Phil Harrison sees downloads as the future of gaming
by David Hinkle 
{ Dec 4th 2008 at 3:30PM }
He sees a future of downloads. One where walking into a store and buying a disc copy of a game is an impossibility. Not due to the fact that discs no longer exist, but because the young ones of today won't want their games in that way. Phil thinks "there's a generation of kids being born today and probably already alive who I'm pretty confident will never buy a physical media product." Phil went on to elaborate that he thinks they'll "never buy a DVD, they will never buy a CD, and they will never buy a game in a box."
We're not entirely sure that such a future is so close to becoming a reality, personally. For one, there comes a certain satisfaction from actually holding something in your hands that downloads could never achieve. Second, that would mean the next generation of consoles would be affected by this and we're not willing to drink the Kool-Aid and say that all three major console manufacturers, as well as the plethora of third-parties involved, would be committed to offering all titles as downloads. Third, have you ever smelled the inside of a freshly opened game? It's like new car smell, but way better.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
KingKRule @ Dec 4th 2008 3:38PM
I totally agree with you. There is a satisfaction in having a physical library of games or music or anything. Downloadable games are cool but will never replace actual physical games. Also I dont feel like downloading 80 gb or whatever for a game. Imagine having to download MGS 4 to your system not only would you need max memory you'd need blistering fast internet. Ill take real games thank you very much.
bukizzle715 @ Dec 4th 2008 3:41PM
I don't care how awesome downloading becomes, I'll always buy my copy off the shelf. The smell of a new instruction book is slightly orgasmic.
ChromeAlchemist @ Dec 4th 2008 6:33PM
yea wtf is with that? smells sooo damn good!
But yeah as many have said, physically owning games is so much better than digital, there is just a better feeling than just downloading it, in fact downlaoding it just makes piracy seem less guilty because no one is losing money per se.
And plus what happens if my console bricks, or if my PC crashes? that is precisely the reason why i don't like this. Steam kind of deals with that situation by saving key codes to your account, but still...it would be pretty crappy if digital downloads took over as the medium for gaming sales.
Hamster @ Dec 4th 2008 4:02PM
As much as I agree with you guys that it's nice to have a physical product to hold and have the smell of an instruction manual and that sort of stuff, these reasons don't really hold much water against the financial and environmental costs of manufacturing, packaging and transporting physical products. Downloading is most likely the future of all media (it's already happening with music) and I don't think that's a particularly bad thing. After all it's cheaper and far more environmentally friendly.
As a lover of boxarts (or artwork of any kind) my automatic reaction may be to bemoan downloads, but I don't think downloads means the end of artwork. This website has plenty of artwork on it, my desktop has plenty of artwork on it. Non-physical media isn't the end of artwork, far from it.
Many say that games are too big (compared to a song for example) and that downloading won't handle it. But this will change in time as technology improves. It seems only yesterday we would quite happily wait an hour to download Elf Bowling or The Radiskull or something, now we'd be annoyed if it was taking more than a minute. I couldn't have imagined 10 years ago that I'd be able to download The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time in a couple of minutes onto my Wii. And even if it did take a while longer, it wouldn't be any longer than the time it takes to go to the shops and back or wait for a delivery from Amazon.
Just_a_guy @ Dec 4th 2008 4:16PM
here's the issue folks: you won't see games like MGS4 coming out if everything is downloadable. I don't want to be forced to download 60 GB worth of data over my cable internet. that would still take a LOOOOOOOONG time!
R @ Dec 4th 2008 4:20PM
Lets say Sony/MS go all digital next gen we all know Nintendo would still stay one format behind and have it's main format hardcopy.(which I prefer)
Matias @ Dec 4th 2008 4:24PM
I agree more with 2, the new instruction book's smell is one of the best drugs that exist.
