John Carmack, who is a well known game developer and was the lead programmer behind Doom, Quake, Wolfenstein 3D and Commander Keen said that he foresees the end of hard copies of games and says apps and digital downloads will be the path that the gaming industry will choose to cut down costs.
In an interview he said, “Clearly, packaged goods sales are still critical on the big platforms at this stage, but that’s all going to go away sooner or later”. It is clear that with much higher internet access speeds, games on demand is an increasing trend and it is inevitable to see a rapid decline in gaming discs once online game downloading and on demand gaming are available for a multitude of games.
He says manufacturers have more benefits by offering downloadable games which greatly reduce the risk of piracy. Carmack says that app stores is how we will be buying games in the future. By having games available via app stores, manufacturers such as EA and Activision can deploy games faster and to a much wider audience. They also save on cutting deals with publishers and store chains.