Just when you thought it would be safe to possibly buy a used Xbox One game comes this little slice of fried gold. Retailers, in speaking with MCV, said that Microsoft and publishers will take a cut out of every used game sale.
If you run a little mom and pop game store, you may want to be sitting down for this one.
When a person enters a retailer to sell a used Xbox One game, that retailer must have agreed to Microsoft's terms and conditions. Furthermore, they must be properly integrated with Microsoft's cloud based Azure system in order to keep track of pre-owned titles.
Once the game is traded in to an appropriate retailer, the game is then marked as being traded in on Microsoft's network. Once this happens, the game is then wiped from the Microsoft account of the person who just sold it. This is where the remark that the Xbox One will have to check in to Microsoft's servers once every 24 hours comes into play.
Now, the used game is in the hands of the authorized retailer. That should be business as usual then, right? Not quite. While the retailer can still sell the used game for whatever they want to, Microsoft and the game's publisher will automatically take a percentage cut of the sale of that used game.
Some unconfirmed reports say that the cut the retailer gets will be just 10% of what it's sold for. This means used game retailers will probably jack the price of used games up even higher to the point, you guessed it, you may as well just buy the game new.
Want to hear something even worse? There are also a few unconfirmed reports that the activation cost for people buying or borrowing pre-owned games will be £35, or about $53 USD. That £35 is not an additional cost on top of what the game will be, that's the total minimum cost you will have to pay be it if you get the game from a retailer, or you borrow a friend's copy of the game and pay the activation cost on your gamertag on your console. Yikes.
Again, this is all filled with various rumors and sources that come from a variety of retailers in the UK, so don't read this as if it's set in stone just yet. But if it is... wow.
If you run a little mom and pop game store, you may want to be sitting down for this one.
When a person enters a retailer to sell a used Xbox One game, that retailer must have agreed to Microsoft's terms and conditions. Furthermore, they must be properly integrated with Microsoft's cloud based Azure system in order to keep track of pre-owned titles.
Once the game is traded in to an appropriate retailer, the game is then marked as being traded in on Microsoft's network. Once this happens, the game is then wiped from the Microsoft account of the person who just sold it. This is where the remark that the Xbox One will have to check in to Microsoft's servers once every 24 hours comes into play.
Now, the used game is in the hands of the authorized retailer. That should be business as usual then, right? Not quite. While the retailer can still sell the used game for whatever they want to, Microsoft and the game's publisher will automatically take a percentage cut of the sale of that used game.
Some unconfirmed reports say that the cut the retailer gets will be just 10% of what it's sold for. This means used game retailers will probably jack the price of used games up even higher to the point, you guessed it, you may as well just buy the game new.
Want to hear something even worse? There are also a few unconfirmed reports that the activation cost for people buying or borrowing pre-owned games will be £35, or about $53 USD. That £35 is not an additional cost on top of what the game will be, that's the total minimum cost you will have to pay be it if you get the game from a retailer, or you borrow a friend's copy of the game and pay the activation cost on your gamertag on your console. Yikes.
Again, this is all filled with various rumors and sources that come from a variety of retailers in the UK, so don't read this as if it's set in stone just yet. But if it is... wow.
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