Going digital

I used to be the type of person who had to have everything that came with a game; if it wasn't CIB, I wasn't interested. I think that's gradually changed, though. I downloaded the first Silent Hill a couple years ago because I had a PlayStation store credit, I was curious about the game, and I knew it'd be a pain in the neck to find used - the last being the biggest factor in my choice. I didn't regret not having a boxed copy at all, and though the download came with a scanned (B&W) manual, I referred to it only as reference for the controls and didn't really miss having a paper copy.

After that, I became a little less obsessive about packaging: I bought a copy of Disaster Report for three bucks on impulse when Gamestop was liquidating its PS2 stock, for instance. Again, circumstances came into play: I came across a stray cheap copy of a rare, odd game I wasn't sure about, and if the game didn't work out, then I was out only three bucks. (If I really like the game, I can track down a CIB copy later.)

Part of it is also due, I'm sure, to some of the games I want to play becoming rarer in their original packaged forms. I've been going back to some SNES RPGs I missed the first time around, for example, but I don't think I would ever go after an actual cartridge again. It's much easier to emulate instead of dragging out and hooking up my SNES; my saves are always handy; and I don't have to worry about battery issues. (And most of these titles aren't making money for their publishers any longer, at least not in their original forms, so ethical issues aren't quite salient here.) Also, GBA games are almost impossible to find packaged; in that market, you have to work to find a non-bootleg copy of a game, forget about a packaged one. (I know people usually just go ahead and emulate GBA titles, but it's much more comfortable to play a handheld in its original format.)

Since buying Silent Hill, though, I've also picked up a couple other titles from the PlayStation Store for which I could've bought cheap physical copies secondhand: Chrono Cross, Legend of Mana, Resident Evil 2. I don't think I would've gone for that before, but playing these titles on the PSP is just so much more convenient and neater - the titles are always available if my system's at hand; there's no stuff to take care of or discs to swap out. Steam has also gone a good way to wearing me down in this regard: it's so nice to have your practically entire library of PC titles near-instantly accessible at any time. And I don't miss the peripheral material as much as I thought I would; on the contrary, I actually feel vaguely annoyed in cases like with older adventure games when I have to go read a manual beforehand instead of jumping right in. I look at the DS games on my shelf nowadays, and I think of how much space the cases take up.

If it's for a series I really care about, I'll definitely want all the tchotchkes of a full release - though I rescued a copy of Spy Fiction from GameStop's yellow-envelope bargain bin, I'd still like to have a boxed copy with a manual, and I'm still very happy with my deluxe edition copy of Angelique: Maren no Rokukishi/Six Knights of Dark Love, flimsyish artbook and all. I was also relieved to have a manual for Baten Kaitos at my side while playing the game; the more complex a game is, the more I'm grateful for a reference crutch. But I just don't care as much anymore about having things for things' sake, I suppose.