Poll of the Day > Are physical copies better than downloads?

(+) Yeah! (+)

With streaming movies you dont get the same 4K quality as a blu ray, is it the same with games?

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I got kids, so physical copies of anything are a nono

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EvilMegas posted...

I got kids, so physical copies of anything are a nono

Get digital kids sucka.

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yeah downloaded games only run at 720p-1080p to save HDD space while the discs do full 4k

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So mass effect andromeda for example. Ive got it on Xbox game pass on my series X. But it doesnt look great, should I have got a disc?

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yeah the disc would have been a higher resolution

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FatalAccident posted...

So mass effect andromeda for example. Ive got it on Xbox game pass on my series X. But it doesnt look great, should I have got a disc?

No. Dont even play it

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Yes because if you bought it and it's taken down from the store then you are screwed. That's What happened with mvc2 and earthworm jim on xbox and ps3.

Pros and cons to both mediums

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Discs scratch too easily

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BADoglick posted...

Discs scratch too easily

I have never, in my life, scratched a game disc. Sounds like you should take better care of your games? Or you're not worried about the money, cause mama pays for em?

Physical is ALWAYS better, because you actually own the game. It can never been taken away. "Purchases" digital downloads is only paying for a rental fee.

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reason posted...

I have never, in my life, scratched a game disc. Sounds like you should take better care of your games? Or you're not worried about the money, cause mama pays for em?

Physical is ALWAYS better, because you actually own the game. It can never been taken away. "Purchases" digital downloads is only paying for a rental fee.

That sounds like a giant lie.

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reason posted...

Physical is ALWAYS better, because you actually own the game. It can never been taken away. "Purchases" digital downloads is only paying for a rental fee.

people always say this but it's literally never happened to me and i own hundreds of digital games on a steam account i've had for 11 years

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TheWitchMorgana posted...

people always say this but it's literally never happened to me and i own hundreds of digital games on a steam account i've had for 11 years

It's happened on shit like battleborn but those shit games have no one playing them anyway.

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DirtBasedSoap posted...

yeah the disc would have been a higher resolution

You better be right bub I just came out here to pick up a physics copy of this game

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EvilMegas posted...

No. Dont even play it

Andromeda was good man.

pretty terrible by mass effect standards dont get me wrong, cos the bar is set so high. But as an action shooter RPG it was actually good. Played it today while waiting for NBA 2k to install and forgot how much fun I had with it.

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On the whole they both have their pros and cons. Physical items can be shared and cannot be taken from you, but if they're damaged or stolen then you're screwed. Digital copies are freely available to re-download, but only as long as the server is active. If the source ever closes then that's it.

I've been burned more than once on both physical and digital games so I know full well that neither is infallible. It really just comes down to personal preference. I lean toward physical, but I don't mind digital if it's the only option or the price is low enough.

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EvilMegas posted...

That sounds like a giant lie.

Yep, taking care of your games is a huge lie.

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I prefer digital. Even with physical copies today youre still downloading the majority of the game most times. The discs are just a form of DRM.

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reason posted...

Yep, taking care of your games is a huge lie.

Yes.

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I personally prefer physical... My brother does, as well. My mom was asking about the PS5, and my brother and I both asked that if she got one for either of us that it was the one that plays physical games...

TheWitchMorgana posted...

people always say this but it's literally never happened to me and i own hundreds of digital games on a steam account i've had for 11 years

It happened with the new Ducktales, didnt it?
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a game being delisted from store fronts isn't the same as a game you own being removed from your library


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TheWitchMorgana posted...

a game being delisted from store fronts isn't the same as a game you own being removed from your library

"2K is ending virtual currency sales platinum in Battleborn as of Feb. 24, 2020. The game's servers will remain active and the game will continue to be playable until January 2021, according to 2K, but after that Battleborn will no longer be playable including the game's single-player campaign"


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Some physical copies have resale value as collectors items.

So your purchase of a physical game could appreciate over time.

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xcrimx posted...

Yes because if you bought it and it's taken down from the store then you are screwed. That's What happened with mvc2 and earthworm jim on xbox and ps3.

