Xbox 720 games tethered to one console, require online code activation – report

Thinking about excluding second-hand games for next-gen is the industry equivalent of Microsoft and Sony playing Russian Roulette with a fully-loaded gun that both thinks only has one round in the chamber.

Whoever pulls the trigger first is going to create an awful mess I reckon.

I hope that code give you an option to download the game as well incase you break or lose the disk? Like Steam with Hl2 and other steam dvd games.

Don’t care one iota about used games. I buy all my games. But not being able to lend a game to a friend sounds bad.

I’m having a hard time believing these kinds of claims are even remotely true. It would kill the entire market supporting them.

On the off chance that these actually turn out to be true… I’ll be going full blown PC gamer and never looking back.

@4 http://bit.ly/11KuhFL – we reported on this back in April too. Our sources say it’s happening.

@1
I dunno, I reckon they’ve both discussed it with the big third party publishers and are heading down that route in the full knowledge that the other is coming that way too.

I can’t see one doing it and the other not as that would give the one not a big advantage. However I can see them coming to an agreement where they both decide it’s a good thing – as long as they both do it. The push could well have come from third party publishers.

I had planned to go fully digital next gen anyway, but I’ll be looking to publishers to share some of the savings they will make by going this route with the consumers too.

@4 Ha Ha Ha, yeah cause you can trade in your PC games can’t you? No, you can’t.

@8, So what is your issue then!?

@4 And I still think its hot air. But like I said, if it isn’t, Microsoft (and anyone else who uses this method) can politely fuck off. I don’t need to be policed if I’m not committing any crimes.

If other consumers want to be willingly butt fucked into oblivion, that their choice.

@7 I don’t trade in my games.

that will be the last straw for consoles, ill abandon PS4 if it happens and go for a wii u and pc. Something will have to be done about the likes of this type of stuff, it will need a consumer agency of sorts that will ultimatley settle this type of nonsense and I can only see piracy getting stronger if these companies pursue this. They seem to forgetwe made them who they are and we can take it away aswell

@6

That’s the most likely scenario I suppose yeah; either both do it or none of them do it.

surely the german steam digital download type case will set precedent and bring about consumer rights and end this corporate control blade runner type future where entering

I dont know about the online always being true but according to superDaE the Durango info is old https://twitter.com/superDaE/status/298786387098992640

I don’t buy very many second hand games (sure most new ones drop in price so quickly) but I do like to clear out my collection from time to time and use old games to fund new tech and software. So… I like stories

Consoles lolllllllll.

Good luck with that MS. You better have demos for everything. I use Gamefly to demo most games before I buy them. 60USD games, 30usd to 50usd “Season Passes”, and now you want to make it so games are tied into one console? Bad Idea.

I also have a hard time believing that MS or Sony will do it. It would be near suicide.

PC is very different.

First the games cost less. The purchases are tied to your account, not the hardware. And no where is there an established and socialy expected means to trade, buy or sell used PC games. Not to meantion that Steam doesn’t charge you a yearly fee to use the games that you buy. Unless of course it is a MMOrpg(and that is slightly different). Oh…and Free Sony Online? I doubt it will be either. Wait for PSN+ to morph into something just like Live.

Still too early to know anything for sure. But if the new hardware won’t play used, rented or barrowed games, they will have an extremly hard time selling.

Even though this is all rumours for now, i actually think its a great idea. No more do i need to change DVDs, just turn on the xbox and start the game you want. Also if you have a game tied to your account you could also play it on your surface or windows phone. So yes its a logical step to go into this direction and i couldnt care less to sell my old games for a fraction of the cost.

Cheers

then the EU will sue them big time probably heh

They will both do it – they have zero incentive not to, except competition with each other and it just doesn’t make sense to compete on this point.

