Why you should NOT pirate games:, A developer's story. Options

[_Pax._]

i pirate some games on principle, because the pirated copy is simply better in terms of usability and much less intrusive in terms of DRM stuff.

Two wrongs do not make a right.

You shouldn't pirate games. At all. Period.

If you disagree with one or more of the conditions of legal acquisition, then you should go without.

[Starmage21]

The same could be said to be true about a car thief. Doesn't make what they do any less wrong.

Thievery and Piracy do not relate except that people generally feel they are amoral and illegal. Stealing the car, and copying the car and driving the copy around instead are not the same thing.

[dertechie]

The concept that a pirated game is a lost sale, every single time, always rubs me the wrong way because it completely ignores the Law of Demand. Half an economics minor is more than enough to look at that and call bulldrek numbers bulldrek numbers.

Or if I "know" the developer, and like their stuff in general (Valve, Spiderweb Software).

Nice, someone else knows Jeff Vogel's stuff (and he's on Steam now!). I wonder if Exile II still runs on Snow Leopard. . . I doubt it, but I know Geneforge does!

Edit: Seriously? The Steam versions of Geneforge are only the Windows ones? I can't play my Geneforge on my Mac? WTF Steam? Jeff bloody well coded and tested those things on a Mac.

[CanRay]

For those that want to try the demo, the website seems to be working now. It seems to be an interesting game.

I'll have to get it if it goes on Steam. (I'd rather trust them with my info.).

[_Pax._]

Thievery and Piracy do not relate except that people generally feel they are amoral and illegal. Stealing the car, and copying the car and driving the copy around instead are not the same thing.

You make the classic mistake.

If you pirate a game, you're not taking the game away from the rightful owner of that copyright. You've stolen the right to control when, how, and by who a copy is made.

[_Pax._]

Nice, someone else knows Jeff Vogel's stuff (and he's on Steam now!). I wonder if Exile II still runs on Snow Leopard. . . I doubt it, but I know Geneforge does!

During my "poor" days, I played and replayed the very generously expansive "demo" portionof the Avernum and Geneforge shareware versions.

Now that I'm not poor, I've picked up the Geneforge collection on Steam, along with Avadon (directly from Spiderweb) and the most recent reboot of the Avernum series (via Steam, again). As new Avernums come out, I'll buy each one in turn. I've also been eyeing some of the other stuff, like the Nethergate one.

Edit: Seriously? The Steam versions of Geneforge are only the Windows ones? I can't play my Geneforge on my Mac? WTF Steam? Jeff bloody well coded and tested those things on a Mac.

.... and not a lot of Mac users are on Steam, yet. No worries, I'm sure if Jeff wants the Mac versions on Steam, they'll be there. Possibly bundled free with the Windows versions.

[CanRay]

You make the classic mistake.

I thought that was fighting a land war in Asia? Or betting against a Sicilian when death is on the line?

[Critias]

Thievery and Piracy do not relate except that people generally feel they are amoral and illegal. Stealing the car, and copying the car and driving the copy around instead are not the same thing.

No, they're not the same thing. But either way, the end result is that you've got a car and the car manufacturer hasn't gotten a dime from you. That's a problem for them, isn't it?

The concept that a pirated game is a lost sale, every single time, always rubs me the wrong way because it completely ignores the Law of Demand.

I don't think people say that it's a lost sale every single time (or at least not very often, in my experience), but to insist it's never a lost sale is equally as irritating a concept.

[_Pax._]

I thought that was fighting a land war in Asia? Or betting against a Sicilian when death is on the line?

Those are on the list too. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[toturi]

I think that what the developers of this game did was skew it such that anyone who downloaded the cracked version would have a negative impression of it and would therefore not buy it legally, so as to show that a pirated game is a lost sale.

[ShadowDragon8685]

No, they're not the same thing. But either way, the end result is that you've got a car and the car manufacturer hasn't gotten a dime from you. That's a problem for them, isn't it?

Not really. Actually, it's never a problem for the car manufacturer, because they will have been paid the first time for the stolen car; the manufacturer doesn't give a toss. It's the dealership or the end owner who's fucked. In the second case, nobody's actually fucked.

I don't think people say that it's a lost sale every single time (or at least not very often, in my experience), but to insist it's never a lost sale is equally as irritating a concept.

The number of people who would have bought a game, but abstain from paying the money for it because they can unlawfully acquire it for free, is miniscule compared to the number of people who would not have paid money for a game, but will play it if they can unlawfully acquire it for free. The people who (a) will have the finances to pay for the game and (b) the inclination to buy the game but © sufficiently lack scruples as to abstain from paying if they can get it for free is a very small cross-section on the Venn diagram.

