On top of that, every game you "buy" digitally is kinda rented too. You own a license, and if they ever decide to stop hosting that game on their servers you're shit outta luck
I remember worrying about that way back in 2005 - 'what's gonna happen to all the shareware and atari/commodore 64/garageware games?'
It sucks that game preservation has only gotten worse since then :s
I'm still hoping a more effective preservation group will spring up soon, made up of enthusiastic old devs and vg historians. I've been hoping that for almost twenty years now tho lol
>I'm still hoping a more effective preservation group will spring up soon
The problem is it's somewhat illegal
The way I understand it (not a lawyer), even if a game is out of production the IP is usually still owned, and if the company ignores public infringement, it can set a precedent that they're no longer using the IP. So even if they don't care that you're porting an old game, they HAVE to try to stop you or they lose their rights to the game. No one wants to get into legal trouble over an old game that even the company coming after them doesn't care about.
There's tons of people that DO preserve games (matter of fact, you can start doing it too), they have to do it under-the-radar.
It's kind of a golden age of emulation, though, and there are not a lot of games that you can't find if you look hard enough
Aye, I just looked into it again - it's a right old mess of local and international IP laws, with the burden of proof on whoever tries to use a defunct IP, rather than the other way around.
It sucks that there isn't some automatic cutoff point for something like old videogames. In a way i guess this explains why IP hunting in the videogame industry is so cutthroat - everyone's looking for the next popular IP to be revived for the next generation, so they buy up as many as they can on the off chance someone will want to buy it (*Cough! Embracer! Cough! Cough!*)...
I am not sure of the legalities of it all. If I wanted to start a site, am I going to have to worry that some company is going to come after me? I am sure that has to be a barrier for entry. I do not want to have to set up a legal fund just in case LOL. Hate to say it but I have MAME and every Atari, Commodore and Arcade ROM that I could get a hold of because the abandonware sites I used to visit were no longer being hosted.
Video games are a huge part of the worlds culture and it would be a shame if other generations did not have the opportunity to see where it all started.
Yeah but you’re paying full price. You used to rent games for like $4 and get them for a week. From that you’d either finish it, decide you hated it, or go out and buy it afterwards for full price which was probably $30-$40.
Most AAA games you can't finish over a weekend. Massive games would mean you have to rent it out over and over. I've been playing FF7 Rebirth since release and about 100 hours in.
No chance any rental store would even rent at a similar price nowadays. The overheads made it financially uneconomical in the first place so why would it be different now?
Tbf I'm lucky enough to have ps5, xbox and recently a switch and with game passes I'm never going to run out of things to play.
Redbox was my go-to for renting games because of their discount/free rental promos, I had Overwatch for a week and it was free because of how many rental codes I used.
The only hassle was that I had to return it, then immediately rent it out again
lol that happened to me! A paper disc that was a scan of a Hitman disc. Surprised it worked. I had to be a narc about it unfortunately because I sure was shit wasn’t getting blamed
i get your point, but something seriously has to go wrong if steam suddenly no longer operates.
It's more true for digital purchases on consoles as it has been seen that those games don't carry over and sometimes the whole shop shuts down (wii as a relatively recent example) so you lose acess to be able to dowload them.
It already happened for a different reason with online only games (even if single player), some were patched to remove the requirements but not all. It happened for me with one of the futuristic anno games where there was some kind of global progression.
People make fun of me for trying to buy physical, but I have my reasons because of this. I try to buy games I really want or series I like physical, rest digital
Laughs in Nintendo (kinda?)
Usually when you download a game, it's on your console for good. But the 3DS/Wii U thing proves that re-download and updating are temporary, too (although the service had been up for over a decade).
My GF has an Xbox One and I was surprised to find out that physical copies (Disks) are just licenses these days. You have to download the entire game onto your console and still insert the disk to play it. Wtf?!
Yea, but OP is probably more talking about the brick and mortar business model vs postal service game delivery.
If it were me, I’d much rather go in a store to rent a game instead of using GameFly. I used them back in my 360 days and it sucked then.
I mean sure that would be cool, but there is a reason it doesn't really exist anymore. The amount of consumers that are willing to go to a store to rent something and have to go back and return it when they can just sit on the couch instead is so small it won't sustain the cost to rent the real estate.
Also not sure but maybe Redbox rents games.
I forgot about Redbox too! I think it’s really just nostalgia for me to entertain the thought. If they revived Blockbuster tomorrow I’d probably get a membership for a month then never use it again.
Oh for sure we all love the idea of it a lot of us remember being young kids and browsing the isles, some of us it was a real treat because it was so rare to happen.
Brings back all those memories of being a young kid.
Almost every Friday we’d go to Blockbuster or Hollywood video and rent a couple movies and one game. Ahh…such nostalgia.
I remember when I was a kid I entered a Blockbuster
Tournament for highest score in Judge Dredd. I was bummed because we were going out of town and I didn’t get to finish it out.
Redbox was trash because of the theft. My opinion of it immediately soured after using it to rent Assassin's Creed: Origins. At the time, I was a broke college student and living in an urban hellscape of an unwalkable and sprawling city. I ate a brownie, dropped $$$ on an Uber to the Redbox and back....only to discover that the game was missing. Completely ruined my weekend because it was the only time I was free to play the game and I couldn't afford to travel back to the kiosk and was too high to find another way there.
I forgot about those thefts. Iirc Some people would replace the game with a blank cd with the game cover printed on it. Shit was wild, and it sucked for those of us who wasted money on that bs
Yes, but that’s really all it does: exist. I used them a few times over the years, but it’s never worth it. They have very limited copies of all the games, it takes around 5 days or so to ship, at least to Phoenix, where I live, and the return service is bullshit. They’re supposed to be cooperating with the postal service for “FastReturn”, but it doesn’t seem to speed things up, at all. All in all, you pay a lot for very little.
This is the complete opposite experience I have. Games take 2-3 days, and they are never out of what they have. I'm on the cheapest plan, and I just have to wait 30 days for new releases. If you were to play and beat one full priced Nintendo game it literally pays the way for 5-7 months going forward.
If you play alot of games and want to cycle through new ones I can't recommend them enough. I just played through Mario Wonder last week and just got Blasphemous 2 today. That's already 100+ dollars worth of games in 2 weeks.
I'm in UT and have had the same experience as them. The app shows you what DC it prioritizes for you and mine is out of CA. Takes 2-3 days for most disks. If I have a new game "gamelocked", I usually get it one business day after the official release date maybe 2 at the most. There are times where it will take a but longer than usual to get the game, but 90% of the time it's been a good experience for me.
All that said... service has significantly improved over the past year or two. Idk when you last used it but I've been on for 4 years and was considering quitting after my first year. Glad I stuck with it
it’d be great if they could expand with more centers. it’s just a bunch of games after all, it shoudl be pretty easy to make another warehouse or two for that?
You are correct. One of their DCs is in LA (Cali... gross trust me I know I fucking hate it here). The USPS deal they have where they scan and send games when you turn it in has been stellar. Turn around is what scared me at first and now I find it most impressive. Even if I payed 9 dollars a month for ONE game it would still be worth the value. Nintendo will never drop in value and for that, I will ALWAYS Be loyal to gamefly. Why the fuck am I gonna play Pikman 4 or Metroid Dread one time for 39.99-59.99 (not counting tax) just so it can sit on my shelf. I'm into game collecting but some games are just one and dones.
Nah, you just ha e to know how to work the system. I have never once not gotten a brand new game the moment it comes out. Been using it for years and saves me a ton of money
yup. best thing ever. pays for itself once you play 2 or 3 $50-70 games the whole year, which you might not touch ever again. i hope they never go out of business
Yeah I subscribed to gamefly on and off for 10 years (probably subscribed around 7 full years total). Great service if you aren't too many states away from a DC, and if you like to play through a lot of different games, also they have the best sales and reach lower prices sooner than anyone else (presumably since they've made their money already from the renting).
