Pre-owned Games

This is a topic which is getting talked about more and more recently; the morality of buying and trading in used games. As you may have noticed from previous reviews, I like really cheap old games, so I have an opinion to share.

I’m not going to make out that pre-owned games don’t hurt developers, because they do. When you buy a used game, literally none of that money goes to the people who made it, and there’s less impetus for the game store to order a brand new copy if they know that people are going to end up trading their games in again. But here’s the twist: I’m all for buying games second hand, but I’m also against trading them in. I know right? It’s like an episode of the Twilight Zone.

I own a fair few games, most of which I could trade in at a moment’s notice, or sell on Amazon or whatever. And in the past, I have traded in games. There are a couple which I regret, but mostly, they were games that I did not, or no longer felt I wanted. I have not done this for a few years however, because basically, I like games. I like having them all on the shelf, even the bad ones. I routinely switch the covers of the ones I really like with the one’s I don’t like so much so that they look nicer. Plus, I’m really indecisive, and prone to shifting tastes in genre, so I need a lot of choice around me. What’s more, I’ve acquired a few games that didn’t do anything for me when they first came out (PS1 games in particular, such as Soul Reaver and Metal Gear Solid), and found that I enjoy them immensely. Now, even if I bought these games in mint condition, still factory sealed, the companies who made them would still get no money, since they aren’t making new copies of those games, and the store can’t re-order.

Recently, however, game companies have been putting in little things to stop people from buying their game pre-owned. Batman Arkham City activated it’s Catwoman levels (arguably, a major selling point of that game) with a single use DLC code. You do have to download the Catwoman content, but that’s largely beside the point.

Classic games get re-releases fairly routinely. If I want to play Final Fantasy VI, I can get the PS1 version, the GBA, or download the PS1 or SNES versions onto consoles. And that makes sense for the developers to do; they still make money, and people who weren’t around to get it the first time for one reason or another can play through a pretty good RPG. But then there’s all these Cult Classics. Eternal Darkness was only released on the Gamecube, and silicon knights seem keen to distance themselves from the few good games they’ve ever made (ooh, burn). Beyond Good and Evil sold so poorly that they were given away with boxes of cheesestrings. And Grandia II, despite being the most popular thing on this blog, has not been available to buy since about 2003. And let’s not forget that ridiculously popular games, like the PS1 final fantasies, did not get any sort of re-release until about 2009. For 12 years, the only way to play FFVII was to buy the original PS1 version. Well, technically you COULD play the PC version, but you COULD also rub glass in your urethra, that doesn’t make it an enjoyable experience.

I’m starting to ramble, so I’ll make my point clear. In five years time, Batman Arkham City (there are other games that do this, and even worse, but they’re shooter-things so I don’t give a fuck) will probably no longer be in production. I doubt that the DLC servers will still be active. That means that eventually, people won’t be able to play through the entirety of that game. Now, I would tend to argue that games are art, at least in as much as any other entertainment media. I can go out, pick up a copy of, let’s say, The World Ends With You, and play it, from start to finish, with every little bit of the experience intact, even the weird tin-pin epilogue where the plot get’s explained in more depth. And the odds are, that game will be pre-owned. If in five years, I buy a copy of Arkham City, then it won’t have the Catwoman levels. Yes, they are largely optional, and yes, they’re not integral to the plot, but that’s not the point. If any part of the game experience requires online activation, then that part is going to be lost forever. And sometimes, it’s the stupid extras that make a good game great. Imagine FFVII with no Vincent or Yuffie. New Super Mario Bros. without worlds 4 and 7. Pokémon Silver without the Kanto region, or the other version mascot. None of these things matter for the story to work. All of these things are entirely optional. But in the world of tomorrow, you are denied them, and you will know that they were there, but now are not.