Amiga.org
Amiga computer related discussion => General chat about Amiga topics => Topic started by: AmigaNG on March 14, 2012, 08:59:39 AM
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So today in England I heard the slightly sad but not to surprising news that the biggest Gaming high street business, Game and GameStation in the UK may go into administration, I kind of knew it would come with Supermarket stores under cutting the price, online retails under cutting the price and downloadable games stores coming online but its kind of sad that when I go into town their be very few shops left of this kind on the high street. I still like and prefer getting physical copies of my games, maybe i'm showing my age, plus I like looking around the store, online just not the same thing.
I do miss the days I could buy Amiga games on the high street, I remember in 96 and 97 picking up loads of bargains when they where clearing all their Amiga stock.
So what do guys think the future of these gaming and software specialist stores will be? Are you sad to see them go?
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I too have fond memories of going into Game to buy Amiga games with my pocket money, but I can't truthfully say I'll miss them. I haven't bought anything on physical media (music, games or movies) in at least 5 years, everything is downloaded, and actually having a disc now just seems so inconvenient and retro to me now. I think the Game group just outlived their usefulness and failed to move with the times by not morphing into an online business like Steam.
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I miss the days in the late 80's going to my local games shop and spending hours looking over the walls full of games deciding which (usually budget) game to buy this week. I wonder if anybody has any copies of the videos that used to be running advertising the latest games.
I think the writing has been on the wall for a while even without supermarkets undercutting the games stores. Downloads are going to be the main method of distribution and Game/Gamestation (and HMV) really can't compete.
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Can't say I'll miss them much myself, I used to always go into gamestation and buy a fair few pre-owned xbox360 games. But then with Game buying them over they decided to jack up the prices of the pre-owned games and i stopped going in and started using other sources for them.
@VuData
I'm with you there, I used to love going into my old computer shop with my pocket money and spending hours trying to pick a cassette case from the wall. And looking at all the new games for computers and consoles you did'nt have :)
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Wow I thought everyone just purchased 200 floppies and go to Computer Swap meets for their game fulfillment like alot of others in the day.. those are my memories :) Up until 4am on school nights playing the new games..
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I can't say I will miss Game. It has always been a bit bland and overly corporate to me.
To be honest I have never forgiven them for replacing Electronics Boutique, a favourite of my childhood :)
Gamestation I have always loved. When the first one opened in Edinburgh it had masses of retro games and until I moved away around 6 months ago they still had a selection (the section had diminished considerably since the game takeover) and it was possible to get some interesting stuff - I bought a PC-Engine there once. Also, as a result of their lack of market knowledge and generalised pricing it was possible to pick up some real bargains, although this did begin to tighten up.
The news isn't surpirsing as the others have said the times they are a changing and these companies never really managed to stay in the game.
It's a shame for the staff though who are the ones that will suffer the most.
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By the way, are there any high street shops that are privately owned (ie not part of a chain or franchise) and still sell Amiga stuff?
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I can't say I will miss Game. It has always been a bit bland and overly corporate to me.
To be honest I have never forgiven them for replacing Electronics Boutique, a favourite of my childhood :)
Actually EB took over Game, not the other way around. They rebranded themselves as Game in the process.
I used to like EB because it was cheap (something that hasn't continued), but Game was generally a much better shop, and had a bit of character. You'd walk in and there would be loud music blaring out. The Amiga section would be an entire wall of full price titles, then you'd look behind and find the smaller boxes of budget re-releases and accessories. In the middle of the shop, there would be an A1200 on a table with Sensible Soccer or something running. One year there was a Sensible Soccer tournament, an old friend of mine got through to the semi-finals and was a minor celebrity in the local Game for weeks afterwards! There's nothing like that anymore, Game is just overpriced and (as you say) bland. There's no reason to go in, other than to look at game boxes to then buy off Amazon later.
I'm hoping that somebody buys them, and makes them back into a decent shop like they were in the early 90s. Pricing games much closer to online prices would be a big step forward for starters.
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What is defo going to spell then end of high street stores and also some online models is the move towards the big game producers to stop games being sold on.
A lot of them now come with a code you can only use once. If you sell the game on you either cant play online or you have to ask for new code and pay some money.