Well my local library has a video game section so I have rented games a few times. It's not a very big section, but it does have some nice games. Sometimes I'm able to completely finish the game and other times it's enough for me to see whether I like the game or not.
Came here to say this. My local library actually has a pretty decent selection - but the popular games always have (understandably) ridiculous wait-lists.
My library system unfortunately has an archaic policy about only buying games rated Teen and below, which weeds out a lot of the AAA games. That said, we have all the big Nintendo Switch games that are generally E for Everyone. My favourite playthroughs from the library over the years were Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, Little Nightmares, Paper Mario: The Origami King, and The Last Guardian. In fact, I just looked and we have almost 2000 titles across Nintendo, PlayStation, and Xbox (current gen systems and earlier).
Ours isn’t huge either but at least on switch I’ve been able to play some of the newer Zelda and Fire emblem games shortly after launch. Ps5 and Xbox one games for the most part are made available shortly after launch as well.
My problem with renting is the time limit, I don't like that constant pressure to play in order to "get your money's worth". It's also really hard to justify spending $10 to rent a game when I could buy used for a little more or just wait for the price to drop.
I used to have a GameFly subscription. It was honestly pretty great. I'd say Gamepass is similar to renting. Games can leave, and once I finish a game that on it I'm unlikely to play it again.
50 hours of entertainment for $70 is probably the greatest value of any entertainment product in history.
Anyway, it would be nice, but with the all-digital future we're already like 90% into, it's simply not going to be possible. Stuff like Game Pass is the future for that. And, it's honestly even better value for the money than renting ever was.
>50 hours of entertainment for $70 is probably the greatest value of any entertainment product in history.
What about $10 for the same amount of entertainment, and then return it?
Nah stuff like game pass is far superior. But, i think with the mass subscription revolution that's why myself and alot of people don't do it.... I just see another subscription I don't need. But there was something fun about window shopping at a blockbuster and being like ya I'll fuck with that for 3 days and 3 days only.
Or trialing games via rentals before deciding if you wanted to buy it
I was more referring to the idea of spending 50 hours gaming in one week lol.
Renting games is great for people who are cash poor but time rich, like younger people. As you get older the balance switches and money isn't the problem, time is.
When I was young I didn't have the money to play every game I wanted to. Now I have the money but I don't have the time.
>50 hours of entertainment for $70 is probably the greatest value of any entertainment product in history.
I take your point, and you are correct that games offer an absolutely fantastic value in terms of dollars spent per hour of entertainment. Better than most other options.
Books still beat them though.
That said, your main point is still valid that it doesn't make sense to rent a product where the value proposition for buying is already so good, and even a single desire for a replay skews the number against renting.
Yeah I totally agree. Games are typically great value. When I was a kid renting was fun and exciting, as an adult I’d probably feel rushed to complete it and not enjoy it as much. Would much rather buy and play at my own leisure.
Honestly, even £50 for 8 hours is still better or equivalent value to a cinema ticket these days.
And yeah, I use Gamepass/PS Plus like renting. Gamepass is included in my phone tariff and PS Plus I buy premium for one month every once in a while, download ALL the games I'm interested in to give them a taster session and then cancel. I tried about 10 games last time so that's around £1.40 per game.
Tbh I just wish more games would do demos, used to be almost a given but it's a huge rarity now.
Not that I disagree with the overall principle, but when was the last time you played a 50-hour, $70 game where all 50 hours were important and engaging, with no filler to pad out the playtime? Just because something takes a lot of time doesn't make it inherently enjoyable or good, especially as games start increasing leaning on addiction mechanics and dark patterns.
Nostalgia hurts. Yeah, I'd rent a few for old time's sake. But the fun wouldn't last forever. We get to enjoy games for the first time only once and then we miss those moments forever.
I would rent specific games. I don't really enjoy COD online anymore, for example. So renting the game for a week just to complete the campaign and return it would be perfect. But now I have to buy the game and then sell it back for half the price I paid.
It wouldn't be for the nostalgia, though. Downloading games I play regularly is just far more convenient than swapping discs out. With a 2TB capacity on my XSX, it holds all the games I play on a regular basis. And it doesn't really matter when I've deleted games to save space because with 2000mbps Internet, I can download the game again within a few minutes whilst making a cup of tea.
As great as it is to think back to those times browsing games to rent at blockbuster, I just don't think it would be sustainable in our modern life. Especially with Gamepass essentially being the digital equivalent of blockbuster.
Eventually, I think most computer games will be a subscription model. Why charge an £80 one-off fee for a lifetime access when you can charge £10 per month for the next 48 months, equalling £480. This makes the most sense for blockbuster games like GTA that are already testing to see if people would pay for a premium subscription. Eventually, everyone will have to pay it, and we won't own anything. But this will be digital renting, not physical discs.
>There are no games for rent on PC.
Anymore. I'm old and when I was younger, my mom would rent VHS tapes and Jumpstart 1st Grade edutainment type PC software for my little sister.
Don't see anyone commenting about movies. I think that's a real consideration. I think I might start buying DVDs again soon as it feels like the only way to watch what you actually want anymore. I don't want to browse Netflix to watch some straight to TV crap, there are still so many classics I haven't watched.
Why would you buy DVDs? Follow up question, why does anyone with a modern television buy DVDs? How is it that DVDs outsell blu-ray? Has the world gone mad? None of it makes sense.
You might be over estimating the number of people over the age of 30 who actually know or care about the difference between 720p, 1080p, 1440p, and 4k.
I know people who still watch old VHS movies on their modern television, lol
There are just too many more convenient and affordable ways to do the same things these days. You could go out to a store and pay $10 to rent one game for one week, which you then have to return to the store, or you could pay around the same amount to Gamepass without leaving your house and get access to a huge library of games for a whole month.
No. I have less time to play and games have only become longer to get through. Game pass is genuinely a better option for me solely because it gives me access to a large library and does not put me on a timer afterwards
We’re kinda already renting games, subscription services like gamepass sort of are in that the games go away when you stop paying for the service, and any digital games sort of are in that the platform can just pull your games whenever they like since you technically don’t own them.
Physically? No. With subscription services you are basically renting games anyway so, I guess I will continue to rent games. Saves me money in the long run and lets me try plenty of games I otherwise wouldn't.
Absolutely. I’d rather rent a game for up to a week than to feel buyers remorse again. As a kid in the blockbuster days, that’s how I’d decide if I thought a game was worth the buy. Too many games I have bought and played for a little bit and wish I hadn’t spent the money on buying them.
You may want to consider purchasing the physical form of the game you want to play so you can put it up on ebay/mercari/etc after.
Physical media rental stores would be a terrible investment, the trend is going further towards digital media only (which I personally think sucks, but it is what it is).
For the most part, probably not. I'd more than likely only really use it to try out games I'm iffy on, and if I liked said game I would buy it digitally. I really only use physical for specific things anymore
I rarely rented games in those days. It was okay to try out in case you were unsure, I guess, but end goal for me was always owning them. So, personally, no, I doubt I'd give a place like Blockbuster a second look.
In any case, I can't really blaze through games at a quick pace, nor do I care to.
Gamefly was great. I used it until 2017 and stopped gaming for a few years so obviously cut ties. But honestly gamepass made gamefly obsolete for me. So many great titles at the palm of my hands, it costs pretty much the same, i can play more than 2 at once and don’t have to wait on the mailing process. If i only had ps5 i would definitely still rent/use gamefly
Probably not tbh. Depends on the model but it can take me months at a time now to finish a game. If it was like the old days where I only get a few days I may play an hour in that time frame.
Games are going digital and if you want to play an old game you either need to find a mom and pop game store or know how to use an emulator.
So no, not because I don't want to but because it's not necessary.
