Peter Moore: Industry 'At Least a Decade Away' From Dropping Physical Media

With services like Steam, Xbox Live, PlayStation Network and more, digital distribution in the game industry seems to gain momentum every month. While many gamers enjoy downloading new titles, there are just as many who still love having that physical disc and DVD case. More importantly, the switch from physical boxed products to digital will be a major transition for the industry and will completely disrupt the ecosystem. Some analysts believe that retailers like GameStop won't really feel the impact until 2017 or later. It seems EA Sports President Peter Moore agrees.

Speaking over this past weekend at The Berkeley Digital Media Conference (>play) [thanks Kotaku], Moore commented, "[The industry is] at least a decade away from saying goodbye to a physical disc. The more important question is what does the next generation of console look like?"

Some have suggested that the PS4 or Xbox 720 wouldn't even feature any kind of disc drive. And certainly if cloud-based computing really takes off, the next round of consoles could potentially just serve as Internet set-top boxes.

Moore also lamented the flood of peripherals on the market and took some shots at rival Activision for its Guitar Hero strategy and its upcoming Tony Hawk game with full skateboard accessory: "We're at the point of how much do you want to pay. How many people bought the maracas for Samba de Amigo? But if you look at the ability of the industry to sustain the big box mentality — Guitar Hero, Rock Band — it's going to be a challenge. The first time somebody puts a skateboard through their television set... To what extent is the user willing to pay?"