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Re: Ars Technica - Buying used games

Aug 28, 2010, 19:52

Jerykk

It makes no difference if you buy your copy of the game from target or phil down the street. They're both legal copies of the game created by the publisher. Your logic is flawed. A used game can be sold and purchased multiple times, with the publisher/developer only making profit from the initial sale. This has the same result as piracy. Somebody buys a new copy of game, then copies it and distributes it on the web or sells copies for $1 in third-world countries. In both cases, one new copy was sold, but more than one person played the game. Just ask yourself two questions: 1) Are you playing a copy of a game? 2) Did the publisher and/or developer see any money from you? Those playing pirated or used games have the same answers to both questions. You can argue that your money goes to retailers and not publishers and/or devs but that's missing the point. Retailers order copies of games based on demand. If customers buy lots of new copies, retailers have to order more. Publishers track these orders and know exactly how much a game is selling, which in turn determines the fate of future projects. If a game sells 1 million new copies, the publisher will likely sign another project with the developer. If a game sells 1 million used copies, the publisher won't know because they don't track used sales. 500,000 new sales can easily become 1 million used sales if each used copy is sold twice. However, publishers will only track 500,000 sales regardless of how many times the used copies are sold. It's not about developers getting royalties, it's about signing future projects based on tracked sales of your previous games. This comment was edited on Aug 28, 2010, 20:00.

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