Can’t use the word “buy” if you can’t actually buy the thing.
Even if you keep your machine offline, many discs have required updates included.
Any one of them could brick your console.
If its not running freedom respecting software and standard hardware, you probably didn’t own it anyways. (Unless you airgap everything and risk assess all new software with a test machine, like the feds.)
Honestly, I can’t justify spending $80 (or actually $95 in my country) at all, period.
Relax and wait for pirates, especially when PC launch comes 😏
Relevant xkcd: https://xkcd.com/488/
This is why I jailbroke my kindle.
Kobo’s are much better
Yeah, well, I have a Kindle and I don’t have the money for a kobo, especially when my Kindle still works
Your kindle won’t work for very much longer.
I can’t justify spending $80 on a game I won’t own.
I can’t justify spending $80 on a game I won’t sell.
I can’t justify spending $80 on a game I won’t share with friends.
Why pre order? Would they run out? It makes no sense without a physical copy
Pre-orders usually let you download the game data before the release date and time so you can play it instantly when it releases.
If the authentication servers can keep up ofcourse.
So they signed up for that subscription right away! (I do believe if you pre-order your auto enroll for the subscription)
I don’t like the GTA, but this “new Business” is bad for all…… The game no is launch in CD/BD and not is you own….
i cant justify spending 80 usd for a game when there are so many amazing games that are free or are under 5 usd
GTA6 doesn’t even have a PC release date, correct? Just funny because of the publisher in the screenshot.
Any word on Linux desktop support? Last time I played a Rockstar game was RDR2 on Win10 and somehow my cloud saves through their platform got corrupted.
Open to trying it but wondering if the platform I have will even be an option.
RDR2 got cracked by Empress a year after release. It worked fine on Linux
And this is a mere part of why great game developers don’t give a shit about Linux.
*publishers I think you mean. Game devs are more than happy to have a captive audience, since they know that the publisher will pay them the same regardless of the outcome of the game with the only success metric on their compensation side being whether or not they’re employed for 1 more year
they probably havnt figured out how to make it digital only the PC, without it get pirated somehow.
PC has been digital only for at least 15 years.
Mostly digital only. Some indie devs will occasionally release disk versions of their games. I’ve got one on my horrid fucken book shelf right now.
Likely the same as GTA 5. Single player only
Yeah I’m just looking for single player. Never played online with any of their titles
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Saw an article a few weeks back that said something about how Rockstar was ensuring availability for the game. Availability? For a download?
Also, why bother pre-ordering? The whole idea of pre-ordering is so that you can ensure you have the game when it comes out because there are limitations on supply meeting demand on the printing of a disc. Again, this is a download. Other than some artificially limited exclusives (which, again, are downloads and will probably be made available again at a later date) there is no reason to pre-order. Unless you want the game to just automatically install for you, I can’t think of a real reason for pre-ordering this. (Disclosure: I am old and I practically never download big games–not at launch anyway)
Bro, you don’t get it.
My preorder tells Rockstar that I am okay with them charging the most for the opportunity to rent the game from them while I pay them additional money for multiplayer. It also means that I can preload the game, because I have been conditioned to have 0 patience, and the thought of waiting to give Rockstar more of my time and money hurts me physically.
Let me have this bro. Please. If I spend the equivalent of a weeks worth of groceries on a game that is going to essentially be the same game as the last game, I can finally feel something for a brief moment.
Had me in the first part, ngl
Didn’t forget, on PlayStation if you download (even pre-orders) you can’t refund it!
So if you buy it and download it now, you don’t have to deal with those pesky reviews.
I also don’t understand what pre-ordering means nowadays. sometimes they offer you some sort of extra thing, which makes sense. but why would you preorder if you get literally nothing for it
Even if you’re old, those are solid arguments.
Even if your IQ < 1 those are solid arguments.
If I were going to make an argument for pre-ordering digital games, the only one I can think of is basically that you can pre-download the game.
Instead of waiting on a 300GB download when the game launches, you simply get a quick patch (probably a few KB in size) to actually activate the game files that you have already downloaded ahead of time. It means your wait is only a minute or two, instead of potentially hours (depending on your local internet speeds).
Maybe if it allowed access to an open beta ahead of the official launch date. I’ve seen a few games do things like that, where the full game releases on {date}, but pre-orders can play the open beta starting like two weeks ahead of time. If it’s something like a competitive game where familiarity with the in-game systems will matter, having access to that beta could be valuable. Even if the systems get updated for the final launch, you’re simply reading patch notes and adjusting your play-style accordingly. But everyone who didn’t pre-order is starting from 0.
That’s literally the only justification I can think of. Because yeah, the pre-order bonus content stuff is almost always artificially gated (it could just be available for everyone right from the start) and will almost certainly be made available to everyone at a later date anyways.
If I were going to make an argument for pre-ordering digital games, the only one I can think of is basically that you can pre-download the game
Sure but that leaves no valid reason to pre-order a few months before launch, instead of a few days.