Now i know this been the way with PC games for long time, but this will kill the second hand market on the consoles and this is where Game, gamestation and a few smaller outlets make their money
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I can't say I will miss Game. It has always been a bit bland and overly corporate to me.
To be honest I have never forgiven them for replacing Electronics Boutique, a favourite of my childhood :)
Gamestation I have always loved. When the first one opened in Edinburgh it had masses of retro games and until I moved away around 6 months ago they still had a selection (the section had diminished considerably since the game takeover) and it was possible to get some interesting stuff - I bought a PC-Engine there once. Also, as a result of their lack of market knowledge and generalised pricing it was possible to pick up some real bargains, although this did begin to tighten up.
The news isn't surpirsing as the others have said the times they are a changing and these companies never really managed to stay in the game.
It's a shame for the staff though who are the ones that will suffer the most.
Gamestation is owned by game. part of the problem is that Game paid well over the odds for gamestation
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I too have fond memories of going into Game to buy Amiga games with my pocket money, but I can't truthfully say I'll miss them. I haven't bought anything on physical media (music, games or movies) in at least 5 years, everything is downloaded, and actually having a disc now just seems so inconvenient and retro to me now. I think the Game group just outlived their usefulness and failed to move with the times by not morphing into an online business like Steam.
I buy a lot of didigital media on my 3ds, xbox, psp, kindle , itunes, steam
what annoys me though is I can not somehow make these not work and sell the copy on, or leave my digital media to anyone in a will
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See the thing is, people in the future will look back and say the day physical game sales stopped was the point in time when retro stopped.
Reason I don't waste my money on FILES via the net is
1. You can get that for free ;)
2. I pay for the packaging/artwork.
3. It has re-sale value.
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By "high street shops", are you talking about the smaller, independent stores that employed savvy, friendly people, whose prices may (*but not always) have been a little higher, but you didn't mind because you used to understand this thing called value?
It doesn't bug me in the least that crappy software stores such as GameStop would go out of business, but it's the same old worthless story repeating itself time and time again:
Small shop that everyone loves expands, opens a few more stores and gets bought up by a larger company who then kills off all the smaller company values and integrity. Large company, by the time it did everything it could to ruin the smaller business model ends up getting absorbed by an even larger company. By this time, all the stores look the same. Robots who do nothing more than earn a mediocre "living" as glorified clerks, robopathically executing their illogical and petty national corporate initiatives, become even further despondent as they eventually end up going out of business themselves because they forgot what customer service is all about and failed to recognize that not every market it is the same as one say, 2000 miles away.
Look at all the superior smaller stores that gave way to larger ones throughout the decades. Now tell me things are better out there in retail today. Somehow (it's no secret really - look at the average consumers spending habits) we've ended up with less choice. Less competition. Less innovation. And ****tier products. That includes the nonsense many software developers/companies are pulling today that basically forces the consumer into being a paying beta testing guinea pig. Yes, I like physical media. I also like knowing when I bought something (especially when it was on cartridge), enough time and care went into it back in the day to know it was the final version. It worked out of box and you didn't have to wait for a revision or other bugs to be worked out AFTER you paid for it. I have no interest in modern gaming today for all of these reasons and more. The few things I've paid and downloaded onto my phone or pad, I've played for less than a few minutes and would have totally forgotten about, if it wasn't for the constant "updates" incessantly bugging me on said devices through the damn app store. lol
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What is defo going to spell then end of high street stores and also some online models is the move towards the big game producers to stop games being sold on.
A lot of them now come with a code you can only use once. If you sell the game on you either cant play online or you have to ask for new code and pay some money.
Now i know this been the way with PC games for long time, but this will kill the second hand market on the consoles and this is where Game, gamestation and a few smaller outlets make their money
Correct. From the developers perspective there's no difference whether you buy it used or pirate it.
"Software as rental, not as property" is coming to the consoles very rapidly.
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As a developer I am very happy with the new download model. It basically cut piracy off in a single swoop, the downside is tht you sell your software for less, but you do make
More sales.
As a software user, I'm happy to not have to worry about losing my disks, or having a massive box to put somewhere... But I'm am at the mercy of the distribution platform... Steam and iTunes for me.
