24 Jan, 2011
Here at GGS the subject of the pre-owned video games market has been a prevalent topic of discussion – indeed we had a good old chat about it on our latest podcast – since the news broke in the latter half of 2010 that publishers planned to limit online use in a bid to combat pre-owned sales.
Whereas EA have dabbled with a few methods including packaging new copies of games like Mass Effect 2 with downloadable content that pre-owned buyers would have to pay for, THQ have gone straight in for the kill with the much-maligned ‘online pass’, restricting network use for those with a pre-owned copy.
However, in an interview published by MCV today, GAME Group CEO Ian Shepherd has stated that the pre-owned market in their stores is stronger than ever, even in the face of new competition from Argos, Tesco and Asda. In the report, Mr. Shepherd was quoted as saying, “Even in the run-up to Christmas, when you would think most of our customers are buying games new in order to give them as gifts, you still have a lot of trade-in happening. Around 50 to 60 per cent of the time, when we were selling a brand new game we were taking in a trade-in against it.”
Mr. Shepherd didn’t elaborate on just how well pre-owned games are selling but clearly the trade-in market is still thriving. Recently, pre-owned games have become an increasingly touchy subject, with Codemasters’ Rod Cousens curiously attributing pre-owned sales to a potential rise in piracy, while GoldenEye producer Dawn Pinkney bravely defended the pre-owned market.
Click here to read the full MCV interview with Ian Shepherd.
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