May I request a little more input please? I'm just curious about your stance. It's obvious your against it, but you must have an opinion on it. And please don't be redundant :P it's a friendly request.
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I, PrinceDrew, will help you find this FBI undercover agent "princedew". No one goes after the good people of SG for their past.
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I hate pirates most of the time. There are only a couple of reasons I'll accept it.
● Trying it as a demo. I've done this myself. If it is good enough to play past the first level, its good enough to pay for. If you are broke, go without the game, play something else until you have the money. There are always cheaper games to get and play.
● Complete inability to get a game in your region. I have done this for a few PS2 games that are otherwise import only and region locked. I have a hard drive in my PS2 which can run ISOs. Still, if the game is in my region, I'll buy it.
I consider anyone who does it to avoid spending money to be nothing but a thief.
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I can agree to this. What I do is kind of like trying as a demo. I try it to see if it'll even run on my computer smoothly. Seeing as FEAR is old and not supported anymore, I wanted to make sure it worked. I now own it in my games :) You can check yourself. Anyways, Thank you so much for your input! I'm really curious on this subject.
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Something you might like to see.
I don't fully agree with it myself (if you like it enough to keep playing, but can't afford it, don't play it, games aren't important enough to justify theft), but worth seeing.
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that's pretty much the same stance I have on game piracy (not the image but your last sentence).
as ilborghi said, games are not a neccessity but a luxury and for most game genres there are a lot of actual F2P alternatives.
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Hell, don't even need free to play. I'm on a limited budget, but PS2 games have been dirt cheap for years, so I have hundreds. Forget the PC with bundles, I could live off the games on just the PS2 using a child's pocket money.
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I agree with that pic 100% and its exactly what I did until some years ago.. I´d say pirating made me buy even more games, as I tried some games that didn´t interrested me that much, but was postively suprised by them.. some games even blew my mind so much, that I went to the store the next day and payed full relail price to have a legit copy.. most of the times I still used the pirated version after buying a game, because I liked to play them in english and most games weren´t multilanguage in the past (and the German translations usually suck).
Nowadays I have no need for piracy anymore, simply because there are so many great games that are so awefully cheap on steam and even cheaper if make use of the trading-system xD And of course the great bundles etc.. So whenever a new game enters the market that I desperatly want to play, I have more than enough other untouched games in my library, I also desperatly want to play ^^ So there is no rush for anything and time will heal all prices ;)
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Would call that a bit hypocritical... You say if you don't have the money, you should do without. Why shouldn't the same apply to games not in your region? Desire shouldn't matter, according to your stance, only legitimate capability. If a publisher doesn't want yo make the game available to you, why should that be any more of a reasonable excuse to "steal" a game, as, say, Australians having to pay ludicrously exploitative prices on games?
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I'm quite willing and and normally able to afford to purchase those games, but living in New Zealand leaves a number of developers unwilling to sell to me. PAL gamers tend to miss out on a number of titles, like with the Namco RPG series, which often go incomplete, as with Xenosaga (we got only Episode 2 of the three games), .hack (we only got the first half of the series) and Tales (where we miss most of the games), and they aren't the only publisher I could raise issues with. Doesn't help that several of the companies that did care for us no longer exist, such as THQ.
I also need to cope with the lacking local PSN. We get games if people remember we exist and allow us to get them. There are companies that forget we aren't Australia, so we just don't get their games since they don't get added to the local PSN service. Australia, with its ridiculous ratings system, gets more games than us. Can't even buy on another PSN service without help, because they don't accept currency from outside the region. I have a US account, but need US friends to spend money on it for purchases.
I'm happy to spend money to complete a series and play it (someday I will finish my Shadow Hearts collection by finding the first PS2 game and the PS1 prequel), but if they don't even bother to give us the complete series, I'll pirate because I actually want to beat the series. I honestly don't like doing it, but its not cool doing something like Namco and giving us only part of a series.