As a child I remember rushing to HMV to buy the latest Album by my favourite band and the whole ritual around experiencing new music, and as such I lament the loss of the "album", iTunes has killed the last vestige of music as an artform... It's nothing more than an entertainment commodity now.
I'm not sure how this new model will affect games, but be sure it have an effect :-/
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As a developer I am very happy with the new download model. It basically cut piracy off in a single swoop, the downside is tht you sell your software for less, but you do make
More sales.
As a software user, I'm happy to not have to worry about losing my disks, or having a massive box to put somewhere... But I'm am at the mercy of the distribution platform... Steam and iTunes for me.
As a child I remember rushing to HMV to buy the latest Album by my favourite band and the whole ritual around experiencing new music, and as such I lament the loss of the "album", iTunes has killed the last vestige of music as an artform... It's nothing more than an entertainment commodity now.
I'm not sure how this new model will affect games, but be sure it have an effect :-/
I know what you mean. I more or less buy all my music on iTunes these days, but I do still like to by the occasional album that I feel is specail to me on CD.
I even bought some newly released music on Vinyl the other day. You really cant beat vinyl packaging it just feels so real. Maybe it my age.
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What is all this crap where certain words automatically make links to other websites ? How long we had this on amiga.org. Dont like it
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I have a freind that is one of the store managers for game. It's a shame for him as he has a wife and kids to support and unemployment in the UK is showing no signs of falling.
I don't have a problem with the download model for games but it does p155 me off that I can't sell them on. Worse still however are the games that require an online check everytime you play them, fine unless your ISP is down for any reason.
As for cost, I own several games that I have retail packs for that I've paid significantly less than the download price for. Fear gold edition, Galactic civilizations 2, Defcom and Uplink all came from Amazon for about half the price of a download or less. Your also at the mercy of the company in question going tits-up of course. Having said that, it's pretty hard to scratch a download and make it unplayable.
All in all my Galactic Civ game has my favoured approach, retail pack plus download.
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As a child I remember rushing to HMV to buy the latest Album by my favourite band and the whole ritual around experiencing new music, and as such I lament the loss of the "album", iTunes has killed the last vestige of music as an artform... It's nothing more than an entertainment commodity now.
This is why I haven't spent money to buy a new CD, since 2003. Sadly, it's only 'cos they keep jacking up the prices, due to "piracy". It's their price gouging that's piracy......
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I even bought some newly released music on Vinyl the other day. You really cant beat vinyl packaging it just feels so real. Maybe it my age.
+1
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as some have pointed out, download content is far from perfect yet, the biggest problem for me is I live in a slight rural area so broadband speed if I'm lucky get just over a 1mb its really annoying as I can't really enjoy most online games, it just too slow, and to download just even the simple updates to games or the ps3 takes ages, reminds me of the old spectrum days, setting it up to load a game and then going for a bike ride or tidying up for half a hour and then finally I can play, this is what I sometime have to do with the ps3, not really progress is it.
Plus like people say the online prices are sometimes more than physical copies and there is going to be less competition if we just have one central store for each platform wich is what seems to be happening at least in the pc market their is a little bit of competition.
so I do feel physical media is still needed.
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As a software user, I'm happy to not have to worry about losing my disks, or having a massive box to put somewhere... But I'm am at the mercy of the distribution platform... Steam and iTunes for me.
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I agree with you. Steam is great, if will only stay this way. Music isn't as easy for me. I also use Goodwill (don't laugh, it's a good source here), ebay, etc.. I am glad I never pitched my old AR turntable :) .
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The only commercial games I play nowadays are small indie games. I'd rather pay 5 bucks to a developer who actually get's my money than 40 bucks to some corporate behemoth.
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There's no substitute for getting a nicely packaged thingy when you buy whatever it is. Downloads just don't cut it for me.
But then, what can I say - I've not bought a CD for years. Bought tons of vinyl records, but no CDs. I think that says something about me (and many others here, it seems) - the packaging and the medium are part of the experience; they give a good album soul somehow, in a way a file downloaded onto your hard disk can't - just like a downloaded game is never as satisfying as, say, a shelf full of those lovely black psygnosis boxes you got in the 90's. Was I the only one who just couldn't get enough of Psygnosis packaging? Equally playing an ADF will never be as satisying as popping a disk in the disk drive.