You think this will hurt the consolemakers? It won’t. Second-hand sales support the game stores that buy the games from you, and sell them to another gamer. The producer of the consoles and the producer of the games receive absolutely nothing from that transaction – in fact, there is a solid argument to be made that this transaction cuts into the funds the gamer would otherwise use for another original game.

This would probably kill a lot of the stores that deal in second-hand games, as this market has exploded as a revenue source for them over this generation of consoles. But while that results in less exposure for consoles in the mall, I think both Sony and MS realize that this is a dying model anyway and are preparing their consoles for the fully digital marketplace.

Whilst I can see for a proportion of gamers it would be a bad thing, for the vast majority it wouldn’t be a problem at all. It certainly won’t effect me in the slightest, the amount of times I’ve traded a game in I can count on one hand in over 20 years of gaming.

Not being able to borrow a game off a mate would be an irritant, but nothing more.

@15 I think you’ll see them use an account-based model like Steam, where new hardware needs your acceptance through a verification system to play your games.

Surely if they do go this route they’ll be able to afford to have more sales/specials? I mean, I rarely buy used games, and I never sell/trade any either. So if this can make game prices a little cheaper, I say go for it. Edit: Sucks for people who rent games though.

Doomsayer, you don’t live in a bubble do you? Or work for MS, lol?

Do you have any idea how much of the pie used games are? I know from a biz stand point companies think that means drastic lost revenue. I can’t argue that, but it also means drasticly less games in circulation. If you guys think the average joe is going to drop 100usd for each game you have lost your mind.

MS might as well tell each would be system owner where they can go to find and buy a Tablet or something else. If the new hardware does have tethered games, the current gen will live for another 6 years.

If it were true, console games would have to drop in price the same way PC games did. Nobody will pay £40 for a game that can only run on their machine and cannot be sold.

It’s just an abhorrent and ridiculous notion that if you buy something it’s not actually yours.

The last time I checked if I bought a book, film, CD, car, pants, cat, dog, shoe, pie, orangutan, guitar, dart board, board game, russian doll or antique lamp – then I could not only share it with my friends and family, I could also sell it on when I was bored of it.

Why the fuck do games have to be so different? Should they have special privileges?

Steam isn’t much better in that regard. Sure, there are workarounds such as logging into your partner’s account, but this whole mentality that you can’t share or resell games is just bloody stupid. I’m not surprised piracy came about like it did.

Haha, if it ends up being true … Gamestop are in big trouble, or any other re-seller of used games.

@7: But you get a shitload of better prices. The consoles market is fucked because the greedy shiteating publishers are still charging up to 50 Euros for a game that has been on the market for more than 6 months.

@18 Probably the most sensible comment I’ve seen on this matter.

@ 22 what are you talking about $100 games. We are nowhere near that level of inflation. As far as publishers are concerned those “used” games are already out of circulation, so tethering games will not increase cost. At all. If anything the games may get cheaper if cutting out the “used” market leads to more profits.

@27 In Australia, we pay anywhere between $80-$120 for new release titles.

@18 So who, pray tell, is going to sell the consoles to the consumers then?

Online activation?

Welcome to the PC gaming feature (that many console gamers will hate for a while)

In my opinion this thing just makes it worse for the consoles because in the past you just used the disc and DONE.
Now, you need to have a code. But the thing is with Keyboard it is much easier to type, but with controller…….

Maybe touch screen will have keyboard but that’s not really good. I hate these codes myself to be honest.

@25, its all about supply and demand. Console games are only more expensive than PC games because they can be. If PC gaming becomes more popular than console gaming you can bet your ass the game prices will increase too. A lot of PC games are becoming more in line with console prices just now anyway.

Considering MS allows you to create a Live/MS account using any email account nowadays and not a horrible Hotmail account, I imagine they will ask you to either transfer or create a new account. Like I did for Windows 8, which I then transferred my old Hotmail/Live account to along with all my digital purchases. I imagine your codes will be linked to the account rather than the console.

