Well, as cars get older, they get more inefficient.clicketyclick
Yes, they do produce less power and consume more as they age, but if by that you mean inefficient by design, don't be so sure. Auto manufacturers are struggling to gain 35mpg on an internal combustion engine, even some worthless hybrid SUV's struggle to fetch that number because people refuse to give up the 600-1000lbs worth of electronic convinience that is stuffed into every new car. The new Dodge Challenger, strictly as a weight comparison, actually weighs more than it's 40 year old counterpart. Electric motors, wiring harnesses, servos, computers, airbags and insulation add up.
The honda CRX, before it was discontinued, got 50+mpg with no frills and the Geo Metro got even higher. If you do some statistic research, you may learn that 25 years ago, new vehicles got better gas milage on average. Which is partially my point that I am making; Not everything is always as it seems.
But your socio-political tirade is a bit off-topic isn't it? We're not talking about the used car industry. We're talking about the used game industry. There ARE significant differences. For one, and most importantly to your argument, people don't dispose of games once they're finished with them.They don't throw them out. They keep them in their collection, either on their shelves or in storage. This is very different from how cars end their days: in junk yards and landfill sites or recycling plants. The concept of reusing vs. recycling just does not apply to games. Games just don't end up in landfills like cars do.clicketyclick
My girlfriend's mother worked for a large company as a buyer for many years. One of her duties in her position was to purchase new technology and properly dispose of the old technology. There is an entire industry that exists just for electronics disposal and recycling. It takes energy and resources to make anything new. In addition to mining various minerals and drilling for oil, batteries and mercury are extremely difficult to deal with in landfills.
Unless of course you are trying to argue that a game that would otherwise be just collecting dust can be resold and reused by someone else and thus be put to better use. That may be true, but using that as an argument for the used game market requires acceptance of the belief that there is something inherently wrong about hoarding games you no longer play while others could make much better use of it than you. That's a sort of Communist Game Redistribution principle that's rather difficult to swallow.clicketyclick
It's hardly communist to follow in practality and thrift. How about a Communist Game Retail principle? It goes both ways. It certainly is difficult to swallow any extreme, which is why I am replying to this thread.
You aren't buying used games for their true value. GameStop buys used games for $8 and then sells them for $30. Used games is an incredibly lucrative market because of the wide profit margin. While profits everywhere for companies are tanking, GameStop is up year after year.The MSRP is the base price of the game that the stores have to pay to the developer, PLUS the added cost for the retailer so they get a cut too. When you buy used, you're paying a reduced price because the developers have been cut out of the deal and the second-hand retailer is taking not only their share, but also taking a partial share of the total MSRP that would have gone to the developer, and then using the rest of the share that would have gone to the developer as a means of reducing the price of the game and competitively undercutting the new game price.
So theoretically, just to make it clearer:
$50 MSRP
New game price breakdown: $30 to developer, $20 to retailer. Total: $50
Used game price breakdown: $15 off the price, $15 to retailer, $20 to retailer. Total: $35clicketyclick
I have purchased used CD's from every kind of business, from larger outlets like Blockbuster Video and Game Stop to privately owned businesses locally like DVD Stop and Buy~Back Games, as well as individually run Amazon and eBay stores and from thrift stores that donate all proceeds to charity and are 100% nonprofit. Again, the pendulum swings both ways on this. It can be over-profitting or completely nonprofit and is entirely moot. I was comparing nintendo to a 2nd hand business. No contest there.
So it's a good idea to support GameStop, a multi-billion dollar multi-national used-game seller with nearly 7000 stores worldwide and nearly 50,000 employees... while it's morally wrong to support game development studios, which have between 2-80 employees on average? You do realise that you've got your notion of large corporation vs. smaller business flipped when it comes to the games industry. This is yet another difference from the car industry. Used game retailers = big business America. Game developmentstudios = struggling, often self-owned and self-financed businesses.clicketyclick
Nintendo is not a self-owned or self-financed business. The nature of this thread follows the dubbed overpriced Nintendo titles in topic, which is the company that I am referring to in comparison to 2nd hand market. You can't have one without the other, which in short, is my point.
I am simply stating the fact that it is usually more practical to take advantage of a 2nd hand market when applicable, save for convinience of time and location. And that this doesn't strictly apply to the electronics industry, which is why I used the auto industry as a random example. I'm no more a communist in theory than someone strictly purchasing games new. In fact, I did state that I partake in both used and new game purchases, which cannot be communist or biased at all.
Capitalism sucks when it's taken advantage of, just like socialism, liberalism or conservatism. Too much of anything usually does suck.And whileI have no sympathyfor Game Stop or Nintendo, if they have rising profit margins, it's because they have something to offer the market that the market is demanding, obviously. If a game publishing studio is struggling, that also sucks, but we can't do away with a 2nd hand market. The economic and ecological impact that would have would be bad. Don't cross the streams.
Log in to comment