What is everyone's opinions on ethical use of traditionally unpopular game distribution trends?

I am hoping this question doesn't go against the Gamespot rules, and I want to stress that I am 100 percent for buying any game for sale that you wish to play. Game devs have families to feed, too.

But my question is, can some ideas that have become popular within the "scene" be intelligently implemented into the official distribution of these games?

My main argument is what is often referred to as "rips." While playing a game with its original texture, video, and audio quality is the objectively best way to go, games are quickly approaching and going over the 100gb filesize marker, and not everyone has that kind of space, especially if they do more than just play games on their computer. Would it be a good idea for game developers/publishers to offer various different versions of their game on Steam - like a "lossless" option and a "space saver" option with compressed data files? This was (sort of) done with older PC games where they offered a choice between "Minimum," "Typical" and "Full Install" options. I don't see why we couldn't go back to that.

A couple years ago, I would make an argument for the default ability to play without the CD/DVD inserted in the drive, but, no one even puts their entire PC games on physical media anymore, so that one's not worth bringing up.

Mods, if you deem this post a breach in the rules, please remove it as you see fit. But please understand that I am not advocating for anything sketchy. Just something that may legitimately be useful for consumers if it were widely adopted as part of the genuine game distribution practice.

Oh man, last time i heard about rips must have been 10+ years ago.

I haven't pirated a game in such a long time.

In all honesty, while games are growing in size, availability of bigger drives is growing and pricing per GB is dropping.

Unless you have to install your whole game library, which i can't really see why you would, storage should generally not be a problem.

The whole point of rips was to shave on download times, anyway. Not an issue for most people nowadays.

Some games still offer things like HD texture packs as separate downloads. I am all for modular downloads/installs. You should be able to choose whether you want to download SP, MP, etc.. Shouldn't have to download a huge MP portion of the game if you are never going to play it. Options are good.

I'm sure game devs/publishers take hardware requirements (including HDD space) into account carefully, since not being able to run the game means you won't buy it. I never thought of HDD space as an issue, but I did have this idea of different versions with different graphics options. For me it makes more sense than offering deluxe/premium/whatever editions with the difference being weapon camos and early unlocks.

Mehh you can get a 4 tb driver for like 100$ so really don’t see the need tbh.

Some games on Steam will package the high-resolution textures as free DLC.

Fallout 4 is an example.

I heard the upcoming Red Dead 2 and the next CoD game are about as 150-170Gb.

I do agree that game devs should ask you whether you want to install a 1080p, 2K or 4K texture pack in their installation.

HDDs are cheap nowdays but then again not everyone want to add more HDDs or replace their HDDs because of that.

Now imagine people with SSD only system.

@gerygo: Ever heard of external HDD's/SSD's? You can literally build your own, so you won't get a slow "wannabe USB3" pre-built crap.

Also adding an HDD to your desktop is not an exact science...

Yeah, I wouldn't do anything rather than store data on external drives. They're also slower than internal HDDs/SSDs.

Didn't say adding HDD is a problem but why would you want to do that and spend more money because lazy devs that didn't customize their installation?

I have the new COD installed and it's around 110-113GB.

Plus a lot of these new games are live services, so they keep updating and adding new stuff. Not a bad thing, but you'll need plenty of extra space if you're gonna keep the game for the future.

Custom build external USB3.0 (Gen 1 both type A and C) HDD is the same speed as internal one. SSD (SATA, not talking about NVMe of course) can be maxed out as well (Gen 2 type C).

Also, games are getting bigger and bigger just like the minimum/recommended PC specs are going higher and higher... So you'll eventually need to upgrade/replace/add another storage drive, just like you need to upgrade your PC. I'm still kinda confused what's "the problem" here. Shitty internet or people complaining for the sake of complaining?
If shitty internet, well too bad, because PC gaming is like 99% digital only for quite some time. Running out of storage space and too lazy to get a bigger one or find an alternative/do some research? Well, then YOU are the problem (complaining for the sake of complaining).

It sounds scary, but it's not like we jumped from 1Gb installations. This has been ramping up, little by little.

As it has been mentioned by others in this thread, bulk storage costs have dropped significantly, in the past few years.

@lucidique: Most installs nowdays are about 50Gb (the heavy AAA titles)

They've tripled it, I'd say it's pretty damn big leap. I hope this won't become a trend.

Same here ;)