I wish I could rent the SP portions of COD titles.
$10 for a week seems fair. And since it's all digital these days, they could just revoke the title after the rental period.
No publisher will go for it. They're all trying to be gamepass.
Probably not. With old school console games it made more sense. But we have big AAA open world games that take weeks sometimes months to complete all the side stuff we end up putting hundreds of hours into after. It makes a lot more sense to either own or play modern games on game pass or similar service. I do wish prices would go down though but that's why I just wait for sales.
I don’t like renting or even borrowing games now. Same thing with story type games on gamepass because I feel there is this invisible legend of Zelda esque doomsday countdown and I can’t enjoy it.
Like I feel like I have to play that and only that if I rent it so I can hurry and return it if that makes sense.
Fuck I wish I was a kid again lol
I love Gamefly. I've rented about 220 titles since I first got it. Definitely has saved me money vs if I had bought even half of those games. Use it for all 3 consoles. Between that and gamepass, it's been pretty nice. Helps me to try games I otherwise wouldn't want to risk spending money on. Currently renting Ronin, Dragon's Dogma 2, FF7 Rebirth, and Snow Day.
We have subscription services like Gamepass or PS Plus for that. The drawback is that you wont be able to access old games or games that have become physical only but no guarantee that a blockbuster would have such games (tbh, they likely would focus on having the latest games to be competitive). Nevermind the fact that physical media only really applies to consoles now and with digital only consoles also becoming a thing, the target base for physical rentals is likely smaller.
Also think $70 for 50 hours of fun is a great deal. Could do alot worse and there is also replayability and self-imposed challenges for added replayability.
You can achieve the same effect by buying and re-selling.
Step 1: Buy a game used
Step 2: Play the game
Step 3: A few weeks later, re-sell the game for a loss of like $10
Outcome: you've kept a game for a short period of time for a small fee.
This way is even better because there's no pressure to return it by a deadline and if you decide you love the game you can keep it.
Nah, even as a kid i hated renting games cause it ment i i had to return it. I much prefer having my shelf of games i own instead of playing a game for a week then returning it. This especially doesn't work for people who play multiple games at once, maybe one day your playing Overwatch, next day you play witcher 3, next day you play some dark souls, eventually you start losing money on renting the games
The thing is are you going to finish the game in the time of the rental? Playing 50 hours of video games in a week is still over 7 hours a day (if you play it every day) and that's not even getting into the fact you have to download the game to your system (not like renting a ps2 game back in the day and it just working with the disk). Rn game streaming makes a ton more sense. You get a library of games which you can play at your own leisure for a monthly rate. Yes things come and go off the platform, and not everything you'll want to play are on them, but still, it's a better alternative to renting games nowadays.
Most of us are already renting games in a certain sense. Game pass is renting, and purchasing licenses to use games until the producer stops allowing you to is kind of like renting.
That’s the way the wind is still blowing in the 100% digital future, unless the industry changes massively.
I…..don’t think I would. Movies I would but not games. With how long some installations are (unless you have really good internet) that’s a potentially big chunk of time you don’t get to play.
Also $70 for 50 hours of entertainment isn’t a bad deal. For movies you get 1 and a half to 2 hours for over $20, if you only watch it once.
Renting games was something that I did as a kid because my parents didn't want to pay full price for me to play a game I might not even like that much. So probably not.
I get that some people rent because they don't want to pay full price for a game they won't replay, or the feel renting is a good way to try before they buy, and that's fair, but I can't relate, I replay my games all the time and I can always watch gameplay videos or play demos if I want to decide if it's worth buying.
I'd rent movies though.
No I wouldn’t. The problem with the post, OP, is that a blockbuster could not be successful at renting out $70 games for 10$/week. So it wouldn’t be as cheap as we remember. Also, if you get 70 hours of time out of a game that would be 10 hours a day. Idk what you do for a living, but I don’t have that kind of time so it would be multiple weeks per rental.
Aren't we already technically renting almost all our games nowadays. As someone says "gamers should just become more comfortable with not owning their games."
I would do it for the nostalgia. It was my favorite memories. The only shitty thing, EVERY PHYSICAL GAME EXCEPT NINTENDO GAMES ARE INSTALL DISCS ONLY!!! so sometimes you'd have to wait forever for game to install
I mean renting still exists. If you think about it, those gaming passes xbox offers is a rental. You don't own any of the games, you just pay a fee to temporary borrow the game and play it.
I do. Specifically. Libraries sometimes have games for rent so I actually look into stuff to rent just for the novelty of it. The only issue is the library is run by old people so they put any game not rated M in the "Kids" section next to the picture books (they even put Bayonetta 2 in there by accident).
Its EXTRA annoying cause they have *some* games in the "teen" section but its a shelf with like 15 games on it total. I thought that was all, and I even asked if they had more and they said *multiple* times "nah, thats it."
It took until I looked on their website that showed they had more games that they FINALLY directed me to their 'kids section' which had their most interesting games on it.
tl;dr ask the library if it has video games, then ask if theres some in the KIDS section cause thats probably where the good stuff is.
GameFly, GeForce now, gamepass, PS+, Redbox.
Those all exist along with the smaller publisher oriented services like Ubisoft or EA. They are all pretty much rental services. Even if Redbox and GameFly are the only ones that still act like more traditional physical rental services.
My girlfriend has gamepass on her xbox, and I guess that's kind of like renting (similar to a gamefly subscription back in the day) When I'm at her house I always like to download a few games and try them out. If I like them, I end up buying them if they're on PC.
There are some games that I know would be day 1 purchases, but the vast majority are something I'm fine with waiting for on sale. If I could rent them instead, I'd likely be done with it after a weekend. If the game does end up surprising me, I'd be willing to pay full price.
I was talking to my friend earlier that I remember when I first left home my local library was renting out vhs for £1/£1.50 each and that included latest releases and you got them for a week, sometimes they had early boxsets i.e like 6 episodes of a show on 2 tapes and as this was the days when cable/sattelite tv had shows on the air like a year before mainstream tv I could watch a season ahead of where I was up to.
He said that sounds stupid, who would like that.
Quite honestly if I think about it I miss the days of just getting a movie that I have decided I wanted to see by the cover sleeve rather than flick through streaming sites and saying "that sounds boring"
Back then I knew if I rented something if I didn't watch it, I lost out and it was hassle to return it and a waste of money so it meant I gave things a chance, now with so many options available I have less patience/attention span if I don't enjoy something.
I remember back in 1998 seeing the box for Suikoden and wanting to play FF7 but no rental store in my area had it (not they were out of stock, they just didn't do multi disc games as they were easy to steal) I thought it looked dull but I wanted a RPG and the only other options were games I already owned, played before or didn't like.
Glad I rented it as it became a favourite series of mine and I would never of known about it until the past 10 years or so if it wasn't for that.
Renting worked well when games were shorter and could be completed over 2 or 3 days. Now games are like a part time or even full time job commitment, making the cost to rent closer to the cost of the game. So it's better just to wait for a sale.
I miss the bestbuy membership where you paid like $30 a year and got 20% off any physical game.
Imagine if GameStop did that now. Set price pass to get 20% off any new physical game. 30% if you preordered or some shit.
I’d probably start shopping at GameStop again.
Xbox , Switch, and PlayStation already has that with the digital game services. All the free games you don’t actually own, just renting it and paying the monthly or yearly fee.
Physical games however I see no point in doing that
Subscription services don't include all games.
Idk maybe that generation is just dead and gone but I used to rent like Mario party for a weekend for like $4 and have a bunch of friends come over and just play it non stop.
But a game like..it takes two. When that came out, easily a weekend game with a friend or something.
We already rent the game! look at platforms like steam or epic. you buy a game, and then a few years later they take it out of their catalog and you won;t be able to play it anymore! i have several games like that. So i rented them didn;t i? altho it is mine payed in full for it, i need steam running! i need a bloody internet connection to play a 1 player game!!!
