Piracy

[deanb]

Yeah I've kind of done that with Medal of Honor. I pirated it to see what it was like. Since at the time I was also going through the recent CODs, and I wanted to see how the story held up as such regarding the taliban stuff.

The game was enjoyable, but I accidentally completed it. It was frigging short. Now normally in the situation of enjoying a game enough to finish it, I'd buy it. But for £40? No way was MoH worth that. Also replay value was pretty crappy so I wasn't really even gonna buy it should it drop of £5. (not much interested in the MP).

Quite the opposite though was Borderlands, which I pirated, played a bit of , got bored after a few hours and got rid of it. Few months later it's on sale in a 4 pack, so Housemates, Ethan and I grabbed it. Dunno for Ethan, but we played it through to the end and even some of the DLC.

 

Game pricing I'd say is an important factor in Piracy. Some games are just priced out of their actual value. But one thing Steams really helped with is their constant sales, and amount of games priced to suit every pocket you hear loads everywhere on how folks stopped/reduced their piracy because of Steam. Games are priced to suit you, it bundles in a ton of great features on top. It'z how things should be.

It's why Piracy is more an issue for consoles: Game prices don't really fluctuate at all. Pretty much 99% of new releases are £40. You can set your watch by it.

Of course the main issue for consoles is used games sales. It's something that's quite weird that piracy is so vilified but it's actually used sales that are more damaging. PC revenue went up last year. Console revenue dropped a whopping 25%. Used sales don't really effect PC.

If I pirate a game, I can either not buy it, or I can buy it. Most likely I won't buy it because it's crappy in which case they wouldn't of got my cash anyway. If I buy it the pub/dev gets my lovely juicy cash. 50:50.

Now if I'm on console, I can either not buy a game, or buy it. Now if I'm gonna buy a game, I can buy it new, or save a few quid and buy it used. Now I'm buying the game cos I like it. But only one of those options gets the dev any cash.

If a PC gamer likes a game enough to buy it, the dev gets the cash. If a console person likes a game, it's not always the case the dev will get anything from that.

[Thursday Next]

Used games are a whole other topic. A lot of people seem to treat buying a game like tipping a waiter. If the service was good and you plan on coming back, you'll part with your cash. If you weren't completely happy then hey, the waiter is still getting paid so it's not your problem.

 

Also, I forgot to mention, with regard to the comment about music and film stars waiting on their golden statues and swimming pools. I work in the games industry and I don't have a single gold statue, swimming pool or private jet. In fact, sometimes I have barely enough money to pay for my car, rent, bills and food. It's not just Kotick's pocket that feels the pinch when you don't support the industry. It's everybody down to the QA testers on £14k a year (and that's before the tax man takes his slice).

[TheMightyEthan]

And you need to feel better because piracy makes you feel bad because you know it is wrong.

IMO something's only wrong if it hurts someone else. I have never had it satisfactorily explained to my why me pirating a game/song/movie/whatever that I wasn't going to buy anyway is hurting the developer/distributor/whomever. If I'm not going to buy it either way, then whether I pirate it or not the developer still doesn't get my money; they're in the same position either way.

 

I'm not talking about people who pirate all their games just because they can, and who would normally buy it, because I do know people like that, I'm talking about the situation where I would in fact not buy it regardless.

[Yantelope]

And you need to feel better because piracy makes you feel bad because you know it is wrong.

IMO something's only wrong if it hurts someone else. I have never had it satisfactorily explained to my why me pirating a game/song/movie/whatever that I wasn't going to buy anyway is hurting the developer/distributor/whomever. If I'm not going to buy it either way, then whether I pirate it or not the developer still doesn't get my money; they're in the same position either way.

 

I'm not talking about people who pirate all their games just because they can, and who would normally buy it, because I do know people like that, I'm talking about the situation where I would in fact not buy it regardless.

 

It seems like that's harder to say whether or not you'd buy it. You've obviously got interest in the game so it's obviously worth something to you. Perhaps you'll never be able to buy the game for what price you think it's worth but the idea that you're never going to buy it anyway but you still want to play it seems like justification.

[Strangelove]

I steal games. I wont try to sugarcoat it. I download them without paying and maybe finish and enjoy one out of five games i get. Sometimes if i have money i buy them just to have them. If i like something a lot i like having the box and disk.

i dont feel bad about it and i dont justify it. Stealing does nothing to my morality. Im a thief. Truth. I buy all my ps3 games because there isnt a way to download them and for some reason i think having a large ps3 collection is cool. Im never going to pirate ps3 games like i never pirated ps2 games.

