One of Fryer's most interesting revelations is the origin of the Shadow of Mordor System How did this feature come about? The quick answer is that it was a solution designed to minimize or end second -hand sales. More than a decade ago the video game industry insisted on liquidating the second -hand games because executives wanted to charge for each copy sold, which did not happen if a player took the game to a second -hand store. This desire to eliminate the second hand led to increase the importance of additional content and games activations even in console.
Fryer explains that it all started in 2009 with the launch of Batman: Arkham Asylum of Rocksteady, a game that commercially went very well until his sales fell. When analyzing the data they realized that there were more players than dispatched copies, and concluded that people bought the game, passed it and sold it in a store. This was a very common practice and it would still be today if it were not for the massive adoption of the digital format. Fryer acknowledges that this was very good for players and second -hand stores, but «a disaster» for developers because they did not charge for each game, only for the first copy. «They lost millions of dollars,» he says.
Obviously no one lost millions of dollars for second -hand sales. The idea that a person who buys a second -hand game at a price reduced had acquired that same title at full price is wrong. Be that as it may, Warner Bros. Games wanted the studies to develop games that players did not want to resell. In the case of Monolith, his engine was not able to offer an open world such as Grand Theft Auto's or wanted to introduce a multiplayer component, so they devised the nemesis system.
In a game like Shadow of Mordor, the Nemesis system creates personal characters and interactions that evolve depending on the treatment that enemies or allies have with the player. The idea was that this customization based on decisions convinced players not to part with their title so as not to lose their personal nemesis.
Definitely, the Nemesis system did not end the second hand, nor did the activation systems. The industry tried in many ways to end this practice, but who has built it has been the one who benefited it most, that is, the players. The massive adoption of the digital format prevents the resale of games and increases the margin of the companies by not having to support the distribution costs. The next step of the players is to increase the price of games normalizing early access, which consists of paying 10 euros more in exchange for being able to play a few days before the official launch.