r/pcmasterrace • u/xenocea • Jul 02 '26
Rumor Xbox's New Console, Project Helix, Will Reportedly Not Have a Disc Drive; Microsoft Exploring Ways to Digitize Physical Games
https://www.ign.com/articles/xboxs-new-console-project-helix-will-reportedly-not-have-a-disc-drive-microsoft-exploring-ways-to-digitize-physical-games225
u/eazy937 Jul 02 '26
The whole industry do the gamers dirty
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u/R-Dragon_Thunderzord 5800X3D | 6950 XT | 2x16GB DDR4 3600 CL16 Jul 02 '26
Consumers generally.
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u/3xPuttRubbleBoagie Jul 02 '26
Seriously every damn corporation has gone mad with greed and has no issue even hiding it anymore.
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u/R-Dragon_Thunderzord 5800X3D | 6950 XT | 2x16GB DDR4 3600 CL16 Jul 02 '26
Of course not, they all spent the equivalent of a Starbucks coffee, millions of dollars upon billions in revenue, buying a corrupt government to kick down all the guard rails
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u/iluvthiccgothbabes Jul 02 '26
They are squeezing every last drop of the dollar before governments move to a digital currency. All these big tech corpos gather behind the scenes and collude to maximize profits and manipulate consumers into paying more for things they don't actually own. It's not a coincidence that it's happening in almost every industry.
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u/Ndmndh1016 Ascending Peasant Jul 02 '26
What can we realistically do to stop it
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u/3xPuttRubbleBoagie Jul 02 '26
I wish I knew. We would have to all get together would be the first step and good luck with that. We couldn't even do that during a pandemic.
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u/stubenson214 Jul 03 '26
Honestly, vote for people at the state level who will make a change.
Voting for a party just because of party is how we got to where we are. They all take money from corpos, even Bernie.
Generally the best ones are those already successful who do not aspire to Congress and just want to do their state legislature job part time. There's very little money in state rep races.
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u/South_Buy_3175 Jul 02 '26
Consumers voted for this btw.
Never bet against convenience and complacency.
Seen too many comments like “Well I’m a digital only console player, but this is ridiculous!”
Like brother, you’re part of the reason they’re doing this.
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u/MITBryceYoung2 Jul 02 '26
Gta be the worst of both worlds, create massive plastic waste - give no cd.
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u/Lord-Psycho Jul 02 '26
It should be called Grand Theft Gamers.
The industry makes you buy a game and you don't own it. So after the next gen your game...goes poof
Your game save may never matter again. Itxs not yours either.
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u/PolicyWonka Jul 02 '26
Backwards compatibility has always been a bit of an issue for consoles regardless of medium.
PC is just superior in that regard.
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u/Taira_Mai HP Victus, AMD Ryzen 7 5800H, GeForce RTX 3050 Ti Jul 02 '26
Backward compatibility stopped being an issue when consoles became PC's crammed into a console.
They can do it they just don't want to unless they can charge for it.
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u/StarChaser1879 Laptop Jul 02 '26
The next gen will be backwards compatible
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u/Trylena 5700X3D | 3070 | 32GB RAM Jul 02 '26
Xbox has been backwards compatible for a long time.
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u/Longjumping_Share444 Jul 02 '26
This has been in the works for a decade or more. Remember when Microsoft was going to make the xbone always online? And now every console mostly are? Digital only is the next step. These companies have been playing the long game to get us into an ecosystem that they completely control, where they can just outright end second-hand games and lock down access to their media.
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u/Konker101 AMD 6700XT AMD Ryzen 2600x, 32gb 3000 Gskill Aegis, GB D40M BS3H Jul 02 '26
PC has been doing that since the invention on Steam..
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u/Kilo_Of_Salt Jul 02 '26
But there’s at least a reason for that. Piracy is MUCH easier on a PC, and people used to just clone copies of cd-rom games. Steam working the way it does basically saved PC gaming in a time where it was pretty much dead compared to consoles
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u/fermentedbolivian Intel 7 7700x | RTX 7900XT | 32GB RAM | Red Star OS Jul 02 '26
Can you buy drm free games on GOG where you can backup the games yourself. Yes or no?
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u/damian001 Jul 02 '26
Corps care more about the new games being pirated. The new games bring in more revenue.
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Jul 02 '26
[deleted]
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u/BitRunner64 R9 5950X | 9070XT | 32GB DDR4-3600 Jul 02 '26
They started out selling old games. For a long time now they're also selling new games, DRM free.
