I guess this comes under both technology and economics.
But yeah I don’t get it. You pay money for a game, you now own that game. That’s how a transaction works. If I don’t own it what on earth did I pay all that money for? How can companies get away with this?
In: Technology
It’s similar to a permanent rent than ownership.
Imagine that you rent a home but only pay for it once, no monthly fee. You sign the usual contract and you can move right in.
Most of the time it feels like it’s your own home. You live there, you have your own keys, you can lock it, you can buy new furniture etc.
But you’re not allowed to resell it, remodel it, change the locks without notifying your landlord or rent it out yourself. You also don’t own anything that was already in the home when you moved in, and you have to preserve them in good condition.
The landlord can also evict you at any time, but it happens very rarely.
If you break the rules you’ve broken the contract and the landlord can evict and sue you.
Similarly, when you buy the game, digitally or physically, you don’t really own it. You can’t resell it, you can’t dissect it and use assets from it for your own projects, or make derivative works. (Sometimes you can get away with it but officially most of these are not allowed)
You can, however, play it as the developers or publishers intended. The only difference between digital games and physical disks is that they can’t take your disk away.
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