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Play.com will sell video game downloads in the near future, the firm has told MCV.
The online retail giant already offers music downloads, and will add books, movies and games to that line-up – but the company wouldn’t give a launch date for the new service.
Downloads will be the cornerstone of our strategic development going forward,” said Play’s marketing director Martin Talbot (pictured).
We are looking at all the different media platforms. We’ve done music and we will move into doing downloads on books, films and of course, video games.
Right now we’re working out which category will be the best one to move into next.
We’re not ready to announce that just yet. But from our point-of-view, digital is a key part of our strategy.”
Like music, it is probable that Play.com’s games download service will be run in-house. And the e-tailer is also keen to introduce download codes for individual WiiWare, Xbox Live Arcade and PSN games – a service its rival Amazon already runs in the US.
We have worked with game codes in the past,” continues Talbot.
One of the things we offer customers is the opportunity to get exclusive in-game content through game codes. For instance, when Age of Conan came out we offered an exclusive War Rhino.
So we have looked at using game codes as a USP for us, and they have worked well. In terms of moving on from this to selling full game codes, again it is another part of strategic development that will go into our overall digital plan.”
Talbot also revealed to MCV that there is currently no plans to bring back Play.com Live, the consumer games show that debuted at Wembley in 2008.
The Play Live brand was introduced to create a live experience around the products we sell,” he added.
It started off with music, and we did exclusive events with up and coming bands that proved to be very popular.
Play Live at Wembley was us developing that strategy into a major event. In 2010, we’ll use the Live proposition in an experiential way. But we have no plans for a big event.”
