Digital distribution to kill future classics?

Digitally downloading your games is a convenient and often cheaper method of building your games collection. The games are usually automatically patched, the ’stores’ never close and they can deliver your chosen game (more or less) there and then.

The lack of packaging probably helps the environment and certainly saves on shelf space; if my house is anything close to normal for a gamer then for many of us there is a constant battle on the shelves between games, movies and music who do not wish their physical selves to be re-located to the darkness that is the bottom drawer.
The major bonus of digital downloads for me though, is that it has allowed a whole series of smaller titles to rise; games that would have struggled within the normal channels are thriving as digital only releases. These titles are spanning everything from traditional bedroom coded projects, publisher back catalogue revamps, right up to the bigger budget exclusives such as the recently released Shadow Complex. Arguably we’ve never had it so good!

But the digital distribution model does concern me a great deal. Because as much as I’m enjoying the benefits, I can’t help but worry about the future pitfalls.


Some of my favourite games recently (Shadow Complex and Rez HD immediately spring to mind) have been exclusively available via the download model. These are games which, if they had of existed on physical media would have taken up the ‘premium space’ on my shelves and relegated a couple of lesser titles to the tomb which is the drawer.

They are both games that I will return to regularly and both are titles I could see myself revisiting in years to come (perhaps more so with Rez HD because of the games nature). The question that irks me though is will I always be able to return to them?

Because the media is digital I am very much reliant on the continued support (in this example) of Microsoft and it’s Xbox Live Arcade service.

If my game corrupts or if I change my console, it’s easy enough to re-download my games. If I run out of space on my HDD I can temporarily delete a few games and re-download them later. But what happens when that service is no longer there?

Console life cycles vary, but on average a system tends to remain current for around 6 years before it begins to fade into obscurity. Sure some systems last longer (PS2) and some shorter (Dreamcast/Xbox) but eventually they will naturally die in terms of availability. And when that happens the support of both the manufacturer and the various publishers dies too.

With physical media, your game is for the most part safe. It does not die when the support dies, at least not it it’s well looked after. Many gamers continue to play their classic games from the very dawn of gaming’s short history.

Dead consoles can be replaced via 2nd hand sources such as eBay or the local boot sale as can any poorly looked after games that have become damaged. Ultimately, if you loved a game from yesteryear, it’s simple enough on the whole to play it today.

The same principles however do not apply to the download era. Once Xbox 720 and PS4 launch, the services provided to PS3 and 360 owners will gradually decline and eventually cease. Suddenly the security of the re-download feature will become redundant. Will this mean that your much loved games are simply living on borrowed time?

From a personal view, this uncertainty bothers me because I can’t imagine the possibility of some of my favourite games being permanently resigned to fond memories. I want to be able to play these games for as long as I’m a gamer, I want to introduce these future classics to the next generation.

We are a completely different model to other media types; games are always based on specific hardware formats, and this is where gaming digital content differs so much from other types of entertainment such as movies and music.

So what happens? Emulation is one answer but it is far from ideal. There’s no doubt we are spoilt with the excellent emulators that already exist but as systems become more complex, can we really expect these part time non profit coders to keep up?

Even today, there isn’t a 100% perfect emulator for the Dreamcast despite the fact the system is over 10 years old and ‘died’ young. Sega themselves couldn’t emulate the Saturn and so eventually acquired the Giri Giri emulator, itself not perfect and now ironically abandoned. And besides, if you ‘own’ the game, you surely will want to play it on its original hardware where possible.

In some cases it may be possible to back up the games to DVD/CD, and certainly it is possible with the 360 to do this but it does require a fair amount of know how. On top of that your games are tied to your Live account, and of course there’s no guarantee that in future these accounts will operate in the same manner or for that matter, exist at all.

So are we doomed to losing our favourites? It’s certainly going to be an interesting time when the new consoles hit; I just hope that it doesn’t prove to be some kind of Digital D-Day.

In the meantime all eyes are firmly on the PSP Go’s download only model. Just don’t get too attached to your games eh?

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PS3 isn’t the best games machine, but it is a great piece of kit.

The current generation of consoles marked something of a departure for me. At any other time in my gaming life I have always brought all the new consoles at the point of (or very close to) their release dates. This time around however I’ve only just now completed the ‘set’ with our recent acquisition of an 80GB Playstation 3.

When the machine launched it was extremely expensive and given the lack of any real decent exclusive titles I decided to wait until there were some titles on the system I wanted to actually play.

