CD's Games days are numbered??

Mr_Wonderful

With the introduction of the X-box in October and sony releasing a 40GBHDD with internet connection for the ps2, are the days for going into your local store to buy a game numbered?? Nomore do u need a cd just connect up to the relevant website and download your ps2 game into your harddrive. But then the other important questions arrive like unmetered flat rate internet access in Ireland and so on....Oh by the way if anyone is interested in buying a ps2 with a modchip, AR2 and regionX (play any region type DVD) give me a shout!

D-Generate

Hell no CD's games days are no where near numbered. Firstly PC's still has games coming on CDs unless you have an ultra-fast internet connection to the internet where you can download them off warez sites. And also what connection does the ps2 have. It must be pretty fast to download games and i seriously doubt that it is going to be a 40gbhd.

fisty

ps2 uses dsl i think - well mine has 2 usb ports and has a few infrared connections and **** - it also has a 5" drive bay in the back - must be for Hdd

Kensai

I have thought about this a bit,

There are pro's and con's to both arguments.

CD's;
It is a tangible product, you can touch it, caress it( ) or even smell it in the case of Gran Turismo 2.
Resale, you can resellany old game in Game or EB.
If you are relatively careful with your cd's, they can and will last years. WHta happens if your HDD breaks? Where are you then?

DownLoading;
It will most likely be faster in years to come, taking minute's or even second's to download a game!
There is also the laziness factor, having to go out to a shop, or you switch on your PS2 or PC surf to a website, and download it and go off have a beer etc.
Also availabitity, whereas you can only buy certain games in shops, online you can buy any game from any maprt of the world.

Of course these are only a few arguments, but i believe them to be important

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<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Sun Tzu:

All warfare is based on deception.

Hence, when able to attack, we must seem unable; when
using our forces, we must seem inactive; when we are near, we
must make the enemy believe we are far away; when far away, we
must make him believe we are near.</font>

GreenHell

Any intensive downloading for games of the net will happen in the next the next generation of consoles until then well cd's will continue to be the main stay for gaming, for pc anyway.

chernobyl

i think in the future you will still have to go to the shop to buy the box.

you open the box and inside theres a piece of paper saying "thankyou for you purchase of whatever, you can get the game at this ip, using this username/password".

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Ashley Lyn Cafagna

popinfresh

Well if Game-downloading starts to happen, all us Irish with our 56k modems will be fuked.

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i hate you guys......

Xterminator

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by popinfresh:
Well if Game-downloading starts to happen, all us Irish with our 56k modems will be fuked.

</font>

Nah, the ADSL will be available in most of the country in september. They haven't released prices yet!

Hecate

even ADSL at its fastest would be a bit too slow to download games over.

Greenbean

a)Regardless of what connections these consoles have, most of Ireland won't support them (you not only need dsl, you need it country-wide and you need it to be of such wide spread use that it is reliable, not just barely existing) - it would be commerical sucide to say "downloading of games only".
b)As hecate pointed out adsl would be far far too slow, even if you only downloaded parts of the game as you needed them (eg use the internet connection and a central server like a remote cd-rom) it would be far too slow and unreliable.
c)40 gigs of a harddrive will not permanently hold your games - with each game expected to be gigs of data. Nor is a harddrive a reliable way of "owning" a game - you could easily loose 100's of pounds of worth of games in one accident. It is very likely you would have a hardcopy lying around somewhere (or that amazing ultra fast netconnection as a backup service).

If the suggestion was that cd's days are numbered because of the move from cd into new formats, that might be more likely in the medium term - but not the short term. Cd's are more than enough to hold ton's of core game engine code, they are a very standard format and likely to hang about now they've caught on for another few years yet.

chernobyl

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Greenbean:
b)As hecate pointed out adsl would be far far too slow, even if you only downloaded parts of the game as you needed them (eg use the internet connection and a central server like a remote cd-rom) it would be far too slow and unreliable.
</font>

I have a constant stream of 1.5Mbytes/sec (which is DSL @ its fastest and i get a game in a couple of mins).
i think thats fast enough.
even DSL at its slowest (ie)60Kbytes/sec and you can have a game in 2hours, which is still fast.

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Ashley Lyn Cafagna

Haer

Re:Hard drive failing.
Look at it this way. To buy a game you are likely to have an 'account' on the site you bought it from.
If you have paid for the game, im sure there will be the ability to redownload any games in case of loss,etc.
ofcourse Piracy becomes a big problem

popinfresh

I think game-downloading won't start because it would be too easy to find a way of pirating, but if it did start, the cost of games would be greatly reduced.

Greenbean

popinfresh: "I think game-downloading won't start because it would be too easy to find a way of pirating, but if it did start, the cost of games would be greatly reduced."

I know that seems to be the obvious answer, but theres no guarantees that the publishers would reduce the prices. The main cost in games isn't the box and packaging, its labour costs and advertising.

chernobyl: "I have a constant stream of 1.5Mbytes/sec (which is DSL @ its fastest and i get a game in a couple of mins)." I'd say thats the slowest it could possibly be if the servers could serve everyone at that speed for joesoap to consider it - thats not the infrastructure of today.

chernobyl

I meant to say that 1.5mbytes is ADSL at its fastest.
so you think 1.5mbytes (not bits) is slow?

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Ashley Lyn Cafagna

Firefox

The CD Format of distributing a game will remain but mass online gaming through consoles and other devices will be the next big thing. It's a shame but the Dreamcast had massive potential to pioneer this with games like PSO and Q3 they proved that it could be done. Aren't Sega and Pace bringing out a set top box where you can only download games on to it?

Fenix

AFAIK teh ps2 connection's will be cable not DSL, whiich can give d/l rates of average 55kb/s, The internet conections are more aimed at on-line console gaming than a new method of buying/getting the games (possibily an online function like interactive TV is like atm, being able to order from GamePlay and stuff) but imo, it would kinda of take away from the whole simplicity of the console... the run of the mill console gamer wants to get the game drive it in and play away, not mess about d/lin games from the internet...
i donno, just my opinions...

DrunkLeprachaun

What sane person would download games with the dreamcast's 33k modem?

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If there's one thing I hate, it's people.

Jimi-Spandex

Drunk Leprechaun

there was a broad band adapter released for dc in the us, i would assume that this box will only be released there therefore having broadband capabilities, sega has its own isp in the us, unlike here

OConnor

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by DrunkLeprachaun:
What sane person would download games with the dreamcast's 33k modem?
</font>

Its 56 K in the USA and In Japan.
Besides, thats a rhetorical question , as you cannot download anything onto a Dreamcast (about a megabyte of storage on a VMU i think). thatd mean like ... (/me thinks) 500 vmus !!!!!!11

orangerooster

definitley not with the inherent risk of credit card numbers being stolen away the dys of the shop will always be with us and the download times of that kind of thing until we get broadband are massive though save games and maby even ntire magazines could be zapped straight to youre ps2

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dont open ... that door- resident evil 1

Can you imagine how long it would take to DL an Xbox game on a 56k.