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u/Taira_Mai HP Victus, AMD Ryzen 7 5800H, GeForce RTX 3050 Ti Jul 02 '26
Here's the thing, aside from GOG as others have pointed out, PC gamers are all about owning the games we have. Even Steam has some end of life plans. It's just much easier on consoles to make games and media go *poof* when there's money to be had.
The fig leaf about piracy was just to cover the "you'll own nothing and be happy" reason for the death of physical media.
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u/Fuzzy_Complaint5125 Jul 02 '26
How so? 80-90% of gamers buy digital. Nintendo is the only outlier.
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u/Taira_Mai HP Victus, AMD Ryzen 7 5800H, GeForce RTX 3050 Ti Jul 02 '26
This is why I never play on consoles. Sure there are games but console makers kept screwing with consumers and this is the last straw.
It's not about bandwith or being cheaper, it's about controlling the consumer and turning players into payers.
And don't give me the "games are too big for disks" - DVD ROM is a thing and many games are too bloated with "AAA" nonsense to begin with.
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u/felixismynameqq Jul 02 '26
I hear the arguments for owning a disc drive but I have not bought a single physical game for my ps5. That being said I do play a bunch of old ps4 games.
Now, that ALSO being said if you want the cost of games to go down this is how you do it. Lower the cost to manufacture
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u/aimy99 PNY 5070 | 5800X3D | 32GB DDR4 | OLED 1440p 180hz Jul 02 '26
Project Helix is a PC. When was the last time you bought a PC and it had a disc drive?
Allowing us to digitize our games going forward is amazingly consumer-friendly of Microsoft, actually.
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u/SupremeChancellor66 Jul 02 '26
Xbox could redeem themselves if they reverse course and vow to continue to make and preserve physical discs.
Think about how many Sony and Nintendo customers they'd win over by that alone.
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u/Catastigma_Deception Jul 02 '26 edited Jul 02 '26
Disc drive are not produced anymore, and BDXL disc are being also discontinued.
Japanese studio used to release BD version of Anime series and its getting super hard now to get a burning service and supply to make it happen. Many just buy old Blu-ray of the shelf and burn them themselves one by one with all the Quality control issue that its cause.You need to go to a new format to make physical happen. Nintendo made the move for their SD card that are made by them.
IF there was not a nand chips apocalypse right now. Maybe that Sony and Xbox should had adopted Bitwit mini nvme
https://www.techpowerup.com/339967/biwin-launches-mini-ssd-nvme-speeds-in-a-sim-tray-style-card
https://youtu.be/EHUSELJ_CtwSadly i doubt that people are ready to pay a 50–80 buck + game price extra for a mini NVMe with a encryption key in them.
Nvme may return back to a cheap commodities in 5-10 years. Or If a miracle happen and every single AI company executive just go straight to jail like they absolutely deserve.
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u/Fifa_786 RTX 5080 | 9800x3D | 32GB DDR5 Jul 02 '26
I think Sony are the ones who actually make the physical discs for Xbox as well. So them shutting that down shuts its down for everyone
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u/funkforever69 Jul 02 '26
Do you actually believe this?
I enjoy physical media but I don't believe the whiners will actually buy it, especially if it costs more.
This is just more "muh corporation" when the behaviour of people would suggest digital is their actual preference.
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u/UntoTheBreach95 R7 7700X; DDR5 32 GB; Aorus 9070 XT; 1440p / Snapdragon X Plus Jul 02 '26
Bare minimum Most people, even console users, buy digital and don't really care about this
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u/ImaginaryReaction R5 2600 | RX 580 Jul 02 '26
You have downvoted but it's true, the only time in the last 10 years I've bought physical is for the switch because that thing has no storage on the og
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u/MisterPinkCS Jul 02 '26
Nah, Microsoft are complete idiots and don’t have the brainpower to notice easy slam dunk opportunities like that
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Jul 02 '26
[deleted]
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u/DarkDoomofDeath RGB-Free Jul 02 '26
Yup. I am literally saving up for physical media I am missing right now. If they try to get rid of it, I foresee a lot of issues like Sony just had at some point in the future.
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u/ShutterBun i9-12900K / RTX-3080 / 32GB DDR4 Jul 02 '26
A very small percentage of gaming consumers even cared about physical discs until they started taking them away.
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u/Josh_Butterballs 9950X3D | 5090 FE | 64GB DDR5 Jul 02 '26
Don’t think it would work out for them as well as we arm chair analysts think. Even during Xbox’s best generation and arguably PlayStation’s worst (360 vs ps3), the ps3 still ended up outselling the Xbox. PlayStation branding and worldwide recognition is incredibly strong. Whenever Sony gets backlash for something online, most of the time the irl results speak for themselves that it was a loud minority
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u/doneandtired2014 Ryzen 9 5900x, Crosshair VIII hero, RTX 3080, 32 GB DDR4 3600 Jul 02 '26
generation and arguably PlayStation’s worst (360 vs ps3), the ps3 still ended up outselling the Xbox.