Most people who play the game are going to be missing at least one of them. There will be those who have the finances and will play it, but would not buy it; either they do not want the game sufficiently to spend the money on it, or they are angry with the company which produces the game and do not wish to support them, but still wish to pay the game; they're not a lost sale, as they wouldn't have bought it in the first place. There will be those who do not have the finances to buy the game, but who would if they could, and will pirate it if they can. They're not a lost sale; they couldn't have bought it in the first place (and, indeed, if their financial situation improves later, they may decide to pay for it.) There will be those who have the finances to pay for the game and the inclination to do so, but do not lack the scruples to pay for it if they can get it for free; they're not a lost sale, because they're a made sale.

[Blade]

I used to pirate games back when I was young and didn't have the money to buy them. If I hadn't pirated them, I would not have bought them. I wouldn't have worked to get money to buy them. I would have just played more freeware games/mods and demos.
Now that I have money I buy games. I buy them when they're on sale for less than 10€. It means I have to wait between one and five years to play a game (depending on how popular it is) but then I get to play it fully patched and modded and I don't have to upgrade my computer with the most expensive hardware to play them with all settings to the max. I've bought so many games I don't have time to play them all, and I now only buy them when they're less than 5€.

Back to the current case: let's say that in a parallel universe they had an unbreakable DRM and hadn't put the torrent online. What would be the difference on the sales? Unless we have the answer to that question, we can't say how much piracy harms the sells.

[bannockburn]

There's clearly a lot of passion going into your arguments, Pax. You're even correct about the moral implications (not so much on the legal, those are different depending on the country you live in).
But you're not considering every aspect of this can of worms.

1.) It has been said before, there is no way to say which percentage of the pirated copy are an actual lost sale, since you can't say who of those people had the intent of testing it before buying it. This goes out of the window, of course, if the publisher actually provided a demo. I'm also not saying that it's okay, to test a game this way, but some of these thefts may actually result in sales.

1a) There are numbers and studies out there that show, that giving out a product for free actually raises the same product's sales. Very prominent and pertinent to this discussion are the humble bundles and an RPG called Eclipse Phase.

2.) Of course you cannot steal data. There is no physical entity changing owners. Piracy is not a shadowrun, where the hacker deletes all other copies. Of course that doesn't make it right to simply copy said data and give the people who made it the finger. Pirating a game despite having the intention of playing it and doing so if you'd have no option of pirating it would constitute an actual loss of a sale. That's bad. But there are two other things to consider before speaking of a real loss. People download it and wouldn't have bought it anyways? Not a loss. Not morally right, surely, but not a loss for the company, because they wouldn't have bought it either way. That's still bad, but less bad. But then there are the guys who download it, like it and buy it. That one is not a loss. It's a gain for the company and it's good. Some studies say that the first category and the last balance each other out in most cases.

3.) And this one is really simple: If there's DRM which makes it more difficult for an honest buyer to play the game, or in a similar vein, a version with the same price but crippled content depending on the region where the buyer lives, the pirates win. I will personally not buy any such game and tell my friends not to do so either, because that's the point where the company (though, to be fair, usually the publisher, not the studio) screws a legitimate customer. This also constitutes a loss of sale, even without an act of active piracy on anyone's part.
There's grades of this, of course.
e.G., I've bought New Vegas and Bioshock 1 on Steam. I also pirated both of them, because I paid the same money as the American version would have cost and got hitched with a German only New Vegas and a violence reduced Bioshock.
I will never again buy an EA or Ubisoft published game, because of Origin and uPlay requirements, even when you bought those games on Steam. I made this mistake with the first Assassin's Creed and will not make it again. Until those publishers learn to not treat their actual customers as thieves, they will never again see my money.

The topic isn't as cut and dried as people on either side of the fence want to make everyone believe, IMO.

[Thanee]

Pirated copies are not "demo copies". For the majority of people who get them, they are the first last and ONLY copy they will ever get .. even if they think the game is the most awesome invention since the discovery of fire.

Yeah, even though some people actually use them that way. But most surely do not.

Also, there are countries where software piracy for personal use is actually legal.

That does not make it morally right, of course.

Bye
Thanee

[Thanee]

And, please, keep the tone civil. No need to throw BS around. Opinions are not automatically invalid, just because they are in disagreement.

Bye
Thanee

[Wounded Ronin]

Also, there are countries where software piracy for personal use is actually legal.

