For me, the saddest thing is that piracy becomes a habit... it's addictive. Once you start pirating games, and you realise how easy it is, then you start thinking: "why would I pay for games, they're all here for free". Before long, you convince yourself that buying games is financially irresponsible, after all, that money is better in your pocket than some greedy publisher's. In the end, when someone mentions that they bought a game you think "what an idiot, he has more money than sense", and feel superior.
Hey, welcome to economics! That's the big problem with ANY product that can be reproduced and distributed pretty much infinitely for free - there WILL be a way to get it for free, and people WILL prefer it at 'free' vs 'not free'. There's actually been some kind of classical question in economics surrounding a hypothetical product that met those criteria (I say hypothetical because it was posed LONG before digital content was even a possibility), and the conclusions were pretty obvious: if you can't curtail the replication and distribution, the retail price of your product will collapse.
Ultimately, I think that'll be largely impossible - locking down digital content sufficiently to prevent replicaiton results in such huge restrictions on use that people don't want it anymore - and as long as you sell the physical media as well, someone will find a way to rip it and you're right back where you started anyway. If PC games go that heavily for digital distribution, I think eventually they'll have to move away from a 'pay for the game' and towards a 'pay for the service' subscription model or microtransactions in game.
For me, the saddest thing is that piracy becomes a habit... it's addictive. Once you start pirating games, and you realise how easy it is, then you start thinking: "why would I pay for games, they're all here for free". Before long, you convince yourself that buying games is financially irresponsible, after all, that money is better in your pocket than some greedy publisher's. In the end, when someone mentions that they bought a game you think "what an idiot, he has more money than sense", and feel superior.
Hey, welcome to economics! That's the big problem with ANY product that can be reproduced and distributed pretty much infinitely for free - there WILL be a way to get it for free, and people WILL prefer it at 'free' vs 'not free'. There's actually been some kind of classical question in economics surrounding a hypothetical product that met those criteria (I say hypothetical because it was posed LONG before digital content was even a possibility), and the conclusions were pretty obvious: if you can't curtail the replication and distribution, the retail price of your product will collapse.
Well, I don't quite agree that people will always prefer the free vs not free. The Radiohead "pay your own price" experiment showed that plenty of people chose to pay, even though they weren't even obligated to, and it turned out to be a huge success for them. I think it depends on the demographics. If it's large enough, you'll have a decent amount of people (like myself) who will pay for the content, because we think the provider deserves it.
The problem with PC games is that the hardcore demographic tends to be the type who could care less if the developer gets paid. Call it "less mature" or anti-capitalist or cheapskate or whatever. On the flipside, you have tons of casual games that have pretty minimal copy-protection associated with it. Yet, the vast majority of casual gamers don't care about pirating it. You also have companies like Stardock that release their games without copy-protection, but their rabid fanbase (myself included!) love their games so much that we'll refuse to pirate them too. After all, we won't get a Gal Civ III if they don't get paid.
Ultimately, I think that'll be largely impossible - locking down digital content sufficiently to prevent replicaiton results in such huge restrictions on use that people don't want it anymore - and as long as you sell the physical media as well, someone will find a way to rip it and you're right back where you started anyway. If PC games go that heavily for digital distribution, I think eventually they'll have to move away from a 'pay for the game' and towards a 'pay for the service' subscription model or microtransactions in game.
This I can agree with. It's very much a phenomenon that started in Asia and has been slowly moving to the West. Korea and China pioneered the business model, and we're starting to see it make inroads in the US. We're not quite there yet though, in terms of infrastructure. For example, in some Asian countries, you can make micro-transaction payments (like buying a soda) off your cell phone. Until we get to the point where microtransactions and subscription-services aren't "instant fail" in the minds of most consumers, and it becomes easy, then this business model won't succeed. But games like WoW and all the DLC popping up on the 360 and PS3 (note: Rock Band songs!) are showing that perhaps it'll be popular here sooner than we all realize.
Ultimately, I think that'll be largely impossible - locking down digital content sufficiently to prevent replicaiton results in such huge restrictions on use that people don't want it anymore - and as long as you sell the physical media as well, someone will find a way to rip it and you're right back where you started anyway. If PC games go that heavily for digital distribution, I think eventually they'll have to move away from a 'pay for the game' and towards a 'pay for the service' subscription model or microtransactions in game.