Though I see the future more adequate for downloading instead of physical games, I think that won't be until a few generations more, because, try to download a blu-ray or double layer DVD game, it would take too much time, and too much space off a HDD, wich means 1) you will have to be erasing or moving stuff too much. Or 2) HDD will have much mroe storage space, but they will cost way more money, (and probably the better internet services needed to download a heavy game will be much expensive too) wich limits your game buying. And I kind of preffer go buy my games in a store and play them sooner, and I don't have to limit by storage issues. The best side of downloading though, it will be that it will be easy(/ier) to bypass region lock, if it exists at all. Also the games would cost less
Drahken @ Dec 4th 2008 4:34PM
Isn't he also the guy who thought the better future advancement of his career was to leave Nintendo and join Sony? I don't think I trust his crystal ball.
tmntman @ Dec 4th 2008 4:55PM
I think that we will move towards downloads as the primary source of software and media, but it still quite a way off. There are still too many obstacles both physical and human.
-Broadband access is still limited in its market share. Granted, the 30% or so of people who don't have internet access much less broadband service probably don't play games. But they are probably related to gamers and may buy video games and other media as gifts. A download only market would be very intimidating if not completely off limits to them.
-Bandwidth limitations The US is far from being the leader in the amount of bandwidth available per person. And even if they move forward to greatly improve this, it is still likely to trail the size of top tier video games for many years to come.
-DRM Love it or hate it, the corporate level individuals who control much to he media which we buy still look at physical copies as one of the better ways to limit piracy. And they aren't entirely wrong. Sure, just about every media out there has some means of copying it available (DVD-R's and CD-R's) But that is nothing compared with how quickly electronic files can be copied. Sure there are ways to lock down a file. But if you look back, how many of those DRM measures last more than a few weeks before hacks pop up to defeat them?
hellhammer @ Dec 4th 2008 5:01PM
1. I can't play (the hundreds of dollars worth of) downloaded games after my console breaks/eventually dies.
2. Apparently, Atari's Phil Harrison hasn't heard of ebay.
...or Atari collectors.
...or video game collectors in general.
...or anyone who's favorite game isn't available for download.
Kia @ Dec 4th 2008 5:12PM
The day gaming goes digital is the day I stop gaming...Or the day I finally say "screw morals" and become a pirate. If they're too cheap to give me a real product then I'll be damned if I'm going to pay for a download.
SuWide @ Dec 4th 2008 5:25PM
sadly that most of the download versions of games are only slightly cheeper than the hardcopies.
If my favorite gamestore told the truth, Spore download was couple of bucks more expensive than the DVD-Version.
Now even if its 10-20 bucks cheeper than the hardcopy, i could easily sell it afterwards when im tired of it for 10-20 bucks, so i dont see the bright side.
Drahken @ Dec 4th 2008 7:17PM
This is exactly how I feel. In fact, your example is exactly what I thought of. I wanted to get Spore, so I was going to download it. But then I saw that it wasn't really any cheaper than going out to Best Buy and buying a hard copy. The fact that I had a gift card actually made the hard copy cheaper. The only downside was that I had to wait until the next day and Best Buy opened back up. Oh friggin no. But this way, I have a physical product in my hands that I can install it on another computer or do whatever I so wish.
wiilover @ Dec 4th 2008 5:24PM
I can c dat happening I mean it's already happened in the music industry.. who buys physical albums anymore? But I c it happening in the next 20 years
Josh @ Dec 4th 2008 6:27PM
If I buy downloadable anything, I have a hard time shaking the feeling that my money didn't just disappear, because I didn't actually gain anything but a different arrangement of bits on my hard drive.
Physical products I can feel proud of buying, and they come with extra packaging, artwork, etc. that means a lot to me. And anyway, I love the way a shelf full of game cases looks.
I can't just give that up.
Abscissa @ Dec 4th 2008 8:54PM
If Nintendo's next console is drm'd-downloadables-only, then I'll be abandoning Nintendo. In fact, the only reason I haven't done so already this generation is because I've found the 360 and PS3 to be every bit as disappointing as the Wii. (I've feel like I've been living the N64/PSX/Sat generation all over again...and it burns, IT BURNS!!!)