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Comment by torben-friis | Hacker News Reader

Hot take: I think the battle for ownership is focusing in the wrong thing a bit.

Everyone is pushing for the rights of keeping the game alive after support ends, but in the move to digital I'm much more concerned with the loss of second hand markets.

Historically, my concern hasn't been running a 2005 game in 2025. Emulation tends to find ways. My concern is that this generation I was able to game at about 10 bucks per game (buying for 30 selling for 20 after I'm done, roughly) and the next generation is shaping at 100/game. That's a 10x increase in practice for the hobby.

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I think this doesn't really apply to games. Video games have had an incredibly sticky price.

The Legend of Zelda in 1987 was $50. Adjusted for inflation it would cost $151 today.

Diablo 2 released in 1999 at $50. Today that would be $101.

Diablo 3 released in 2012 at $60. Today that would be $88.

Diablo 4 released in 2023 at $70. Even this would be $77 today, despite being only 3 years ago.

Zelda Tears of the Kingdom released in 2023 for $70.

I do agree that the lack of a secondary market is concerning, but I think that in practice subscription services, piracy, and F2P games fulfill the niche of low cost gaming (for now). Don't know what the future holds though.

This is ignoring just how much more copies those games now sell as they did when Diablo 2 was popular and just how insanely have revenues risen while keeping the price.

It's like comparing a price of a modern car to a 1920's Rolls Royce and saying "eh, they're cheap, they're less than 500.000$, why are you complaining?"

>I think that in practice subscription services, piracy, and F2P games fulfill the niche of low cost gaming

F2P is not an alternative because (good) games are not a commodity, each piece is individually valuable (otherwise why conserve?). Subscription services are just enshittification waiting to happen.

Piracy is actually an alternative, but we all lose if consumers are pushed to that.

The lack of secondary market is not only a concern for low cost gamers, it also pushes for monopolies in several different dimensions. For example, you're less likely to move platforms if you can't resell your library. You're also less likely to give a chance to a less known dev if you can't resell in case you don't like it.

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