It’s the Content, Stupid

The newspaper business is in big trouble. Insanely, the newspapers do not believe their content is in trouble. They do not believe that people stopped buying newspapers because they don’t offer anything. Rather, they believe the Internet has ‘broken’ the link between content and paying for it. So newspapers are trying to charge for their content online and are running into resistance.

If you suggest that the problem is the content itself, that no one wants to buy the content they are offering, you will hear screams like banshees come from these journalists and editors. In their minds, they believe their content is *so popular* that everyone is rushing to the Internet to see it. Rather, it has become increasingly clear that the only way to get people to read such content is to give it out for free. No one believes there is ‘great content’ going on in the newspaper side except for the people who make the newspapers.

Alternative content, which some of it the Internet does offer even from bloggers, often rivals and is better than the ‘newspaper content’ they are trying to charge for.

The point is that declining interest in the content is the root cause of the problem, not a broken business model. Interestingly, this is the one possibility that newspapers refuse to listen to. Go ahead and ask them, and they will screech like harpies and hurl insults at you. Quite amazing.

The “Game Industry” is in a similar situation. The reason why used games exist in the first place is not because Gamestop is evil but because the games ceased to be interesting anymore. No one intends to sell their games when they buy them. However, the customer is faced with a dilemma when stuck with a game that is not doing the job of entertainment. The customer can either hold on to this bad game or give it away. Or the customer can try to recoup part of his loss by selling it to a game store. This turns into credit that is incentive for the consumer to buy another game, hopefully a game that WILL entertain him or her.

Nintendo’s big picture of this generation is that games need to fight against disinterest and that the Core Market is in trouble because they have been taking interest for granted. Customer dissatisfaction is increasing, not decreasing. The ‘core’ games are not as interesting as they used to be.

I’m suspecting that the “Game Industry” isn’t even in the business of making games anymore. Instead, the “Game Industry” seems more focused on marketing and hype while creating production effects. Making games doesn’t seem to interest the “Game Industry” as it used to.

Like newspapers, the “Game Industry” does not believe the ‘used games’ market represents disinterest in their content. No, they believe the problem is from a ‘broken business model’.

Consumers are even saying, directly, that the problem is not the business model but the content. “This game is not that good,” they say when they sell their game. “Maybe this next game will be good.” After doing this for a while, the consumer gets tired and says, “Screw this. Gaming is no longer fun.” And the consumer leaves the market entirely.

One of the reasons why a vast used games market didn’t exist for PC games is because it is only very recently that PC games were sold with just a disc. PC games used to come in nice big boxes with thick manuals, charts, maps, even little trinkets, all to get you into the game.

It is incorrect to believe that the game exists only on what is on the screen. The true nature of the game is inside the player’s head. Things like maps and all help add to that consumer experience. The Ultima game experience would not have been the same if there was no cloth map. Anything that is in your hands is very tangible. The customer can hold it, can feel it, can even still have the ‘game experience’ when the game is shut off by burying himself in the rich story told in the manual or study the tech tree charts of his new RTS game.

Piracy was rampant then as well. But no one bought these games used except unless it was from a trusted friend who had all the pieces and had them in good shape.

Games exist beyond the screen. I try to tell people who get lost in Metroid or Metroid II that they should get out some paper and try charting a map. This baffles them. “Why would I do that?” they wonder. In older PC games, you’d take down notes. Today, many gamers are baffled by this process. “It should do that for me.”

To those of the NES generation who were dealing with cruel and unforgiving NES games, you KNOW that those Nintendo Power magazines made the game experience so much richer with their vast maps and tips. So the game experience isn’t just confined to the screen. The Wii, alone, with its constant gadgets should show this.

Here, someone goes up against Jaffe on used games sales. Interesting read. I’m glad people are speaking up especially when the game developer says something like: “That is the way it is going to be. Get used to it!” They don’t realize that customers control the shape and direction of gaming, not publishers or developers.

A NeoGaf thread on that ‘twitter’ interview with Jaffe is also very interesting.

A poster named Sagata Sanshiro made this post in that thread:

Because due to the poor way the larger part of the industry has conducted business, many publishers are now in financial trouble and desperately need something to blame instead of looking in the mirror and saying “we fucked up.”

While the comment is still blaming the financial decisions, it is squarely putting the blame on the “Game Industry”. When you blame the content of newspapers for their decline, they squeal. This is the closest we’ve seen.

In the video as a ‘response’, near the end Jaffe squeals and responds to Segata’s post directly.

I don’t need to write an article on why used games markets exist. All I need is four words: It’s the Content, Stupid. People sell games because the content in them is subpar.

What is hilarious is the argument that if a used game gets sold, resold, countless times, the developer and publisher don’t get any of the money. It is hilarious because such a game would only be a ‘crappy game’ that is constantly sold and re-sold.

Let us say the “Game Industry” made money off of every game resold. If there was a used games business back in the Atari Era, games like E.T. would have been very profitable.

In fact, under such a system, it would be more profitable to make games no one wants to keep so to keep that cashflow coming. There would be no incentive to make a game people would want to keep because that would mean less revenue ultimately.

The problem is not the business model. It’s the Content, Stupid.