Traditional bricks-and-mortar retail faces a bleak future, as digital distribution looks set to become the standard across the videogame market.
That's according to a number of games industry veterans, who agreed that the evolution of music sales online is evidence that consumers are accepting and demanding their entertainment digitally.
"What percentage of record sales are iTunes?" asked Brian Fargo, founder of Interplay and currently CEO of inXile Entertainment. "The writing's on the wall there. It's not looking good for retail," he said.
Acclaim's David Perry pointed to Apple's pioneering digital sales methods, which will prompt more company's to follow its lead and sell cheaply and directly to connected consumers.
"Just look at the success of the iPhone App Store, and the fact that everyone's going to copy it, and clone it and do their version of it anyway," he said.
Will Wright, the designer behind The Sims and most recently Spore, suggested that the industry was close to a tipping point, with the jump to digital as standard just around the corner.
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