This I can agree with. It's very much a phenomenon that started in Asia and has been slowly moving to the West. Korea and China pioneered the business model, and we're starting to see it make inroads in the US. We're not quite there yet though, in terms of infrastructure. For example, in some Asian countries, you can make micro-transaction payments (like buying a soda) off your cell phone. Until we get to the point where microtransactions and subscription-services aren't "instant fail" in the minds of most consumers, and it becomes easy, then this business model won't succeed. But games like WoW and all the DLC popping up on the 360 and PS3 (note: Rock Band songs!) are showing that perhaps it'll be popular here sooner than we all realize.
I think stuff like Steam will be the future. It hinders piracy quite well while not being a huge annoyance. Plus it keeps costs down for us and provides developers with a little more kick back.
Ultimately, I think that'll be largely impossible - locking down digital content sufficiently to prevent replicaiton results in such huge restrictions on use that people don't want it anymore - and as long as you sell the physical media as well, someone will find a way to rip it and you're right back where you started anyway. If PC games go that heavily for digital distribution, I think eventually they'll have to move away from a 'pay for the game' and towards a 'pay for the service' subscription model or microtransactions in game.
This I can agree with. It's very much a phenomenon that started in Asia and has been slowly moving to the West. Korea and China pioneered the business model, and we're starting to see it make inroads in the US. We're not quite there yet though, in terms of infrastructure. For example, in some Asian countries, you can make micro-transaction payments (like buying a soda) off your cell phone. Until we get to the point where microtransactions and subscription-services aren't "instant fail" in the minds of most consumers, and it becomes easy, then this business model won't succeed. But games like WoW and all the DLC popping up on the 360 and PS3 (note: Rock Band songs!) are showing that perhaps it'll be popular here sooner than we all realize.
I think stuff like Steam will be the future. It hinders piracy quite well while not being a huge annoyance. Plus it keeps costs down for us and provides developers with a little more kick back.
Exactly. I like having hard copies, but then again I hate digging through a massive mountain of discs when I feel like reinstalling something older, or when I reformat my computer. With steam I just re-download.
MistaCreepy on
PS3: MistaCreepy::Steam: MistaCreepy::360: Dead and I don't feel like paying to fix it.
Good thing I didn't imply that it did. I said it hinders it. You can't stop piracy. Your best hope is to make it difficult and keep the games cheap enough that it really isn't an option for the vast majority of people.
It certainly is awesome, but as far as I am aware, steam exclusive games get pirated the same as anything else. Maybe back when Half-life 2 first came out it worked for a bit, but I think it is totally cracked now.
Edit: corin7, I wasn't meaning to imply you said it did, I just wanted to point out the myth that steam games don't get pirated is as incorrect as the idea that the Gamecube never got 'cracked'.
It certainly is awesome, but as far as I am aware, steam exclusive games get pirated the same as anything else. Maybe back when Half-life 2 first came out it worked for a bit, but I think it is totally cracked now.
Edit: corin7, I wasn't meaning to imply you said it did, I just wanted to point out the myth that steam games don't get pirated is as incorrect as the idea that the Gamecube never got 'cracked'.
I am sure plenty of steam games are cracked. But plenty of steam accounts still get banned. Taking the cracked games online in any meaningful way is pretty much impossible. So it certainly does help. At any rate it seems like the best option to me these days.
For me, the saddest thing is that piracy becomes a habit... it's addictive. Once you start pirating games, and you realise how easy it is, then you start thinking: "why would I pay for games, they're all here for free". Before long, you convince yourself that buying games is financially irresponsible, after all, that money is better in your pocket than some greedy publisher's. In the end, when someone mentions that they bought a game you think "what an idiot, he has more money than sense", and feel superior.
Hey, welcome to economics! That's the big problem with ANY product that can be reproduced and distributed pretty much infinitely for free - there WILL be a way to get it for free, and people WILL prefer it at 'free' vs 'not free'. There's actually been some kind of classical question in economics surrounding a hypothetical product that met those criteria (I say hypothetical because it was posed LONG before digital content was even a possibility), and the conclusions were pretty obvious: if you can't curtail the replication and distribution, the retail price of your product will collapse.