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didn't really answer my question though... how can you justify theft because of one inconvenience that prevents you from owning a game (availability - having a game available in your region is not a 'right'), but not justify it for a different inconvenience that prevents you from owning a game (lack of funds - because games are too expensive and overpriced).
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Simple. Those overpriced games will get cheaper with time. Waiting won't kill you.
Waiting won't change one bit when the problem is that they just aren't here.
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my point isnt the hypothetical "one day"... hell, "one day" those unavailable games might get a re-release too, and make it to your region.."
the question is, why does a "want" justify theft? availability shouldnt mmatter, its not YOUR game, you have no "right" to play it.
when you get down to it, what you ARE actually saying, is that you are entitled to have access to a game, if its available you can buy it, if its NOT available, you are still entitled to play it, so therefore you will pirate it. I simply don't see that as being the case. No one is entitled access to an entertainment product.
I could see your point if your pirating of an unavailable product is meant as a 'fuck you' to publishers that dont think you are worth their time and effort though, but not as an act of entitlement to play the game.
for my part, i dont care about piracy one way or the other... im not trying to catch you out or tell you that youre a bad person for pirating, i just think that your stance is a bit hypocritical.
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Unfortunately, I don't like waiting for those hopeful remakes. I think the last one (Chrono Trigger) took more than a decade to make it here (and still haven't found a copy of the DS release).
If I have the choice of buying the game, I do. I have other imports. My pirated imports are all on either region locked systems (PS2) or purchasing is region locked. My Gamecube for example, I've paid for imports, because I can use them with a region unlock disc, and before I was forced to sell my PSP collection (a system without region locking), I had a significant number of imports (still have several of them actually, since the store wouldn't take anything not on their systems :D). Can't do the same with the PS2 unless I want a chip (and I'd have no clue how to make that work) or to get multiple import systems and deal with power converters. I already have one US system here that no longer works, and I don't want to get another after all the trouble the first time.
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I see nothing wrong with it if its for a try before you buy reason or the pirate cant afford it. Crap games don't deserve sales and if someone poor pirates a game the devs haven't lost a sale anyway as they can't afford to buy it (and may well buy it when they can afford it).
Greedy people who pirate when they can afford to buy and know they like the game are the only bad ones imo.
I have dozens of full price games which I pirated first. Would never have considered shelling out £££ unless I had a chance to see if my money would be well spent.
We test drive cars, get free samples of new foods, can try on clothes in shops etc before buying. What's different about software?
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That last line is really great. Some game have demos while others don't so you don't know what your getting. Good read enterthehole. Thanks for sharing your opinion!
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What is your stance on pirating video games, or anything for that matter?
I'm on with pirating if you download it to demo it or look if you can run it.
Have you every pirated a game?
A lot.
When was the last time you pirated a game?
Last month.
What game was it?
StarBound.
Why did you do it?
Wanted to try the game.
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1) As a creator, I think piracy is bad, but the worst for me would be to have someone stealing my creations and claiming it's theirs. I think it's tolerable to try games before buying them - to some extent.
2) Yes, I've pirated a lot of games in the past. I don't do it anymore.
3) Last time must have been before a year ago, before I moved in my new apartment.
4) Last Game I pirated was Tomb Raider, if I remember correctly.
5) I used to live in an apartment provided by the State for students. They provided free internet (fiber) but it was filtering Steam, I was completely unable to use it. So, it meant a big no-no on all games that use online activations and DRMs. I was still buying retails games, but most of the times I needed to use cracks and stuff to play them.
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I'd really like to get inside the mind of an actual creator of games. Notch said himself that he doesn't mind if Minecraft gets pirated, but i guess when you have multi-millions in sales it doesn't matter at that point. Gaben blamed the distributors of the games saying that if the transaction isn't easy then people will resort to easier methods for convenience. Thanks for sharing!
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By "creator", I didn't mean "creator of games", I should have made it more clear.
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Don't worry about it! When I read creator though those 2 things came into my head and thought I'd mention them.