Maybe I'm just old. :)
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What is all this crap where certain words automatically make links to other websites ? How long we had this on amiga.org. Dont like it
Check your browser, sounds like you may have some kind of "adsense" addon installed.
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Could be the old thing. I buy Vinyl for things that I know will be mastered well, but I download other things that are wall of sound or with low dynamic difference. As for video games, I am a steam/humble bundle user pretty much exclusively. I do miss cartridges tho!
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The only commercial games I play nowadays are small indie games. I'd rather pay 5 bucks to a developer who actually get's my money than 40 bucks to some corporate behemoth.
+1
I'm looking forward to the PC version of The Wasted Lands from Red Wasp Design and Prison Architect from Introversion. Bethesda on the other hand can stick it up their skyrims.
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Could be the old thing. I buy Vinyl for things that I know will be mastered well, but I download other things that are wall of sound or with low dynamic difference. As for video games, I am a steam/humble bundle user pretty much exclusively. I do miss cartridges tho!
Know what you mean. Made me laugh when they were selling the remastered pink floyd box set on iTunes. How that work :)
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Know what you mean. Made me laugh when they were selling the remastered pink floyd box set on iTunes. How that work :)
Well, because 48Kbit AAC is just as good as CD redbook donthca know !!! :roflmao:
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Correct. From the developers perspective there's no difference whether you buy it used or pirate it.
I read a good article about this. The argument for "pre-owned" is that the people trading their games in, then spend the money they've gained on buying more games (which they otherwise wouldn't be able to afford). So, indirectly, developers do lose out if there is no 2nd hand market.
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Being a games junkie I am kinda struggling to know where I'm going to get my fix now. Whilst I have downloaded games like Rift I generally still like the boxes as with Warcraft, STO and SWTOR... plus the stuff on the PS3 like my latest FFXIII-2 I get from Game. I have been using Game since the days on the Amiga and I always kinda hoped they would survive. They are a great source of interest to me cus often I go in and we just have a chat. They also let me know whats coming up and I can pre order. I prefer the boxes and the content and never feel like I have gotten the game till I have the case and the manual. Same with music, even though I do put all my CDs on the MP3 I still have the originals.
I kinda sense the download brigade will eventually destroy much of the digital market and we will see HMV get pushed over next along with the big book stores, magazines, music retailers on the high street. Its more than a loss of facility its a loss of human interaction that I miss. I did enjoy going into Lansdown Computers here and spending an age talking about computers, software and games. If all this stuff is coming over the wire or through the courrier we really are going to lose so much.
So in losing Game we can chalk up another tick onto the anonymous Facebook society of self actualisation and human interaction via text only.... and a big cross sadly against true human contact. But then I did enjoy Amiga groups way more than forums. Must be getting old I guess. The next gen can have their Facebook and Amazon... personally I liked clubs and real shops. Something about 'eye contact' and real flesh and blood.
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Hi,
I will miss them, basically I like having discs for my computer. Just think as the old CD's and DVD's go away and more people start downloading their games, music, and movies, the internet compainies are going to start modding the bandwidth, allowing you just so much and then charging you for the extra bandwidth that you need. Don't say it isn't going to happen , just 2 years ago I had unlimited bandwidth, then they cut it down to 500 gigabyte, then just last month it was cut in half again down to 250 gigabyte plus they raised the price by $10, and then to top it off Microsheet is coming up with updates every other day (using up more of my precious bandwidth). So you don't think you will miss those CD's and DVD's think again.
By the way the politicians are once again discussing taxing the internet by bandwidth usage after all we computer people have been having too much fun for to long.
smerf
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Hi,
I will miss them, basically I like having discs for my computer. Just think as the old CD's and DVD's go away and more people start downloading their games, music, and movies, the internet compainies are going to start modding the bandwidth, allowing you just so much and then charging you for the extra bandwidth that you need. Don't say it isn't going to happen , just 2 years ago I had unlimited bandwidth, then they cut it down to 500 gigabyte, then just last month it was cut in half again down to 250 gigabyte plus they raised the price by $10, and then to top it off Microsheet is coming up with updates every other day (using up more of my precious bandwidth). So you don't think you will miss those CD's and DVD's think again.