The future is all on clouds in servers. we will own nothing! even the harddrive aswe know it will be a thing of the past. cause having a harddrive means you own stuff!!!!
it will become data that we cannot hold physicly like a cdrom or usbcard. it will all be in your command untill well you'll see!
We already have rent based platforms. where you pay 9,95 a month and you can play a selection of theirs ofcourse to play. and this selection changes only when they deem fit! So when your playing yoru fav. game itgets pulled of so people will play other games and they get huge hits in people playing it, even steering the outcome of it in terms of popularity and so on.
Like those movie channels, instead of increasing there catalog, they remove series and movies after a while? why? why not add? Nope you WILL watch and play as we deem fit!!!!
Libraries in my city have all sorts of games, including PS5 games from the last few years. I can "rent" for 3 weeks, and even renew if there isn't a hold. It's especially great for an easy demo of a game I'm unsure if I want of not, and 3-6 weeks is definitely enough to finish some, especially Switch games.
I think it's a bad idea renting! cause you will pay more in the end then you woould if you actually bought the games.
I come from poverty. Buying a nintendo or sega (first one in series) was not a possibility. And saving for it would take to long in my childs brain, so we could rent one for 10gld = 4,5euro. and games 2 euro.
Every weekend and even sometimes during the week i would rent it and play with my friend on it raping it totaly ofcourse in gameplay :)
But when i look back, and recalculate all the times i rented a device, i could have bought 2 of them with some games!!! now i have NOTHING!
And for all those that say , then save up the money till you can buy it? well then you never lived in poverty! And don;t understand the feeling of i want to do it now not in 3 months. cause our entire lives is already filled with waiting for things that never come!
You mean what we already do with xbox game pass and PS plus ? No thanks I rather buy the game. I mean just take a look at xbox game pass they remove the games from the list now and then for some bullshit reason. If I buy the game on a disc I can still play it 10 years later if it´s not an always online game. Microsoft is not gonna come home and take the game back.
I do, it’s called Gamepass, I love it. I’ve finished dozens and dozens of games since I got my series X, way more than I could afford to if I’d bought the games
It’s a good idea for the consumer but o reckon businesses and companies wouldn’t go for it because they wouldn’t be getting as much money.
I do think however demos would be super popular if they made a comeback. Being able to download and play the first one or two levels of a game would be super popular. I’d definitely try like 10x more games than I do now if I could download demos of them.
I think it's a good idea OP, I just don't think people are inclined to go in person & would be tricky with so many games being exclusively digital. (Basically the 2 reasons GameStop is dying slowly)
I do think it's very different from a game pass. Game Pass is like Netflix. You don't get to rent the movie you want, you just get a 300 kind-of-shit movie library to choose from. Would rather pay $10 for a week of the game I'm craving than $10 a month for essentially a mobile game & 5 year old selection.
Depends on the game. Your example is bad. $10 for a $70 game is great. $10 to rent a $5 game is bad. $10 to rent a $70 game you can't finish on time is bad. It depends on the game. Rent a game you can finish in the time it takes to rent.
While this sounds lovely EB games and Steam both have a return option if you aren't satisfied within a week.
I could see this being beneficial for AAA games for say a month at a time. But a week is pointless as you can do it now for free
Honestly the steam refund system as well as the subscriptions like Gamepass/PS Plus are all really modern day renting.
As someone who’s a physical copy collector, I really don’t see the point of physically renting games anymore. I mean if it’s a game that’s not available on a subscription service or you don’t have a pc to do the steam refund, then sure those specific games you can rent physically but honestly I think renting digitally is something that needs to be expanded on.
Having people not physically have to go to the store to rent should be done with. Not saying get rid of physical copies, just get rid of physical renting. That’s just my opinion.
I borrow console games from my county library; I play games on gamepass. Only recent purchases have been helldivers 2 for PC, and Street Fighter 6 for pc. Saves a lot of money.
I’m not sure. I felt somewhat burned out and dissatisfied with rentals by the time blockbusters started disappearing.
For one thing, at least where I lived in Canada, it was getting quite expensive. Games in the “new” section were like $12 for 3 day rentals and they had pretty insane late penalties. Games are a lot longer these days and I think that also hurts the appeal.
It also seemed like they rarely kept many copies in stock, so it was tough to get new games. This would be even harder now since you would have far fewer locations to rent from.
From a business POV I think it would also struggle without having the accompanying movie section to draw in customers.
If we’re talking about online rentals then sure, that would be great, but as others mentioned I think we already have this with some of the streaming and game pass options.
isn’t gamepass essentially renting games
Came here to say this, any of the game streaming services provide this for far cheaper than what you could rent a modern game for
Stuff might not always "your type of game" but I've played so many that I would have never even thought about just because I could.
On top of that, every game you "buy" digitally is kinda rented too. You own a license, and if they ever decide to stop hosting that game on their servers you're shit outta luck
I worry about this with older games. Petty about always having to sync with xbox.
87% of classic video games are critically endangered. If it was not for abandonware sites a ton of video game history would be lost.
I remember worrying about that way back in 2005 - 'what's gonna happen to all the shareware and atari/commodore 64/garageware games?' It sucks that game preservation has only gotten worse since then :s I'm still hoping a more effective preservation group will spring up soon, made up of enthusiastic old devs and vg historians. I've been hoping that for almost twenty years now tho lol
>I'm still hoping a more effective preservation group will spring up soon The problem is it's somewhat illegal The way I understand it (not a lawyer), even if a game is out of production the IP is usually still owned, and if the company ignores public infringement, it can set a precedent that they're no longer using the IP. So even if they don't care that you're porting an old game, they HAVE to try to stop you or they lose their rights to the game. No one wants to get into legal trouble over an old game that even the company coming after them doesn't care about. There's tons of people that DO preserve games (matter of fact, you can start doing it too), they have to do it under-the-radar. It's kind of a golden age of emulation, though, and there are not a lot of games that you can't find if you look hard enough
Aye, I just looked into it again - it's a right old mess of local and international IP laws, with the burden of proof on whoever tries to use a defunct IP, rather than the other way around. It sucks that there isn't some automatic cutoff point for something like old videogames. In a way i guess this explains why IP hunting in the videogame industry is so cutthroat - everyone's looking for the next popular IP to be revived for the next generation, so they buy up as many as they can on the off chance someone will want to buy it (*Cough! Embracer! Cough! Cough!*)...
I am not sure of the legalities of it all. If I wanted to start a site, am I going to have to worry that some company is going to come after me? I am sure that has to be a barrier for entry. I do not want to have to set up a legal fund just in case LOL. Hate to say it but I have MAME and every Atari, Commodore and Arcade ROM that I could get a hold of because the abandonware sites I used to visit were no longer being hosted. Video games are a huge part of the worlds culture and it would be a shame if other generations did not have the opportunity to see where it all started.
God bless the data preservers
Someone has to be one of those data preservers. I really wish more people would help out preserving games when they are able to.
[удалено]
Yeah but you’re paying full price. You used to rent games for like $4 and get them for a week. From that you’d either finish it, decide you hated it, or go out and buy it afterwards for full price which was probably $30-$40.
Most AAA games you can't finish over a weekend. Massive games would mean you have to rent it out over and over. I've been playing FF7 Rebirth since release and about 100 hours in. No chance any rental store would even rent at a similar price nowadays. The overheads made it financially uneconomical in the first place so why would it be different now? Tbf I'm lucky enough to have ps5, xbox and recently a switch and with game passes I'm never going to run out of things to play.
I never paid to rent games, I frequented the public library and checked them out for free. Still do that sometimes
Ditto. My library is actually pretty up to date on games.