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Pirating is completely fine if your product is good. If your product is good, people will buy the fuck out of it, like people have bought Minecraft, Skyrim, etc. That being said, the safest way to test the game is to pirate it as a 'demo' of sorts.
Usually, game demos are so short they just barely dip you into the mechanics and gameplay. It's considered "wetting your appetite" but I call it "giving you the small piece of the good layer of a burnt cake." I'd much rather have access to the ENTIRE game.
Sure, I've 'demoed' games and I play them to the end of the first/second area. However, if they're bad up to that point, I refuse to buy and I uninstall. But, if the game makes me want more and I find that I beat it, well, I decide that it was that good so I fork out the money for it.
Anyway, simply put, pirates help to promote good products. They aid in weeding out the crap that's in the market today -- and it's a massive portion, unfortunately.
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Funnily enough, my support ticket got noticed by an employee about two months later :) . When I received an update asking me if I still needed help. :)
Example number 2: Settlers 7. I bought the game to play when travelling. Surprise, surprise - always-on Internet access required (for a game that has absolutely no reason to require it!!). So once again, I had to resort to the "free" version.
In the end, for me it all boils down to convenience/simplicity/ease of use. I buy A LOT of games on Steam because it's convenient. But when the DRM actually makes paid versions more cumbersome than pirated ones, well... piracy it is! :|
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I saw a lot of this when the SimCity reboot came out and had always on DRM. Thanks for your input!
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1) i'm neutral with piracy - some people just pirate games to try them
2) yes
3) 1-2
4) Skyrim, it was awesome, so I bought it
5) to try the game
edit: also AoE 2 HD, i don't know if skyrim was earlier, doesn't matter, bought both games :)
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You can't justify piracy by saying "I can't afford the game". Videogames are not a basic necessity (and in any case there are free options for entertainment) but a luxury: if you can't afford a luxury, you will have to live without it.
Maybe people are more accepting of it because it's easy to get away with it with no repercussions, maybe (most likely) because it's harder to appreciate the value of digital goods.
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Just to make things clear, you totally don't buy game, you're buying license to be able to play it ;) buying some game would cost tons of money imo...
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I think you don't understand the concept of "owning" something.
True, at the Steam store you only buy the license to access the game.
But apart from that, you can actually own a digital product, giving you the rights to do everything within legal boundaries with it, even re-selling (that's what you can't do on Steam currently).
To stick to your analogy: Buying a physical product doesn't allow you to produce and sell that product under your name either, because again it "would cost tons of money" to develop a product, that's why the concept of copyrights does exist.
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On a side note, I hope we get the ability to sell our steam library games on the market. That would be so nice, but I can see the precautions it would take to implement that.
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I think some EU lawyers are still in the process of talking to Valve about this, though I don't know the current status of this case.
It did already lead to a change of Valve's TOS about 1 year ago.
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So maybe we are closer then I think. that is amazing news!
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Dang, I thought the case was still open.
I also thought EU laws were involved, not just German laws.
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what youll find is it lost in a german court now theyll likely appeal to either a higher german court or to the lowest EU court, essentially the EU overrules members laws if its in an area the EU has power over which is most areas(note im not lawyer merely a fairly well read englishman who doesnt believe left wing or right wing press so read both on occasion to get some balance so if you go to prison on my advice its your own damn fault :))
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Heh, why do you have that little checkbox at installing games, that you agree to end user LICENCE agreement? Also i am sure that if you buy game oustide of steam, you still only buying licence to play it. Just for the record, did you ever read ToS or EULA of any game? If it was your property, you could do anything with the code and evertything in the game, which most of the games' terms/agreemets prohibit. (and to add, i understand concept of owning, but in this digital era, there are not many things you can say you own for real)
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it's hard to find a non-digital analogy, because disassembling a product and mass-copy it without putting in further resources doesn't work well for non-digital products.
much like you said, you're buying a finished product and you get what you payed for.
alright, you're probably right and you're only buying access to using the product without technically owning it.
isn't it the same for movies? if you buy a movie you can watch it, you don't get access to the script or single parts (be it voice recording or requisites), you're not allowed to alter it, sell it altered or under your name, you you can't "own" the movie in that sense .
