Why do people really prefer physical games?

Proponents of physical games will give you BS-answers when you ask them why they like physical games over digital ones. They spout off the same answers that proponents of guns and the Republican party do. "I feel like I own the games." "You don't really own the games if you have the digital version." They talk about the rights of the consumers and blah blah blah. What they really mean is that they want to be able to sell them later. They are collectors first, and gamers second. Why do people really prefer physical games?

The fetishization of physical media (materialism).

 

We all live in the third dimension, and there are both ugly and wonderful things about living in a physical reality. There are some beautiful boxes and cases of videogames out there. Having a beautiful box or case to behold and cherish certainly beats having nothing but an icon in a home-menu on your system.

The shadow-side to the overappreciation of our physical reality is hoarding. When you have shelves, drawers, and boxes full of games, does that really make your life better? You're drowning in excess and we forget why we played games to begin with: to enjoy the game itself and to have fun.

Trying to recapture lost childhoods

Many of our childhoods were spent in poverty, and videogames seemed like one of the most expendable things to ensure surviving another day. We sold or traded in our games and systems in order to make ends meet, or to buy the newest games and systems. A lot of us, thus, in our adulthoods, seek to overcompensate for our lost childhoods by buying as many physical games as we can. In the back of our minds, if we keep buying physical games, it will fill the hole in us that was caused by the departure of our childhood games and systems.

But that hole will never fill as long as you acknowledge its existence, consciously or subconsciously. Instead of focusing on our lost childhoods, let us eschew regret and longing; and look to the future.

Reselling

We didn't start off as resellers and scalper-scumbags. Resellers and scalpers were innocent children once, too, who gamed like you and me. Perhaps, as adults, they wanted to buy NES-games they had sold in their youths. But upon seeing the values of these games on ebay, they were traumatized. How dare other people prey upon the nostalgic! Upon that day, they became scalpers and resellers for life.

A lot of people buy games solely for their resellability. A pure gamer doesn't look at a game and think about how much he or she can sell the game for; he or she only cares about the enjoyment that game will bring. A gamer tainted with capitalism looks at a box and sees dollar-signs.

Low self-esteem

What is hoarding? Hoarding is a defense-mechanism that arises from the mental standpoint of having low self-esteem. Instead of doing more constructive things to combat that low self-esteem, hoarders just gather things. Everything is made up of energy. Maybe they feel that energy and they like living around countless pieces of energy that they never play in their game-systems.

Let us be more constructive. You will never fill that hole brought on by low self-esteem with hoarding. Imagine a self that doesn't have low self-esteem. Focus on him or her, and your compulsive desire to hoard will go away.