You can see the trend in that Call of Duty Elite social service, or the “season pass” offerings that give gamers access to DLC releases over time. As it turns out, purchases are unpredictable, vulnerable to piracy, and resellable on the used market. Subscriptions are cold, hard, predictable cash. Predictable is the word game companies like. Who wouldn’t want to rake it in month after month? Who wouldn’t want to force every customer to buy a subscription from you at full price, rather than a used game at half-price from a secondary store? Expect to see games jumping on the subscription service wagon in the future. Reuters has the story.
Actually owning the things you buy is soooo 20th century. These days, everything’s a service, and only corporations are allowed to own property. That’s cool though. Who wouldn’t want a corporation to have total control over everything they buy? Being able to share and resell stuff you bought is a total drag. Good thing it’s going away.