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It's the same thing. You own a license to watch it and that license is attached to either the digital download or the physical media. In case of physical media, you're allowed to sell the disc, effectively transferring your license to someone else. (Unless it's been attached to some kind of account)
When buying a DVD/Blu-Ray, you get a license for private use. You're not allowed to rent or do a public showing of the movie. That's why we sometimes saw $200 DVDs pop up on Amazon when a studio released the version for video clubs but delayed the public release. Amazon would make that version available which is physically the same media but comes with a broader license.
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Thats true, only thin you can say is yours is medium on which this type of intellectual property is stored. With movies and other digital media, you can think as you borrowed given movie (blockbuster style) and have no return time, therefore it's more expensive than borrowing one. Also there are plenty services that allow you (for some monthly fee) watch anything you like, but as mentioned above, they are only buying licences to air that media for subscribed user only. Also i think there is no analogy in non digital products for digital ones simply because it's whole different world. And at last, didnt want to make some flame or what, but was just pointing out that you are barely "own" any game you have in your library :/ (i think moddable games and other stuff like that is story on it's own, but everything is in terms/licence agreement)
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I don't understand your point. No one is saying its a basic human right to have access to a game but in the cases where someone cannot afford to buy a game, where is the harm in them having access? Think about it..
Two scenarios :
1) Poor gamer cant afford game; doesn't buy it > devs get no money > zero chance of him recommending it to anyone else.
2) Poor gamer cant afford game; pirates it > devs get no money > high chance of him recommending it to friends who could afford to buy.
Can you not see the benefit in this specific circumstance ?
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One scenarios: Poor gamer can't afford game, doen't buy it, instead looking for a free alternative from an Indie dev. Poor gamer enjoys game and donates to indie dev when he has some spare money left or decides to buy a non-free game from the indie dev.
can you not see the poor indie dev in this specific circumstance?
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If every developer had a free alternative (that is the same genre of the non-free game they actually wanted to play) then perhaps that scenario might hold weight. As it stands I'm not familiar with any developer, indie or otherwise, that does so.
So no, I don't see the "poor indie dev" in that specific circumstance. I don't see any dev in that circumstance.
I'm not necessarily in favour of piracy but your scenario is inadequate in the extreme.
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What genres are you thinking about, that don't have a F2P alternative?
The only genre that currently comes to my mind is a "game development simulation" where probably only Game Dev Tycoon and Game Dev Story exist (btw: I like GDT's take on piracy)
If you don't pick your genre too specific you'll probably find a F2P alternative very easily.
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I read that before and I had a good chuckle out of it. My favorite part is the people who complained about it and got caught for pirating.
Edit: Great quote form that. And this is coming from a dev who just started out without a paycheck:
"There are still individuals who either can't make a legal purchase because of payment-issues or who genuinely cannot afford the game," Klug concluded. "I don't have a quarrel with you.
I find it funny that more and more you see devs who say this kind of thing when it really effects them the most, but the AAA title companies are the ones bitching.
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The AAA titles companies usually experience a larger number of copies of their games being pirated. And since the pencil pushers at those companies think that every pirated copy is a lost sale, to them it equates to millions of dollars they're missing out.
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Perhaps I misunderstood your scenario. Were you not saying that people who could not afford, say, an FPS game made by an indie dev should then hunt for -another- FPS game made by the indie dev? Or were you saying that people should turn away from mainstream developers if they can't afford mainstream prices and instead support free-to-play stuff by relatively indie developers?
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No, I meant the second one: people that want a jump-n-run puzzler but can't afford it should look for a F2P jump-n-run puzzler from a different dev (and it's most likely that the dev with the F2P version is an Indie dev and the pay version is most likely from a non-indie dev).