 

i cant believe how much bullshit is in this thread.

[Thursday Next]

It seems like that's harder to say whether or not you'd buy it. You've obviously got interest in the game so it's obviously worth something to you. Perhaps you'll never be able to buy the game for what price you think it's worth but the idea that you're never going to buy it anyway but you still want to play it seems like justification.

 

Pretty much this. It's that whole, entitled, "I want to play it but not enough to pay, so I'll nick it." thing. I like going to see films at the cinema, but I think it's overly expensive. So I have a few choices, I pay up and suffer in silence (or noisily), I sneak in and "steal" what I want and suffer the consequences if I get caught or I do what I do in real life. Go on Wednesday when it's 2 for 1 (thanks Orange!). Yes it means that I don't go to the cinema at the weekend when it would be more convenient, but I do get what I want at a price I find acceptable.

 

You don't have a right to play every game ever released. If there's a game that you think you might not like then (in my opinion) you should "pays your money and takes your chances" or not play it and forever wonder.

 

At least Strangelove is honest about his dishonesty. Most people seem to be condemning some types of piracy while defending their own.

[Mal]

Its all about the mighty money and because you can. Chances are, if you can then you will do something. However, being a nice human beings with feelings, sometimes if I like it enough, I will pay for it. Most of the time if the price is right and other times when the price is far from right.

 

Speaking of this topic... I don't think I have pirated any games recently in the last... six months or so. Now music and other stuff... eh. I should seriously get Nujabes' discography legit.

[TheMightyEthan]

You guys completely missed the point of my question: I'm trying to ask how it hurts you.

 

If we assume, for the sake of argument (again, I would like to reiterate that I don't pirate games, I either buy them or don't play them), that I would not buy the game anyway, then how is it hurting the developer if I pirate it?

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

[Yantelope]

You guys completely missed the point of my question: I'm trying to ask how it hurts you.

 

If we assume, for the sake of argument (again, I would like to reiterate that I don't pirate games, I either buy them or don't play them), that I would not buy the game anyway, then how is it hurting the developer if I pirate it?

 

The point was that we're questioning the premise that you'll never ever buy it at any price. If you have enough interest to pirate and play the tame then it must hold some value to you. If it were $1.00 then maybe you'd buy it? It's easy to say "I'm never ever going to buy this game" and then pirate it but if piracy isn't an option at all then it's more likely that you'd say "well, maybe I can spare $10". I'm not trying to speak for you directly, I'm just saying that I think piracy and even the option of piracy changes people's spending habits at least a little which in the end might result in a loss of profits for a game company.

Edited January 24, 2011 by Yantelope

[Thursday Next]

You guys completely missed the point of my question: I'm trying to ask how it hurts you.

 

If we assume, for the sake of argument (again, I would like to reiterate that I don't pirate games, I either buy them or don't play them), that I would not buy the game anyway, then how is it hurting the developer if I pirate it?

 

Isn't that the same as saying "How does it hurt the developer if I steal it?" Tesco's annual revenue is approximately £62.54billion. Stealing one disc from them is going to cost a fraction of a fraction of a percent of their revenue, so they haven't been hurt, or if they have it is de minimis. Plus, the publisher/developer has already been paid by Tesco, so, who cares right? How is the developer hurt?

 

It's not one person doing it, it's thousands, tens of thousands maybe more. If the stores know that a portion of the market is not going to pay for it, then they reduce their forecasts, the publisher produces fewer copies, there's less money for the devs.

 

Even among those who say that they would never have bought it, they can't say for certain that if they walked into a shop and it was on sale and they had a gift card to use up and there was nothing else coming out in the near future that they wanted, that they wouldn't pick it up as an impulse buy.

 

Further, I don't see why developers should have to defend their right to decide who gets to use their software while pirates are assumed to have an automatic right to get whatever they want for free and choose if they want to pay afterwards. I think you're placing the burden on the wrong people.

 

In cases of theft you don't ask the victim why they wanted to keep hold of whatever item it was that was stolen and only try the thief if the victim can prove that they valued what was taken. You assume that what was taken had value to the victim and that the thief was wrong to take it.

