Any time a company says "People don't want x" what they mean is "We don't want people to want x", usually due to money, effort, control, or a mixture of the three.
You used to be able to resell your PC games too, back in the day.
Why can’t PC games also come on discs? The last one I had the option to buy on disc I remember was Skyrim. When I put the disc in, it launched steam, connected my purchase to my account, and steam did the remainder of the install over the network. Turns out, it didn’t really have anything useful on disc.
yeah and it's not that dissimilar on consoles. 800gb call of duty games on a single disc? plus you need a connection to play most games or even get the necessary patches that make the game playable since everything comes out as trash in the 1.0 version.
I see the appeal and desire for physical media but at this point it's a charade and more harmful for the environment to boot
PC games are a bit different simply from how open they are. It was too easy to rip disks which is part of how the perception of PC gamers as nothing but pirates came about in the 00's. Part of the reason that early Steam sales were so legendarily good was because so many publishers had written PC gaming off as a lost cause.
Because it all routes through one digital storefront without the possibility of competition, so digital pricing on console storefronts is artificially high.
Plus, they’ve already shut down stores on older consoles and people have lost games. That’s less likely as console companies learn how to make competent digital storefronts and account systems, many have felt the burn of losing all your digital purchases on console and won’t let it happen twice.
I ended up with a disc console, but I admit it makes up a minority of my usage. I just wanted to be able to play old PS4 games, and blu-ray movies. Most of the games I play are on PS+ or purchased digitally.