Well, this is a fine little mess I've gotten myself into.
Games are my passion, and all I ever see splattered across the net are flame wars between the fans of various systems. I've got my hands on all the major systems, and I'm happy with games on all of them. There are some games I like better on one system over another, and some points on upcoming technologies I like better than others.
I'll start with a small, yet large argument over the net these days: Digital Distribution.
The way times are moving, digital distribution is necessary. It saves everyone supplies and distribution costs (honestly, think about how much it costs to make the packaging and instruction manuals?) but it still poses problems for many gamers.
-- The first problems I would pose as my opinion are having the physical copy... I, like many others I've seen online, like to have a physical copy in my hands so that I know it's there. If the copy stored in my system gets erased by some fluke... how do I recover it? I've never really found any information on that because I haven't searched through knowledge databases. Most codes that anyone gets (for points and such) are used once, and only once. If you try and redeem it again it tells you it's already redeemed. I would hope that this could be rectified by combining that code with your online ID, which would then make sure that you could reuse it with your own systems. But if someone attempted to use that code elsewhere, it would give an error like "Code not recognized with online ID"... it would make it more personal, and re-redeemable if the item was lost.
-- The second problem is lack of an instruction manual. I mean, I know that most of these XBLA, PSN, and VC/WiiWare/DSiWare games have instruction manuals built in, but that still takes up even the smallest amount of space. With the many instructional gaming sites online (GameFAQs being the biggest one), it brings up the question why games really need instructions anyway? (But that also brings up the argument of difficulty given most games nowadays; that's a conversation for another day however)
With many games nowadays, it's understandable to have digital distribution. With so many re-releases of older games, what's the point of putting them onto a disc? They aren't big enough to worry about. But to redo many games and put them on a compilation disc ala Mega Man Anniversary Collection, Sonic Mega Collection, that easily makes it worthwhile because you're paying for multiple games. Nowadays, companies are trying to really milk money out of the consumer, releasing small tweaks, or even just upgrading the looks.
-- A recent re-release of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time looks like garbage compared to the original.... at least that's my opinion... because Baxter Stockman doesn't look anything like the original.
-- Re-releases of PS Classics in the Playstation store are only slightly cheaper than you can find some used copies... heck, even new copies. Several years ago, you could unfortunately find a used copy of FFVII for probably upwards of $80 because people fawned over it (I wasn't one of those people) but I bought a new copy from Wal-Mart for $20. What does that tell you? Prices of games are blown out of proportion, and digital distribution doesn't help this much because it's only $5 cheaper than what I paid for it in 2003.
Releasing each game individually makes you dish out even more money than you should have to, because you can still go out and find a hard copy of the aforementioned games for a portion of the original prices. That right there is probably one of the biggest problems with digital distribution.
Say what you will, but digital distribution is both good and bad for the coming years. The PSPgo is a GOOD example of this... re-releases is a BAD example of this.
And that's my take on it.