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Money is one of the main reasons people say they pirate. i can agree to it actually being there. I feel like it's the perfect excuse for a teen seeing as usually they don't have a steady income, if one at all. I know once you become an adult and get a job that money troubles aren't over, though. Thank you for sharing!
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I concur, but not all games get bundled or go on sale. For example, any of the CoD games. I have been waiting for MW2 to go on sale, yet to happen. It's $20 on steam which I believe is overpriced for a game that old.
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Well next time make a huge announcement and message me :P I will grab it first chance I get. Had such a blast with friends on it when I used to play on the Xbox 360.
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Some people don't have huge backlogs and/or don't want to wait for a game to go on sale. And as mentioned couple times in this thread, some games rarely go on sale (Blizz games, CoDs, etc.). Or someone has limited budged and rather spends money on upgrading PC so s/he can play some games (manny people I personally know thinks like this and I don't blame them).
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I did played pirated games.I always feel guilty about it, but a person like me can't afford 20$ games.But after that I know huge sales and bundles exists, I decide it to play as a demo(like delta mentioned).Today I play my old games until that other games be bundled or get discount.
It was rogue legacy.Sry I don't remember last time.I got it because I love hardcore games and can't afford them.
I stoped playing after the last phase as I mentioned above.
To me it is silly to justify piracy.I never did.I mean pput yourself in their place.I am making a game and no one buys it but everyone plays it WTF?.I am using pirates due to poorness but after the bundles it is not makes sense to play pirated games(I can esily give 1$)
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Someone had to buy it to share it though. Piracy can be seen as free publicity at the expense of a sale, but could potentially bring in even more income. Tt's another way to look at it. Thanks for sharing!
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Multiplayer games(COD is a good example) and nowadays steam workshop system compel people to buy the original after download pirated version.COD multi can be played with pirated but it is full of hackers so after they enjoyed it they buy original(Me when bought cod:mw2).Also even achievment system tend to atract gamers.But if game consists non of above chances they would pirated is too high.
Other exaple could be Skyrim workshop.It is hard to download mods on the internet and install it on contrary to steam (clicking subscribe button)
I know the first sentence I just said what will happen after excessive usage of piracy.
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1) The right price for a game, if the price is too high, I don't have anything to say to pirates, else I'm totally against, but buy it when the price drop
2) In the past, yes, a lot
3) A couple of years ago
4) Skyrim. Today I legally own Skyrim LE bought during one of steam sale. The same goes for a lot of games I pirated in these past years, like Stalker, alice madness, bioshock 1 & 2 etc.
5) The price was too high and I wasn't really sure I wanted to play Skyrim
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I pirated all 3 of the Stalker games (wanted to see what the series was like. Ill admit a little overkill getting them all, but it's the truth.), and I am so attached. I deleted them but I would gladly buy Stalker CoP when it goes on sale. It was that amazing and I'm glad I got to try it out. thanks for sharing and bringing up happy memories roaming the zone :)
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I just demo-ed Democracy 3 just now. It was the first or second time in 2 years after I got my internet banking card. The other time was Dragon Age because the Ultimate edition is about 27GB but the uploader had the files compressed to just 12GB - I don't count it as pirating, just saving my time for my convenience.
I think I stopped pirating because "AAA" games does not worth my time downloading it, with 20-30GB download size but only 7-10 hours of gameplay.
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I think the most common reasons for pirating are theese:
On the other hand, it is a good way to try games, and you can buy the games any time after. And the studios who are going nuts over piracy (e.g. Rockstar) should focus on improving their product's quality instead of causing unpleasant experiences with their DRM to the customers who actually buy their games (looking at you max payne 3)
All in all I think piracy alone is not a threat to the industry.
The last game I pirated was tomb raider after the release, liked it, bought a retail copy later. :)
In the past I did pirated more games, altho did bought most of them after they've dropped in price, having a small part time job, and uni the 50€ release price for me looks like a bad joke at a lot of games, especially with the todays DLC era.