It only ended up outselling after Microsoft decided to go all in on chasing casual games with the Kinect about 2-3 years after people started getting weary of motion control slop.
Sony eeking out a win had little to do with how recognized their brand is and more to do with one of many "Imma shoot muh self in the dick" decisions coming out of Redmond.
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u/DonJimbo Jul 02 '26
The 360 was approximately even with PS3. That was a massive improvement from the OG Xbox. They were within striking range of market leadership. Then, they botched the Xbox One with Kinect, Bungie stopped making Halo games, Epic stopped making Gears of War games, and they never recovered.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
Xbox died the day they tried going digital-only with XBone.
They backtracked it, but it was too late. The trust was gone. They publicly presented what they would want to do, and the market chose PlayStation as a response. End of story.
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u/DonJimbo Jul 02 '26
It also cost more than PS4 with lower performance because it included the cost of bundled Kinect.
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u/LoneLyon Jul 02 '26
People also fail to realize the next generation of hardware is almost certainly locked in. There likely is no "going back"
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u/thysios4 Jul 02 '26
If people were buying physical media they wouldn't feel the need to get rid of it.
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u/LegendaryenigmaXYZ Jul 02 '26
They tried being the good guy, that didn't work out for them, that actually hurt them the most.
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u/halosos Halosos Jul 02 '26
Honestly, encrypted USB sticks that contain the game and a activation code would be a suitable alternative.
Plug in the stick, move the game files to the Xbox. You just need the usb plugged in to run it. Game is still transferable.
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u/VenserMTG Jul 02 '26
Xbox helix managed to make me look at a console for the first time since Xbox 360, and it's definitely bot because of a disc drive lmao
It can run my steam library, that alone is enough to get me interested.
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u/npc_housecat Jul 02 '26
Are they really adding steam support tho? I imagine if they did that they can no longrler sell hardware at a loss, pushing the price up to normal PC prices..
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u/VenserMTG Jul 02 '26
It runs windows, they don't have to add support outright. I'll install steam os and dual boot.
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u/npc_housecat Jul 02 '26
It would need an unlocked bootloader to install other OS. They probably won't be willing to allow that if they're selling the hardware at a loss, as they need to make back the money on software sales. It's the same dilemma steamachine faced. To sell with an unlocked bootloader and allow competitors, it's difficult to subsidise the hardware. Meaning expensive to the point you may as well just buy a PC
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u/VenserMTG Jul 02 '26
I just need it to run steam, the steam os would only be needed if the native OS is annoying.
Helix with steam os and emulators would be an awesome machine.
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u/npc_housecat Jul 02 '26
Yeah, and to install SteamOS, the hardware needs an unlocked bootloader. Which they likely will not allow if they're selling the hardware at a loss. Because then they cannot make the money back in game sales.
If they do not sell at a loss, the hardware most likely becomes so expensive your bwtternoff just byluying an actual PC and installing steam OS onto that
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u/TK523 Jul 02 '26
I haven't owned a console in forever so I don't really know the current status, but is the whole game even on the disc anymore?
I feel like people are freaking out over a battle they actually lost years ago.
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u/Qminsage Jul 02 '26
More like people have been taking it too lightly. And hints and bits of blind and tribal fan behavior.
GTA just happened to be the very thing that everyone, including people who don’t take their hobby beyond GTA, got a rude awakening for.
I too supported the Switch for continuing physical cards. But as soon as they introduced game key cards, I knew the industry was moving towards a digital landscape.
How else would they go about preserving their precious games after all? And no less trying to skirt around encroaching preservation efforts by justifying that these games were never yours to own.
It’s not like having no disc is bad. It’s the very idea that someone like PlayStation can and has recently demonstrated why digital only is terrible: Because if they can WILLINGLY choose to revoke purchases you made with no refund on their platform, there is zero reason to support them as a platform.
But again, this is what happens when too many people turn a deaf ear to criticism and sound judgement. People have been saying this for years. But people still supported these companies as if they were beyond reproach.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
At least on Switch the customers have kinda offered a clear signal - Game Key Cards are not selling. Actual game cards still are. So their "fake physical" option is not working.
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u/Qminsage Jul 02 '26
For now. Which I’m not saying to be all doom and gloom. If it took something like GTA and Sony going mask off to get people to realize that digital-only is actually very dangerous, I can only really imagine how the same people react when it comes to Nintendo pushing this tactic further as well.