Well, I don't quite agree that people will always prefer the free vs not free. The Radiohead "pay your own price" experiment showed that plenty of people chose to pay, even though they weren't even obligated to, and it turned out to be a huge success for them. I think it depends on the demographics. If it's large enough, you'll have a decent amount of people (like myself) who will pay for the content, because we think the provider deserves it.
I didn't mean people as in "every individual person and not one single person will play", just that the collective market in general will tend not to, which will drive the real price down towards zero. The other side of the coin is that with distribution and reproduction almost free, 'close to zero' can still mean profitable - as Radiohead showed. Even though the per download (or per copy, if you prefer) price of the album was miniscule by traditional standards, Radiohead is on record saying they actually made a greater profit than they did on their past albums because the record company didn't take a massive chunk of the gross revenues in exchange for fronting the upfront costs.
It's a very different model, but in a sense it works that way already - the piracy is simply illegal instead of merely classical freeloading behavior - but for the purposes of the market it ultimately has largely the same effect. The difference is that Radiohead ditched the uncessary revenue skimming physical media publishers and kept the smaller per-copy sales price completely to themselves, which allowed them to make a solid profit. Obviously the raw production costs are higher for games, but the basic principle is the same (and HAS to be the same) because the final product shares the most important attributes.
For me, the saddest thing is that piracy becomes a habit... it's addictive. Once you start pirating games, and you realise how easy it is, then you start thinking: "why would I pay for games, they're all here for free". Before long, you convince yourself that buying games is financially irresponsible, after all, that money is better in your pocket than some greedy publisher's. In the end, when someone mentions that they bought a game you think "what an idiot, he has more money than sense", and feel superior.
Hey, welcome to economics! That's the big problem with ANY product that can be reproduced and distributed pretty much infinitely for free - there WILL be a way to get it for free, and people WILL prefer it at 'free' vs 'not free'. There's actually been some kind of classical question in economics surrounding a hypothetical product that met those criteria (I say hypothetical because it was posed LONG before digital content was even a possibility), and the conclusions were pretty obvious: if you can't curtail the replication and distribution, the retail price of your product will collapse.
Well, I don't quite agree that people will always prefer the free vs not free. The Radiohead "pay your own price" experiment showed that plenty of people chose to pay, even though they weren't even obligated to, and it turned out to be a huge success for them. I think it depends on the demographics. If it's large enough, you'll have a decent amount of people (like myself) who will pay for the content, because we think the provider deserves it.
I didn't mean people as in "every individual person and not one single person will play", just that the collective market in general will tend not to, which will drive the real price down towards zero. The other side of the coin is that with distribution and reproduction almost free, 'close to zero' can still mean profitable - as Radiohead showed. Even though the per download (or per copy, if you prefer) price of the album was miniscule by traditional standards, Radiohead is on record saying they actually made a greater profit than they did on their past albums because the record company didn't take a massive chunk of the gross revenues in exchange for fronting the upfront costs.
It's a very different model, but in a sense it works that way already - the piracy is simply illegal instead of merely classical freeloading behavior - but for the purposes of the market it ultimately has largely the same effect. The difference is that Radiohead ditched the uncessary revenue skimming physical media publishers and kept the smaller per-copy sales price completely to themselves, which allowed them to make a solid profit. Obviously the raw production costs are higher for games, but the basic principle is the same (and HAS to be the same) because the final product shares the most important attributes.
Yup, I agree that online distribution changes things entirely. Game companies, especially PC-centric ones, need to learn to adapt, lest the fall into the same problems as the RIAA and MPAA. If anything, since game companies are so technical, it looks like companies like Valve, Blizzard, and Microsoft are making good in-roads on this. I'm excited to see that competition is driving the business too. Yeah, Games for Windows LIVE is not so hot right now, but neither was Steam when it first launched. It's cool to see these services go head-to-head, as competition should make them better.
Good thing I didn't imply that it did. I said it hinders it. You can't stop piracy. Your best hope is to make it difficult and keep the games cheap enough that it really isn't an option for the vast majority of people.
That's one tactic, but I don't think that it's the only one. Another is to tie things to an online service, since hacking that is much harder than cracking something that's only client-side. (For example, you have to log-in to be able to play the game) You also have the MMO-model where the server controls everything, so you basically have to subscribe to access the game.