Besides, they have the WiiU’s mistake to learn from as I’m sure there was a story where you could buy a pre-owned console with someone else’s digital purchases on the machine.

I don’t see why this is a big deal. This is more like the PC market if anything. I haven’t been able to return or trade in a digital PC purchase… ever.

@31, Agreed. PC gaming seems to be creeping up and up. It’s only due to Steam sales people still get really good deals.

XBLIG has an alway-online requirement so MS is not really adverse to the idea to begin with.

@31: … but they are as popular already, so nope.

Great… so that means that if your Internet doesn’t work then you can’t play with the games you BOUGHT?

What if some Anonymous “genius” decides to launch an attack and render the service not available?

What if you move to a new house/apartment and have no Internet connection (happened to me a year ago and due to various reasons I had to wait 3 months before having Internet at home)?

What if, just like me, you don’t have time to play all the games that are released and still enjoy discovering/buying old games through occasion? Many PS3/360 games CAN’T be found at retail anymore (I’m not talking about previous gen), and you HAVE to rely on second-hand market (eBay or whatever) to get them if you want.

I really hope it won’t be the case and that those are just rumors, but that could really be a deal breaker for me, just like the region-locking of the 3DS made me not buy it (I had a ration of 50% EU, 10% US and 40% JAP games on my DS).

@30
“But the thing is with Keyboard it is much easier to do, but with controller……”

Yeah, spending a minute wrestling with a controller to input a code is going to be the key factor in all this…

Well I buy most of my console games as ‘used’. Why? I think the full price of a game is too high for 90% of the games out there. I occasionally rent.

But I am in a minority, I don’t buy games to play online. I mainly buy games for the single player experience. But games these days are developed and promoted for their online play. Don’t get me wrong, I do occasionally play online but its rarity on my consoles and I using stick to the PC & MMOs for that.

And why, after a few months or release, are digital download version more expensive then DVD/BluRay versions?

Tying games to the hardware is a bad move and if it does happen in the new generation then either prices of the games need to be halved or I’ll stick with my PC….

So this is definitely not an “upgrade” of the current situation? By that I mean instead of it being “no MP for you unless you buy an access code from us for 1200 points” to now being both SP and MP? It could allow Second-hand sales to continue but allowing MS (which I would help would be shared out to the publisher/developer of said game) to take a small amount of money from the sale.

That is what they disliked the most right? that second-hand games = 100% money for the retailer and 0% for the developer(s). Just seems insane to completely take the retailer completely out of the loop, as in return could the retailer not boycott releases as Second-Hand sales make a last sum of their profits (If I remember correctly from being reported previously somewhere…)

EDIT: I’ll be honest though, personally the only second hand games I purchase are ones I have struggled to find brand new. It is a rarity this happens, but when it does these new rules could mean that if I don;t buy that niche game day one I’d be doomed to never own it. Fingers crossed all games will also be available digitally!

@22 Last time i checked at least there was no bubble and yes its just my opinion. But im tired of switching DVDs. I just want all my stuff available on the hdd, thats it. And if you look closely it didnt bring the PC market down. These days you have steam and origin and even though there was the usual outcry on the internet first, most of the people are fine with it now. And yes i also dont buy used games, so i couldnt care less what the second hand dealers do.

Cheers

And also, when you buy something, it’s supposed to be YOURS. I don’t pay $60 to “rent” a game. I pay this amount of money to have it and play it one day, when I will have the time, even if it’s in 10 years, not “until the company who ‘really’ owns it decide to shut their server or force me to move to a new system”.

What will happen when new models will release AFTER PS4/Xbox720??? What if Sony and Microsoft decide to force you to buy their new console “because the old one is going to stop being supported”?

It will be too late to react at that point… But then again, let’s see if the rumors are true or not.

@29 Large electronics stores, walmarts, etc. You’ll see them where you buy your iPads and iPhones today.