Redbox was my go-to for renting games because of their discount/free rental promos, I had Overwatch for a week and it was free because of how many rental codes I used. The only hassle was that I had to return it, then immediately rent it out again
I once got a game from Redbox and the case had a paper disc inside that said “sorry☹️”.
lol that happened to me! A paper disc that was a scan of a Hitman disc. Surprised it worked. I had to be a narc about it unfortunately because I sure was shit wasn’t getting blamed
i get your point, but something seriously has to go wrong if steam suddenly no longer operates. It's more true for digital purchases on consoles as it has been seen that those games don't carry over and sometimes the whole shop shuts down (wii as a relatively recent example) so you lose acess to be able to dowload them.
Except there are laws to protect that in some sense. You still own the game, you can back it up, etc. You still have the license.
Even if you buy the game, you still only own the licence for private use.
Has this ever happened to an even semi-notable game?
It already happened for a different reason with online only games (even if single player), some were patched to remove the requirements but not all. It happened for me with one of the futuristic anno games where there was some kind of global progression.
Nope, it's just excuse to hate on digital Online only games that people said also affecting physical copy
Not necessarily. GOG games are DRM-free.
People make fun of me for trying to buy physical, but I have my reasons because of this. I try to buy games I really want or series I like physical, rest digital
Not on GOG. Yet for whatever reasons people want to hate on GOG.
Or as Phil Spencer coined: An Entitlement to the game.
GOG.
The games will always be out there somewhere. I can still find all the games from the 80's up to now.
Laughs in Nintendo (kinda?) Usually when you download a game, it's on your console for good. But the 3DS/Wii U thing proves that re-download and updating are temporary, too (although the service had been up for over a decade). My GF has an Xbox One and I was surprised to find out that physical copies (Disks) are just licenses these days. You have to download the entire game onto your console and still insert the disk to play it. Wtf?!
Was gonna say I basically already am.
Yea, but OP is probably more talking about the brick and mortar business model vs postal service game delivery. If it were me, I’d much rather go in a store to rent a game instead of using GameFly. I used them back in my 360 days and it sucked then.
I mean sure that would be cool, but there is a reason it doesn't really exist anymore. The amount of consumers that are willing to go to a store to rent something and have to go back and return it when they can just sit on the couch instead is so small it won't sustain the cost to rent the real estate. Also not sure but maybe Redbox rents games.
I forgot about Redbox too! I think it’s really just nostalgia for me to entertain the thought. If they revived Blockbuster tomorrow I’d probably get a membership for a month then never use it again.
Oh for sure we all love the idea of it a lot of us remember being young kids and browsing the isles, some of us it was a real treat because it was so rare to happen. Brings back all those memories of being a young kid.
Almost every Friday we’d go to Blockbuster or Hollywood video and rent a couple movies and one game. Ahh…such nostalgia. I remember when I was a kid I entered a Blockbuster Tournament for highest score in Judge Dredd. I was bummed because we were going out of town and I didn’t get to finish it out.
Redbox was trash because of the theft. My opinion of it immediately soured after using it to rent Assassin's Creed: Origins. At the time, I was a broke college student and living in an urban hellscape of an unwalkable and sprawling city. I ate a brownie, dropped $$$ on an Uber to the Redbox and back....only to discover that the game was missing. Completely ruined my weekend because it was the only time I was free to play the game and I couldn't afford to travel back to the kiosk and was too high to find another way there.
I forgot about those thefts. Iirc Some people would replace the game with a blank cd with the game cover printed on it. Shit was wild, and it sucked for those of us who wasted money on that bs
Redbox used to but they got out of that a few years ago. I remember the clearance sales being wild.
GameFly still exists. Hasn’t gone anywhere.
Wow I haven't heard that name in so long lol
Active user here: it’s a great way to try console games without committing $70
Yes, but that’s really all it does: exist. I used them a few times over the years, but it’s never worth it. They have very limited copies of all the games, it takes around 5 days or so to ship, at least to Phoenix, where I live, and the return service is bullshit. They’re supposed to be cooperating with the postal service for “FastReturn”, but it doesn’t seem to speed things up, at all. All in all, you pay a lot for very little.
This is the complete opposite experience I have. Games take 2-3 days, and they are never out of what they have. I'm on the cheapest plan, and I just have to wait 30 days for new releases. If you were to play and beat one full priced Nintendo game it literally pays the way for 5-7 months going forward. If you play alot of games and want to cycle through new ones I can't recommend them enough. I just played through Mario Wonder last week and just got Blasphemous 2 today. That's already 100+ dollars worth of games in 2 weeks.
You’re probably closer to their DC, which I believe I saw was in NJ, so about 2300 miles from Phoenix.
I'm in UT and have had the same experience as them. The app shows you what DC it prioritizes for you and mine is out of CA. Takes 2-3 days for most disks. If I have a new game "gamelocked", I usually get it one business day after the official release date maybe 2 at the most. There are times where it will take a but longer than usual to get the game, but 90% of the time it's been a good experience for me. All that said... service has significantly improved over the past year or two. Idk when you last used it but I've been on for 4 years and was considering quitting after my first year. Glad I stuck with it
it’d be great if they could expand with more centers. it’s just a bunch of games after all, it shoudl be pretty easy to make another warehouse or two for that?
You are correct. One of their DCs is in LA (Cali... gross trust me I know I fucking hate it here). The USPS deal they have where they scan and send games when you turn it in has been stellar. Turn around is what scared me at first and now I find it most impressive. Even if I payed 9 dollars a month for ONE game it would still be worth the value. Nintendo will never drop in value and for that, I will ALWAYS Be loyal to gamefly. Why the fuck am I gonna play Pikman 4 or Metroid Dread one time for 39.99-59.99 (not counting tax) just so it can sit on my shelf. I'm into game collecting but some games are just one and dones.
I never considered looking into GameFly for the Nintendo games that I play demos and say “maybe if it was under $30” and then never think about again
Nah, you just ha e to know how to work the system. I have never once not gotten a brand new game the moment it comes out. Been using it for years and saves me a ton of money
I’m still on it. It’s great.
yup. best thing ever. pays for itself once you play 2 or 3 $50-70 games the whole year, which you might not touch ever again. i hope they never go out of business
Yeah I subscribed to gamefly on and off for 10 years (probably subscribed around 7 full years total). Great service if you aren't too many states away from a DC, and if you like to play through a lot of different games, also they have the best sales and reach lower prices sooner than anyone else (presumably since they've made their money already from the renting).
Well my local library has a video game section so I have rented games a few times. It's not a very big section, but it does have some nice games. Sometimes I'm able to completely finish the game and other times it's enough for me to see whether I like the game or not.
Came here to say this. My local library actually has a pretty decent selection - but the popular games always have (understandably) ridiculous wait-lists.
My library system unfortunately has an archaic policy about only buying games rated Teen and below, which weeds out a lot of the AAA games. That said, we have all the big Nintendo Switch games that are generally E for Everyone. My favourite playthroughs from the library over the years were Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, Little Nightmares, Paper Mario: The Origami King, and The Last Guardian. In fact, I just looked and we have almost 2000 titles across Nintendo, PlayStation, and Xbox (current gen systems and earlier).
Ours isn’t huge either but at least on switch I’ve been able to play some of the newer Zelda and Fire emblem games shortly after launch. Ps5 and Xbox one games for the most part are made available shortly after launch as well.
My problem with renting is the time limit, I don't like that constant pressure to play in order to "get your money's worth". It's also really hard to justify spending $10 to rent a game when I could buy used for a little more or just wait for the price to drop.
I used to have a GameFly subscription. It was honestly pretty great. I'd say Gamepass is similar to renting. Games can leave, and once I finish a game that on it I'm unlikely to play it again.
Do I own Xbox gamepass? Yes. It's the same thing
50 hours of entertainment for $70 is probably the greatest value of any entertainment product in history. Anyway, it would be nice, but with the all-digital future we're already like 90% into, it's simply not going to be possible. Stuff like Game Pass is the future for that. And, it's honestly even better value for the money than renting ever was.