[TheMightyEthan]

It's different than theft because with theft you're being deprived of something. Someone pirating the game who wasn't going to buy it anyway (again, assume for the sake of argument, I acknowledge the practical problems with this assumption) doesn't take anything away from anyone else. So I still don't see how the dev/publisher/whatever is actually hurt.

 

And numbers don't matter. Even if it's 500,000,000 people pirating the game who weren't going to buy it anyway, NONE of those would have been sales (with this assumption which, again, I acknowledge is not an accurate description of the world, but I'm trying to argue the theory) then there haven't been any sales lost.

 

Whether or not the pirates have a "right" to play the game (I agree that they don't) is a completely separate issue from this question.

[CorgiShinobi]

My issue with the "write a letter" thing is this: If I pirate a game to demo it, it's because I'm considering buying it. If I enjoy it enough, then I will buy it. If I just write the dev a letter though, that means I'm not buying the game, and they're not getting a sale from me. Honestly, I imagine devs and publishers would prefer that I pirate the game and then buy it, than that I write them a letter and not buy it at all.

That's what you would do, but I don't imagine everyone who pirates to demo a game is going to stick to that criteria. After all, you already are in possession of the game, what's stopping anyone from keeping it for free? Like, what if the game isn't as good as someone thought, but they kept playing it to finished it.

 

That's where morality comes into play. You may get rid of the game yourself, but someone who is constantly coming up with excuses to play a game for free could easily brush it off and keep playing. Heck, where do you stop in your demoing of a game?

 

I'm not trying to point fingers or belittle anyone, but the point of the letter is to create action. We could carry on with pirating to demo a game, but you have to admit its an unorthodox method that could be thrown out if developers would simply offer a real demo.

 

I don't believe morality ever comes into play here. Copyright infringement is not theft, it is a law. Breaking laws doesn't mean you're breaking any universal moral codes.

 

That's another thing I took issue with in the video: they listed a bunch of flaws with a game that might make someone not buy it, and then said "but if you pirate it and play it, obviously it's worth playing despite the flaws." Their logic their is flawed. For one thing, there's a cost consideration that enters into it: sure, it may be worth playing if it's free, that doesn't mean it's worth paying money for, or paying more than a couple dollars for.

 

Yea, that was my only issue as well.

Morality as in, follow me, if someone is going to stick to their criteria of deleting a pirated game after their supposed demoing/trial period and then make a legal purchase. Yes, you are still breaking the law to have your makeshift demo, but in the end you don't hurt anyone if you follow through with a purchase or delete the game if you were disinterested.

 

As for the issue of Extra Credits, again, I'll tell my interpretation. Unless you want a game absolutely free, I'm willing to say we'd pay some amount of money to play a game. It's common for someone to hold out until a game is cheap because they know it's not as high quality, or perhaps short, or whatever.

 

The thing is, while you can argue you wouldn't pay the full MSRP, should you flat out not pay? The point of the argument was that even though people make a list of justifications to not pay, they still play the supposed "terrible" game and that, I believe, does negate all those justifications. It's like complaining about how terrible a restaurant's food is, but when offered a free meal you gorge yourself. It can't be that terrible if you're still going to submit hours of your free time to play, can it?

 

Really, the show tries to streamline the topic as best they can; they only have a couple minutes. It's why, if you watch them daily, they will almost constantly refer to furthering a discussion in another episode. In example, they still have the discussion of Diversity, and we still have the copyright issue with Piracy.

 

Look at this thread. Now, could you fit all of this into an eight minute video?

[Strangelove]

Some people will cave and buy a game theyre unsure about. Those are sales and theyre quite a bit of them. I bet all of us have taken that plunge and bought something we werent sure about for whatever reason and walked away pleasantly surpised or dissapointed.

trying things before you buy them...whether the option is there or not, i just cant apply it to whatever i wish. I know games are one of them, but seriously. Its just bullshit.

[deanb]

On the whole money issue I just don't believe it's the case that piracy affects developers.

The most pirated game of the year was Black Ops. The most best selling was also black ops. If piracy truly did eat into game sales as much as publishers suggest Blops should of been one of the worst selling games of the year. Also on the list Starcraft II, aka 2nd best selling PC game of the year. The figures don't really add up to reflect publishers theories.

 

And on top of this several studios a year close down, but I can't really think of any where mass piracy has resulted in that. Free Radical close down cos they took a gamble and made a shit game. Not cos Haze was heavily pirated. Bizzare also had a string of bad hits. Game studios close because they make bad games that I feel most folks wouldn't even bother pirating anyway.

