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Green Man Gaming occupies a unique position at the intersection of possibly the two hottest topics in the games industry – digital distribution and trade-ins.
It couldn’t be more zeitgeisty if it dressed itself in a calendar and stripped off a layer every morning to reveal the new date.
The firm’s USP is quite a concept to grasp because, of course, as a purely digital distributor, there is nothing physical to trade in. Rather, players relinquish the code that gives them access to the content and, in return, get credit to put towards new games.
Their ‘old’ codes, however, are then sold to other customers as ‘second-hand’ games, even though, obviously, none of the digital content they can access has been denigrated in any way. Revenue from these ‘second-hand’ sales is passed back to the publishers.
CEO Paul Sulyok admits there were some raised eyebrows when the scheme was first mooted, but insists it brings nothing but benefits – for gamers and for the industry: From a consumer’s perspective it means we monetise your digital collection. And from a publisher’s perspective we’re the only retailer out there, as far as I’m aware, who pays them on an ongoing basis every time a traded product is re-sold.”
To read the full interview, click here.