I do think there's a new model that's beginning to pop-up, though, that will definitely help. There's more and more "stuff" being associated with Xbox LIVE and even Steam profiles. Things like achievements, friends lists, etc. Once you've spent enough time on the service, building up your list of friends, your achievements, your scores, etc. you don't want to give it up. So, given the opportunity, would you really want to sacrifice your built-up LIVE or Steam account, just so you can play a game for free? (If Valve or MS caught you playing on a hacked version of a game, they would have good reason to ban your account entirely) I would venture that many gamers would steer clear at that point.
It certainly is awesome, but as far as I am aware, steam exclusive games get pirated the same as anything else. Maybe back when Half-life 2 first came out it worked for a bit, but I think it is totally cracked now.
Edit: corin7, I wasn't meaning to imply you said it did, I just wanted to point out the myth that steam games don't get pirated is as incorrect as the idea that the Gamecube never got 'cracked'.
I am sure plenty of steam games are cracked. But plenty of steam accounts still get banned. Taking the cracked games online in any meaningful way is pretty much impossible. So it certainly does help. At any rate it seems like the best option to me these days.
It's apparently not hard. I think pirated Steam games come with a cracked version of Steam, so you never connect to Valve's servers. You can play online with Hamachi.
Plenty of people are playing pirated versions of TF2 online, so it can't be too difficult.
They Wonder Why People Don't Make PC Games Any More
On another PC related note, we pulled some disturbing numbers this past week about the amount of PC players currently playing Multiplayer (which was fantastic). What wasn't fantastic was the percentage of those numbers who were playing on stolen copies of the game on stolen / cracked CD keys of pirated copies (and that was only people playing online).
Not sure if I can share the exact numbers or percentage of PC players with you, but I'll check and see; if I can I'll update with them. As the amount of people who pirate PC games is astounding. It blows me away at the amount of people willing to steal games (or anything) simply because it's not physical or it's on the safety of the internet to do.
They Wonder Why People Don't Make PC Games Any More
On another PC related note, we pulled some disturbing numbers this past week about the amount of PC players currently playing Multiplayer (which was fantastic). What wasn't fantastic was the percentage of those numbers who were playing on stolen copies of the game on stolen / cracked CD keys of pirated copies (and that was only people playing online).
Not sure if I can share the exact numbers or percentage of PC players with you, but I'll check and see; if I can I'll update with them. As the amount of people who pirate PC games is astounding. It blows me away at the amount of people willing to steal games (or anything) simply because it's not physical or it's on the safety of the internet to do.
I had no idea how huge a problem piracy is. Especially finding out Crysis only sold 86k or so, while 150,000 people were downloading it from a torrent at one moment in time. Could be 3/4 or more people playing the thing are doing so without buying it. Not to mention how damn easy it is to pirate things on the PC compared to console.
if people who pirated and are playing online using cracked CD keys, they need to re-check their algorithm. Sure you can get lucky and generate a valid one, but if a good majority of PC Call of Duty 4 players are using hacked ones, there is something wrong.
They just play with other people with pirated copies on pirated servers.
Is that all it is? Being able to play multiplayer? What about the other stuff that Steam recently added? (Friends list, achievements, etc.).
*Shrug* I was just suggesting. I know there's all sorts of pirated WoW servers out there. Same with any other MP game I've ever seen.
Hell, they probably run their own Friends Lists.
Yeah, but I've always seen those as unpopular one-offs. If I'm playing WoW, do I really want to do it on a barebones server with only a few people on it? Do I really want to be on an unauthorized version of Steam? I'd imagine something like this:
Friend: Hey buddy! I bought Orange Box the other day, and TF2 is amazing! Me: Yeah! It's awesome. We should totally play together! Friend: Cool! Yeah my Steam nickname is HiroProtagonist, just add me and we'll play. Me: Oh wait, well, actually, I'm on a pirate server. So to play, you'll have to uninstall your version and download X. Then install it along with Y. Run program Z to bypass the registry stuff. And also, Valve may find out and ban your real Steam account. After that, we can then play together! Friend: O_o
It's crazy that it's so open and mainstream. Many gaming forums here in Australia have regular Hamachi threads (which list new servers), and I've even seen them on the official forums for some games.
Yeah, but I've always seen those as unpopular one-offs. If I'm playing WoW, do I really want to do it on a barebones server with only a few people on it? Do I really want to be on an unauthorized version of Steam?