By the way the politicians are once again discussing taxing the internet by bandwidth usage after all we computer people have been having too much fun for to long.
smerf
I agree.
there is nothing like walking into a shop and buying a physical product, getting it home and playing it.
I recently got a ps3 and a copy of Infamous 2. In it came a code allowing me to get the first Infamous and a reduced cost through download. Great I thought until I noticed the game is 7.8gb in size. Thats 7.8gb of bandwidth allowance that my ISP is gonna take off my "unlimited" (which I have just found is actually 250gb under their fair usage policy. After which they will impose restrictions on my line up to and including cutting my my line completely) allowance. Now if I had got that game from Game in the first place i would have probably paid the same for a new copy and not needed to bother with downloads.
There is one thought I have always had at the back of my head regarding all this download buisness. What happens if the service suddenly goes out of buisness. What happens to all my content that I purchased. Especially if your someone that uses a cloud based service such as On Live. Sure I could backup content from Steam, for example. But there are a lot of other services that use this cloud based model where nothing is physically stored on your system. So you can't actually back anything up. What happens then? And what happens if my backup suddenly becomes corrupt?
I know people will argue that ownin a physcial copy puts you just as much at risk. For example the boxes of Amiga floppies that are already coroding or losing data due to use. But when it comes to modern media, so long as you look after them right, should last for ever almost.
Also there is the second hand market that these shops provide. Something that the game industry seems to working very hard on destroying.
plus it just looks cool to have boxes sat on a shelf. Like with my collection of 2600, 7800, C64, NES, SNES, Mega Drive, Amiga, Playstation, Playstation 2 and XBOX 360 games. looking at them is like a little pat on the back to myself. because I have worked hard and bought them from a shop with money I have earned. Something that downloads doesn't seem to give.
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Actually EB took over Game, not the other way around. They rebranded themselves as Game in the process.
QUOTE]
Apologies.
In my teenage mind they replaced them.
It was EB then suddenly every EB was Game.
I have never liked Game for some reason.
The shops are too uniform. At least with EB and Gamestation there was a feeling you might uncover a hidden gem somewhere in the store.
Plus the staff are annoying. I know they are trying to provide good customer service and they are nice and friendly but I hate shops where the staff approach me asking if I need their help.
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it would seem that there are a few interested parties in purchasing Game. So maybe it's not all a complete loss.
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Wow I thought everyone just purchased 200 floppies and go to Computer Swap meets for their game fulfillment like alot of others in the day.. those are my memories :) Up until 4am on school nights playing the new games..
This is what I remember, think I went into a shop once and bought some games from the junk bin. But was more fun and more social to buy boxes of blank disks and hang out with a group of friends.
Use to have a usual run that we did during the week going around peoples houses. I miss having that, met so many people. Even a dude that had dial up internet and a room full of disks :-)
The BBS scene filled the gap for awhile after that and PC LAN gatherings but still wasn't the same as the C64/Amiga days :-)
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Hi,
I will miss them, basically I like having discs for my computer. Just think as the old CD's and DVD's go away and more people start downloading their games, music, and movies, the internet compainies are going to start modding the bandwidth, allowing you just so much and then charging you for the extra bandwidth that you need. Don't say it isn't going to happen , just 2 years ago I had unlimited bandwidth, then they cut it down to 500 gigabyte, then just last month it was cut in half again down to 250 gigabyte plus they .....smerf
Just read this and had to reply a little OT but I'd kill for a 250GB cap. Try living in NZ for awhile. LOL :-)
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No reason anyone should ever wring out a 250 GB cap. I use Netflix a fair bit, do a ton of online gaming and torrenting, and never even approach my ISP's cap.
I do have fond memories of every Saturday or two, going up to the shopping mall on the North end of my town and picking up a new Amiga game way back when.
I haven't bought a retail packaged game in likely 10 years now though, however.