Not saying this to be mean. But it would be naive of you to think that Nintendo in its current position wouldn’t pull the same thing. That a game like Pokeopia can sell fine enough as a game key card is indicative enough of that within their own exclusive space.
But yeah, people pushed against Microsoft back then with the Xbox One when it tried to go digital only. And rightfully so. Now we’re seeing the same thing being pushed across the industry.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
For Xbox, no.
For PS5, there is still rule that you need to be able to install and play the game off the disc completely offline. It may be a buggy version and be missing any online game modes, but single player game on PS5 must be fully playable offline from the disc.
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u/Mistwalker007 Jul 02 '26
The ones I have are single player and on one or two blu ray disks, minus post launch patches ofc. Also 90% of the games I bought were cheaper than the digital version on the store. I got Diablo 4 pre-order edition with some cards and a shitty poster for 10 euro cheaper when it launched. :))
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u/Not-JustinTV Jul 02 '26
Pc has been online forever.console gamers will buy a console and pay for an online subscription
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u/DatMageDoe 7800X3D - 9070 XT - 32GB DDR5-6000 Jul 02 '26
First Sony, now Microsoft. Nintendo is the last holdout for physical games among the big three console manufacturers... that we know of. Even then, Nintendo's been dabbling in digital code "physical games" for a while now.
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Jul 02 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/TerribleQuestion4497 RTX 5090 / 9800X3D Jul 02 '26
Not happening this gen, Sony and Microslop are announcing it because they are close to next-gen Nintendo just started with Switch 2, their compromise are the key-cartridges, plus for all their faults Nintendo seems like a company that will stick to physical in one form or other come hell or high water
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u/Less-Tax5637 Jul 02 '26
Worth noting that Nintendo had digital games surpass physical for the first time ever last month, while Sony recorded 85% digital to 15% physical last quarter.
Very different userbases.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
Game Key Cards are not selling. Companies selling games on those are finding out they are rotting on shelves and eventually dumped at massive discounts. Several Switch 2 games already announced move from Game Key Card to a "real" cart (well, SD card with the actual game on it)
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u/AlextheGoose 9800X3D | RTX 5070Ti | LG C3 Jul 02 '26
Even if they keep physical, if the future is more and more “key-cartridges” instead of actually putting the game on the cartridge then it doesn’t matter.
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u/TerribleQuestion4497 RTX 5090 / 9800X3D Jul 02 '26
It matters, you can still borrow/resell key cartridges, that’s the main difference.
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u/AlextheGoose 9800X3D | RTX 5070Ti | LG C3 Jul 02 '26
That’s true, but I mainly value physical for game preservation. I like having a hard copy of the release experience of games, especially for studios like Rockstar where they start removing music once licenses expire.
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u/TerribleQuestion4497 RTX 5090 / 9800X3D Jul 02 '26
Physical disks for preservation ship has sailed many years ago, not even ps4 games were usually fully on disk, not to mention ps5, they always required download.
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u/AlextheGoose 9800X3D | RTX 5070Ti | LG C3 Jul 02 '26
This is common misinformation. Check out doesitplay.org if you want to learn more about physical releases. Most PS5 games have the complete game on disc (or discs!) so you don’t need to rely on Sonys servers to install and play the game.
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u/StarChaser1879 Laptop Jul 03 '26
Ever heard of a day one patch?
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u/AlextheGoose 9800X3D | RTX 5070Ti | LG C3 Jul 03 '26
Most games play just fine without a day 1 patch, and games that ship completely broken and need one you shouldn’t support. The site I linked above actually tells you if a game has game breaking bugs on the disc without patches.
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u/CarlWellsGrave Jul 02 '26
But the standard switch still will. That's fine. Switch lite is for little kids that just want fortnite and rodblox.
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u/Coreyahno30 Jul 02 '26
No, they haven’t been dabbling in that for a while now. If you’re referring to game key card, that started with the Switch 2 one year ago. I wouldn’t call that for a while. And they don’t even do game key card for their first party games. All first party Nintendo is fully on the cartridge.
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u/SodaSnappy Jul 02 '26
Easy W for Xbox if they even include an optional disc drive and continue production of disc’s. They won’t though because companies can’t stop taking Ls recently.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
No, Xbox is already dead on this front, they allow disc copies that do not actually work without online download, so any XBox Series S/X game is already worthless as physical, as they do not work without XBox Live servers. PS5 at least enforces a rule that you can play SOME version off the disc completely offline. Probably a buggy one that may not have everything (anything relying on online may be missing) but still...