It depends who you are friends with. If most of the people you know are pirates, then you are actually at a disadvantage by having a legit copy. They are all playing on "unofficial" servers, and your legit copy is sometimes locked out if it has been updated to a version of the game that hasn't hit the pirate scene yet.
I'm certainly in that category. I've stopped regularly playing online with a lot of my friends from my Uni days, because they have kept on pirating, whereas I've gone legit. It's actually much more hassle for me to connect to the servers they play on than it is for them.
Now hold on, Hamachi just like Bit Torrent has plenty of legit uses for games with no online modes, or online modes on defunct networks.
Don't go blaming a useful tool just because some people use it for piracy.
Xenogears of Bore on
3DS CODE: 3093-7068-3576
0
Zxerolfor the smaller pieces, my shovel wouldn't doso i took off my boot and used my shoeRegistered Userregular
edited January 2008
Yeah, Hamachi is just a VPN client. You can use all sorts of VPN solutions out there to simulate a LAN over the Internet. Windows even has a VPN solution built-in (I use it all the time on my Windows Server box at home to connect to my network when I'm out). Don't mistake it as a tool specifically to empower pirates.
Although, that hamachigames website is very interesting...
Yeah, but I've always seen those as unpopular one-offs. If I'm playing WoW, do I really want to do it on a barebones server with only a few people on it? Do I really want to be on an unauthorized version of Steam?
It depends who you are friends with. If most of the people you know are pirates, then you are actually at a disadvantage by having a legit copy. They are all playing on "unofficial" servers, and your legit copy is sometimes locked out if it has been updated to a version of the game that hasn't hit the pirate scene yet.
I'm certainly in that category. I've stopped regularly playing online with a lot of my friends from my Uni days, because they have kept on pirating, whereas I've gone legit. It's actually much more hassle for me to connect to the servers they play on than it is for them.
Ugh. I find that whole thing so depressing. As someone who works on platform software, we have to spend so much time on security because of pirates and hackers. It's precious man hours/months that could be spent on more interesting things, like community features, fixing bugs, etc. Instead, a significant amount of time is spent on securing products that often eventually get cracked anyway. What's the point?
Yeah, but I've always seen those as unpopular one-offs. If I'm playing WoW, do I really want to do it on a barebones server with only a few people on it? Do I really want to be on an unauthorized version of Steam?
It depends who you are friends with. If most of the people you know are pirates, then you are actually at a disadvantage by having a legit copy. They are all playing on "unofficial" servers, and your legit copy is sometimes locked out if it has been updated to a version of the game that hasn't hit the pirate scene yet.
I'm certainly in that category. I've stopped regularly playing online with a lot of my friends from my Uni days, because they have kept on pirating, whereas I've gone legit. It's actually much more hassle for me to connect to the servers they play on than it is for them.
Ugh. I find that whole thing so depressing. As someone who works on platform software, we have to spend so much time on security because of pirates and hackers. It's precious man hours/months that could be spent on more interesting things, like community features, fixing bugs, etc. Instead, a significant amount of time is spent on securing products that often eventually get cracked anyway. What's the point?
I suppose the point is that a million pirated copies in two weeks is far better than two million pirated copies at launch. Still stinks, though.
Posts
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)
Have PS2s stopped selling?
Uh, not only are they selling, they are selling faster than PS3s. Hence the question.
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)
then I guess they probably won't?
PS2s are just so goddam cheap.
And thus you have your answer.
Hey, welcome to economics! That's the big problem with ANY product that can be reproduced and distributed pretty much infinitely for free - there WILL be a way to get it for free, and people WILL prefer it at 'free' vs 'not free'. There's actually been some kind of classical question in economics surrounding a hypothetical product that met those criteria (I say hypothetical because it was posed LONG before digital content was even a possibility), and the conclusions were pretty obvious: if you can't curtail the replication and distribution, the retail price of your product will collapse.
Ultimately, I think that'll be largely impossible - locking down digital content sufficiently to prevent replicaiton results in such huge restrictions on use that people don't want it anymore - and as long as you sell the physical media as well, someone will find a way to rip it and you're right back where you started anyway. If PC games go that heavily for digital distribution, I think eventually they'll have to move away from a 'pay for the game' and towards a 'pay for the service' subscription model or microtransactions in game.
In case it wasn't obvious I was talking about YTD for 2008 not LTD. Or are you sure that the PS2 will continue to outsell the PS3?
