EA: Game discs are sticking around, streaming is NOT the only answer

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Where do you stand? Do you love the shiny circles, or are you sick of finding shelf space?

Pouring a bit of water on his previously-reported bonfire of digital future excitement, EA CEO John Riccitiello has stated that although digitial distribution, in all its crazy carnival of boxless forms, is increasingly big business, the traditional shiny data-biscuits we know, love and have a consistent nightmare finding space to store aren't going away any time soon.

Talking toIndustry Gamers, the grand poobah of the mighty empire of EA spake thusly:

""Do I believe longer term that the disc will go away? Not any time soon. I think the disc can actually be a great starting point for a digital business, like an MMO, World of Warcraft, for instance"

But he's not just talking about discs' survival as the starting point for an online experience. Oh no, he seesthem as part of a broad spread of game formats moving forward.

"I don%26rsquo;t think people want a streaming game service. I think they want their games to work. At times, that will be delivered best with streaming. At times, you should just download the game. For example, I think it%26rsquo;d pretty silly for us to stream Scrabble to you. We%26rsquo;re talking about three minutes, you%26rsquo;ve downloaded the words perfectly, you can play with your friends, the tiles move back and forth%26hellip; why would you want to pay for bandwidth for us to redraw a Scrabble board sixty times a second? That%26rsquo;s just sort of bad math, if nothing else"


Above: Maybe he has a point

"I think the consumer, at least in my view, doesn%26rsquo;t care what the technology is, what lives behind the veiled curtain; they just want it to work. I%26rsquo;ve yet to see - I haven%26rsquo;t played OnLive recently - but I don%26rsquo;t think you%26rsquo;d bring OnLive to a LAN party for first person shooters, because latency matters a lot in those circumstances. So, I think there%26rsquo;s different technologies for different purposes, and the consumer wants it to be largely invisible"

So, is he right in his assumptions? Do you not give a flying monkey's nose flute how your games work, just as long as they work? Is any preferably to any other? Are youas dubious of game streaming as I am? Let me know.

Despite having been previously quoted aspredictingthat this year's digital download revenue will be higher than the dollar-pounds cultivated by boxed games, he's advocating an eclectic approach, with delivery methods decided based onthe best fit for each individual title. Which to me seems a lot more sane than the mantra of "Who cares about your bandwidth, stream everything!" currently professed by streaming services such as OnLive. Take a look at his comments and let me know what you think.

Talking toIndustry Gamers, the grand poobah of the mighty empire of EA spake thusly:

""Do I believe longer term that the disc will go away? Not any time soon. I think the disc can actually be a great starting point for a digital business, like an MMO, World of Warcraft, for instance"

But he's not just talking about discs' survival as the starting point for an online experience. Oh no, he seesthem as part of a broad spread of game formats moving forward.

"I don%26rsquo;t think people want a streaming game service. I think they want their games to work. At times, that will be delivered best with streaming. At times, you should just download the game. For example, I think it%26rsquo;d pretty silly for us to stream Scrabble to you. We%26rsquo;re talking about three minutes, you%26rsquo;ve downloaded the words perfectly, you can play with your friends, the tiles move back and forth%26hellip; why would you want to pay for bandwidth for us to redraw a Scrabble board sixty times a second? That%26rsquo;s just sort of bad math, if nothing else"


Above: Maybe he has a point

"I think the consumer, at least in my view, doesn%26rsquo;t care what the technology is, what lives behind the veiled curtain; they just want it to work. I%26rsquo;ve yet to see - I haven%26rsquo;t played OnLive recently - but I don%26rsquo;t think you%26rsquo;d bring OnLive to a LAN party for first person shooters, because latency matters a lot in those circumstances. So, I think there%26rsquo;s different technologies for different purposes, and the consumer wants it to be largely invisible"

So, is he right in his assumptions? Do you not give a flying monkey's nose flute how your games work, just as long as they work? Is any preferably to any other? Are youas dubious of game streaming as I am? Let me know.

David Houghton
David Houghton
Former GamesRadar+ Features Writer

Former (and long-time) GamesRadar+ writer, Dave has been gaming with immense dedication ever since he failed dismally at some '80s arcade racer on a childhood day at the seaside (due to being too small to reach the controls without help). These days he's an enigmatic blend of beard-stroking narrative discussion and hard-hitting Psycho Crushers.