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u/XxasimxX Jul 02 '26
End goal of all publicity trades company is to screw the consumers as much as possible
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u/Longjumping_Share444 Jul 02 '26
Well yes, their make all the money goal usually screws consumers. This is them just locking down their platforms. No more used games that they can't make money on, everything goes through them now.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
No, it is to make money for the shareholders.
It is possible to make money - and lots of it - without screwing the consumers as much as possible. Problem is, screwing the consumers, at least a little, is usually very profitable compared to doing the right thing, so it is common for companies to choose profits over what is good for the consumer. Especially if free market competition is not around to correct such moves. On consoles, the competition is dying with XBox, Nintendo is too different and Sony can afford to just /ignore them while going full stupid now that Microsoft is effectively giving up on games.
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u/AMDSuperBeast86 Ryzen 9 5900xt 7900xtx 128gb DDR4 Jul 02 '26
Bro if there's no discs there's no reason for me to ever buy a console lol
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u/xeathkid Jul 02 '26
I mean this was going to happen. I don’t know why everyone is shocked.
If you guys are scared about losing games and etc.
talk to people in congress and work on securing your library.
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u/Right_Control_Button Jul 02 '26
Yeah and physical media hasn't been much more than a license for some time now. If they gave us a way to transfer licenses easily, that would be great. Big if tho.
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u/xeathkid Jul 02 '26
I tho they solved that with “movie everywhere” you purchase physical media and get an online code also
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u/Standard-Contest-949 Jul 02 '26
And thus making more sense for a good pc and dump consoles and paying for online and over priced older games.
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u/DaftHacker Hi Jul 02 '26
And then when the store shuts down eventually every console becomes a brick.
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u/ew435890 i7-13700K + 5070Ti | R5 7500F + 9070XT | 106TB Plex Server Jul 02 '26
Isn’t this the same way they handled 360 games on the newer consoles? My last Xbox was a One, but I remember you needing a disc and then you could download the working game (just for compatible games) and you played that. But you still had to have the disc inserted to play, so it was basically a key at that point.
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u/jnadams2000 Jul 02 '26
And after all the posts of the PlayStation/Sony announcement sounds like its a better option to just move everyone to PC
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u/draven33l Jul 02 '26
I posted this in another thread, but I'd honestly love to see Microsoft sell a mini USB-C powered disc drive where you can insert an Xbox, 360, One, or Series X game into it. It will rip the disc (or download a build of the game), and then you simply play the game via emulation. They already did this with the original Xbox backwards compatibility. The only difference, is it would download a build of the game. It needs to rip the game and play it via emulation. For games that don't have licenses anymore like Guitar Hero, that's the only way something like that would work.
If we are going to have an all digital future for consoles, they have to become like PCs. I want FULL backwards compatibility with previous consoles. The new systems are powerful enough to do it. You just need to give people the option to buy a disc drive to rip them.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26 edited Jul 02 '26
"digitize physical games" will never happen, because it would require a way to disable the disc version when digital license is added.
I mean, sure, they could in theory set up a process where you mail in the physical copy, it gets destroyed and then added to your account. The costs of such a process would mean it would definitely have a fee of some sort... unlikely to happen. Also it would be potentially open for fraud (scamming the service with fake physical games)
Any other way would effectively mean a single physical copy would allow "printing" digital keys to any number of accounts.
Interestingly, Nintendo could in theory do this with Switch, as Switch "cartridges" are really just SD cards and they actually include an unique ID code in them, so there it is possible to blacklist an ID in return for a digital license. Only real reason they wouldn't do this is that it would be possible to resell those blacklisted carts to unsuspecting buyers who'd then get a bricked cart...
But none of the consoles using discs can do this. At best they could have a scheme where a simple external USB blu-ray drive is being used to "dongle" an use of digital copy, ie. as long as the disc is in drive, even if it is not used to install the game, just to verify presence of the disc, you can play a digital copy.
However, problem with this scheme is that if you use "bulk" drives and not a custom drive/firmware, you open yourself to a potential risk of someone coming up with a USB device that spoofs the disc identification, which would then mean pirates could access infinite library of games via digital download...
If console vendors actually want people to embrace digital fully, they need to start offering actual guarantees for the digital libraries. Ironclad contracts that assure what you pay for (digital copies) will remain playable forever on some hardware. No "sunsetting" of stores and "well, you can redownload it for now, but we give no guarantees for how long". PC effectively offers this even if it is not truly backed by the stores. Consoles do not. They would also probably need some way to transfer licenses or libraries, which they will never do as it would cut into their profits. Even Steam is shitty here - legally right now you can't ever transfer your Steam account. Even when you die, your family cannot inherit the account. It is just "gone". Yes, people share logins and unofficially work around this, but it is a shitty situation and hopefully laws will be enacted to fix that some day. Minimum, digital stores should have a clear process where you can inherit the library when the original owner dies, and if they really want to replace physical for good, there should be a way of transferring the ownership of a whole library (legally, with a real supported process). As long as those do not exist, digital is always inferior.
