I came across a video on YouTube by RGT 85 discussing digital vs physical games. It’s led to some interesting conversations and I felt our perspective is different. Years ago we thought the people who were pro physical games were conspiracy theorists. Today we are pro physical games after seeing stores go down. We’ve seen games get delisted and can’t get relisted because of licensing and you have to find a copy. Recent events have shown purchased digital content is not safe either.

He felt that getting physical copies of games is comfort food. He says this after he talks about storefronts taken down and delisted. You should always keep an eye on companies. He then talks about with physical releases, things like XBLA games wouldn’t have been possible, like Daytona USA. Exceptions aren’t rules, and titles like that also had physical releases beforehand. I do agree many indies couldn’t have happened, though many do get physical releases after. Indies aren’t likely to take their games off of a market and will look to put them on as many platforms as possible, unless they have some type of licensing.

It must also be said that digital storefronts have made it easier for scams. Many early access games are asset flips, broken, or the developer will just stop supporting the game. These games don’t always get taken down. Titanfall games on PC are a good example, they’re still sold today, though someone has taken control of their servers and you either can’t get in a match or the players are getting killed right away by the hacker.

One thing I disagree with is the idea of PC gamers have gotten used to all digital why can’t everyone else? PC gamers got used to paying nearly $1000 for a GPU. PC players got used to making patches for broken games. Just because someone is used to something doesn’t make it right. I know in Steam’s TOS, they do say you’ll be able to download all your games if the store closes.

He does go on to talk about emulation which is good, though not all emulation works. With the emulators you can install game updates or the updated rom. The physical games that have nothing on them or are access codes to the full game aren’t physical games. It’s like when you buy a game code from the store.

The topic of used games dd come up and I agree there’s some expensive physical games out there. One thing no one mentions is how 360 games getting made back compat on Xbox, has made prices go up. Certain games aren’t on the store and can only be played with the disk.

Customers and businesses interests should almost never be the same. All digital allows for companies to set the prices and not change them. I remember when industry people were saying digital games will make everything cheaper. This will never happen, even though companies are richer than ever. Digital only consoles will takeaway the used game market like publishers would like to.

Cloud services are even worse, you’re paying for the service and games can be removed whenever. With Stadia, people lost their entire profile and progression in games when it shut down. Though I believe they were refunded for it. The other way companies are looking to do it, is where you have a game subscription service in the cloud. Then all your new releases go to that service. At least with digital games you can download and back them up.

It’s obvious there’s a push for an all digital and cloud gaming future. I believe it will eventually be there, but that gamers need to understand what’s in their best interests. Understand that you have power to change things by just being selective with your money. Preservation should be something that should be in peoples minds going forward. One of the best things about the internet is that people have made backups to preserve old games.