Unless it has changed, afaik any game you purchased digital on Xbox live can always be redownloaded. It can't be purchased anymore, or "found" on the store, but if you go to your owned games that are ready to install, you can download it again from there.

I'm all for digital on games. 90% or more of the games I play, I play online multiplayer anyways, so digital has no downside for me.

I'm fairly certain a great deal of "physical" game releases are literally unplayable without downloading additional files anyways.
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ultra magnus13 posted...

physical" game releases are literally unplayable without downloading additional files anyways

you can play in offline mode

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I'm a hard core physical media owner, but I've slowly been moving to only buying select games physical. basically, anything Nintendo I want physical, Yakuza I want Physical, etc.

But for most games these days, digital suits me just fine.

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I go physical because I assume one of my machines will break down the line so it's better to be able to play the games on a new machine then have them lost to time assuming the machine that broke can't access the online service.

My Wii died, for instance. I can't play the games I bought on there anymore.

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Garlands_Soul posted...

My Wii died, for instance. I can't play the games I bought on there anymore.

Same, actually. Since I had a Wii U and physical games, I was still able to play my Wii games...
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My sisters and I typically get physical games. We borrow from each other and that's not possible with digital yet AFAIK.

The few non-steam digital games I bought were because the Nintendo gold coins were expiring (really dumb that they expire, but that's how Nintendo gets more money out of you, I guess).

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SpeedDemon20 posted...

My sisters and I typically get physical games. We borrow from each other and that's not possible with digital yet AFAIK.

I think there is a way to share them, but I dont know how. My friend says he does with his brother. But I think internet is required on both sides, and something else. And only for one system, I think...

But I do like physical because I do the same. My brother and I borrow games from each other. And with physical, he can borrow the game without the system. Especially if Im using the system...
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I prefer physical media when it comes to games but with films or music digital is more convenient for me.

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Imagine buying physical games in 2020

This post was brought to you by the digital download gang

In all seriousness digital is far superior

You can download games a few days in advance and have it ready to go on launch night instead of having to wait the next day or longer if you choose to get a physical copy

People like to argue that you don't own digital games and if one day the servers get shut down you'll lose access to said games but physical is no better off

If the servers get shut down ie PSN gets shut down for good and you reinstall a game there won't be any updates/patches that fixed the game so you basically have a glorified paperweight

Another thing is you'll always have the digital copy in your library and they can't take that away unless you're dumb enough to get permabanned

The only time I can recall losing access to a game is the Silent Hills/PT demo but that was more on Konami than anything else plus it was a demo anyway

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Physical also takes up less room on the system or card, IIRC. At least for switch...
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LinkPizza posted...

I think there is a way to share them, but I dont know how. My friend says he does with his brother. But I think internet is required on both sides, and something else. And only for one system, I think...

But I do like physical because I do the same. My brother and I borrow games from each other. And with physical, he can borrow the game without the system. Especially if Im using the system...

Dang, you are right:
"Nintendo Switch Lite guide: How to share digital games | VentureBeat" https://venturebeat.com/2019/09/23/nintendo-switch-lite-guide-how-to-share-digital-games/amp/

That's complicated AF though.

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Both have advantages and disadvantages. I mostly buy digital because it works out cheaper for me.

For the mention of Battleborn access shutting down, that isn't because of digital, that is because of games as a service. Everyone is losing it, discs will be coasters, etc. Even single player has forced online, and when they no longer support it, you no longer get it.
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captainjeff87 posted...

Imagine buying physical games in 2020

I don't need to as I already do that.

In all seriousness digital is far superior

Not for me.

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Physical--->digital. All day everyday. You can, ya know, sell them when you are done. Or let a friend borrow it. Can you do that with digital? Nope.

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SteveNasti posted...

Physical--->digital. All day everyday. You can, ya know, sell them when you are done. Or let a friend borrow it. Can you do that with digital? Nope.

You can let a friend "borrow" games in your digital library on Steam, at least.

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Not really... Most games have huge patches and some are literally unplayable without them, like Control UE and MW.

ultra magnus13 posted...

I'm fairly certain a great deal of "physical" game releases are literally unplayable without downloading additional files anyways.

Where the heck are you getting that from? Maybe a handful of AAA titles that got rushed at launch or something, but other than that the vast majority of games that aren't primarily online/multiplayer are good to go straight out the box.

captainjeff87 posted...

