Publishers do not deserve to get paid again from, or outright deny, a used sale. Toyota wasn't standing in line to get paid again when I sold my Camry. Simon & Schuster didn't have a hand in my pocket when I went I bought a used book. Apple can't block me from trading in my iPad at Best Buy.

Locking physical disc installs to my account. Requiring that I go to a partner, like Gamestop, who is tied into their system to buy or sell used games. How much of my information would I have had to give Gamestop to enable the removal of a game from my account to sell it?

The only real choice that a physical disc would have given me is where my installation came from. Every other choice would have been given to the publisher.

I don't resell my games, so aside from download time, there's no real advantage for me to be physical-or-die. The collector in me won't let me, though...!

I only like digital. Hate the thought of collecting more physical media and no fuss from discs...

They sell game codes separately now for consoles, but for PC games their basically one and the same; the retail disc comes with a key that you just redeem on Steam (or Origin, UPlay, or whatever). If it followed that model, there wouldn't be a point in separate physical key code sales and i'd hope discounts would then be applied universally to one physical product. Wishful thinking I suppose

It would be nice if third party sites that exist on PC had the ability to do the same for console codes since that's where a lot of discounts can be had. Although I know cdkeys.com has cheap XBox Live codes and has digital console codes, although I don't know how regularly they're discounted.

I never understood why the fact that a used market exists in one industry that it should apply universally. And I hate continuing to use PC's as an example, but I don't find the PC gaming market anti-consumer at all. Although in that case, I think the system mostly grew out of piracy more then anything. And honestly, that's why I started the thread since it seems like the attitude you hold which was so prevalent 3 years ago seems to be considerably less so with consumers realizing that all of the above isn't the concern they thought it would be the way digital has been received this generation.

I think both have their place.

For example, Destiny is the perfect game to have the digital version. The amount of content you have to download for the game, and with all the expansions being tied to digital only (the disc you get with the Taken King is the vanilla disc, with codes for the DLC addons), it just makes sense having the base game digital.

It didn't hurt that I got the digital version cheaper than the disc, plus I got the PS3 and PS4 versions.

Except it was more than an idea, it was their entire platform six months before launch.

Consumer choice is wonderful. If one wants to go all digital no one is stopping them. If one wants to buy, rent, borrow a physical disc they're free to.

X-Box One owner here. I prefer physical copies in most instances still. I've bought a few games digitally though. I downloaded Life Is Strange which was initially only available for download and the Mega Man Legacy Collection which received an earlier release on digital and I was in the mood to play them. I also downloaded WWE 2K15 as it was reduced in price plus had all the DLC. I've also used my Gold account to download Tomb Raider for free.

I'm curious, if you don't sell games back, what's the draw of physical? Having the game case? Isn't the disk basically just acting as a license to verify that you bought the game, which is installed on your HDD either way?

To me its just the fact that companies want to charge the same price either way so I'd rather pay for something I can have in hand and put on my shelf. If there's a discount or incentive for me downloading digitally then I'll go that route otherwise I'll almost always go for a physical copy. There are some titles or game franchises that I'm a bigger fan of and just prefer to own a physical copy though. I've always been more of a physical media supporter in general too so that plays into why with me.

I'd rather have a disc over a digital download. Downloads for games are enormous and you're not going to have an endless amount of hard drive space. Even 2 TB will eventually run out with all these downloads.

If I'm spending $60 for a game, I absolutely want a disc/case/artwork as opposed to a digital copy sitting on a hard drive.

I would only do a digital download for a much less expensive game that isn't 80-100 GB of download space and doesn't cost me $60.

9 times out of 10 physical is cheaper. Pretty basic.

Unless the digital is a steal, I want physical copies as I can sell or trade in when I'm done.

Oh, and I should say since I started this thread and feel like i'm arguing more in favor of digital versions is that i'm also mostly physical currently because of price. If price were equal, I'd probably go digital more often then not. I've gotten some games digitally when on sale, like Forza Horizon 2 or Lego Marvel Super Heroes, but things like store credit, employee discounts, and random gifts have meant the majority of my games are physical. Some games like Rare Replay I really wish I had digital versions of though.