 

Piracy is almost correlated to sales, so if you have high piracy, you're also more than likely going to have high amounts of sales.

If the developer makes a good game, people will want it. And yes inevitably some of those people are going to pirate it. I think it's overly negative to concentrate not on how much you sold but to concentrate on how much was pirated.

 

Piracy figures are shitty anyway. Some folks will end up grabbing multi-torrents, either trying to find a working game or because they're retarded. Some people have RSS feeds set into their torrent client to grab pretty much any game that'll come out, regardless of if they'll ever play them. And they're the ones that throw things in limbo. That's an automated process. The person is just someone wanting games, not a specific game. And it's wrong to assume every game they grab is something someone would find value in.

Also (I can't at this moment be arsed to look up the respective articles) folks who pirate tend to also be heavy spenders too. You're an enthusiast, which is why you pirate so many games, it also means you're quit likely to be heavily investing in games. It's wrong to assume a pirate pirates everything they get and buys nothing.

Would EA or whoever much rather have:

1million versions of my mum: Buys maybe 2-3 games a year for her Wii (and like most Wii owners that means right from Nintendo or Ubisoft), but doesn't pirate a thing.

Or would they have a million versions of me?: Buys a few dozen games a year, multiple platforms and companies. Pirates a fair bit too.

They hate piracy, but do they hate it more than their love of my cold hard cash?

Hey I could probably quit the whole piracy thing but I guarantee you my purchases will drop right down with it.

 

 

Oh btw I do agree that if you've pirated something and played it through to the end it must of meant something to you. But if you pirate it, play for a couple hours n find you hate it and delete the game, then it clearly had no value to you. If you like it and buy it, the devs get a sale they may not have had. It's why I feel a bit ifffy with MoH. Cos obviously I liked it. But I don't feel enough to buy it for the then £40, and tbh I'm not sure if I'd buy it when it hits £5 cos theres zero chance I'd ever play it again.

[Cyber Rat]

Morality as in, follow me, if someone is going to stick to their criteria of deleting a pirated game after their supposed demoing/trial period and then make a legal purchase. Yes, you are still breaking the law to have your makeshift demo, but in the end you don't hurt anyone if you follow through with a purchase or delete the game if you were disinterested.

 

As for the issue of Extra Credits, again, I'll tell my interpretation. Unless you want a game absolutely free, I'm willing to say we'd pay some amount of money to play a game. It's common for someone to hold out until a game is cheap because they know it's not as high quality, or perhaps short, or whatever.

 

The thing is, while you can argue you wouldn't pay the full MSRP, should you flat out not pay? The point of the argument was that even though people make a list of justifications to not pay, they still play the supposed "terrible" game and that, I believe, does negate all those justifications. It's like complaining about how terrible a restaurant's food is, but when offered a free meal you gorge yourself. It can't be that terrible if you're still going to submit hours of your free time to play, can it?

 

Really, the show tries to streamline the topic as best they can; they only have a couple minutes. It's why, if you watch them daily, they will almost constantly refer to furthering a discussion in another episode. In example, they still have the discussion of Diversity, and we still have the copyright issue with Piracy.

 

Look at this thread. Now, could you fit all of this into an eight minute video?

 

 

Instead of using a restaurant when talking about video games, I'll just give you a gaming example: I played Robot Unicorn for a few hours. It was fun. It was also free. Would I have paid for the game were it a 5 euro title? No. Not because I think it's terrible, but because I don't think it's worth 5 euro. Had I paid for it, played it for an hour or so, I am positive I would have regretted spending money on it.

[CorgiShinobi]

Instead of using a restaurant when talking about video games, I'll just give you a gaming example: I played Robot Unicorn for a few hours. It was fun. It was also free. Would I have paid for the game were it a 5 euro title? No. Not because I think it's terrible, but because I don't think it's worth 5 euro. Had I paid for it, played it for an hour or so, I am positive I would have regretted spending money on it.

I would hope you wouldn't pay for a free game, via adultswim.com

 

Your paying for the option of making it portable, and that's about it.

[Cyber Rat]

Instead of using a restaurant when talking about video games, I'll just give you a gaming example: I played Robot Unicorn for a few hours. It was fun. It was also free. Would I have paid for the game were it a 5 euro title? No. Not because I think it's terrible, but because I don't think it's worth 5 euro. Had I paid for it, played it for an hour or so, I am positive I would have regretted spending money on it.

