While more and more gamers are playing their games online and purchasing digital downloads, it's clear that in 2010 packaged goods are still the predominant form of the gaming medium. And while proponents of digital or cloud services sometimes act like GameStop and retail games in general will be dead in five years, it's going to take a lot longer for people to make a complete switch to digital, argues Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter.
"Digital distribution will become the norm and completely replace package products in about 20 years, maybe 25… 22% of all households in the U.S. don’t have cable or satellite, so if they don’t have cable or satellite, they probably don’t have high-speed Internet and they’re probably not about to download all their games,” he commented.
As for GameStop, the leading retailer has been trying to adjust its business model so that it's a part of the digital ecosystem, rather than an extinct fossil in the future. The company believes that digital is still not as convenient as it needs to be for the average customer, but that it'll get there. “What you’re doing is avoiding the necessity of going to the store to buy something, but still having to experience the pain point of waiting however many hours or minutes or days that it takes to download that piece of content. I think the convenience is outweighed by some user experience hurdles that we still have to get through, but we’re pretty convinced that with technology continuing to advance that this will only get better,” said Chris Petrovic, GM Digital Ventures, GameStop.
[Thanks Game Theory]
4 Comments
August 24, 2010
Thats a somewhat believable figure, although it will probably take alot longer than that. If I'm still gaming in 20 years I'll still prefer my games on a physical disc. Until internet speeds reach the point of being able to download a Mass Effect size game in less than 10 minutes and hard drives surpass 10 TB's of storge space I'll still be more than happy to game on my consoles.
August 24, 2010
I actually think it'll end up happening in less than that, maybe much less (like closer to 10-12 years). In terms of the progress of technology, 20 years is an awfully long time. I mean 20 years ago, we were playing games on NES or SNES, and now games on phones look better than those. I think the broadband speeds and infrastructure will be vastly improved.
August 26, 2010
I only buy digital now for PC cause its cheaper and easier to buy with the biggest selection. No retail store can have every game and places like steam always have great deals with discounts and bundle deals.
August 28, 2010
Steam is rarely a good deal.
As for Pachter, he has terrible track record when it comes to predictions.
James, it has nothing to do with technology. People prefer physical games for a variety of reasons (one of the most common is that you can sell the game when you don't want it anymore, something you can not do with digital games), another being that you are not slaves to one company (like you would for digital games).