This is a well put together article and just goes to show that you can never figure out big business. When even the bottom dollar doesn't convince companies to change.

The CD version of World of Warcraft is retarded to install. They must use the most difficult compression ever because it takes 10-12 minutes PER CD on a PC, and on my ibook, each CD took no lie, 25 minutes. And theres 4 CDs. It took me 4 hours to get it all loaded, patched and ready to play. Thats just ludicrous. Now at least if its on a DVD I can start it up and go do something else, as it were, I had to sit and wait to switch cd's out. NO THANKS.

I used to not mind multi-disc games, when maybe 20% of games released were greater than two discs.

Now every single game is three to SIX discs. My binder can hold 100 discs but it sure as hell doesn't have 100 games in there. It's annoying when FEAR, WoW, and UT2K4 take up like three pages of space. Re-installing is a bitch.

DVD drives are, no joke, $20. Every console uses them now (GC's funkiness excepted). Home players are $30.

It's time to cut the rope. If you have a CD-ROM drive I'm sorry, time to upgrade or get left behind.

How many people use DVDs vs CDs? Here you go:

http://www.steampowered.com/status/survey.html

I think 87% of people with DVD drives (and this is a broad gaming audience) should make the decision obvious, but ah well. I blame EA for all of the gaming industry's problems. Fuck you EA.

It's only really in america that games still come on cd though. many releases in europe these days don't even give you the choice, its dvd or nothing. However seen as how almost everyone has a dvd drive these days then why not. UT2004 should have been a wake up call, we don't want to get back to those days when games came on overa dozen different disks. (Monkey Island 2 on the amiga took near to twenty).

I got a DVD player for my PC one month ago, almost exactly. But here in Sweden games has been released on DVD for quite a while. :) I just haven't been bothered to get one until I built a whole new computer.

What's really stupid is things like Need For Speed Most Wanted Black Edition...the game comes of 4 CDs and the bonus disc is a DVD!!

Publishers do CD's over DVD's for two reasons:

1) Confused consumers who don't understand the difference. Instinct for business is to make the things easiest on the customers. This is why Google just finds things for you. It's why your digital camera just works with Windows XP. And it's why games come on CD's - the consumer would rather change out four discs that work than one disc that doesn't

2) CD manufacturing and distribution just works. DVD manufacturing still has kinks. Activision said the reason they didn't want to do a DVD version of DOOM 3 was because they get lots of defective returns on DVD's and almost none on CD's. So from what I understand it wasn't id's call. How many of those "defective" DVD's were just some confused person without a DVD-ROM drive is anyone's guess.

It's the same basic reason the banks still use mainframes - they just work and making changes costs money. CD-ROM's just work and changing to DVD will cost money. To heck with the hardcore contingent on Shacknews. I can't say I don't see their point.

When one of the best if not the best DVD burner on the market is <$40 shipped via newegg ... how do you NOT have a DVD drive in a computer that plays something more then sol.exe ?

Heck yeah I have a DVD player in my computer. In fact, in both my laptops, all three of my comuters at work, and both my desktops at home.

These are not all new computers...in fact DVD (burner! Not even a "mere" DVD reader) drives cost ~$100 in the US. When games like Doom3 and Quake4 are coming out that are basically "expecting" you to upgrade to a new multi-hundred dollar video card and have 3GHz+ processor, why *would* they ship on CD...almost all computers that will have those specs MUST have been built in the the last year or so (give or take 6 months), and will have DVD.

I mean, would YOU build a new computer with an Athlon 64 4000+, a GeForce 6800 (or 7800) and a CD DRIVE? I thought not... =)

I will always purchase the DVD version over the CD version. I hate hate hate multiple CD's! And, like so many have already pointed out, if you don't have a DVD-ROM drive then there's something seriously wrong with you. We're already 5 years into the 21st century, about time you joined us!

I've got a DVD-ROM drive...and yeah, the DVD releases are nicer, as there's less discs to keep track of and such...

But, really, multiple cds only means a little extra effort during the install process, and nothing more...so, it's hard for me to get that upset about it, logically speaking.

I definitely don't understand why they can't just release games in both formats. Movies seem to do just fine releasing in both wide and fullscreen.

One thing I didn't fit into the article because I wasn't sure if it was too extraneous was the fact that Collector's Editions are starting to really take off with this console generation. (Better clarify, since X360 is out today: PS2, Xbox, GCN.) You can find a collector's edition for almost anything out right now, and they're typically $5-$10 more expensive just like PC CD/DVD editions of a game.

In a way, it's a similar situation to PC gamers having to choose between 6 CDs or a single DVD: if you want the ease of use of a DVD plus all the extras, you've gotta pay a bit more. Though as far as game format goes, consoles have always had it easier: if you have an Xbox, and game X is released on the system, you only have 1 version to buy unless there's a special edition. If the game happens to come on 2 discs... too bad; that's the one you get because that's the one that was chosen for release.

