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Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter believes anti-used-game consoles would hurt all three major platform holders. Out of all the major players in the industry, he can only see EA and Activision benefiting.
“It isn’t really in Sony’s or Microsoft’s best interests to block used games,” Pachter told Games Industry. “It would benefit Activision and EA slightly, and would hurt GameStop a great deal. If Sony unilaterally did this, I could see GameStop refusing to carry their console, and sales of the PS4 would therefore suffer,” he added.
Pachter doesn’t believe one platform holder is “stupid enough” to go the anti-used-game route “unilaterally” as it would give the others a clear advantage, and doesn’t think they’d conspire to do it together as none of them “are evil enough”.
According to David Cole of DFC Intelligence, customers would “rebel” if anti-used-game systems came into play, but does think Sony will step up the idea of online passes.
“I can certainly see Sony stepping up the idea of $10 online passes for connected multiplayer and so on, but especially for families of limited means or that have a narrowband connection at home, the ability to buy/trade use discs is an important reason why they buy game consoles in the first place.”
Sony and Microsoft are now both reportedly working on next-generation consoles that feature anti-used-game measures – something that has been met with blanket negative coverage.