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"unpleasant experiences with their DRM to the customers who actually buy their games (looking at you max payne 3) "
Exactly, I haven't played Max payne 3 but I played GTA IV and that was something awful - the game needs steam, GFWL and Rockstar club, I had SO MANY PROBLEMS runing that piece of crap that I actually was close to just pirate the game and play DRM free version! Same goes to Far cry 3 and their uplay crap
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I think pirating is ok as long as you do it to see if you like the game before buying it OR If you honestly can't afford it at full price and will buy it whenever it gets on sale (Applies to AAA titles).
Yes I have pirated games more in the past than now but I bought all the games I once pirated OR bought other games from the company I pirated from.
I pirated Sniper Ghost Warrior 2 about a week ago because I wanted to see if I want to buy it on steam sale. Glad I did because the game is boring and I lost interest after 20 minutes.
To sum it up - I think its ok to pirate expensive titles you don't know if you even like and then buy the game in case you do want it.
This rule doesn't apply to indie titles. Noone should pirate indie titles since (A) They cost less (B) Your individual purchase has more impact on the developer. They actually have to have it to survive and produce more stuff.
The rule above doesn't apply if said indie title is honestly horrible and the developers are lazy and money grabby.
Also another note regarding currency the living conditions throughout the world.
We have to keep in mind not everything is the US.
I live in Israel and paycheck / living cost ratio is really expensive.
In very broad terms, everything costs me about 3-4 times more than it would to an American.
In other places in the world its even worse.
If you live in a western country (like USA) and buying a game would cost you about as much as going out to lunch, buy the friggin game.
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Back when I was young and got my first PC (after years of playing NES with cartridges smuggled from the outside of country by some shady dealers who operated from the green markets) I went with a friend to the "cd club" where we sat down, browsed through a catalogue made of reviews cut from the local game magazines, and selected a game... Need For Speed 2. The, the guy behind the counter said that's 4 DM (Deutsche Mark) and we had to wait for half an hour for him to burn us the game on a blank Verbatim disc. Went home, had fun for years with the NFS, and bought many games in the same way... Until I realized that's not how you buy games anywhere else in the world. That was one serious WTF moment, but then again, there was no way to know there's a different way when no one sold "originals".
After year 2000 some music stores in larger towns started selling PC games, and as I was a bit older, I started buying them. Everyone thought I was crazy, because, you see, you could buy any game for $1 on the street, and I was giving $9 for Neverwinter Nights, old Red Alert 2, or even more for Guild Wars and so on... Couldn't get all the games, as the choice was fairly limited, and I was a student with almost no money, but I enjoyed getting an older (cheaper) game once in a month or two. I even started working to have more money for games and books, but retail games were still hard to find, especially when I moved to a smaller town. I could order them via Internet, wait for 3-5 days, pay for post services...
Then, in 2009 (yeah, I'm late arrival) an acquaintance sent me a steam gift. He actually had to encourage me to accept it, as we all "knew" steam is bad in more ways than one. So I did... And I liked how easy it is to buy and play games on steam, specially multiplayer games, so I got my own debit card and started saving and buying games on Steam (and GOG and D2D and Impulse and... well, Steam mostly). Luckily, at this time I had some more regular jobs (nothing permanent or long term, but I worked more often) and also, broadband in my country went from 256 Kbs download and 64 Kbs upload to more acceptable speeds, mainly 3-4 Mbs download, which made Steam games even more acceptable. Anyway, haven't installed or played a pirated game in more than half a decade.
So, now I have 750 games in my library, have given away 280 games here, and have brought 100+ people to Steam, who would otherwise be pirating even now. Comparing to the west, my paycheck is really small, but I manage somehow. And I'll continue to show to young and old people that Steam is great. Nice of Gaben to help me with free TF2 and Dota2...