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Just read this and had to reply a little OT but I'd kill for a 250GB cap. Try living in NZ for awhile. LOL :-)
Sky in UK give truly unlimited downlaods and no traffic shapping at all.
Dont slow down or block torrents on any ports
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Caps are things you have to live with because of the explosion in internet capable devices. My TV, XBox, Apple TV, sundry iOS and Android tablets and phones and collection of Macs and Amigas all share one ADSL line. Even though there's only three of us in the house there can be six or eight devices using the ADSL. We've hit our cap once or twice and the whole thing just slows down to dialup for the rest of the month. VERY annoying, but it's better than in the past where a bill that looks more like a mortgage statement appears in the post....
We have a 250/250 HGB cap, 250,GB peak, 250 GB off peak....
Just read this and had to reply a little OT but I'd kill for a 250GB cap. Try living in NZ for awhile. LOL :-)
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We have a 250/250 HGB cap, 250,GB peak, 250 GB off peak....
60GB cap here no off peak/on peak, $55 NZD a month for naked ADSL2 and $11.50 NZD for a VOIP phone. Can double to 120GB for an extra $30 NZD :-) Then that's it dial up internet for me :-)
Download linux iso's, stream tv, os/software updates (5 odd pcs and server)... still somehow on 60GB have managed to still have 15GB left each month.
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In the US at least, you rarely have more than 1 or at most 2 options in a given region for high speed internet. Say hello to your friendly neighbourhood monopoly pricing and restrictions
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I agree.
there is nothing like walking into a shop and buying a physical product, getting it home and playing it.
I recently got a ps3 and a copy of Infamous 2. In it came a code allowing me to get the first Infamous and a reduced cost through download. Great I thought until I noticed the game is 7.8gb in size. Thats 7.8gb of bandwidth allowance that my ISP is gonna take off my "unlimited" (which I have just found is actually 250gb under their fair usage policy. After which they will impose restrictions on my line up to and including cutting my my line completely) allowance. Now if I had got that game from Game in the first place i would have probably paid the same for a new copy and not needed to bother with downloads.
Dear Customer,
This email is to advise you that last month you exceeded the usage allowance for your BT Total Broadband Option 1 service.
Your current monthly usage allowance is 10GB.
Your total usage for last month was 12GB.
Additional usage is charged in units of 5GB, at £5 per 5GB. Based on your usage last month a charge of £5 will be applied to your next bill.
Great news! To help you keep track of your usage we provide a usage monitor which shows on a daily basis, how much of your allowance you have used and how much is remaining. To access the usage monitor you will need the log-in details for your online account. If you haven't set one up then you can register at www.bt.com/mybt (http://www.bt.com/appsyouraccount/public/index.do?siteArea=con.mya&s_cid=BUP_email_UC_CHRG_mybt_registration) or if you already have an online account click here (http://www.bt.com/broadbandusagemonitor?DN=01623513477&s_cid=BUP_email_UC_CHRG_usage_monitor) to access the usage monitor.
To avoid usage charges, you can always upgrade to one of our broadband products with a higher usage allowance or go for unlimited usage. To find out about your options and to upgrade, please go to click here (http://www.productsandservices.bt.com/consumerProducts/displayTopic.do?topicId=27281&s_cid=BUP_email_UC_CHRG_usage_upgrade) or call 0800 707 6044, available 8am-9pm on weekdays and 9am-6pm during the weekend.
For more information on usage allowances and charges, please see our Broadband Usage Policy (http://bt.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/10495/c/346/?s_cid=BUP_email_UC_CHRG_usage_policy).
Best wishes,
BT Broadband team
Please note that this is an automatically generated email for your information only. Unfortunately we cannot respond to 'replies' to this address.
:python:
Hmmm...I must be on a crappy deal then!
That was my sister who pushed it over 10GB when she came over before Christmas on youtube and what not. First time ever it went over, I think my usual usage it about 6GB at most. Yet I don't get credit for under using...
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I suppose a 250gb cap doesnt sound too bad. Yet I got an email telling me my isp was restricting my line after heavy usage. This was from watching a few episodes of inspector gadget on netflix. Though Virgin ADSL seem to make the rules up as they go along.
regardless I stand by my post saying I will always prefer a physical copy of something over a download.