Only when it comes to the Sony. I don't like to have to keep renewing my license to play my digital games therefore I will only buy physical when it comes to the PS3.

I have a friend who went exclusively digital after his home was burglarized. He no longer will run the risk of reliving the experience of having his collection end up in some tweeker's backpack.

What license? PS+? Anything you purchase is yours.

Any free games on PS+ and X1 Gold require a subscription to have access to them.

But for the One and PS4, the digital download takes the exact same amount of Hard drive space as the disk. I don't think I've seen a game this generation where that isn't true, or am I misinformed?

Many people don't care if a right they don't use gets eliminated. Many people will never replay their old games and don't sell them. Many who might want to replay them assume that the online marketplaces are required to maintain their access in perpetuity.

I happened to be looking at an mp3 on Amazon. I thought, "Hey! Didn't I buy this song?" It didn't give me the option to download it, instead it wanted 89 cents. A little notification on the page told me that I had purchased it. Fortunately, I had downloaded it at the time I bought it and still had it on my HDD.

My backlog of games is so many at this point that I'll probably just stick to digital since by the time I get around playing newer games they'll be dirt cheap, and they won't be worth much in resale value by that point anyway.

Digital all the way. Just too god damn convenient.

No more going to BB or GS and not finding a game. No more hoping Amazon gets you release date delivery.

No more clutter, and more shit on the shelf.

Game share means never spending more than $30 for a game. So trading or selling the game is meaningless because I got it so cheap anyway.

I am still physical on movies and comics, but no way on games.

This probably sounds bad, but I also tend to forget some of my digital purchases because they get lost in the shuffle. Whereas the games are sitting on my shelf, staring at me if I don't play them

It also sometimes helps me keep my purchases in check. Like if my shelf is getting full and I'm not finishing enough games, then I'm pretty good at pumping the brakes for a bit. But if I have extra credit sitting in my account and a good sale comes along, I'll pick it up and never get around to playing the game. This happened a ton for me back in the XBL days with the Bing credits. I probably have around 30 XBL games I never touched, but it doesn't sting as much since I didn't pay real money for them.

Not really.

I do like digital if I plan on never selling the game but that is extremely rare.

I just don't play games over and over again. Once I play them and finish them, I almost never replay them again. So having a physical copy lets me recoup a little bit of money and I can sell it or trade it to get something else (or just get some cash).

I still stick to physical for almost everything unless it is 10 bucks or less. I would rather have the options of selling/trading a game. I don't understand the whining of having to "put in a disc." It takes two seconds. What's the big deal? And most of the time, if I am concentrating on one game, the game is always in the disc drive anyway.

Digital would be nice for convenience, but it's not worth the tradeoff. There is no flexibilty with digital releases. A new release on consoles is always going to be full price (versus $48 with GCU), and you also can't pricematch future sales. Nor can you trade in a digital copy if you don't like the game or get tired of it.
It also gives me a sense of security having the disc version. Who knows 20 years from now if I get a hankering to play some classic game that I had bought digitally on a different system if I will still be able to access it.

You probably need to go to Amazon Music, not the main Amazon store I checked mine and that's where I can download previously purchased items.

But yeah, a few years ago it felt like many people shared your concerns even if they fit in to one of the descriptions you provided. I think more people are realizing that it doesn't affect them as much as they thought it would.

I'm still firmly on the physical disc side, both due to price and being able to trade or resell games when I'm done with them. About the only time I'll choose digital is if something's on sale for $15 or less and the price is considerably cheaper than the physical alternative. GCU really makes physical a no brainer for most AAA games. I've had quite a few games that I bought for $48, got a $10 RZ cert and traded in for $40 or more in credit 3-4 weeks later. It's basically a free rental service if you want it to be.