/company have yet to be able to register/tie disks to devices, and they're not gonna break into my place and take my media away. So while I don't own the thing, my copy is my copy to do with as I please so long as I'm not passing it around for others to download). It's also not tied to any account, so my use of the thing doesn't hang on whether i have a Steam account or a Netflix account or whathaveyou. There's also media preservation, and just the fact that some people like to have something tangible that they can say "this is mine".
Discrot and failing hardware is a problem...but personally, as long as I have a receipt or proof of purchase for it, I'm not gonna lose sleep over getting it from alternative sources if i can't rip the data off the thing myself. It's simple: the company gets my money, they give me a copy of the software, and that's it. What they do with that cash is not my business and what I do with that copy (unless I'm either illegally distributing it or reverse engineering it for my own profit) is not thiers.
It's funny how this is never an issue when people are buying their latest favorite indie game that's only available to download.
How many of our favorite indie games are massive file sizes with draconian DRM?
To be fair, indie games don't get hounded for that because they more often than not don't have the big ass budget most AAA studios do to spend on stuff like physical copies and such. Dunno, I'd love to have all my games physically, but I'm also not gonna look at a small dev team or lone indie dev and expect them to be able to pony up for anything other than say, a limited number of physical copies of thier games....but then, what do I know, it could be dirt cheap to do so (but I doubt it).
Are they released as a "physical release" without the game actually being physically there?