How are we supposed to collect games in the future?

[flojocabron]

yay! I know what's under my Christmas tree! Its my download vouchers!

Says little Timmy, holiday 2017.

I'm sure kids in the future are gonna proudly display their download codes and have them framed on their walls or in a binder like Pokemon cards.

A fancy sheet of paper or a premium 'art book' is all the physical proof that we are gonna have.

Dammit

[MrNash]

I'll probably just do the same as I've already done the last few years: New stuff on Steam and handhelds, and then lots of retro games. I'm not keen on where consoles are going, and really haven't touched my 360 or Wii all that much, so it's becoming more and more about the older stuff for me.

As physical media becomes less of a thing, and ditto for the anti-used games shift we may see, it's going to be a lot harder to collect for upcoming systems. So the majority of collecting that I see myself doing is for much older systems.

[Curlypaul]

Anti-used games measures will be terrible if they do actually implement it, but like MrNash says there are still thousands and thousands of physical games that I don't own yet

As for digital collections, I can see how you get some pleasure out of that but for me it will never be as impressive as a full set of physical games that you've had to hunt for. Logging in and navigating to the download button just seems to take away so much of the fun, not to mention the price is always the same so no chance of scoring a bargain from and unwitting seller anymore either.

[the7k]

I'm not worried about a digital future. Like, all the games that are download only on PS3, 360, Wii, etc - I don't feel threatened in the slightest that I won't be able to play them later on outside of Multiplayer only games.

Piracy will keep these experiences alive. I've already got friends who have modded PS3s, 360s and Wiis that have truckloads of download only games on their console that they never had to go through official means to acquire, and I believe that once the consoles have been discontinued, it's only going to get easier to use these methods.

Now, maybe you won't be 'collecting' these games, but the experiences will be alive and for me, that's the whole reason I got into collecting.

[Ivo]

Well, you still collect them, just digitally.

Oh boy, yee-haw. A digital collection.

I'm not sure it is such a huge difference from having floppies, cartridges and optical discs. The data was digital already.

This reminds me of the people that collect pieces of cardboard for Magic: the Gathering (and think they are valuable - which they are, because people give them that value) but think that it is ridiculous to collect "virtual" pieces of cardboard on Magic Online (they have the value given by people anyway). What is the big difference? It is not like cardboard by itself is very valuable, it is basically worthless.

Similar reasoning applies for "paper money", or the "digital" money most of us have: a number in a bank account somewhere!

The huge problem with stuff like Steam is that you don't really own things (a very obvious proof of this is that you can't trade games to another Steam account in exchange for cash). Otherwise there would be room for collectors just like we have for "physical" media.

GoG is a bit better (bless them, they are great actually), but for "digital collectors" the ideal would be something which you can trade but where there is value in having it "original". In my opinion Magic Online is pretty close to that, and a bunch of people there are genuine collectors with huge digital collections including extremely rare digital objects (which have unique IDs etc.).

Ivo.

[TEKTORO]

Collect them now and forever hold your future.

[TheRev]

There will still be stuff to collect. Retail sales are dwindling, but they are not going to go away entirely in this next gen if ever (could you imagine retailers not having video games in stock during the holiday season?!).

The most likely scenario is that there will be an increasing amount of games that are digital-only releases. So there will likely be a smaller percentage of games that make it to retail in the next cycle.

Also, there's lots of rumors about the used game capabilities of the next PS or Xbox - but nothing has been confirmed. So don't get too worried just yet.

Remember the no used games rumor was floating around for this gen too.

[BoringSupreez]

You know what the great divider between physical and digital games is, as far as collecting goes? Scarcity. One has a finite number of copies, the other is literally unlimited. That's why "collecting" downloads will never be a thing.

To make an analogy that I'm sure will be quickly torn apart, it's like the difference between diamonds and gravel. One has a quite limited supply, the other we may never run out of.

[Hazerd]

I collect digital coins and stamps.

[Menegrothx]

PC gaming has been this way pretty much the last 4 years. It sucks but we're doing okay.

Unless it's something indy, you can buy most legit PC games in physical form just like any 360/PS3/Wii game. Even indy games are available in physical form, it's just more expensive than regular download. And now the old big boxes seem to be making a sort of a return as many kickstarter projects are promising a big box version for people who donate a certain amount of money.

You know what the great divider between physical and digital games is, as far as collecting goes? Scarcity. One has a finite number of copies, the other is literally unlimited. That's why "collecting" downloads will never be a thing.

To make an analogy that I'm sure will be quickly torn apart, it's like the difference between diamonds and gravel. One has a quite limited supply, the other we may never run out of.

I know it's apples and oranges, but in many MMORPGs items can be worth a lot of real life money. And they can be scarce if the developers want them to be, for example in World of Warcraft there was a tabard that was given to 1 person on each realm (the one with the most honor kills) back in 2005, maybe 100 people or so ever got to own it (and out of those people how many are still playing the game/playing the same character today? 1? 2?). The Scarab lord mount, Arena flying mounts and Talisman of the Binding Shard are other good examples of this in the WoW universe.