[RiderSkyward]

Having had some time to think, I'm stilled slightly annoyed at the re-play fee situation. I still think this is purely greed based, and I don't think for a second that the money from these re-play fees will go to the developer, it will be all for the publisher (sure some could get filtered back but I doubt it)

Personally I very rarely buy used games, but I can see why people do. Heck I've seen families in my local game that are still buying PS2 games and still restricting their kids on the number of them that they can get (even at like 5 for 20 or something ridiculous like that). These things cost a lot, the only reason I don't buy used is because I'm impatient and don't buy games all that often anymore.

Developers/publishers aren't stupid either, they've been slowly combating it for years now with the use of DLC and pre-order bonuses. It's why on the disk DLC is so common these days, and that extra bits of DLC are released in episodes. Space it out and slap a £/$8 price tag on each one and nobody will really mind. This also works with the pre-owned market, if you buy it cheap/cheaper you're more likely to spend the extra on the DLC. Sure you've probably lost a chunk of profit but it's better than nothing.

The best solution would be for retailers to strike up a deal where a guaranteed percentage goes to the developer. Sure it could push up regular prices (and therefore pre-owned slightly) but it's better than having to pay full retail.

End of the day, the industry is moving away from brick and mortar stores and physical copies. If you have to install the game so you can multitask is there any real point in buying the disk version anyway? If you can't really re-sell the disk as well is there any point? Sure losing out on money sucks for developers, but thousands could potentially lose their jobs if everybody embraces it. (granted this is more of a worse case scenario, but it could happen- the app store is obviously a great example of this)

Too many developers seem to be shifting away from exclusives to mass release in order to make the most money and I think we are quickly (maybe 5 or 6 years depending how bad/if this next gen flops) heading to a market that will just feature one console/service, with games being broken up into smaller chunks or episodes to both keep prices low (to compete with apps) but encourage mass consumption.