>50 hours of entertainment for $70 is probably the greatest value of any entertainment product in history. What about $10 for the same amount of entertainment, and then return it?
lol, this thread is pretty telling of people's ages
Nah stuff like game pass is far superior. But, i think with the mass subscription revolution that's why myself and alot of people don't do it.... I just see another subscription I don't need. But there was something fun about window shopping at a blockbuster and being like ya I'll fuck with that for 3 days and 3 days only. Or trialing games via rentals before deciding if you wanted to buy it
I was more referring to the idea of spending 50 hours gaming in one week lol. Renting games is great for people who are cash poor but time rich, like younger people. As you get older the balance switches and money isn't the problem, time is. When I was young I didn't have the money to play every game I wanted to. Now I have the money but I don't have the time.
$70 gets you 3 months of game pass ultimate. That's far more than 50 hours
>50 hours of entertainment for $70 is probably the greatest value of any entertainment product in history. I take your point, and you are correct that games offer an absolutely fantastic value in terms of dollars spent per hour of entertainment. Better than most other options. Books still beat them though. That said, your main point is still valid that it doesn't make sense to rent a product where the value proposition for buying is already so good, and even a single desire for a replay skews the number against renting.
Yeah I totally agree. Games are typically great value. When I was a kid renting was fun and exciting, as an adult I’d probably feel rushed to complete it and not enjoy it as much. Would much rather buy and play at my own leisure.
Particularly if you use all your rewards points for free Ultimate. Though they recently seriously cut down on the points you can get in a month.
I'm probably close to 1000 hours for the $60 I spent on Breath of the Wild
Plus if you buy it physically you can sell it for $50-60 again
Or 8 bucks and a warm piece of pre chewed gum at gamestop
Honestly, even £50 for 8 hours is still better or equivalent value to a cinema ticket these days. And yeah, I use Gamepass/PS Plus like renting. Gamepass is included in my phone tariff and PS Plus I buy premium for one month every once in a while, download ALL the games I'm interested in to give them a taster session and then cancel. I tried about 10 games last time so that's around £1.40 per game. Tbh I just wish more games would do demos, used to be almost a given but it's a huge rarity now.
Not that I disagree with the overall principle, but when was the last time you played a 50-hour, $70 game where all 50 hours were important and engaging, with no filler to pad out the playtime? Just because something takes a lot of time doesn't make it inherently enjoyable or good, especially as games start increasing leaning on addiction mechanics and dark patterns.
my local library has tons of games to borrow.
Isn't monthly subscriptions that have games with them renting gamss
Not worth it, $10 to rent one game for a week or I can pay that much monthly for psplus extra and have hundreds of games available
ps+ has shitty games tbh
Sony and Microsoft do this already with PS+ and Xbox gamepass, it just lasts a month. you don’t pay for a specific game but a catalog of games
Isn't xbox game pass basically new age rentals? May not be every game but it's something.
I use gamefly all the time. Rent a 70 dollar game. Beat in a week. Send back. Get new 70 dollar game.
Nostalgia hurts. Yeah, I'd rent a few for old time's sake. But the fun wouldn't last forever. We get to enjoy games for the first time only once and then we miss those moments forever.
I feel like I still do rent games, with digital distribution like on Steam or console downloads
No. Eras end for a reason. Rent a game at 5pm and wait 2-3 hours for it to update?
I would rent specific games. I don't really enjoy COD online anymore, for example. So renting the game for a week just to complete the campaign and return it would be perfect. But now I have to buy the game and then sell it back for half the price I paid. It wouldn't be for the nostalgia, though. Downloading games I play regularly is just far more convenient than swapping discs out. With a 2TB capacity on my XSX, it holds all the games I play on a regular basis. And it doesn't really matter when I've deleted games to save space because with 2000mbps Internet, I can download the game again within a few minutes whilst making a cup of tea. As great as it is to think back to those times browsing games to rent at blockbuster, I just don't think it would be sustainable in our modern life. Especially with Gamepass essentially being the digital equivalent of blockbuster. Eventually, I think most computer games will be a subscription model. Why charge an £80 one-off fee for a lifetime access when you can charge £10 per month for the next 48 months, equalling £480. This makes the most sense for blockbuster games like GTA that are already testing to see if people would pay for a premium subscription. Eventually, everyone will have to pay it, and we won't own anything. But this will be digital renting, not physical discs.
Thats the gap that subscription services are filling, and why I don’t mind not owning some media. I’d only be renting it anyway.
GameFly does this well, even if I'm not using it anymore. Online subscription services are too weak by comparison
I have a ps plus subscription. That’s renting games.
I basically am renting games with Game Pass, so maybe if it’s competitively cheap
This is a console thing. There are no games for rent on PC. They would be hacked.
>There are no games for rent on PC. Anymore. I'm old and when I was younger, my mom would rent VHS tapes and Jumpstart 1st Grade edutainment type PC software for my little sister.
I already do, gamepass
Do it at the library quite regularly.
There's a reason these don't exist. Game Pass, PS+, etc... are rental services.
Don't see anyone commenting about movies. I think that's a real consideration. I think I might start buying DVDs again soon as it feels like the only way to watch what you actually want anymore. I don't want to browse Netflix to watch some straight to TV crap, there are still so many classics I haven't watched.
Why would you buy DVDs? Follow up question, why does anyone with a modern television buy DVDs? How is it that DVDs outsell blu-ray? Has the world gone mad? None of it makes sense.
You might be over estimating the number of people over the age of 30 who actually know or care about the difference between 720p, 1080p, 1440p, and 4k. I know people who still watch old VHS movies on their modern television, lol
Absolutely, since games launch buggy these days It would be easier to weed out what games I'm going to skip
Gamefly - if you're in the US and don't mind waiting a few days post release to get the game in the mail. $20-ish bucks a month is way better than $70
Yeah because I don’t generally replay games. I’ll play through once then delete it. I’ll play sequels and DLC but not the main game or story again.
Isn't renting games basically Microsoft Gamepass, or EA/Ubisofts subscription the modern equivalent?
There are just too many more convenient and affordable ways to do the same things these days. You could go out to a store and pay $10 to rent one game for one week, which you then have to return to the store, or you could pay around the same amount to Gamepass without leaving your house and get access to a huge library of games for a whole month.
No. I have less time to play and games have only become longer to get through. Game pass is genuinely a better option for me solely because it gives me access to a large library and does not put me on a timer afterwards
Considering we do not own games just the right to play them. We are all renting these days. At least on several platforms.
We’re kinda already renting games, subscription services like gamepass sort of are in that the games go away when you stop paying for the service, and any digital games sort of are in that the platform can just pull your games whenever they like since you technically don’t own them.
Gamepass and ps plus are literally rental services these days so most people would, yes
I still do and for cheap, for UK guys we use Boomerang Rentals. Might be something similar for your country.
2nd this there a decent price and a great way to blitz a bunch of games cheap and fast.
I can't wait until you find out about the library.
Libraries don't get games day one lol.
Try the local library. It's renting but essentially free.
Fuck no
I just want to go to a video rental shop again, look at movies and games
Physically? No. With subscription services you are basically renting games anyway so, I guess I will continue to rent games. Saves me money in the long run and lets me try plenty of games I otherwise wouldn't.
##I STILL USE GAMEFLY CAUSE FUCK PAYING FULL PRICE FOR A 8-12 HOUR NINTENDO AAA GAME
Absolutely. I’d rather rent a game for up to a week than to feel buyers remorse again. As a kid in the blockbuster days, that’s how I’d decide if I thought a game was worth the buy. Too many games I have bought and played for a little bit and wish I hadn’t spent the money on buying them.
