Author: Jeremy Horwitz / Source: VentureBeat
Sorry, cartridge and disc collectors — in the foreseeable future, console gaming is going to become either download-only or download-first.
This might bother some console gamers, but I’m excited to see this happen.Twenty years ago, I owned one of the country’s largest personal collections of console games. After heading up the Ziff-Davis magazine Intelligent Gamer, I’d filled two separate rooms with obscure consoles, cartridges, and arcade boards from around the world. My apartment looked a little like the Sonic Mania photo above, with forgotten electronics spread across floors and shelves. Once I realized that I’ve never play most of these items again — and that I’d be moving for grad school — I sold everything off, freeing myself in a way that even current eBay prices can’t make me regret.
Since then, I’ve tried to avoid amassing space-consuming physical media. When iPods became capable of storing hundred-CD collections in pockets rather than on shelves, I jumped right in. Later, an iPad reduced many of my books, videos, and games into the footprint of a single magazine. Though I still have fond memories of the physical publications I once created, I’m ready for them — and all of my media — to be fully digital.
Though console makers have taken tentative steps in this direction, they’ve been unable to ditch physical media. Understanding why requires a games industry master’s degree, including an appreciation for the traditions of retail distribution to international broadband differences and concepts such as inertia and cooperative marketing. (Since game companies don’t participate in the resale market, collectibility generally isn’t a major factor.)
Apple didn’t flinch when ditching physical distribution dogma for its iTunes and App Stores, but Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony aren’t brave enough to declare themselves digital-only and stop issuing games on discs and cartridges. Competitions to have the largest monthly physical game sales totals guarantee that no vendor will unilaterally disarm by cutting off retailers. So they’re probably going to wait until brick-and-mortar game retailing is on the edge of collapse — RIP, Toys ‘R’ Us — before making machines without optical drives or cartridge slots.
That said, each console maker has spent years preparing for a digital-first era (though Nintendo seemingly had to be dragged into it kicking and screaming, and still lags its rivals). Today, the PlayStation, Xbox, and Switch platforms all have storage space for digital games, online stores that permit infinite software re-downloads, and enough publishers familiar with…
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