Since then the PS3 has hardly set the world on fire with its games and thus I never really got round to making the purchase. A console should live and breathe in the quality of its games library and to date the PS3 has offered very little that isn’t already being done better on Microsoft’s winter heater.



Multi-format titles have on the whole been better on the 360 (The Orange Box debacle instantly springs to mind as does the more recent Ghostbusters ‘admission’ by Terminal Reality) and to date the exclusives generally have been more appealing (Halo series, Gears of War, PGR, GTA IV exclusive DLC).

Some developers such as Haze’s Free Radical have voiced complaints over the PS3 being difficult to code for, whilst heavy hitter Valve have gone one step further and simply refused full stop to code for the system. This decision alone means that PS3 owners may never get to experience the brilliance that is Left 4 Dead and potentially the up and coming (soon I hope!) Half Life 2: Episode 3.

I must admit that Uncharted: Drakes Fortune and Little Big Planet have both nearly persuaded me to part with my cash previously but unusually the sensible family man overruled the impulsive gamer’s heart.

It’s also worth noting that although I do not consider myself a ‘fan boy’, I do at times tend to think of Sony more negatively than the other two big hitters. This is mainly due to the impact Sony has had on Sega over the years; they are after all responsible for Sega’s exit from the hardware market, they killed the Dreamcast right? Well no, Sega unfortunately managed that all by themselves.

Sega failed to recognise the importance of 3D with the Saturn, produced a machine for the ‘hardcore’ (I prefer the term old skool mind you) and missed out on a whole new generation of ‘clubbing’ gamers.

They then produced the brilliant and pioneering Dreamcast, failed to market it so anyone really knew what it was and again produced old skool games. Now that’s great for someone like me but was hardly likely to entertain the newer (and by now much larger) gaming demographic.

Now you may well assume given so much negativity on my part and the minor bias towards all things blue and spiky that I’m simply writing here to bash Sony and its black monolith. But to my own surprise I’m actually writing to say how impressed with it I really am.

Whilst many will no doubt disagree, it’s not in this writer’s opinion the best out and out system for games, something I have covered enough above. It’s expensive (although at the time of writing there are numerous price cuts around due to the imminent arrival of the PS3 Slim) and very surprisingly the word Playstation is no longer synonymous to many with the phrase games console. Owning a Playstation isn’t the cool thing it was in the past.

Bizarrely we actually never really ‘paid’ for our PS3, it came ‘free’ with my partners new mobile phone contract (I’m holding off on renewing mine for the launch of the PSP Go!).

Our sole reason at the time for picking the PS3 as our freebie was that due to various circumstances we no longer had a DVD player in the main living room. Since the PS3 is both a DVD and Blu-ray player it seemed the obvious choice for us despite its gaming shortcomings.

What we never realised at the time was just how good the PS3 is at serving as our complete family entertainment centre. And it’s here that the PS3 really excels, it is because of this the PS3 sees use in our household every day and by several occupants.

We have our DVD and Blu-ray player for our films. We have a music centre which streams music from our PC effortlessly along with our photo and video collection. Then there’s Vidzone, essentially a free music video channel where you pick what plays. And of course there’s the games, finally Uncharted and Little Big Planet are getting my well deserved attention (Uncharted being the first game in ages that I’ve actually bothered to complete). Heck we can even surf the net with it during the television ad breaks.

Of course the 360 also has some media features of its own but they simply are not as well implemented.

The DVD player is DVD only and it’s intrusively noisy for a front room. The media streaming works to a point but it’s not as easy or as smooth as on the PS3. The music videos on Live are limited and have to be paid for. It can’t surf the internet and unless you own an Elite model the HDD is woefully small. And also, somehow, the 360 just doesn’t look like an entertainment centre. It looks like a games console; it looks out of place under my main TV.

My partner has never really touched a non-handheld games console before and yet with the PS3 she presents our photos to friends and family, pops music on in the morning to keep the kids quiet (our 1 year old daughter dives across her pen when the PS3 power button beeps because she loves to dance away to the videos) and even watches the odd film.

And so, it’s only now that I’ve come to realise that the old skool gamer in me has blinded me into ignoring this great machine.

No it’s not the best games console, the 360 is currently the choice here with its vast library and it’s excellent (though still annoyingly chargeable) Xbox Live. But it is a great all rounder, it serves the purpose Sony always said they wanted to serve, the central family hub of entertainment, the unseen box of tricks that quietly delivers all of your living room needs without you even realising it. And for that Sony should be applauded.

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