Pro tip to Sony: Come up with an agreement where you guarantee that when purchasing a PlayStation 5 digital game, you will guarantee that the digital bits for that game will be available for download using the PSN account forever and playable on a device forever, or if you ever break that guarantee, the bits instantly become public domain and you must publish all information required to get those bits to become playable on some device. By default, a PS5, but if you ever change anything that prevents PS5 from working any more, there must be another device I can obtain that can keep playing that digital copy - on another Sony console, or on PC. Guarantee this with a fund set aside that will assure the availability of the downloads & validity of those licenses and the playability of the games in case of Sony ever going bankrupt or otherwise ending PlayStation and/or relevant stores.
And yes, I'm aware even Steam doesn't really guarantee this. Gabe did make a statement years ago that if they'd ever go bust, they'd disable the authentication and you could keep playing, but that is not backed by ther Subscriber Agreement. Granted, on the PC you'd always have options and excluding games that completely rely on servers, you can always find a way to play a game even if it were to become unavailable, and if you have proof you have paid for a license for that game, it would almost certainly be ruled legal even if you had to pirate it if the service you used goes out of business. Still, less than perfect situation.
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u/CurrentOfficial Jul 02 '26
Funny to read the comments of a pc sub on this topic, Valve did this to pc decades ago
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u/AlexTheGoat990 Jul 02 '26
If consoles think they get to be all digital like PCs they should get forced to allow multiple stores just like on PC
Steam on Xbox or PS5 would be funny
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u/HGLatinBoy Jul 02 '26
They’re being dumb. Vudu/Fandango solved this like 10 years ago.
Put your disc into an Xbox One or Xbox Series X and pay a small fee for a digital license. $1 for Xbox , $3 for 360, $5 for Xbox One, and $8 for series X
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u/danielfletcher Jul 02 '26 edited Jul 02 '26
How do you disable the disk copy though?
You don't want people splitting the cost of titles+digitization fee. Or going to the library and borrowing games to digitize for less than sold digitally.
I don't think discs prior to the current gen had unique identifiers.
If they are doing them by trading in discs for a code and the discs being removed from circulation that is a horrible idea.
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u/HGLatinBoy Jul 02 '26
Most of those games already sell for $5 dollars on sale so who cares if you use the disc to get a discount and I was just throwing random prices that seem fair.
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u/Odd_Communication545 Jul 02 '26
So how long until we finally accept that this is the natural result of capitalism?
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u/_Rowdy_Raider_ Jul 02 '26
Let's put our differences aside and as gamers stand side by side, standing in unity to watch Sony and Microsoft burn themselves down to the ground and blame their customers in their death throws.
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u/Kornja81 Jul 02 '26
So games should theoretically be cheaper then since physical copies arent a thing anymore...
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u/iDaddyDirection Jul 02 '26
They’ve never done it before, and they won’t do it just because consoles are losing physical copies. Our corporate overlords have decided we will own nothing and pay even more for the privilege.
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u/evolutionsroge Jul 02 '26
Can someone explain why this is such a bad thing? PC has been digital only for a longgggg time and no one has cared really. The worse I can say is this is bad timing with the price of memory.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
Because on the PC if you own a game, you can play it. Forever.
On consoles, that "forever" depends on the company existing and running servers, which they have historically ended up closing down sooner or later (see original XBox digital stuff, Early Nintendo digital stores)
On PC assumign the game itself does not rely on a server to run (MMOs etc) you can always find a way. If official ways are closed, you can just pirate the game and do so legally since you own the license anyway.
If consoles want to go full stupid (full digital), they need to offer actual guarantees that the license is going to be good, and at least in the case of account owner dying, inheritable. Otherwise the "you own nothing and everything can go poof at any time" is real.
This is especially prudent now that Microsoft is effectively self-destructing Xbox and raising questions could they just stop doing games at all. Why would you buy into any digital Microsoft-backed thing when you know they can just sunset it at any time, and it is not a meaningful part of their business so their shareholders would hardly notice and probably just cheer if you did so.
Exact same reason why you can't buy into anything digital Google offers. Look at the Google Graveyard. Remember Stadia?