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)
If the PS3 outsells the PS2 this year I will eat a cock sandwich.
Heh, you know you are at PA when the only way to communicate cleary is to bring up the ritual eating of cock.
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)
predictions predictions lol.
The thing about a cock is that it is an old and tough bird. Not so good in a sandwich, better when braised in some wine all day.
(Please do not gift. My game bank is already full.)
Well, I don't quite agree that people will always prefer the free vs not free. The Radiohead "pay your own price" experiment showed that plenty of people chose to pay, even though they weren't even obligated to, and it turned out to be a huge success for them. I think it depends on the demographics. If it's large enough, you'll have a decent amount of people (like myself) who will pay for the content, because we think the provider deserves it.
The problem with PC games is that the hardcore demographic tends to be the type who could care less if the developer gets paid. Call it "less mature" or anti-capitalist or cheapskate or whatever. On the flipside, you have tons of casual games that have pretty minimal copy-protection associated with it. Yet, the vast majority of casual gamers don't care about pirating it. You also have companies like Stardock that release their games without copy-protection, but their rabid fanbase (myself included!) love their games so much that we'll refuse to pirate them too. After all, we won't get a Gal Civ III if they don't get paid.
This I can agree with. It's very much a phenomenon that started in Asia and has been slowly moving to the West. Korea and China pioneered the business model, and we're starting to see it make inroads in the US. We're not quite there yet though, in terms of infrastructure. For example, in some Asian countries, you can make micro-transaction payments (like buying a soda) off your cell phone. Until we get to the point where microtransactions and subscription-services aren't "instant fail" in the minds of most consumers, and it becomes easy, then this business model won't succeed. But games like WoW and all the DLC popping up on the 360 and PS3 (note: Rock Band songs!) are showing that perhaps it'll be popular here sooner than we all realize.
- Don't add me, I'm at/near the friend limit
Steam: JC_Rooks
Twitter: http://twitter.com/JiunweiC
I work on this: http://www.xbox.com
I think stuff like Steam will be the future. It hinders piracy quite well while not being a huge annoyance. Plus it keeps costs down for us and provides developers with a little more kick back.
Exactly. I like having hard copies, but then again I hate digging through a massive mountain of discs when I feel like reinstalling something older, or when I reformat my computer. With steam I just re-download.
It helps. And its also awesome.
Good thing I didn't imply that it did. I said it hinders it. You can't stop piracy. Your best hope is to make it difficult and keep the games cheap enough that it really isn't an option for the vast majority of people.
It certainly is awesome, but as far as I am aware, steam exclusive games get pirated the same as anything else. Maybe back when Half-life 2 first came out it worked for a bit, but I think it is totally cracked now.
Edit: corin7, I wasn't meaning to imply you said it did, I just wanted to point out the myth that steam games don't get pirated is as incorrect as the idea that the Gamecube never got 'cracked'.
I am sure plenty of steam games are cracked. But plenty of steam accounts still get banned. Taking the cracked games online in any meaningful way is pretty much impossible. So it certainly does help. At any rate it seems like the best option to me these days.
It's a very different model, but in a sense it works that way already - the piracy is simply illegal instead of merely classical freeloading behavior - but for the purposes of the market it ultimately has largely the same effect. The difference is that Radiohead ditched the uncessary revenue skimming physical media publishers and kept the smaller per-copy sales price completely to themselves, which allowed them to make a solid profit. Obviously the raw production costs are higher for games, but the basic principle is the same (and HAS to be the same) because the final product shares the most important attributes.
Yeah Ill start a new thread when the NPDs hit Thursday like this thread was started.
The beauty of reaching page 100 at exactly new NPD time is staggering.
Last minute predictions get em in now.
Yup, I agree that online distribution changes things entirely. Game companies, especially PC-centric ones, need to learn to adapt, lest the fall into the same problems as the RIAA and MPAA. If anything, since game companies are so technical, it looks like companies like Valve, Blizzard, and Microsoft are making good in-roads on this. I'm excited to see that competition is driving the business too. Yeah, Games for Windows LIVE is not so hot right now, but neither was Steam when it first launched. It's cool to see these services go head-to-head, as competition should make them better.