I'm pretty sure that piracy is legal out here in the Federated States of Micronesia.

[Stahlseele]

Technically, it's legal in Germany too . .

[nezumi]

The study is flawed. Who here has ever heard of Greenheart Games before yesterday? I sure haven't. Who here has heard of PirateBay? If I'm looking for a new game to try out, how likely am I to go to a known website like Steam or PirateBay, search for games, and try out what looks interesting? How likely am I to guess game company names until I find one I like? (Greenheart Games does not come up in the first twenty hits on Google for 'new games', 'download games', etc. It is also not available on Steam.)

I suspect a significant number of these players downloaded a game on a lark from PirateBay and played it. These are people who would NOT have purchased the game if it weren't available on PirateBay, because they had no idea it existed. This implies a failure of marketing. A fair test would be to take a known, well-advertised game and compare numbers, or at minimum, stock the game on both the largest file-sharing site AND the largest game-selling site at the same time.

HOWEVER, I do agree with their methods. Frankly, I'm proud to be a gamer, as the games industry has been working hard to educate and work with their customer base for decades to address piracy. Gaming companies don't sue grandmothers and children for millions in 'lost revenue'. So I go that extra mile to buy games when I have the chance.

A few quick notes for myself; I do pirate games. I pirated Starcraft II when an update error with Blizzard bricked my legitimate copy right before the last mission, and tech support required I spend a few hours uninstalling, reinstalling, and doing updates over my terrible Internet connection to get it working again. Plus, the constant sign-in and update process sucked even when it worked. I pirated GTA IV when the Rock Star sign-in process required too many IDs and wouldn't validate properly. I pirated Fallout 1 when it wasn't available for sale. I pirated Chemspace when I wasn't sure if it would work on Linux or if I'd enjoy the gameplay (and subsequently bought it when it did work). I feel no remorse for any of these.

I do also write for Eclipse Phase. I seed my work and email it to people. I agree with the PS+ philosophy; it's better for someone to like your game and not pay for it, then to pay for it and not like it. One of those builds trust relationships with your customers that pay out over the long term.

[Starmage21]

I do also write for Eclipse Phase. I seed my work and email it to people. I agree with the PS+ philosophy; it's better for someone to like your game and not pay for it, then to pay for it and not like it. One of those builds trust relationships with your customers that pay out over the long term.

I suspect that this is why there are so many "open beta" phases that last for so long these days. It used to be that there would be a huge chunk of time dedicated to closed betas and then several weeks of open beta before release day. These days with some of the games out there, its hard to tell the difference between the three phases because open-beta testing lasts so long.

[_Pax._]

The number of people who would have bought a game, but abstain from paying the money for it because they can unlawfully acquire it for free, is miniscule compared to the number of people who would not have paid money for a game, but will play it if they can unlawfully acquire it for free.

Assumes facts not in evidence.

You can no more prove this claim, than the people who claim everypirated copy is "a lost sale" can prove theirs.

1a) There are numbers and studies out there that show, that giving out a product for free actually raises the same product's sales. Very prominent and pertinent to this discussion are the humble bundles and an RPG called Eclipse Phase.

And, I do think that more games should offer free demos of their games. Upthread, I mentioned that I would buy anything interesting-sounding that Spiderweb Software put out. That's because their free (and unusually-expansive) demos earned my loyalty long before I could afford to buy access to the rest of their games.

People download it and wouldn't have bought it anyways? Not a loss. Not morally right, surely, but not a loss for the company, because they wouldn't have bought it either way.

Perhaps not a loss of revenue. But, yes, "a loss" - a loss of their right to control the making of copies.

But then there are the guys who download it, like it and buy it. That one is not a loss. It's a gain for the company and it's good.

No. It's still morally bnkrupt. Stealing something, then sending in money later? Still starts with stealing.

3.) And this one is really simple: If there's DRM which makes it more difficult for an honest buyer to play the game, or in a similar vein, a version with the same price but crippled content depending on the region where the buyer lives, the pirates win.

Yes, they do.

I'm not saying "the companies are shining white knights, angels of purity and righteousness".

I'm just saying, "piracy (almost always) sucks."

e.G., I've bought New Vegas and Bioshock 1 on Steam. I also pirated both of them, because I paid the same money as the American version would have cost and got hitched with a German only New Vegas and a violence reduced Bioshock.

That is actually one of the very, very few situations where I don't look badly upon the act of piracy. The consumer should not be charged the same money, for less product than the next guy, just because of what zipcode/country/etc each of them lives in. Crippled/reduced games, should be sold for reduced prices.