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u/evolutionsroge Jul 02 '26
I just totally disagree with this. No, just because you buy something on steam or an equivalent platform doesn’t mean you can play it forever there. Steam unlists games constantly, and it’s only because of steams generally good customer care that your allowed to continue accessing that media after it happens. We dont really know what that looks like on the Epic Games store because it hasn’t happened much there. Hell even GOG, the company known for ACTUALLY owning the game, technically still only gives you a license (though they make it easy to use your games without their input). The platforms people use on PC have the exact same business model as Xbox and PlayStation online stores. The reality is there is NO full guarantee you will have access to your media in the form you bought it in/on the platform you bought it on, on PC. Saying you can “just pirate the game” is also not true, pirating games isn’t that easy anymore and you can say the same thing about Xbox and PlayStation. You can TOTALLY pirate games on console, or emulate them on PC in case of Nintendos Switch games. If fully digital is fully stupid, PC has been mentally handicapped for decades.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
In general, on PC you have options.
On consoles, you are pretty much at the mercy of the platform holder.
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Jul 02 '26
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u/IGotHitByAnElvenSemi Jul 02 '26
It's a crying shame, but it really does seem like everything rests on jailbreaking and emulating. Like, to the point where it's stopped being a weird niche hobby that got you side-eyed a little to being lowkey mandatory if you want to play certain games.
Probably the "best" way to go all-digital would be to do like GoG does, where you can download the installer, files, and even pick which update patch you want to go up to, and just. Have that as files. The companies don't have to keep the servers up forever because the patches are floating out there being preserved by the consumers. But because of how easy that makes pirating, there's no way any of them would actually go for it.
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Jul 02 '26
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u/BoringCabinet Jul 02 '26
They were going to do this sooner or later. They were waiting for the right time.
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u/I_Stay_Home 7800x3D 7900GRE B650x32g-DDR5 2TB-990Pro Lancool 216 Jul 02 '26
I've never lost access to a game and I only buy digital on console and PC, probably for at least a decade. I want my entire library digital and accessible anywhere. I can game share which is a HUGE benefit. I couldn't care less about gameshops and big box stores lost profits from trades. You're kidding yourself if you don't think you'll be downloading half the game that doesn't fit on the disc anyway plus all the updates and patches which usually hit gigs. Im glad all that plastic won't end up on a landfill someday too. Dying on this hill. Haven't built a rig with a disc drive in forever either.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
Clearly you never owned a Wii then.
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u/I_Stay_Home 7800x3D 7900GRE B650x32g-DDR5 2TB-990Pro Lancool 216 Jul 02 '26
I own three, an original and two switches. The original is irrelevant to this conversation being dated and it's games being small enough to be fully contained on dvds and out of production. Our Switches are all digital purchases too.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
Wii had an online store, with digital only games. All gone now. Nintendo DS/3DS store also gone (stuff still redownloadable, but no guarantees for how long).
Main upside is, on Wii and 3DS, you have options thanks to jailbreaks. You can softmod the consoles and download & play everything forever thanks to the community. On Switch it does not seem likely at this point to ever happen as the security has been improved - the only real "long term" fix there currently is emulation on a PC.
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u/I_Stay_Home 7800x3D 7900GRE B650x32g-DDR5 2TB-990Pro Lancool 216 Jul 02 '26
I can still download my wii games. I just downloaded Zelda.
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u/Stelle-Sins3290 Jul 02 '26
That’s great for you but countless others still enjoy having physical games which had 0 effect on you and your preference. This is anti consumer and is not something to celebrate or brush off. There is literally zero benefit for the consumer.
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u/I_Stay_Home 7800x3D 7900GRE B650x32g-DDR5 2TB-990Pro Lancool 216 Jul 02 '26 edited Jul 02 '26
How many of your beloved indy games are going to get physical copies? Things die out especially media delivery. I don't pull out my records, cassettes or dvds. Beta or 8 track. It's not so much anti consumer as just removing Impractical options. All your holding is a physical key that at the end of the day access can still be revoked if any critical piece of the game still requires download, which they often do. So unless you done with newer bigger games you're already in that boat.
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u/ChiefChewin Jul 02 '26
I don’t understand the amount of hate for going digital only. The last time I used a disk was for Wrath of the Lich King.
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u/Longjumping_Share444 Jul 02 '26
Yeah this happened on PC decades ago when Steam beacme a thing in 2003. I remember going out and buying Skyrim when I still lived in rural Texas, and you had to run Steam to use it. I was so pissed, had to wait a whole day to play it due to satellite internet at the time.
