That’s not true. There was no way to own a television show until DVDs, and now that’s disappearing. Yes, there were compilation VHS “best of” tapes and whatnot, but you’d never have the entire season. Hollywood was so threatened by the mere existence of home video that they charged an arm and a leg for a copy and set up profit sharing deals for rentals, because they thought this threatened their stranglehold on charging for the theater viewing. Now we’re at a spot where you can buy a “digital copy” of movies and TV shows, which is the same thing as not owning anything at all, because once their store goes down, so does your “copy” of the movie you bought.
Across the entire landscape of consumer media, there is only one industry in which this business model of non-ownership and dependence on subscription services is not rapidly becoming the norm: video games.
Think of how many songs, movies, or TV episodes you can get through in a month for one cheap subscription fee. Now think about, on average, how many video games you’ll get through in a month. That’s just simple economics. It’s usually more worth it to buy the games outright.
Games will likely never be free from aggressive and unnecessary DRM software. AAA titles in particular are falling victim to faux-live service systems where games cannot be played without a good internet connection, even if they are singleplayer experiences. I am not saying that buying the newest release from EA for $80 will guarantee your long-term access to it. It won’t.
Games will only never be free from this stuff if you keep accepting it as an inevitability and pay for them. In the meantime, do what you can to support the Stop Killing Games initiative. I wrote my representative asking for consumer protections for this stuff, knowing that she’s a member of the other party and likely doesn’t care, her e-mail response indicating as much too, but it’s better than doing literally nothing.
Think about the titanic power of the music industry in the 20th century. Back when people paid to own music, music idols were at the center of pop culture.
It’s funny, because all I heard back then was that the artists made hardly any money off of record sales and made all of their money touring. Now I rarely go to concerts because Live Nation is going to tear my eyes out with ticket prices, and there’s no competition I can go to instead.
I don’t see Game Pass as a threat to gaming. Their subscription numbers have stalled out, and they’re not doing the lousy things with it that Nintendo does, at least for now. Once again, just simple economics. Even Nintendo’s online subscription will eventually fade, perhaps over the course of a decade or more, as PC becomes more and more the de facto way to play games.