Frank Gibeau, President of EA Labels, says 100% digital strategy is the companies near future. This means that digital distribution is becoming increasingly relied upon, and if EA starts solely using digital distribution in the future I have a feeling other companies may follow suit. This could be the future of gaming, no more discs or cases, just space on a harddrive.
Gibeau told GamesIndustry International:
“It’s coming, we have a clear line of sight on it and we’re excited about it. Retail is a great channel for us. We have great relationships with our partners there. At the same time, the ultimate relationship is the connection that we have with the gamer. If the gamer wants to get the game through a digital download and that’s the best way for them to get it, that’s what we’re going to do. It has a lot of enhancements for our business. It allows us to keep more that we make. It allows us to do some really interesting things from a service level standpoint; we can be a lot more personalized with what we’re doing.”
Apparently Gibeau said this isn’t only about Origin, it will also include Facebook, mobile, and game streaming services.
[SOURCE]
I’m not sure what to think about this. As a classic gamer I am sad because I like to have to the game in person, to hold the case and see the disc – but as a futurist I am happy that the industry is progressing to a more reliable venue for distributing games and I can see the evolution of gaming happening which is cool. I suppose we will just have to see how things turn out, for all we know this may be another thing that crashes and burns like HD DVD’s.
Oh god…I can just see the piracy problem getting even worst…this is a horrible idea
I thought of the piracy aspects too, it’s much easier to pirate when the games are digital so I’m not sure what EA thinks will happen.
This is not good, not good at all….just space on a harddrive that’s all E.A would see it as, I like to think more of my games than this
As do I, I’m not too excited about this turn of events.
I guess that’s one way to kill the used market. Of course, that will create a domino effect. With no need to compete with the prices of used games, I bet most of those 75% off specials you get from digital distributors like Steam are going to go from weekly to few and far between. It’s bad news for brick and mortar because they’re getting cut out of the market entirely, and it leaves consumers responsible for buying more storage since every game will require installation.
If this is really the direction things are going (and it obviously is), my PS4 better ship with a 2TB HDD and an expansion bay.
Side note: I’m the one idiot that bought the Xbox 360 HD-DVD drive. Go me!
Exactly, it’s not a good thing at all.