Digital distribution of games – it will work!
Will digital distribution of games ever become the defacto method of game delivery? I think it will, eventually. But only when it becomes more beneficial for gamers to do so. The music industry currently benefits from a maturing digital distribution model, so what can the video game industry mimc from that music industries approach?
A number of things must change before digital distribution of games can ever overtake physical media distribution: 1, the cost of games and, 2, the convenience factor for the gamer. Direct2Drive, a leading digital distributor of games, currently sells new release PC games at a higher price than can be had via indies and, especially, online retailers. Not good when you consider that your traditional brick and mortar retailer will have significant over heads for selling physical media (staff and office space). So why the high cost? Well, one reason is the sheer amount of bandwidth the distributor is required to provide for games at be downloaded at high speed. But with bandwidth costs spiraling (and increasing pressure on our governments to improve broadband infrastructure), the costs here will decrease.
The next factor, the convenience factor, is equally as important as cost. The music industry currently benefits from a mature digital distribution market. Music can be downloaded and played on your favourite music player within a few moments of paying for it. Games, on the other hand, tend to have a much larger storage footprint and can take a whole day, depending on your internet connection speed, to download. Thankfully, broadband speeds are continuing to increase and will improve this situation.
Another issue affecting current digital distribution model for games, is a thorny one, the issue of right of first sale. Many gamers will sell their completed games, and use that cash to part pay for the next game. With the current model for digital distribution, this approach is not possible, making gaming significantly more expensive. Reducing the initial cost of a game via digital distribution would negate this issue, but the reduction would need to be significant to balance things out. This isn’t going to happen in the near future. A mechanism could be employed to enable the transfer of digital ownership, but would open up new channels for piracy of games.
Digital distribution of games is a natural next step for the industry, and we’re already passed the point of no return. Sony’s already has the PlayStation Store for it’s PlayStation 3 owners. Microsoft’s Xbox Live MarketPlace, and iTunes are all examples of infrastructure currently in place to accommodate this next step.