I would hope you wouldn't pay for a free game, via adultswim.com

 

Your paying for the option of making it portable, and that's about it.

 

I gave an example of how I enjoyed a free game which I wouldn't have paid for despite enjoying it, as a counter argument for your restaurant example.

 

I'll just stick to comparing video games to cars. Gets the point across better...

[deanb]

Yeah I guess there are some games that are worth... £0.00p

Which tbh the devs are dong that themselves. Many flash games are free of varying quality. Iphone n Android games in a similar boat.

And now you van get this like Battlefield or Lord of the Rings online etc without opening your wallet.

There's no direct value of "you enjoy this, therefore it's equal to 20 pseudo bucks".

It's actually a fascinating process, games publishers are actively devaluing their games. Bonus of course is that F2P games can't be pirated.

I got Angry Birds for free on Android, I don't think I'd be up for paying it for iPhone. In fact when it's free to Android, I can see why iPhone owners might begrudge paying too.

Which I expect similar to happen with Portal 2 btw. PS3 buyers get PS3 and PC version at no extra cost, but Pc only buyers are expected to shell out?

[CorgiShinobi]

Well, truth be told, if you get anything for free, I'm damn well sure most people would allow themselves to feel more enjoyment. Like you said, there would be no regret.

 

Like a movie, I'm sure someone wouldn't be so critical in their judgment of the quality if they saw it for free on television. When you pay to view a movie in theaters, there's suppose to be an experience, something that quantifies the worth of the money spent. If the movie doesn't live up to that worth/expectation, you're going to be more sore about it.

 

Video game exmaple, Force Unleashed II. After paying full MRSP, I finished the game within the week. Damn it was short. Part of me wishes I payed less, so there's some regret. If I had received it for free, I honestly don't believe I would be so down. I mean, I'm correlating length with money. If money wasn't in the equation, I wouldn't have anything to relate the length of the game to.

 

EDIT: If an iPhone/iPod Touch user begrudges spending $0.99 on the countless hours, latest updates, and free content, they're an ungrateful douche.

 

I've played the Android version, and it's really just a personal issue, but the pop-up ads really take me out of the game.

Edited January 24, 2011 by Atomsk88

[CorgiShinobi]

(Possible) Double post

 

But yeah, there's no exact science to "worth = price." After taking Business Management last semester, there's so much crap that goes in to simply find what might be a reasonable price for a product, and even then there's no guarantee.

 

Say, for example, the Nintendo 3DS. I wouldn't doubt Nintendo would like to price that thing higher with all that's going into it. Well, how many people would go for a $350 handheld? Dollars to donuts I would say a whole swell of consumers would pay $150 for the thing. Nintendo does need to make a profit, but you price too high and you're not going to even get sales.

[Yantelope]

Yeah, it's kind of like how people stampede over others at walmart for a crappy laptop just because it's super cheap.

[CorgiShinobi]

Yeah, it's kind of like how people stampede over others at walmart for a crappy laptop just because it's super cheap.

Oh my, you reminded me of this clip...

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWeBpUBzKBs

 

$50 used laptops and you've got to call the "ambalance."

[Faiblesse Des Sens]

It seems some of you don't think "downloaders remorse" exist. Time is greater than money, is it not? If you download a bad game, you still think "wow why did i waste my time with this?" instead of "why did i waste my money on this?' To me the enjoyment level is going to be the same. I guess I don't have the mindset "well this isnt worth my purchase it's worth my download" because I don't play enough games to ever want to play something mediocre. I try to keep the quality level up at all times. Any game I pirate I do with the idea that yes, I'm broke now, but if it's worth the download, then one day it will be worth my money. I pirate much less when I have the money to spare.

[CorgiShinobi]

Time = Money

 

I have a job; the hours I've worked I receive payment for. With that, I have spent both time and money if I waste the money. It's the main reason why I went ahead with the optional Mighty Eagle feature in Angry Birds, or my remorse on spending $60 for a not-so-good game. ($60 for me is about 7 hours of work.)

 

Do I try for another hour to finish one level in an expansive game with dozen more levels, or do I put down another dollar to skip it in a second?

 

EDIT: Otherwise, yeah, you can waste only your time if you received something for free, but there's no scenario where you have spent money and there exists no time.

 

Well, I guess there's charity where you give away money, but that's not a waste!

Edited January 24, 2011 by Atomsk88