Another thing is you'll always have the digital copy in your library and they can't take that away unless you're dumb enough to get permabanned

That's far from the only way to lose a digital game. As I said, I've permanently lost access to digital games that I purchased before, when Sony shut down the service hosting those games. It's why I had no qualms hacking my system and using backups of those games.

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Personally, when it comes to Switch games (since physical PC games aren't really a thing anymore), I tend to buy physical copies of larger releases unless it's something I expect to want to play impulsively, such as Smash or Animal Crossing. Those, I buy digitally so I can always access them on demand without needing to carry around extra game carts.

FatalAccident posted...

With streaming movies you dont get the same 4K quality as a blu ray, is it the same with games?

Digital downloads aren't streaming. With streaming, you don't download and store a copy of the product, you download small parts of it at a time and delete them as they're consumed. That means you're limited by your connection speed and the speed of the server, and since higher quality video takes up more bandwidth, it's generally harder to get higher-quality stuff streamed than to watch it from a disc.

With most digitally distributed games, you're not streaming them, you're downloading the full game and storing a copy of it (streaming games is something various companies keep trying, but it generally struggles to get off the ground because most people don't have the necessary internet speed to avoid troublesome lag). That way, you're not limited by your internet connection, you're just limited by the read/write speed of whatever storage medium you're using. Sometimes, that works out to better performance than a physical copy, since optical media is generally pretty slow compared to HDD's (and especially SSD's). Other times, it ends up being worse because being able to read from an optical drive and the HDD at the same time can yield performance boosts (off-hand, I don't actually know how often that kind of parallel processing is used to optimize games). In general, though, you aren't likely to see major performance advantages either way.

EvilMegas posted...

"2K is ending virtual currency sales platinum in Battleborn as of Feb. 24, 2020. The game's servers will remain active and the game will continue to be playable until January 2021, according to 2K, but after that Battleborn will no longer be playable including the game's single-player campaign"

That's not simply delisting it from the storefront, that's shutting down the game's servers, which renders it unplayable for everyone regardless of their purchase format. That's a downside to server-based single-player modes, not a downside to digital.

Exceptions exist, but by and large, people are still able to play copies they've already purchased of games that have been removed from digital storefronts. Most recently, people who bought Cyberpunk digitally on PS4 are still able to play it (as much as they ever could >.>), people just no longer have the option of buying new digital copies. It's quite rare to actually see people's ability to play games they purchased taken away from them.

reason posted...

Physical is ALWAYS better, because you actually own the game. It can never been taken away. "Purchases" digital downloads is only paying for a rental fee.

You're only ever paying for a license regardless of your purchase format. Hypothetically, they have just as much legal right to revoke your license to a physical game as to a digital one. Obviously, it's significantly less practically possible to enforce such a revocation for a physical game than for a digital one, but legally, they're no different. Continuing to play a physical copy after having your license revoked is no less illegal than playing a pirated digital copy, as much as it seems better because all they can really do is say "don't play that anymore."

Of course, that's largely a moot point because that almost never happens. As much as people are paranoid about digital games being taken away, it's far, far more common for people to lose physical games to theft, fire, or any other manner of physical destruction than for digital games to be revoked.

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i'll stick by my original point. Physical copies can appreciate in value.

Chrono Trigger Physical SNES copy vs. Digital PC Release

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I prefer digital. Steam just makes game purchasing extremely convenient and it has killer deals.

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KJ StErOiDs posted...

I prefer digital. Steam just makes game purchasing extremely convenient and it has killer deals.

Steam does. But not all digital games are like that...
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adjl posted...

You're only ever paying for a license regardless of your purchase format. Hypothetically, they have just as much legal right to revoke your license to a physical game as to a digital one. Obviously, it's significantly less practically possible to enforce such a revocation for a physical game than for a digital one, but legally, they're no different. Continuing to play a physical copy after having your license revoked is no less illegal than playing a pirated digital copy, as much as it seems better because all they can really do is say "don't play that anymore."

What are you talking about? If you purchase a game, unless they physically come to my house to take it, I can play it forever. Your post made NO sense at all?

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