DLC and the march of corporate interests
One thing the recent recession has taught developers and publishers of video games, is this: be afraid, be very afraid. Whilst global markets have crashed during the last couple of years, and are now showing signs of recovery, these hard times have seen developer studios shut down and hasty gobbling up of other developers by larger developers or by the big games publishers. Consumers have been savvier in their purchasing decisions too, with pre-owned game sales up in 2009. So it is no surprise that the money people behind the companies we rely on to bring us the best that gaming has to offer would perhaps push for the increased availability of downloadable content (DLC) in order to further expand potential profits from a product, and increase fanbase loyalty and also keep games out of the pre-owned market.
If you have played the large amount of available quests in Oblivion, for instance, then the Knights of the Nine and Shivering Isles DLC (or discs) from Bethesda probably came as a form of relief all those years ago. Even Rockstar's addition of content to GTA 4 added to the lifetime of the game. Essentially players tend to appreciate download content if it seriously extends the replayability of a game already in their collection that they have previously 'played to death' and, for the most part, comes some time after release.
When it comes to big titles released between the PS3, Xbox 360 and PC, downloadable content is now key. According to Microsoft's Kevin Salcedo during Gamefest in 2008, DLC essentially keeps a game in the hands of a consumer significantly longer than if it had no DLC. So the longer a game stays in the possession of the original buyer, the more DLC they will probably buy for it, and the less likely the game will end up in a store that trades in pre-owned games. And therein lies the tenuous relationship between selling games and the effect of the second hand market.
Most noticeably with two big titles published by EA Games in the last twelve months, BioWare's Dragon Age Origins and Mass Effect 2, strategies have essentially been implemented by EA to ensure that these games do not end up for sale in pre-owned sections or that gamers buy a product pre-owned, and instead feel compelled to buy it firsthand. The lure of DLC has been the carrot to the stick that has been used to persuade gamers to buy the game on launch, in the case of both Dragon Age Origins and Mass Effect 2. Both had redeemable codes in brand new copies of the games, codes that could only be used once to get at DLC for the games on launch (and for a certain time afterwards) for free. Similarly, new copies of Gears of War 2 came bundled with a code for downloading 5 additional multiplayer maps, which were later made available at a premium.