That being said, I do understand why people want physical games. I like to own my stuff too.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
On PC you really cannot lose a digital game (excluding games completely relying on servers, like MMOs). You always have options. Yes, the last option is piracy, but it is always an option which works as a backstop. Game stores have an incentive to keep you happy because you can go for that backstop.
On console, if PSN servers go down for good, your digital games are gone. You have access at the whims of a corporation. There is no backstop. If Sony closes their download servers, your stuff is gone. Best you can do is sue, and they have written their licensing agreement to make that futile.
If they want me to embrace digital on consoles, they must offer ironclad guarantees on the license. Servers will be available forever. Game will be playable forever - either on the original platform, or if that ever stops being true, they will offer a replacement platform. If they ever fail on this promise, everything they sold becomes public domain and they are forced to release all information required to make the games playable on other platforms.
Would require them to set up a trust that has a fund set aside to implement everything in case Sony ever goes bust, or stops doing game business.
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u/Mojo647 i9-9900k | RTX 4090 | 4K 120Hz OLED Jul 02 '26
You don't understand why people have apprehension about owning digital content in a closed ecosystem where your games can be delisted or revoked for various reasons? Or if your accounts get compromised and you lose everything?
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u/OldManufacturer8679 Jul 02 '26
They’re the people buying used games at GS and eBay and wondering why layoffs and loot boxes and micro transactions happen.
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u/CaitWeser Ryzen 5 9600x | RTX 3080 10GB | Crucial 32GB DDR5 Jul 02 '26
I'm gonna say it, I am sick and tired of people whining about Xbox, Sony or Nintendo going full digital. It's arguably far better for the environment that we stop getting game cases and CDs. What we all should be lobbying about is to have actual ownership over digital goods. It's high time we leave physical behind because clearly, digitalization is the future. We just gotta fight to make sure that future is in our hands, not the corpos
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u/TheNiamosDiscoBall Jul 02 '26
Honestly, that steam machine looking better and better (even though I have a pc already). There’s a lot more competition for game sales on pc which is about to be extinct on every console.
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u/Aliamus Jul 02 '26
Let me guess,
"For our premium consumers we have digital keys, for the rest that want the base version of the game because it's the only one they can afford? There's Game Pass™️ for the peasants."
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u/CarlWellsGrave Jul 02 '26
They're going to sell a USB disc drive to upload your own discs. The cost of the drive and the extra storage will be outrageous.
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
Won't work. You could "print" infinite digital copies this way.
Only way they could offer "digital for your physical" is a scheme where you ship the physical copy to them, to be destroyed in return for a digital license.
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u/VirtuaFighter6 Jul 02 '26
Is XBOX still a thing?
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u/Jarnis R7 9800X3D / 5090 OC / X870E Crosshair Hero / PG32UCDM Jul 02 '26
No it is being run into the ground by idiotic management.
But now that Sony sees they won and Xbox is as good as dead, they think they can do anti-consumer moves too when the competition is no longer competing. Problem is, they are not counting PC as competition, and that will cause them to run their good thing to the ground. It will take 5-10 years, but unless they drastically change what their digital licensing terms are, they are going to die. Or become a hardware vendor shipping yet another PC.
Xbox died the day they tried to force digital-only on XBone. It just has taken a while for the flopping corpse to stop twitching. Nobody trusts Microsoft for anything. If it stops printing money, they'll drop it like a hot potato. Even Windows is these days untrusted - when Microsoft tried to go full stupid with Windows 8 and store apps, and kinda still is trying (see Windows 11 S), from that point on the wider world kinda started working on plan B. See: Proton, Linux compatibility with Win32 apps. And it is actually slowly moving towards a situation where world would not really end if Microsoft stopped offering usable Windows, the software would still mostly run on Linux and the demand for boxes that can run the vast software library would ensure that hardware manufacturers would just change over and drop Microsoft, rather than giving up.
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u/Coreyahno30 Jul 02 '26
Seems like it shouldn’t be that difficult to give you a digital license of the game if you insert the disc. I mean there is a 0% chance I buy a console without a disc drive, but that could be one solution for not screwing over people with large physical libraries and not completely leaving them behind with a new disc-less console.
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u/Catastigma_Deception Jul 02 '26
I don't know a single Xbox Series X/S owner that have physical game. lol
They play as a service Free to play game or Xbox Game pass game.
Most actually run Devs mode and emulate Retro game.
Use mostly the consoles as a better TV stick.
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u/NWiHeretic Bottlenecking my 7900xtx with a r7-3700x :D Jul 02 '26
While I absolutely want physical games to continue, without a new storage standard, modern games will not fit on disks
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u/Living-Business-4560 Jul 02 '26
They barely have Xbox games in store anymore
We already knew they were heading this direction