Patapon 2 US retail a waste of money and space

In case you are wondering, this is what you get when you walk into a North American store and purchase Patapon 2. Basically a box, a manual and a voucher to redeem and download the game from the PSN store where it actually resides. Now, I understand the necessity of digital distribution, but when someone is willing to walk to a retail store to purchase his or her game (and pay more for it), that is what they should expect - the game and the ability to play it straight away. This whole pointless exercise defeats the purpose of both retail and digital download games. Not to mention what a waste of plastic and paper (the manual can be embedded in the game) just to purchase a one-off voucher. Wasn't the point of digital downloads to cut the middle man? I am willing to bet good money that there won't be any free WiFi access in most shops for customers to download the game from.

I think this experiment has more to do with appeasing to the retail shops like GameStop and Walmart than it is to Sony's customers. It really boggles the mind what goes on in the brain of those geniuses who runs SCEA. Just sell the physical games at retail and increase the amount of downloadable games at PSN, at a cheaper price.