My husband and I regularly buy dvds and blue-rays. Still. For a simple reason: ownership.
An Ubisoft executive recently said gamers need to get “comfortable not owning games.”https://www.cbr.com/ubisoft-gamers-comfortable-not-owning-games/. I haven’t heard anyone defending this stance. Specifically, Ubisoft is saying that everyone will/should need subscriptions to play games.
I am firmly against this idea. I watched Linus (Linus Tech Tips) over the weekend, and he discussed music as a good alternate example – and he nailed my frustration with movies/tv shows and video games. Options.
The analogy Linus used was “if I decide I don’t like listening to my favorite artist on Google, I can switch to Amazon or Apple and listen to the same music. There are occasional exceptions. But they are exceptions. Generally, if I want to listen to the new Beyonce or Taylor or LilNasX – I can use whichever service I want
If I want to watch…. oh the original Bewitched series – where do I get it? How many different streaming services will I need to sign up for to find it? Can I find it? Who holds the IP? Who holds the streaming rights? Do they have their own service?? Ok, I get it- what I’m “missing” is something akin to our old cable subscriptions where whether I had Comcast or AT&T or DirectTV – I generally could get all the same channels.
Right now in the gaming world there are a rising number of subscriptions: EA, Microsoft (xbox), ubisoft, Nintendo, Humble Bundle… with wild deviations in which games are (and are not) available. AND there are still games which are locked behind even more paywalls. Like Nintendo – you get like the oldest 6 Zelda games, but not the newest games. If I want to play Breath of the Wild (2017), I have to spend $60. Still. The next installment is out and it is still the same full price. Sure, I might find it a little cheaper on ebay, but it isn’t necessarily 50% – oh and btw, that’s ON TOP of the subscription I could be paying Nintendo.
All I’m saying is that video game companies are trying to take lessons from Netflix, Disney, Paramount and the other obnoxious companies on the subscription model instead of the one a lot of people pay for without complaining as much: music. Because as nice as it might be to get 100% of the money – 5% is better than 0%.
Dream by Day 