Game prices are going down, their delivery mechanisms are changing, and the type of content the mass market wants is different than what the publishers are giving them. What are the game companies responses? They adapt draconian DRM methods and complain that secondary sales are the root cause of evil in the industry. Or they use diversionary tactics like blaming the bad economy. “Hey, look over there! Don’t look at our root problems.”

To be fair, Activision did respond by merging with Vivendi to get access to World of Warcraft’s >$1BB annuity/cash cow. That is a great property and a great move, but it will not continue to cover up their strategy of to pump out TEN versions of Guitar Hero in 2009, and that the vast majority of their additional titles will be sequels. All of these sequels will be delivered in the same boxed manner to the same crowd that they have always played to.