Sure but that leaves no valid reason to pre-order a few months before launch, instead of a few days.
Ok, I got one! You’re in the process of declaring bankruptcy, your credit card is about to be revoked, and if you pre-order the game now, the cost will be included in the credit cards that get zeroed out. Even better, unlike a physical game, there’s nothing for the court to seize!
A fringe benefit of digital games - they have no monetary value, therefore they can never be seized by courts to pay debts and fines! They’re bankruptcy and judgment proof!
Or really, any scenario where you have the ability to pay now, won’t have the ability to pay later, but can still get some benefit from it in the future.
Not sure if it’s the same where you live but where I live, there are high interest rate bank accounts that require a minimum spend per month. A pre-order could help you hit that maybe. I don’t know that’s the only thing that comes to mind. Plus if it’s on Steam, you could refund if it turns out bad anyways. If it’s not on Steam, however, welp.
Tell you what: Finish making the game, patch out all the bugs, add some DLC, and I’ll consider paying you $5 for the GOTY edition in a few years. Best I can do.
DLC is shit and ruins game balance in GOTY editions.
Welcome to the game! Here’s all this amazing loot you bought! Now your first quest is to kill that rat over there with your brand new Fire Sword. Oh yeah, here’s your Anglic Armour and your Awesome Horse Armour. You’ll have to lug that around in your inventory for a few hours until you find the horse quest though.
Chet watching the brain damaged mailman sell a bunch of random shit to him.
lol this exact thing happened to me in Dying Light.
I was used to DLC being a new world to explore at an appropriate time like in Dark Souls. I didn’t expect to be given items that invalidate the first 15 hours of the game. (I didn’t use them, but still, it’s unpleasant to have to exert that much willpower when starting a new game…)
I’m going to disagree with you. Things like Shivering Isles added replay value to Oblivion and, to my memory, didn’t include anything that would overpower you in a new game.
I agree with both of you, I think it comes down to the scope and type of DLC. An expansion size DLC like Shivering Isles tends to fit in nicely with the rest of a game because the developer needs to plan out when and where you can start to access the new stuff, but a lot of smaller DLC like bonus weapons can be integrated pretty poorly because they want you to get the cool little thing you paid money for and it’s easier to put it in a hard to miss chest or just give it to you early on.
I’ve never played a game that was ruined like this. so I’m gonna say it’s an issue of shitty games doing shitty game things
Fallout: New Vegas is like this. With all of the DLCs you start with some overpowered weapons that makes the first serious quest silly
Eh, depends on the game.
Plus, you don’t have to use it if you don’t want to.
One counterpoint to that argument is that you might not know what’s OP, what’s a normal balance level, and what’s gonna be cosmetic when first starting a game.
Very possible but if it’s something that mattered to you, you could probably look it up.
Maybe, but I would be worried about spoilers personally. You can only experience a game freshly once, once you know what’s coming it’s never the same.
I absolutely hate it. I always have to try and remember all the random crap that was thrown into my inventory and avoid using any of it for an authentic experience.
I still havent played GTA5 because I never found the disc cheap enough, at some point I quit looking for it, really sucks GTA4 was the last game from that franchise I’ll get to play, but ending physical discs means I will not buy your console game.
I found GTAV at a thrift store for $4.99 several months back. Bought it. Still haven’t played it lol
Pretty sure I paid $5 for GTA5 and not much more for 4 and San Andreas. I think GTA 3 was the last time I paid MSRP.
Maybe if Epic gets desperate enough after their plan to chase Roblox and slop crashes they’ll let you download it from them for free like they did 5
preorder what?.. what are you reserving anyways?
I assume the standard “I didn’t wait to see the reviews” cosmetic that all pre-orders seem to give people these days
You’re preordering your bytes, duh! It’s well known that companies run out of bytes when there’s massive demand and have to order more from the byte farms. If you don’t preorder this, the company might not have enough bytes for you and your download could have to wait a long time until they replenish byte stock!
If it’s anything like Forza Horizon 6, they are reserving the ability to play the game five days before everybody else.
I doubt they will do that because they’re releasing a story focused single player game, they don’t want spoilers out
Even better for Rockstar, they can say:
Oi if you don’t want spoliers you better lock in and preorder right now (you scum).
If it is yes, but afaik they won’t do that for gta
The ability to have it all downloaded and ready to go at launch, I guess. Wouldn’t be so bad if the price weren’t raised out of blatant greed while simultaneously removing the option to get a sellable license via a disc.
What I dont get about this is most game CDs today dont include the full games on them. We dont have CDs in existence to hold these games.
No CDs big enough, sure. Most modern consoles (like PlayStation and Xbox) use Blu-ray as their disc type for physical copies of games. Those can hold up to 100 GB for PlayStation 5 in particular.
