Here's some more assaults on the used game market. And basically another step down that slippery slope we've been watching with more and more important things being given as DLC.
Essentially, online play is now considered an add-on for the game. It comes with free vouchers with a new retail game but otherwise you have to pony up 20 bucks if you bought it used and thus don't have the voucher that game with the game.
I can't wait until until end bosses come as DLC, but I guess we'll have to wait until "bonus extra bosses guarding rare powerful items" are added as DLC first.
I'd want to blame Game Stop for causing the Game Industry to lust after the used game sales, but the blame lies entirely with the game industry being dicks and GAMERS ACTUALLY THINKING 5 DOLLARS OFF RETAIL MAKES AN AWESOME FUCKING DEAL. We know Game Stop is being a bunch of dicks with their pricing, we have the power to make them stop by not buying it.
Additionally, I think I know what the next gen for consoles will probably do. It won't be digital-only media. Even if that's what the console makers want (so they can charge insane prices for a virtual product without any physical alternative for people to complain about) there's just no way in hell the bandwidth will be there.
Instead, I can see them attempting to pull what Ubisoft is pulling with the always-online-to-play bullshit. "It's the next logical step." I'm tagging this as "game prediction" to hopefully find the post again easily 4-5 years from now or whenever the new generation launches. We'll see if I'm right. I pray I'm wrong.
*edit*
I was going to fix that "game" typo up above, but decided to leave it to make another unrelated point. I used spellcheck to quickly find typos without pre-reading the post. That's how it slipped through. That's why game developers that make a conversation heavy game, like Ar Tonelico II, should have more eyes reading their scripts. (Those are the types of typos you see littered throughout the game.)