Sony Considers 'Online Pass' for First-Party Titles!

[4_ever_ps2]

"I don't think we really care whether used game buyers are upset because new game buyers get everything. So if used game buyers are upset they don't get the online feature set I don't really have much sympathy for them."

[John Roberts]

The tighter they clasp their fists the more honest paying customers will slip through their fingers...

You are dead right, mate. Already this gen I have had to pirate many PC titles due to some crazy-arse anti piracy method making legit gamers scream in agony (not having a reliable net connecton makes many legally obtained PC games unplayable). And if this is the same route console games are going then I will either quite gaming, or go 100% piracy on every gaming device.

Out of pure spite I reckon I will choose piracy. Just back up my own games? Nope, not anymore. I'll hire, copy and return to my heart's content. But, hopefully it never has to come to that. The joy of buying a brand new game all still factory wrapped with the promise of an awesome single player experience still makes me feel young! Don't take that away from me, Sony.

[bungiefan]

If they simply do it like pc games I really don't see what's the problem for the legal buyer. They just add a unique key to every game and you have to enter it to play online. They could even do it so you have to login to psn and activate the game before you can play it. And each code is tied to 1 psn account. Then everybody who tries to play illegaly downloaded games is screwed and the people who use psjailbreak to run the games they bought can still run them.

It would be a lot more difficult to hack this imo. (Like when you install the game gets installed encrypted with the key you got, then the sony server verifies your key and decrypts the data if it sees your key is valid).

This has been proposed before. The idea is to ship a game with a code that has one use, and it is used for online play, or in single player games to enable the last chapter. Then someone that buys the game new gets access, but someone that buys it used or pirates it has to buy the code on the online store, for say $5-10, which is about what the game company would make off a new sale factoring in all the distribution and manufacturing costs.

They're not making a used game unplayable, they're just making sure everyone pays for the feature that you get when buying new.

GameStop's business model is quite unhealthy for companies to make money off their game sales, with the store that is selling the games undercutting the developers by handling used copies sometimes even the day of release. It's even more unhealthy now that they've eaten up or driven away a lot of their old competing companies like EBGames, KayBee, and Babbages.

A monthly access fee wouldn't make so much sense. A one-time fee per game to unlock content if you buy used (or that content for free if you buy new) would give more incentive. It would also let them see just how many people are actually buying used when they compare codes used to copies sold.

They do need to have an option for code reactivation though, like MicroSoft has for if you change your motherboard and need to reinstall your OS, since the hardware fingerprint changed.

[Fugus]

The used game market isn't bad or unhealthy for them, quite the opposite, they are just too short sighted to see it.

The sale of used games is typically bought by people who would not have paid the full price anyways so they didn't really lose a sale except maybe a future sale a while down the road when it has hit the Classic bin for $20 if at all and the guy selling the game back is typically doing it in order to help purchase that brand new game they are trying to get so the companies still get the cash they desire, just in a more roundabout way. And many of the guys who buy that used game might enjoy it enough to buy the next version of it new.

Long run, doing this might drive up their short-term sales of their games but at the expense of their longterm sales. And again, I will never purchase a video game I can not resale later unless I am purchasing it for less than $10 brand new.

[_zaphod_]

There's also the problem of used and new game stores getting COMBINED.

Used to be to get used games, you went to a used game store.

The current situation of gamestop pushing the other game stores out of business, and getting into the used game market as well as the new one is what's hitting the publishers hard.

Gamestop will buy less of the games because they know about X percent are planning to return the game when they beat it and Y additional percent are tempted by the large store credit. SO they order less games and make more money, and the publisher sees lowered demand for their game.

This wouldn't work out so well if there was more competition, as people would just get the new games elsewhere. but as competition fades for gamestop, the allure of the overpriced used game caused by the large store credit grows bigger.

SO yes, it was much less of a problem in the past, but is now becoming a real problem for the publishers, and, at least on the console side, probably really does lose them more than piracy.

People who cant' afford new games are not the issue here. People who resell games after a month or two aren't the issue here. It's the used new releases being sold at new game prices within days of release that's the problem, and gamestop is only getting away with it due to lack of competition.

[My_Balls_Itch]

There's also the problem of used and new game stores getting COMBINED.

Used to be to get used games, you went to a used game store.

The current situation of gamestop pushing the other game stores out of business, and getting into the used game market as well as the new one is what's hitting the publishers hard.

Gamestop will buy less of the games because they know about X percent are planning to return the game when they beat it and Y additional percent are tempted by the large store credit. SO they order less games and make more money, and the publisher sees lowered demand for their game.

This wouldn't work out so well if there was more competition, as people would just get the new games elsewhere. but as competition fades for gamestop, the allure of the overpriced used game caused by the large store credit grows bigger.

SO yes, it was much less of a problem in the past, but is now becoming a real problem for the publishers, and, at least on the console side, probably really does lose them more than piracy.

People who cant' afford new games are not the issue here. People who resell games after a month or two aren't the issue here. It's the used new releases being sold at new game prices within days of release that's the problem, and gamestop is only getting away with it due to lack of competition.

I agree used games are used there is no reason to pay top dollar for it, there is 2 gamestops and 1 Ebgames within a 25 mile drive around here, but I still think that publishers are also ripping is us off just as much as used game stores. 4 hour games or games that are full of bugs, or reviewers that have been paid to give a good review are also spoiling it.

I remember when I got my first ever PS1, and was still trading Mega Drive games, the game shop only had used games maybe 2 or 3 new games for the ps1 but that was about it, it would have been pointless to go there and ask for a top title because they simply wouldn't have it, and they didn't do trades they bought your games for cash, if you wanted to trade you had to sell your game and buy it. They were one of the only stores I remember that did used pc games to.

[Bayron]

I always accepted this regarding PC games, games like WoW, CoH, CoD etc.
But doing this on the console ? .. are they for real?

So your PS3's HD crashes, or you lose your account's password.
The game you bought will have no online function anymore.

If this happens to let's say a game like Call of Duty or BlazBlue, that would destroy the game's re playability.

They need to think this through, if the code is only able to be used ONCE, I want to know how they are going to handle HD failures, and lost accounts.

I know it's far-fetched but it shouldn't be shoved aside that it's possible.
If they really want to do something regarding buying used games, they should contact all the stores that use this feature.

What if you lose your steam account password on pc...