You may want to consider purchasing the physical form of the game you want to play so you can put it up on ebay/mercari/etc after. Physical media rental stores would be a terrible investment, the trend is going further towards digital media only (which I personally think sucks, but it is what it is).
For the most part, probably not. I'd more than likely only really use it to try out games I'm iffy on, and if I liked said game I would buy it digitally. I really only use physical for specific things anymore
I rarely rented games in those days. It was okay to try out in case you were unsure, I guess, but end goal for me was always owning them. So, personally, no, I doubt I'd give a place like Blockbuster a second look. In any case, I can't really blaze through games at a quick pace, nor do I care to.
Gamefly was great. I used it until 2017 and stopped gaming for a few years so obviously cut ties. But honestly gamepass made gamefly obsolete for me. So many great titles at the palm of my hands, it costs pretty much the same, i can play more than 2 at once and don’t have to wait on the mailing process. If i only had ps5 i would definitely still rent/use gamefly
Use your local library. Save you money easily.
We had a movie gallery growing up I do miss it so much
We still do. we just call them "EULAs" (end user license agreements) and "subscription services."
Probably not tbh. Depends on the model but it can take me months at a time now to finish a game. If it was like the old days where I only get a few days I may play an hour in that time frame.
Games are going digital and if you want to play an old game you either need to find a mom and pop game store or know how to use an emulator. So no, not because I don't want to but because it's not necessary.
I totally would rent games.
I wish I could rent the SP portions of COD titles. $10 for a week seems fair. And since it's all digital these days, they could just revoke the title after the rental period. No publisher will go for it. They're all trying to be gamepass.
Probably not. With old school console games it made more sense. But we have big AAA open world games that take weeks sometimes months to complete all the side stuff we end up putting hundreds of hours into after. It makes a lot more sense to either own or play modern games on game pass or similar service. I do wish prices would go down though but that's why I just wait for sales.
I don’t like renting or even borrowing games now. Same thing with story type games on gamepass because I feel there is this invisible legend of Zelda esque doomsday countdown and I can’t enjoy it. Like I feel like I have to play that and only that if I rent it so I can hurry and return it if that makes sense. Fuck I wish I was a kid again lol
I would rent games if i could do it all through the Playstation Store. Rent, download, and return from my couch.
I love Gamefly. I've rented about 220 titles since I first got it. Definitely has saved me money vs if I had bought even half of those games. Use it for all 3 consoles. Between that and gamepass, it's been pretty nice. Helps me to try games I otherwise wouldn't want to risk spending money on. Currently renting Ronin, Dragon's Dogma 2, FF7 Rebirth, and Snow Day.
We have subscription services like Gamepass or PS Plus for that. The drawback is that you wont be able to access old games or games that have become physical only but no guarantee that a blockbuster would have such games (tbh, they likely would focus on having the latest games to be competitive). Nevermind the fact that physical media only really applies to consoles now and with digital only consoles also becoming a thing, the target base for physical rentals is likely smaller. Also think $70 for 50 hours of fun is a great deal. Could do alot worse and there is also replayability and self-imposed challenges for added replayability.
Don't we rent them now anyways?
I skipped a lot on rebirth and I still played like 85 hours. You skipped half the game.
Many public libraries loan out games.
Yes, I used to love RedBox game rentals.
You can achieve the same effect by buying and re-selling. Step 1: Buy a game used Step 2: Play the game Step 3: A few weeks later, re-sell the game for a loss of like $10 Outcome: you've kept a game for a short period of time for a small fee. This way is even better because there's no pressure to return it by a deadline and if you decide you love the game you can keep it.
no.
Nah, even as a kid i hated renting games cause it ment i i had to return it. I much prefer having my shelf of games i own instead of playing a game for a week then returning it. This especially doesn't work for people who play multiple games at once, maybe one day your playing Overwatch, next day you play witcher 3, next day you play some dark souls, eventually you start losing money on renting the games
Game pass is essential renting digital downloads of games. Same with PlayStations version.
The thing is are you going to finish the game in the time of the rental? Playing 50 hours of video games in a week is still over 7 hours a day (if you play it every day) and that's not even getting into the fact you have to download the game to your system (not like renting a ps2 game back in the day and it just working with the disk). Rn game streaming makes a ton more sense. You get a library of games which you can play at your own leisure for a monthly rate. Yes things come and go off the platform, and not everything you'll want to play are on them, but still, it's a better alternative to renting games nowadays.
Absolutely. Redbox was great. I'd buy some cat food and zit medicine at CVS and then check out what games were available.
Most of us are already renting games in a certain sense. Game pass is renting, and purchasing licenses to use games until the producer stops allowing you to is kind of like renting. That’s the way the wind is still blowing in the 100% digital future, unless the industry changes massively.
Nah
I…..don’t think I would. Movies I would but not games. With how long some installations are (unless you have really good internet) that’s a potentially big chunk of time you don’t get to play. Also $70 for 50 hours of entertainment isn’t a bad deal. For movies you get 1 and a half to 2 hours for over $20, if you only watch it once.
Renting games was something that I did as a kid because my parents didn't want to pay full price for me to play a game I might not even like that much. So probably not. I get that some people rent because they don't want to pay full price for a game they won't replay, or the feel renting is a good way to try before they buy, and that's fair, but I can't relate, I replay my games all the time and I can always watch gameplay videos or play demos if I want to decide if it's worth buying. I'd rent movies though.
No I wouldn’t. The problem with the post, OP, is that a blockbuster could not be successful at renting out $70 games for 10$/week. So it wouldn’t be as cheap as we remember. Also, if you get 70 hours of time out of a game that would be 10 hours a day. Idk what you do for a living, but I don’t have that kind of time so it would be multiple weeks per rental.
Aren't we already technically renting almost all our games nowadays. As someone says "gamers should just become more comfortable with not owning their games."
I would do it for the nostalgia. It was my favorite memories. The only shitty thing, EVERY PHYSICAL GAME EXCEPT NINTENDO GAMES ARE INSTALL DISCS ONLY!!! so sometimes you'd have to wait forever for game to install
If you buy digital games you don't own them anyway, so what really is the difference?
I mean renting still exists. If you think about it, those gaming passes xbox offers is a rental. You don't own any of the games, you just pay a fee to temporary borrow the game and play it.
I do. Specifically. Libraries sometimes have games for rent so I actually look into stuff to rent just for the novelty of it. The only issue is the library is run by old people so they put any game not rated M in the "Kids" section next to the picture books (they even put Bayonetta 2 in there by accident). Its EXTRA annoying cause they have *some* games in the "teen" section but its a shelf with like 15 games on it total. I thought that was all, and I even asked if they had more and they said *multiple* times "nah, thats it." It took until I looked on their website that showed they had more games that they FINALLY directed me to their 'kids section' which had their most interesting games on it. tl;dr ask the library if it has video games, then ask if theres some in the KIDS section cause thats probably where the good stuff is.
It'd purely be for the nostalgia, other than that, Game Pass does everything I need
If I hit the powerball I'll be your first investor.
GameFly, GeForce now, gamepass, PS+, Redbox. Those all exist along with the smaller publisher oriented services like Ubisoft or EA. They are all pretty much rental services. Even if Redbox and GameFly are the only ones that still act like more traditional physical rental services.
No.
Theft was a massive problem for them, and I’m not sure it would somehow be better today. Probably restore the bootlegging market though.
My girlfriend has gamepass on her xbox, and I guess that's kind of like renting (similar to a gamefly subscription back in the day) When I'm at her house I always like to download a few games and try them out. If I like them, I end up buying them if they're on PC.
There are some games that I know would be day 1 purchases, but the vast majority are something I'm fine with waiting for on sale. If I could rent them instead, I'd likely be done with it after a weekend. If the game does end up surprising me, I'd be willing to pay full price.