Regardless, even if the disc isn’t able to store enough data to hold any one game, it isn’t immediately a problem. For example, the physical copy for the PS4 version of Red Dead Redemption 2 came with two discs to hold all of the data. There are ways around any data capacity limitations more often than not for physical media.
The best part is a lot of games are bloated because discs are very slow in random seek, so they format the files to load in sequence and results in a lot of assets are duplicated.
I would at least take a thumb drive or something 😂
$80 should at least get me a thumb drive !
Why? You having a physical thing doesn’t make you own the product any more or less.
Not saying you should buy the game. I’m not going to. But not because of physical media, it’s going to be the same old rubbish they’ve been peddling for over a decade, except even more focused on GTA Online.
Well I don’t see Sony breaking down my door to take my physical copy of Sackboy: A Big Adventure.
If they want to screw you over they will, they still control the full software stack. If you make a backup of the game you downloaded that might also simply not be allowed back on the machine, at least in theory.
What makes you think Sony/publishers will take away your games in some way that they don’t already without physical media?
A transferable licence on a hard copy definitely beats a non-transferable digital license for sure, but for any online game being able to play is obviously not only related to your local hardware and copy. We’re definitely going down a shitty road, but it’s not like we’re not already on it.
Except it does. Because owning a digital copy legally speaking means you own a licence to a software, but not the software. Physical discs / flash drive / cartridges are owned, licenses can be revoked and are not owned in the same sense.
In most jurisdictions you are always just buying a license, physical media or not. Except now you have a physical thing that you need to protect from damage/loss because it’s tied to your license. Depending on where you are you might not even be legally allowed to create a backup, especially if there’s DRM involved.
The only advantage I see with physical media is the used market. Digital kills that, and I’m sure that that’s the big reason Sony is doing it. They don’t want to take your games, they want to stop you from buying someone else’s.
The data on that is worthless with online DRM, and I’d bet that GTA 6 would require online activation regardless. The real enemy is DRM, disks being gone is just a symptom.
Games have also always been tied to licenses, the details are what matters really. A license to use a program that can no longer launch because a server is down isn’t any more useful if you have the program on a disk.
It would be pretty simple to require an online account or some kind of activation key to use the software on that disc or drive, making the software on the drive essentially useless or even unreadable without the license. Congrats, you own a $0.10 piece of shiny plastic with some art on it.
Most game discs these days don’t contain the latest version of your games anyways, they are usually a base package that immediately gets a huge update to work. Not 100% sure in the technicalities, but I would not be surprised if discs these days come with just a bunch of assets for the game and the actual game is downloaded as a “day 0 patch”.
This game is going to be nothing like past grand theft autos. All the people who made the prior games are gone, and now they write by focus group and committee… I think it’s probably going to suck.
I mean, maybe?
Most media have a committee or group focus to them.
I would argue the reason modern media sucks so bad is because of min max writing by focus group in pursuit of a test-tube blockbuster. Any originality or risk taking is a no-go so you write for the lowest common denominator and do reboots and remakes. Brand new stuff has to happen using existing IPs that are already popular.
It’s different from just being collaborative or testing ideas on your intended audience. It’s closer to how companies make dog food than the creative process for making good entertainment or art…
Shit article. Counting down to when you can start giving them money for a pre-order we don’t even have details about is news!?
But really, if we reward companies for games before they’re even released and reviewed, we deserve any and all garbage they decide to give us…
speak with your wallets sisters and brothers, do not rent this bs
Millions will, and Rockstar will make billions, but don’t buy it at launch anyway. Get it on a sale or pirate it when it comes to PC instead.
Rockstar will make billions
Yeah, well it won’t be my fucking fault, at least.
Nor mine!
Once again we all suffer because of the stupid majority. Imagine if everyone closed their wallets to the likes of google, meta, apple, rockstar.
Shame actually works quite well despite what everyone’s been trying to tell us.
In my experience, I’m the one who gets shamed for not being in walled gardens of google/apple/meta when everyone else is. Network effect is powerful
Does it though? Pre-orders have been constantly shamed since the '90s and, if anything, they’re even more prevalent today without the ability to get anything physical.
It’s pretty sad you have to tell people to pirate when honestly no one should be playing it at all. even discussing it helps them. If this is so bad, which I think it is because I’ve quit buying/playing games almost 10 years ago, Then the answer is to not engage.
This isn’t food.
There are so many independent studio/artist making things that desperately need your help in anyway. To read share and engage with their shit. Every minute spent with a major corps bullshit piece of entertainment Is time taken away from the independent artist. Every minute you spend engaging with this complaining or not, helps them.
No, you don’t have to play it, but if you want to without giving Rockstar money, the option will be available eventually. I’ll urge people not to give a company money for a game, but I’m not going to tell them not to play it at all. The game WILL be massively popular and WILL be talked about regardless of what you do, so just doing your part of not paying $80+ for it is good enough.
