If there were any questions lingering about how owning games for the Xbox One would work, there shouldn’t be now.
Microsoft revealed how it’ll work in a series of blog posts, capped off with one detailing “How Game Licensing Works,” implying you won’t technically own your Xbox One games, just the license to play them on your console. Here’s a breakdown of the important tidbits:
All of your games will be accessible from any Xbox One, no disc required. This confirms that the console’s physical game disks are nothing more than a method of delivering the game data to your hard drive. You won’t need the discs to play, they’re all stored on Microsoft‘s cloud servers. The downside is it also confirms that the system will require an internet connection to work; according to Microsoft, the Xbox One needs to check in with online servers once every 24 hours, or else you won’t be able to play any of your games. Also, if you’re logged into your account on a friend’s console, you only get one hour of offline gameplay with your own titles… it’s more like an extended trial mode of something you already own.
Also, you will be able to share your games with up to ten “family members,” but the details on how you prove who a family member is are still sketchy. Games can also be given to a friend, but only once, and only to someone who’s been on your friends list for at least 30 days. Microsoft says there will be no fees to play a used game on your Xbox One, but games can only be traded in at “participating retailers,” and your ability to do so is left entirely up to that individual game’s publishers (meaning if you want to trade in your copy of Madden, EA will have to give GameStop approval for it).
All of these details seem aimed at taking a bite out of used game sales, which many gamers use to play games they wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford, but are largely condemned by developers and publishers who argue that used games take sales away from new ones.