- Don't add me, I'm at/near the friend limit
Steam: JC_Rooks
Twitter: http://twitter.com/JiunweiC
I work on this: http://www.xbox.com
That's one tactic, but I don't think that it's the only one. Another is to tie things to an online service, since hacking that is much harder than cracking something that's only client-side. (For example, you have to log-in to be able to play the game) You also have the MMO-model where the server controls everything, so you basically have to subscribe to access the game.
I do think there's a new model that's beginning to pop-up, though, that will definitely help. There's more and more "stuff" being associated with Xbox LIVE and even Steam profiles. Things like achievements, friends lists, etc. Once you've spent enough time on the service, building up your list of friends, your achievements, your scores, etc. you don't want to give it up. So, given the opportunity, would you really want to sacrifice your built-up LIVE or Steam account, just so you can play a game for free? (If Valve or MS caught you playing on a hacked version of a game, they would have good reason to ban your account entirely) I would venture that many gamers would steer clear at that point.
- Don't add me, I'm at/near the friend limit
Steam: JC_Rooks
Twitter: http://twitter.com/JiunweiC
I work on this: http://www.xbox.com
It's apparently not hard. I think pirated Steam games come with a cracked version of Steam, so you never connect to Valve's servers. You can play online with Hamachi.
Plenty of people are playing pirated versions of TF2 online, so it can't be too difficult.
From a Call of Duty 4 Dev:
I had no idea how huge a problem piracy is. Especially finding out Crysis only sold 86k or so, while 150,000 people were downloading it from a torrent at one moment in time. Could be 3/4 or more people playing the thing are doing so without buying it. Not to mention how damn easy it is to pirate things on the PC compared to console.
No wonder PC game sales are so crap.
Is that all it is? Being able to play multiplayer? What about the other stuff that Steam recently added? (Friends list, achievements, etc.).
- Don't add me, I'm at/near the friend limit
Steam: JC_Rooks
Twitter: http://twitter.com/JiunweiC
I work on this: http://www.xbox.com
*Shrug* I was just suggesting. I know there's all sorts of pirated WoW servers out there. Same with any other MP game I've ever seen.
Hell, they probably run their own Friends Lists.
Yeah, but I've always seen those as unpopular one-offs. If I'm playing WoW, do I really want to do it on a barebones server with only a few people on it? Do I really want to be on an unauthorized version of Steam? I'd imagine something like this:
Friend: Hey buddy! I bought Orange Box the other day, and TF2 is amazing!
Me: Yeah! It's awesome. We should totally play together!
Friend: Cool! Yeah my Steam nickname is HiroProtagonist, just add me and we'll play.
Me: Oh wait, well, actually, I'm on a pirate server. So to play, you'll have to uninstall your version and download X. Then install it along with Y. Run program Z to bypass the registry stuff. And also, Valve may find out and ban your real Steam account. After that, we can then play together!
Friend: O_o
- Don't add me, I'm at/near the friend limit
Steam: JC_Rooks
Twitter: http://twitter.com/JiunweiC
I work on this: http://www.xbox.com
There are whole websites for that sort of thing:
http://www.hamachigames.info/find.php
http://www.planethamachi.com/
It's crazy that it's so open and mainstream. Many gaming forums here in Australia have regular Hamachi threads (which list new servers), and I've even seen them on the official forums for some games.
It depends who you are friends with. If most of the people you know are pirates, then you are actually at a disadvantage by having a legit copy. They are all playing on "unofficial" servers, and your legit copy is sometimes locked out if it has been updated to a version of the game that hasn't hit the pirate scene yet.
I'm certainly in that category. I've stopped regularly playing online with a lot of my friends from my Uni days, because they have kept on pirating, whereas I've gone legit. It's actually much more hassle for me to connect to the servers they play on than it is for them.
Don't go blaming a useful tool just because some people use it for piracy.
Although, that hamachigames website is very interesting...
Ugh. I find that whole thing so depressing. As someone who works on platform software, we have to spend so much time on security because of pirates and hackers. It's precious man hours/months that could be spent on more interesting things, like community features, fixing bugs, etc. Instead, a significant amount of time is spent on securing products that often eventually get cracked anyway. What's the point?
- Don't add me, I'm at/near the friend limit
Steam: JC_Rooks
Twitter: http://twitter.com/JiunweiC
I work on this: http://www.xbox.com
I suppose the point is that a million pirated copies in two weeks is far better than two million pirated copies at launch. Still stinks, though.