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You are an amazing individual. That is seriously a mind bowing story. I would never do that if I was broke. i'd be the guys still buying games for $1 on the street. Congrats to you sir and keep up with all the good work. That makes me look at pirating in a completely different way and I mean it. Even with not that much money, you still chose the more expensive route. Thank you for sharing that awesome story!
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Well, even now I do not buy games for a full price, but instead wait for the 75% sales (if I can't buz something, and do not get it on Steam gifts, I don't play it until I can/do get it), try to find places to pay in USD instead in EUR (damn GMG sold us out) and so on... But, that is something you have to do when you live outside of USA/EU and some similar countries. I'm sure I'm not the only one.
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Every year I create lists of games I would like to buy, and I keep them until winter/summer sales and mostly buy them at 75% or more(sometimes even 50% if the game is good).
Only a few games I buy at full price, those that i REALLY like (the last one was starbound, that I've backed since the beginning).
So yeah, I don't think you're the only one.
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I did that this past Christmas. I think I'll start a lot earlier this year :p in fact I'll start right now.
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Back in the days, my situation was almost as yours(started with the SEGA Megadrive tough, and then got a pc) and I quite know how you feel.For years I got floppys(and then CDs) with games that were probably from warez sites and I thought that was normal(most of those games even came with cracks).Then, same as you, I found out that's not how a game gets sold. I first started buying game magazines that had games with them, which mostly meant I would play games way after they came out, and when possible I would've buy full price with saved money.
Then I found out about steam, and the rest is mostly like you.
So kudos to you NBA264, you bought back quite some memories for me as well.
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My take
My advise to devs.
Don't freak out about this issue. Generally there's always gonna be 2 types of pirates. The ones who pirate to check out the game before jumping the gun, and the ones who are never gonna buy your game. If your game is good enough, those in the first category are gonna buy it. Thus it is not a lost sale. Well what about the second group of people. Well they're never gonna buy your game anyways, so again, not a lost sale. The only reason you're anti piracy is because you're afraid that people are gonna see your game is crap, making you lose the sale. Piracy is not going away. Rather than alienate your potential customer, make better games and get them to shell out a few bucks for your stuff (Psst - CDProjeckt RED).
P/s - Scrolled up a bit while typing and saw the Pirates guide posted by Delta. That summed up my post nicely I think.
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You wanna go there?
Look at my game list. Look at yours. I'm a pirate, and you're apparently not a pirate. Yet somehow, I bought more games than you. So is it a lost sale for devs that I'm a pirate?
Oh and I shouldn't forget the mandatory derogatory -
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If you think my Steam list is a measure of my game purchases, you're ignorant. I very much prefer to have actual manuals, maps, posters, actual discs and registration cards. I've bought hundreds of titles and your comment is like saying to someone "I know you put years of your life into this thing but I'm going to steal it, don't freak out."
How any of this is even debatable is absurd, you should be ashamed.
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Yeah you're not the only ones that buys physical copies, in addition to steam library. So to simplify, I've bought more games than you. Just because my steam list is decent enough, doesn't mean I haven't bought physical copies as well. We've established that I bought more games than you yeah?
Okay, ready? Here comes the point that I made in my post earlier that you conveniently ignore. If I'm a pirate, and I bought more games than you, who are not a pirate, is it lost sales for devs? Simple yes or no question. So am I "stealing" the game now?
Say that if in some bizarre world you turned out to be correct, just for the sake of the argument. According to you, game developers should freak out? Hey, Great job! Keep encouraging those devs to make stuff like Sim City common practice! People like you pisses me off. Get off your high horse. Piracy exists for a reason(s). Price, hardware, regional restriction, game quality, ect. So fix these.
Don't give me that crap about spending years into the game and people stealing it. If the game is good, it will sell, pirates or not. Witcher 2 was available DRM free, ripe for pirates. Does it affect the majority of their sale? Nope, in fact they're making a sequel with minimal DRM as well. Why? Because they are not freaking out about piracy.