In 5 years we’ll wonder how anyone ever made a living having a gaming-focused retail store with the overhead this requires.

eehhh this makes since seeing how bad piracy was on the 360. However, its not something I am interested in investing in.

This is just stupid. If either company goes through with this, I refuse to buy the next gen. It wouldn’t be worth my time. I always swap games with friends, as I don’t have a lot of disposable income and I occasionally pick up the second hand game.

What about the ramifications of doing this? People who don’t have a online connection can not play games, and yes, not everyone has a good connection or can afford it. What about all those jobs that could potentially be lost? As a lot of company’s rely on 2nd hand sales to remain open. Where then will you buy these games in high street? Asda, tesco?? no chance, they haven’t even stocked ni no kuni wrath of the white witch in my area. Game developers will then be worried about taking a risks with their games as people won’t be able to afford every new release. So yeah, brilliant.

The issue with “piracy” is nothing to do with it, its the fact the second hand market give no money to the devs/pubs

There will always be piracy, ALWAYS! That can’t be stopped… but the second hand market can be.

Hey if you think piracy can’t be stopped and isn’t a factor in this then you keep believing it. It’s only one of the main reasons they did a hardware revision on 360 and addeda security patch to every 360 disc.

Sure they might want to stop second hand distributors but seeing how this is about MS it should be taken as personal reasons for MS and not industry reasons.

I think it would be helpful if you took a step back and looked at this from another angle:

Today, used game sales do not benefit the people who create awesome games at all. The sale is at the store only, and no money reaches the developers. And I don’t mean this figuratively, I mean it literally: ZERO benefit to developers and publishers and distributors.

But used game sales is fairly large, millions are made on this by the stores – yet in the creation of new and better games, the used game market is a huge parasite, as the money stays with the retail store.

Here’s the math for a new game: 60 USD purchase price, about 20-30 USD go to the store and the rest go to the publisher and distributor.

And for a used game: Store pays 20 USD to gamer A, store sells the game to Gamer B for 40 USD – Store makes 20 USD, publisher makes 0. But Gamer A has 20 USD more to spend, and Gamer B has 40 less – meaning 20 dollars less in the market for new games that might benefit the developers.

So what happens when they can no longer do this? It costs the average consumer a game or two a year, as the average price increases, however a lot more money goes towards the development of new games and sales go up in new games as well.

This will allow prices to drop (more people to finance the development should do this, even if the distributors and publishers take a cut), and it’ll give us more original games.

And if this becomes the model and legal issues (like the German case) forces console makers to allow the sale of used games, transferring the licenses within the marketplace of the new consoles should be doable.

It will, however, suddenly have to benefit the developers and publishers of the consoles, instead of the – in this case – parasitic stores.

I’m fully aware that it sucks to have to pay more for a new game than a used one, and I’m definitely way past the age and income level where I can truly relate to this, but you just can’t argue this is bad for either game companies or the console makers – it can only be to their benefit.

I’d like to go fully digital next gen. Retail is nothing but a barrier to that, as they have to be ‘kept sweet’ by publishers and platform holders not underselling them.

This keeps digital pricing artificially high.

The sooner we all go fully digital and lose retail the better, IMO.

The argument that used game sales = 100% retailer profit is wrong though. What do you buy with the money from your traded games? Yup, more games.

I’m not keen on the idea of always-on DRM though.

I don’t have a problem with this…

How can a bunch of people on a website complain about needing an internet connection!???

I will only believe this when it really happens. It sound just to terrible, can’t imagine they do something like this.
But just in Case, the good Thing is no one forcing anybody to buy such a Console if it should come. I sure would not buy it, so I could save some Money when they do this. In the End, everything will be good ^^

@48, You don’t have a problem with this as your giving up games!

This is bad news for retailers. CEX in the UK will be worried about this and selling your used games on eBay will be a thing of the past

I wonder if Microsoft will adopt the psn+ model, with exclusive *free* games each month?