And, as a corollary (?sp), people in regions where a game has been priced down (due t currency conversions, local economy, etc) and thus, region-locked? Should have the opportunity to pay the FULL price, for an UN-locked game. Because, again, "otherwise they'll just pirate it", and that's another case where I really can't blame them.

I will never again buy an EA or Ubisoft published game, because of Origin and uPlay requirements, even when you bought those games on Steam. I made this mistake with the first Assassin's Creed and will not make it again. Until those publishers learn to not treat their actual customers as thieves, they will never again see my money.

I'm with you on EA, but I don't mind uPlay, myself. *shrug*

The topic isn't as cut and dried as people on either side of the fence want to make everyone believe, IMO.

Well, no. Except, as I just said, "piracy (almost always) sucks".

The study is flawed. Who here has ever heard of Greenheart Games before yesterday? I sure haven't.

So what?

Ever hear of "MinMax Games LTD." ...? Neither had I, until I bought "Space Pirates and Zombies".

Ever hear of "Amplitude Studios" ...? Neither had I, until I bought "Endless Space".

How about "SuperGiant Games" ...? Nope, not me either, until I bought their first-ever game, "Bastion" (and am now eagerly awaiting their NEXT game, "Transistor").

Hell. Had you ever heard of "Mojang", before Markus Persson had already sold a quarter of a million copies of then-Alpha Minecraft? I know I hadn't - and I know for a fact that you hadn't either, because at the time, not even "Mojang" existed. It was still JUST Markus. One guy, with his hobby-that-turns-a-nice-profit.

Not having heard of a company, in no way justifies pirating their software.

(Greenheart Games does not come up in the first twenty hits on Google for 'new games', 'download games', etc. It is also not available on Steam.)

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/file...=game+developer

You were saying? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[bannockburn]

We're mostly in agreement then, Pax (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[BishopMcQ]

This topic is bound the skirt the line, and we all understand that. Please remember: No posts that contain pirated materials, requests for pirated materials, or advocacy of pirating are permitted. That said, there are a lot of different laws at play--copyright, Creative Commons, and various nations' takes on how each applies to their citizens. Thank you for keeping things civil and on point.

This is all just a friendly reminder, so we don't have to make official warnings. No one has crossed the line yet in my book.

[Critias]

Not really. Actually, it's never a problem for the car manufacturer, because they will have been paid the first time for the stolen car; the manufacturer doesn't give a toss. It's the dealership or the end owner who's fucked. In the second case, nobody's actually fucked.

I'm sorry, but you're saying nobody is fucked if someone can just magically copy a new car and drive around in it. I would posit that, instead, the entire automobile industry is fucked, because now someone can just magically copy a new car and drive around in it. No one gets to make a living off of making cars any more, or certainly at least not to the extent they currently do.

Because someone can just magically copy a new car and drive around in it.

Seriously, can you not see how that would have a negative impact on people buying cars, instead?

The number of people who would have bought a game, but abstain from paying the money for it because they can unlawfully acquire it for free, is miniscule compared to the number of people who would not have paid money for a game, but will play it if they can unlawfully acquire it for free. The people who (a) will have the finances to pay for the game and (b) the inclination to buy the game but © sufficiently lack scruples as to abstain from paying if they can get it for free is a very small cross-section on the Venn diagram.

According to...what, exactly? You can say so, and that's fine, I'm not disputing that it's your opinion. But when you say so with such certainty, I can't help but feel like you've got to have some statistics to back it up. So it would be great to see some of those actual statistics.

And -- again -- I'm not saying every pirated copy of a thing, ever, is a lost sale. I'm saying that some of them are. It's ridiculous to argue that every pirated copy is a lost sale, but it's equally ridiculous to argue that none of them are (so it's something no one would be worried about or take issue with).

[bannockburn]

The car analogy is flawed, Critias.
It costs very real money and parts to produce a car. If such a copy were possible, we would all be very happy people indeed, since we'd have mastered Star Trek like replicator technology (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

On the other hand, once a piece of code is finished, it costs a miniscule amount of energy to copy that data.

[Critias]

The car analogy is flawed, Critias.
It costs very real money and parts to produce a car. If such a copy were possible, we would all be very happy people indeed, since we'd have mastered Star Trek like replicator technology (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

On the other hand, once a piece of code is finished, it costs a miniscule amount of energy to copy that data.

I'm not the one that started up the car analogy, I was running with someone else's ball.

OH SHIT PIRATED BALL SORRY GUYS.