Do many Shackers go for the special edition of a console game they plan to buy, or just pay the $50 for the regular? I've noticed a bit of cheapness in these special editions. Halo 2, for example, featured a pretty nice bonus disc, but it didn't even have it's own case, or at the very least a sleeve! Mortal Kombat: Deception for Xbox had a bonus disc, but it was just tossed into a sleeve like it was an after-thought or something.

Anyone else read the title in a Jerry Seinfeld voice?

Anyway, the lack of DVD releases is very disappointing. How many gamers out there lack a DVD drive?

I work at a pawn shop and buy dvds off of people for $3, sell for $5 and I think that is way to much.

Some people embrace progress (DVD) some people like things to stay the same. (CD's)

I'm for progress every time.

CD's are stupid in this day and age. Hell, every server I've worked on in the past few years has had a DVD drive FFS. If they have DVD drives on servers, they sure as hell should be on pretty much every gamers pc by now.

I hate CD releases. I mean, seriously, if people can't go out and spend about 50 bucks for a decent DVD drive, why do they have a computer. I also hat the fact that DVD versions of games can tend to be $5-10 more than the CD version, but have minimal differences in content. I wish the game industry would force folks to upgrade by releasing DVD only versions of their games. Hell the video card industry's doing it by dwindling support for AGP compatible cards on next gen video cards. CDs are a bane unless you're burning music, otherwise, move along.

Wasn't this a slightly worse issue when fmv games were cool and you had to SWAP OUT like 6 or more CD's during the entire game? At least now we just install once and need one cd for the rest of the time we play the game, barring a reinstall. Phantasmagoria was fun though. :-)

Why even waste time with a dvd-rom drive anymore? Burners are at the point where they are cheap for current ones or dirt cheap for a generation or two removed from current. Honestly unless your doing multiple "backups" a day there isn't that much of a difference between burning at 8x-12x-16x speeds.

holy fuck! it's about time we start raising a stink over this issue. you know how much fucking space 6CDs take up in a binder as apposed to 1 dvd? it makes no logical snese! my question is

WHO THE FUCK DOESN'T HAVE A DVD DRIVE IN 2005?

computers sold by all the pre-built PC companies started including dvd drives as standard back in 1999! so for the computer illiterates...you have no fucking excuse! you can't even play fucking modern games on systems built before that, so don't give me that shit.

and for you fuckers whl build your own PCs and still don't have DVD drives...fuck your mom, your sister, and your little dog too!

I got a DVD drive when The Matrix DVD was released, and it wasn't expensive back then, I mean, these games require $300 video cards or more but they can't require a friggin cheapo DVD drive?

get your act together!

I HATE multiple CDs. I've had a DVD in my system since 1997. Thats 8 freakin years. I don't know anyone who has a computer and doesn't have a DVD drive. I know pleanty that have crappy video cards though. If you can demand people to buy a new card every other year, there is no excuse to to be selling on games that need multiple CDs on DVD. None.

I'm almost to the point now where I won't buy a game unless it's on DVD. It's not that it's such a big deal really. Multi disk installs aren't so much of a hassle that it ruins the game experience, but as odd as it sounds it's almost a point of national pride. America used to be at the forefront of so many things, and now we're teaching creationism in schools, there's a scientific exodous as tons of our scientists have to leave the country to do stem-cell research, and of course, worst of all, our games still come on CD. :(

WHISKEY.TANGO.FOXTROT.

The industry caters to the lowest common denominator.

If one retard tries to install Quake 4 DVD on his Pentium2 733MHz with a CD-ROM drive and returns the copy to the store thats one more returned product then they wouldve had if he had gotten the CD version. Retailers don't like returns so they'll pressure publishers into using CD-ROM discs.

lol ... americans... lol

An IDE DVD *burner* is less than $40.

A DVD-ROM is less than $30.

A CD-Rom is less than $20.

That spread in cost pretty much seals the numerical analysis. People that don't at least get DVD-Rom in their custom gaming rigs (because all major manufacturers have been doing it for YEARS, it's the tweakers holding us back?) need to have their PC building halted.

It's a conspiracy, the cd manufacturers are paying off the publishers to keep using their media. j/k. or maybe it's true.

I actually stopped buying games that are multi-cd. It's that big of a turn off. With the large number of good games out I will simply play ones available on dvd or have online distribution mechanisms. My office is full enough with junk!! STOP WITH THE 4 PACK CD'S!!!

It is the year 2005. Make with the DVD releases. Every new computer has one -- and if it doesn't, it's NOT a "new computer," it's obsolete.