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Digital should never be the same price as physical
No shipping
No brick and mortar shops
No game case
No game art
No game cartridge/disc
No factory seal plastic
No online distribution companies
Digital is literally acting like MAME…… An emulator…… On my console??????????
Now taking all of these things into consideration explain to me why digital cost the same price
This post has been captured from our very own retro gaming group over at FB
Developers are being underpaid
Agreed.
Well, it’s not emulation, but you’re right about the logistics cost
We should also get a discount for self checkout at stores
You forgot to mention no blowing either😂
An example here an old game Xbox One called rugby league 3 is like $70 on the Xbox store while I could buy that for maybe $25 at eb games. That’s here in Australia. So this whole thing they’re more expensive is bs
Greed.
Where I live it’s not the same price, digital is 40-50% more expensive than physical. 🫣
It used to be cheaper. We allowed them to do this unfortunately
Convenience. People sacrifice a remnant of ownership for convenience.
Digital is never going to be cheaper, and will likely become more expensive once physical is gone…..for consoles you will completely be at the mercy of Sony, Microsoft or Nintendo who will charge what they like as there will no longer be any competition
digital costs mroe because of storage access cloud cpu cycles and license management…plus its fun to charge the customer more
Should be more for digital
Unpopular opinion. When I buy it’s physical. I can probably count on my hand how many digital games I have bought, but you could make the case that with increased development costs + inflation, games costing the same price for the last 20+ years is in a way cheaper.
I’ve said this for years now
things are worth what people are willing to pay for them. it literally is that simple
Profiteering is the excuse. This is why I don’t buy digital. Only exception is small indie or solo studios who cannot afford a physical run, but their games are generally $30 or less but you also get a complete passion driven game than shovelware with franchise fatigue.
No your console is not emulating when it’s playing digital games. What a silly thing to even suggest.
ty!!!! Cant tell this younger generation anything they know it all, except how to start a lawn mower.
Except being able to maintain the distribution and support for the digital version of the game costs money. Not saying that justifies a 70 dollar price tag but it is cost. Plus they have to recuperate costs from development somehow.
For the record i buy physical.
These factors do suggest a cost advantage in the production and distribution of digital versions of games over physical versions. However, digital games may be priced at the same level as their physical counterparts because game publishers want to maintain uniformity in pricing to avoid price differences between physical and digital versions that could affect consumers’ purchasing decisions. In addition, the digital version of the game may also include some additional content or services that are not available in the physical version of the game, such as digital extras, online features, etc., which can also be one of the factors to be considered in setting the price. Ultimately, the equal pricing of digital and physical games may be a pricing strategy in the marketplace that is not based solely on cost considerations.
That emulation comment shows your ignorance on how all this works
Zachary Foster
Having sold servers and Data Center networking to large companies, I can tell you digital data hosting and distribution is expensive. Average server is about $5,000-20,000. Most companies have 100+ servers. Companies hosting data have much more usually thousands of servers. Networking switches like Cisco can cost $5000-20,000 each. Security firewalls can cost $5,000-100,000. Generally companies have such server farms in multiple locations per country. There are many many more costly components to make a data Center work and be secure. Then there is the cost for internet connection as well. Most server farms are refreshed to new hardware every 3-5 years or sooner if they fail past the usual 3 year warranty. OEM Next Business Day extended warranties are super expensive too. Digital isn’t free just because some hardware costs aren’t there.