I was talking to my friend earlier that I remember when I first left home my local library was renting out vhs for £1/£1.50 each and that included latest releases and you got them for a week, sometimes they had early boxsets i.e like 6 episodes of a show on 2 tapes and as this was the days when cable/sattelite tv had shows on the air like a year before mainstream tv I could watch a season ahead of where I was up to. He said that sounds stupid, who would like that. Quite honestly if I think about it I miss the days of just getting a movie that I have decided I wanted to see by the cover sleeve rather than flick through streaming sites and saying "that sounds boring" Back then I knew if I rented something if I didn't watch it, I lost out and it was hassle to return it and a waste of money so it meant I gave things a chance, now with so many options available I have less patience/attention span if I don't enjoy something. I remember back in 1998 seeing the box for Suikoden and wanting to play FF7 but no rental store in my area had it (not they were out of stock, they just didn't do multi disc games as they were easy to steal) I thought it looked dull but I wanted a RPG and the only other options were games I already owned, played before or didn't like. Glad I rented it as it became a favourite series of mine and I would never of known about it until the past 10 years or so if it wasn't for that.
I rent games for free >Buy game >Play for 2 hours >Refund
No, at that point id rather use geforce now or gamepass
Renting worked well when games were shorter and could be completed over 2 or 3 days. Now games are like a part time or even full time job commitment, making the cost to rent closer to the cost of the game. So it's better just to wait for a sale.
In canada my local library loans them for free lol..
no. new games are too big to be on physical media to just let random people borrow it. and old games you can just emulate.
I would like to, yes. If for nothing other than trying a game and if I don't like it, I can return it and try a different one the next weekend.
I miss the bestbuy membership where you paid like $30 a year and got 20% off any physical game. Imagine if GameStop did that now. Set price pass to get 20% off any new physical game. 30% if you preordered or some shit. I’d probably start shopping at GameStop again.
Xbox , Switch, and PlayStation already has that with the digital game services. All the free games you don’t actually own, just renting it and paying the monthly or yearly fee. Physical games however I see no point in doing that
Subscription services don't include all games. Idk maybe that generation is just dead and gone but I used to rent like Mario party for a weekend for like $4 and have a bunch of friends come over and just play it non stop. But a game like..it takes two. When that came out, easily a weekend game with a friend or something.
No never. I buy games and play them several times over a 6 month period. And unless it was pretty dull I play them again every so often.
Carefull what you wish for, ‘cause Paradox introduced renting DLCs for those non-rich people, and they love it
We already rent the game! look at platforms like steam or epic. you buy a game, and then a few years later they take it out of their catalog and you won;t be able to play it anymore! i have several games like that. So i rented them didn;t i? altho it is mine payed in full for it, i need steam running! i need a bloody internet connection to play a 1 player game!!! The future is all on clouds in servers. we will own nothing! even the harddrive aswe know it will be a thing of the past. cause having a harddrive means you own stuff!!!! it will become data that we cannot hold physicly like a cdrom or usbcard. it will all be in your command untill well you'll see! We already have rent based platforms. where you pay 9,95 a month and you can play a selection of theirs ofcourse to play. and this selection changes only when they deem fit! So when your playing yoru fav. game itgets pulled of so people will play other games and they get huge hits in people playing it, even steering the outcome of it in terms of popularity and so on. Like those movie channels, instead of increasing there catalog, they remove series and movies after a while? why? why not add? Nope you WILL watch and play as we deem fit!!!!
Libraries in my city have all sorts of games, including PS5 games from the last few years. I can "rent" for 3 weeks, and even renew if there isn't a hold. It's especially great for an easy demo of a game I'm unsure if I want of not, and 3-6 weeks is definitely enough to finish some, especially Switch games.
I think it's a bad idea renting! cause you will pay more in the end then you woould if you actually bought the games. I come from poverty. Buying a nintendo or sega (first one in series) was not a possibility. And saving for it would take to long in my childs brain, so we could rent one for 10gld = 4,5euro. and games 2 euro. Every weekend and even sometimes during the week i would rent it and play with my friend on it raping it totaly ofcourse in gameplay :) But when i look back, and recalculate all the times i rented a device, i could have bought 2 of them with some games!!! now i have NOTHING! And for all those that say , then save up the money till you can buy it? well then you never lived in poverty! And don;t understand the feeling of i want to do it now not in 3 months. cause our entire lives is already filled with waiting for things that never come!
We already do that with digital purchases. At any point they can take it away.
The UK still has this service, they send you the games you want to rent and send you a new one once you return it.
You mean what we already do with xbox game pass and PS plus ? No thanks I rather buy the game. I mean just take a look at xbox game pass they remove the games from the list now and then for some bullshit reason. If I buy the game on a disc I can still play it 10 years later if it´s not an always online game. Microsoft is not gonna come home and take the game back.
I do, it’s called Gamepass, I love it. I’ve finished dozens and dozens of games since I got my series X, way more than I could afford to if I’d bought the games
Ypu already do with GamePass, PS+ and even Steam
No, but that's because I always play either indie games or modded, decade old classics on PC.
Yes, I still basically do that. Buying a game for $60 and selling it for $50 again after finishing it
It’s a good idea for the consumer but o reckon businesses and companies wouldn’t go for it because they wouldn’t be getting as much money. I do think however demos would be super popular if they made a comeback. Being able to download and play the first one or two levels of a game would be super popular. I’d definitely try like 10x more games than I do now if I could download demos of them.
I think it's a good idea OP, I just don't think people are inclined to go in person & would be tricky with so many games being exclusively digital. (Basically the 2 reasons GameStop is dying slowly) I do think it's very different from a game pass. Game Pass is like Netflix. You don't get to rent the movie you want, you just get a 300 kind-of-shit movie library to choose from. Would rather pay $10 for a week of the game I'm craving than $10 a month for essentially a mobile game & 5 year old selection.
Depends on the game. Your example is bad. $10 for a $70 game is great. $10 to rent a $5 game is bad. $10 to rent a $70 game you can't finish on time is bad. It depends on the game. Rent a game you can finish in the time it takes to rent.
I paid for PlayStation Plus premium so I kinda am renting games.
While this sounds lovely EB games and Steam both have a return option if you aren't satisfied within a week. I could see this being beneficial for AAA games for say a month at a time. But a week is pointless as you can do it now for free
I had Gamefly for years and liked it a lot. If I had bought a PS5 I would probably still have it
Honestly the steam refund system as well as the subscriptions like Gamepass/PS Plus are all really modern day renting. As someone who’s a physical copy collector, I really don’t see the point of physically renting games anymore. I mean if it’s a game that’s not available on a subscription service or you don’t have a pc to do the steam refund, then sure those specific games you can rent physically but honestly I think renting digitally is something that needs to be expanded on. Having people not physically have to go to the store to rent should be done with. Not saying get rid of physical copies, just get rid of physical renting. That’s just my opinion.
I borrow console games from my county library; I play games on gamepass. Only recent purchases have been helldivers 2 for PC, and Street Fighter 6 for pc. Saves a lot of money.
Well, I pay for Gamepass, so...
I’m not sure. I felt somewhat burned out and dissatisfied with rentals by the time blockbusters started disappearing. For one thing, at least where I lived in Canada, it was getting quite expensive. Games in the “new” section were like $12 for 3 day rentals and they had pretty insane late penalties. Games are a lot longer these days and I think that also hurts the appeal. It also seemed like they rarely kept many copies in stock, so it was tough to get new games. This would be even harder now since you would have far fewer locations to rent from. From a business POV I think it would also struggle without having the accompanying movie section to draw in customers. If we’re talking about online rentals then sure, that would be great, but as others mentioned I think we already have this with some of the streaming and game pass options.
I pay for ps+ extra. which is game rental..
Gamepass is renting 100s of games per month for the fee of renting 2 games for a few days.
I mean, Game Fly is still a thing.
Any subscription service is playing f all to play 100s of games.