Yeah I think it will be like music and movies. Dedicated hardware and physical media will stick around, but over time the market will shift to those being for enthusiasts while average users are fine with streams even if the quality is lower. I'm guilty of this myself as I was a pretty big buyer of CDs, DVDs and Blurays up to my mid 30s or so. I eventually regretted it and tossed/recycled cases and put all that shit in binders a couple years ago. Now I just have 20 or so Blurays on the top shelf of my 3-shelf book case in my office/game room--just favorites like Star Wars, LOTR, Matrix trilogy etc--and the only thing I still buy/collect are Star Wars movies. I could honestly ditch those binders of CDs/DVDs/Blurays etc. and not miss it as I've not even unzipped them once in the 2+ years of putting stuff in there and most anything I'd want to watch/listen to is probably on one of the streaming services we have (Spotify, Netflix, Amazon, Hulu). I just can't bring myself to as it's a few thousand dollars and doesn't take up much space in the closet.
Gaming I never got the collecting bug as I've always seldom replayed games and thus always sold games off, sold (or traded in with good programs to avoid buyer scams/hassle) consoles when I was done with a generation. I still do that, but have shifted more to just buying in digital sales and will embrace things like Gamepass more going forward as it makes so much more sense financially for someone that rarely touches games after the credits roll. Same with music and movies--so much money wasted on CDs I listenened to for a month or two movies I bought and watched once (or never if I already saw it in theaters).
Physical hardware and media makes sense for the diehards who want the best quality and revisit things regularly, much less so for those of us who are more disposable and casual consumers of content.
Gaming I never got the collecting bug as I've always seldom replayed games and thus always sold games off, sold (or traded in with good programs to avoid buyer scams/hassle) consoles when I was done with a generation. I still do that, but have shifted more to just buying in digital sales and will embrace things like Gamepass more going forward as it makes so much more sense financially for someone that rarely touches games after the credits roll. Same with music and movies--so much money wasted on CDs I listenened to for a month or two movies I bought and watched once (or never if I already saw it in theaters).
Physical hardware and media makes sense for the diehards who want the best quality and revisit things regularly, much less so for those of us who are more disposable and casual consumers of content.