Treyarch will opt for a must-have multiplayer mode over a one-time code system as its weapon in the battle against the pre-owned market.

That's the feeling of studio head Mark Lamia anyway, who told MCV that Black Ops won't need any kind of code to get online and that multiplayer features of Black Ops would be so compelling and well supported gamers won't want to give their copy up.

"Multiplayer is critical to the success of this series. It has such tremendous staying power - there are millions of people playing Call of Duty every day," he said.

"It's entertaining people on a magnitude that's mind-blowing and we work really hard to make sure it's supported for a long time."

"We're going to support the hell out of Black Ops," he continued.

"That will be our focus post-release: making sure we keep our fans engaged, and hopefully as a result, they'll want to keep playing our game and won't want to trade it in."

Publisher Activision, however, has said that it aims to combat the pre-owned market by making DLC more important, which could hint towards how Black Ops multiplayer support will be handled.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/ar ... ?id=263978

He's a witch, burn him!

He is right to an extent. But they are being side tracked by the concept of pre owned games. If they have really good online game then it opens up the opportunity of getting the new owner of the pre owned game to sign up for the service. An income from preowned games is as good as that from a new sale. If the former owner has lost interest then you would not be getting any extra income from the first user at all.

I know someone who bought COD:MW2 secondhand and then paid for and downloaded the new maps as they were released. Surely this is a source of income?

With some very good games, I will pay the asking price. But these are far and few between. Most of the time, unless the price is low, I won't bother. Some games are bargain-box priced at say £10 to get rid of stock and I'll buy then. Sometimes, I'll buy secondhand for the same reason.

People buy secondhand DVDs. How is that any different? Why hasn't the film industry stopped this?

Even if the player only uses the single player features they may actually find that they like the game so much that they will buy a sequel or another game for full price. Think of it as additional marketing.