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If you've spent  anytime recently on Xbox Live, Play Station Network or Nintendo's Virtual Network (does anyone really use that?) you'll notice that more and more there is a whole lot more game content making its way to gamers than there used to be. In fact in the past year gamers have been witness to everything from new map packs, weapons and cars to full fledged story missions. In the case of Rockstar's, The Lost and the Damned, it's practically a whole new game housed in the same landscape and setting of the original GTA IV.  Additionally you have the consoles offering up old games to download direct to your hard drive. All this in addition to stuff we've come to expect like demos and other media such as trailers, TV shows, movies, and music videos.

The console it would seem is finally making strides toward offering what PC gamers have had for years. But what does this mean for game retailers like Gamestop when it comes to the once popular method of trading in old games for new? Now that many of these games will offer up new content periodically, there's no reason to get rid of them. Adding more wrinkles to the trade-in troubles is the fact that trades aren't worth what they used to be, and now with things like exclusive download codes only for new games (that can't be ported or reused) the motivation to trade your game is not as great. And not just for the person who bought the game but for the person who buys a used copy only to realize they won't enjoy the benefit of that download code in the box. 

So Long Trades, Hello Downloads

Let's be clear, complete games (in the box) still have some shelf life. The saving grace right now for game retailers is that not everyone owns or has upgraded their consoles to larger hard drives so dumping a bunch of full games on your PS3 or 360 isn't something anyone wants to do.  And then there's the chance of your machine breaking and suddenly you have no games at all.  Memory is still memory and if you don't have a lot of space then you tend to get pickier about what you want on your hard drive. So while the future of full games is still intact (you’ll still need them to use the DLC), the trade business might as well hitch a ride on the Black Freighter.

Think about it ... would you rather trade in your $60 game for $20 or $25 ( if it's still deemed worth that trade in value by the retailer) or would you rather hang on to that game and drop $20 for some new content of a game you already love? Granted games like Kane & Lynch or Grabbed by the Ghoulies are not going to be good enough to even merit DLC but there are plenty A and B list games that will provoke a need for more content.

Get Ready For The DLC Flood

Keep in mind just because there's downloadable content doesn't mean you have to buy it but if you're dealing with something like a map pack for a multiplayer mode and you don't get it, then you miss out on that multiplayer fun.  Ultimately it's still money you have to spend but it's less money for something you know you're going to like or are still enjoying.  Trading in your game means you get a fraction of what you paid for your game and not half enough to get another new game. So you end up using your trade to get something cheaper or bring in two or three games so you can get enough trade credit to get one new game. You don't need to be a math wiz to figure out that DLC is a better deal.

It's not just a better deal for gamers though. For developers and publishers they now get to improve upon popular titles with the new content rather than having to try and come up with title after title. Additionally no boxes or discs need to be made and shipped so big props to reducing the videogame industry's carbon footprint.

It would seem that 2009 is really going to take monster leaps in DLC offerings so for the gaming glut that will happen in the fall, you can look forward to having stuff come out months later that will extend their lifespan well beyond what you could get for trading them in. And if  less game are getting traded in, then what happens to gamers who typically wait to buy a used copy? Well, thanks to the internet marketplace there are other options like, Craig's List and EBay that could possibly offer you a chance to buy a relatively newer game at a lower cost. Eventually though, the notion of game trading that was a useful way  to save on games a few years ago will give way to DLC, downloadable older games and a game library that takes on the qualities of a giant loose-leaf binder with space to add more pages.