I refuse to have any business with digital only purchases; for a few reasons:
1. Just like movies, you don't own anything. Revocation can occur at any time.
2. More likely than movies, you might find your game patched to add or remove content you do not want.
3. You can't give your games to the next generation. Which matters a lot when your exposure to gaming started from NES and Atari hand-me-downs.
4. Every game you purchase is chained to just yourself. Which is actually stupidly selfish when you have a large extended family also interested in games. The Switch is a hit for borrowing back and forth from a large network of relatives and friends (and, if Nintendo's reading this and questioning the resale market - this has caused a lot of games to get bought that wouldn't have).
5. If you have a large NES collection, there will be someone interested in paying for it. If you have a large Switch collection, there will be someone interested in paying for it. Physical games have some asset value, and it can be thousands of dollars for larger collections. Digital games have zero value.
> More likely than movies, you might find your game patched to add or remove content you do not want.
Well this is a complicated point. A lot of games these days rely on digital distribution for day-one patches, a practice which allows developers to continue working on and polishing the game even after it goes gold. Physical only really gives you the option of "no updates at all" (including no day-one patch) or "every update so far to date" (including updates you don't want).
I agree with the rest of your points, but I think that this one would be relevant only in a few extremely niche cases.
> Physical only really gives you the option of "no updates at all" (including no day-one patch) or "every update so far to date" (including updates you don't want).
For Switch games, you can always refuse to upgrade the game (the cartridges are read-only, the updates are stored as overlays on the microSD card or internal storage). Switch game cartridges are just fancy flash cards with a long-since reverse engineered communications protocol [1], and there's multiple card dumpers and reflashable cards on the market.
> 1. Just like movies, you don't own anything. Revocation can occur at any time.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but you'll still rely on Sony's servers to get the updates that make the game playable, since it has become customary to ship games riddled with bugs to patch them afterwards (which doesn't happen with movies, yet).
And if they really want to target you specifically, they can still blacklist your console by id, unless you completely stop connecting your console to the Internet.
So, buying the physical version can only protect you against revocation in very specific cases, unless you want to limit yourself to playing the broken version that is shipped on the disc.
On the PS5 refresh, no, an internet connection is required to activate the drive, whether or not it came in the box.
On the Xbox One... you haven't been able to, for over a decade.
On Switch... Switch is just delightful. The game cards even come with the required system updates (criticism for lack of theming or music aside, the whole OS is under 400MB, so amazing things are possible). You can also update your game or system wirelessly, from any other Switch, which has a higher version of either, no internet necessary.
>On the PS5 refresh, no, an internet connection is required to activate the drive, whether or not it came in the box.
Because the disc drive and the main board are required to be paired with each other since the PS3/X360 era. People who repair PS3s (except super slims, for some reason) and PS4s need to re-pair the disc drive board with the main board (or failing both, replace both boards with one that has been already paired) every time there is drive replacement: https://www.psdevwiki.com/ps3/Remarry_Bluray_Drive (for PS3)
They've been paired for a long time as you point out; however, that's missing part of the story.
In the past, they were at least paired from the factory. If you pulled your Xbox 360 out of the box, and never connected it to the internet, it would still work.
The PS5 refresh's disc drive is not paired, even from the factory. Without an initial internet connection, it will not work, even out of the box. Also, unlike the Xbox 360, it un-pairs every time you sign out of your personal account.
Theoretically there is no problem with keeping your PS5 100% offline. It can read and play game disks perfectly fine without the internet. In practice though, plenty of games download additional content even if you have a disk, and there's no way to know in advance.
> If you have a large NES collection, there will be someone interested in paying for it. If you have a large Switch collection, there will be someone interested in paying for it.
Well, yes for the NES. There's a limited number of cartridges made, there is no digital substitute, and the official cartridges are not being manufactured anymore. The demand for NES games is a product of their scarcity.
But have you tried actually selling a physical copy of a modern game? It's not like you're making your money back, you're lucky to recoup 1/3rd of the MSRP if there's even anyone interested in waiting for your copy to arrive in the mail. But there's also complicating factors like piracy, the immediacy of digital storefronts, and the used market controlling (and lowering) the price of used games. Famously, a trip to GameStop with a stack of PS3 games is worth maybe $5 of in-store credit and a complimentary soda pop.
Nobody said you'd get all your money back. Used games historically were generally cheaper and unless we're talking retro games, used games are always cheaper. That's the point. You get games cheaper when you buy. You get some money back when you sell. The idea that you need to get everything you spent back is nuts.
Given most games won’t work without online activation, does it even matter in the case of PS? Or you’ll contain yourself to non Sony/Microsoft platforms?
1. Just like movies, you don't own anything. Revocation can occur at any time.
2. More likely than movies, you might find your game patched to add or remove content you do not want.
3. You can't give your games to the next generation. Which matters a lot when your exposure to gaming started from NES and Atari hand-me-downs.
4. Every game you purchase is chained to just yourself. Which is actually stupidly selfish when you have a large extended family also interested in games. The Switch is a hit for borrowing back and forth from a large network of relatives and friends (and, if Nintendo's reading this and questioning the resale market - this has caused a lot of games to get bought that wouldn't have).
5. If you have a large NES collection, there will be someone interested in paying for it. If you have a large Switch collection, there will be someone interested in paying for it. Physical games have some asset value, and it can be thousands of dollars for larger collections. Digital games have zero value.