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So, on the one hand we have someone who - atleast on the front we can PROVE - has bought more games.
On the other hand we have someone who claims to have bought more games and is talking from an ideological, but faulty point of view.
Essentially, because you haven't bought these games on steam - and from a marketing point of view - you are lost sales. Cause any game you have not bought through steam is a lost sale.
This is how corporate thinking works. Any person who has not bought their product, is by definition a lost sale.
It does not matter whether you tried the game at a friends place, because you do not own a PS3 and he does. It does not matter whether you share a steam account with a roommate or significant other. All of these are "lost sales". And will be accounted for in their next annual financial report.
A corporation is required to make more revenue year after year. If a corporation makes 10% profit this year, and 9% profit next year - according to the statistics and financial advisors they have made a loss. They still made 9% profit, hell - they could even be making exactly the same amount of profit as the year before. But percentages say, you should've made more!
And since the percentages rule the corporate world, they end up calculating this into their next projects. Decreasing budget, cutting employees and so on.
But you, as an upstanding citizen and person with good morals. You spit on piracy! Its all the blame of these lowly people who can not afford todays standards and cost-of-living. They just should've worked harder and made more money!
Lets see how you talk when you're the one with not enough money to pay for your food and family - because of circumstances that are outside of your control.
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Shouldn't your advice be "provide a demo of the game" instead?
Then pirates would have 1 reason less to justify pirating.
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Well, you played any demo ever? most of the time it's like on the other side of the planet where the actual game is...
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Demos can be misleading like naka said. Not saying that making more demos available is bad. If there's a demo, I'd try it sometimes. Problem is, making more demos available is not a cure, it's more of a band aid.
My advise for devs to "make better games" are more suitable to convert pirates into sales instead of demos. Piracy isn't going anywhere. Instead of taking genius actions to stop piracy like the new Sim City did, yeah that went well, devs should be more innovative with their games.
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Demos would massively help with the "can I run it?" questions. True, it will not tell you if you will like the length / story / ... of the complete game or if you will run into other game-braking problems.
I'm not saying that demos are an overall cure against piracy, I was only pointing out that with demos available, you take one of the justifications away.
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Just think of all the times you've fought with DRM, wacky securom drivers, authentication, online registration, email verification, phone verification, blood/urine samples, limited installs, next time you fight with that draconian garbage...
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Or, more likely, thank the publisher companies that have massive and gratuitous overhead costs, deliberately bankrupt developers, created heavily biased "studies" and made naked accusations about piracy having a massive impact on the industry when more neutral third-party studies have indicated that it has a negligible impact on sales and a massive impact on word-of-mouth advertising. It's the publishers who typically push for DRM, not the developers, and many of the publishers out there right now epitomize everything that is currently wrong with the entertainment industry.
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In such cases I always thank the pirates! Because thanks to them, there are ways to "patch" this shit out of the games and actually enjoy what we payed for. They are the rebells against big publishers that just want draconian controll over their products and try to kill second-hand-markets.
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I guess that thank the youtubers too? Because youtube says the same thing as you, that gameplay videos steal the intellectual properties of the game's dev. So thank the youtubers too?
OR MAYBE
Thank the shareholders behind the companys who are sort sighted number topping greedy pricks? Who make developers release games too early, just because gibmoneypleze? Who make sure at a lot of games core content is released as DLC, just because sort sighted money now > money on the long run, customer satisfaction
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3,4,5 When far cry 3 came out, i wanted to see how my PC runs it and played it for ~30 minutes and the deleted it and bought the game.
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I prefer the swashbuckling Caribbean version to the Somali pirates. But, that is IMO only.
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Recently, I've noticed a lot of people mentioning that they pirate games. I know this is nothing new, but it seems like the "Burn him! He's a pirate!" days are over. By this, I mean that people are more accepting of it, and don't criticize you as much for mentioning it. Just had a few questions and wanted the communities input on this.
To be fair, I'll post my answers, because yes, I have pirated games in my past.
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