Weekend Reading: Electronic Arts' War on Second Hand

The idea behind the move made by Electronic Arts is that players will buy more new games (and route their money directly to the publisher and developer) if there are clear advantages linked to them, while significant disadvantages are connected to used games (which bring money to retailers, but not to those who create and publish the games).

The martial metaphors I used in the first paragraph are well suited to the situation. It's a battle for survival for Electronic Arts and other publishers who, like  Ubisoft, are watching to see what the impact is. They are losing money, the overall economic situation is not helping and videogame development is always more expensive. The publishers need to sell more games, to have more hits on the level of Modern Warfare 2 or Madden NFL, and one way to do it is to limit or even wipe out the used games market.

GameStop claims not to be threatened by the Online Pass concept, but battle lines have been drawn, and soon we might find that new buyers will be getting the full experience from videogames, while those who buy second hand might find they have to pay not just for multiplayer but also for things like, let's say, alternate endings for role playing games or extra championships for sports titles.

The customer could be the one collateral casualty in this fight. New games will likely not drop in price and quite a lot of people might be tricked in picking up a used game which lacks features and only find this out when they try to play it.




Electronic Arts is on the war path and the tribe which might get close to annihilation is that of the Used Game. The publisher has already been doing some scouting of the terrain with its Ten Dollars Project, linked with such titles as Mass Effect 2, Battlefield: Bad Company 2 and Dragon Age, and now a full fledged offensive is on the way with the introduction of the Online Passes, initially appearing in Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11. 


The idea behind the move made by Electronic Arts is that players will buy more new games (and route their money directly to the publisher and developer) if there are clear advantages linked to them, while significant disadvantages are connected to used games (which bring money to retailers, but not to those who create and publish the games).

The martial metaphors I used in the first paragraph are well suited to the situation. It's a battle for survival for Electronic Arts and other publishers who, like  Ubisoft, are watching to see what the impact is. They are losing money, the overall economic situation is not helping and videogame development is always more expensive. The publishers need to sell more games, to have more hits on the level of Modern Warfare 2 or Madden NFL, and one way to do it is to limit or even wipe out the used games market.

GameStop claims not to be threatened by the Online Pass concept, but battle lines have been drawn, and soon we might find that new buyers will be getting the full experience from videogames, while those who buy second hand might find they have to pay not just for multiplayer but also for things like, let's say, alternate endings for role playing games or extra championships for sports titles.

The customer could be the one collateral casualty in this fight. New games will likely not drop in price and quite a lot of people might be tricked in picking up a used game which lacks features and only find this out when they try to play it.