Requiring a disc to be in the drive during play needs to die in fire.
Man do I agree with this. I know the reasons why they keep doing it, but ugh do I hate having to drop the disc in my laptop when I want to bust out Diablo 2 to kill time between work projects.
The recent Warcraft III patch just removed the disc requirement while playing, which is nice.
The argument over whether or not developers or gamers believe piracy is killing PC gaming is irrelevant.
It's only relevant for the publishers who back the development of many major titles. All the people who invest in games see that piracy is rampant on PC so why bother spending money for games on PC? Sure Blizzard and the Sims can do it but the safer bet is on consoles.
The bottom line is that piracy and the belief (false or not) of a downward trend in across the board PC game sales has people with the money scared. I believe this is way people like Chris Taylor and the Epic guys keep saying the things they do. They constantly get to hear from their publishers how they just don't want to invest in PC games as it is too risky.
Second, my Vampire: The Masquerade: Bloodlines CD1 has been broken. Would it be wrong of me to download the torrent?
Depends who you ask, it's my opinion that doing so would be perfectly moral, and just. Most countries archaic law would say it's illegal.
The idea here is that it's not moral or just for the seeders to be putting the torrent up in the first place (which doesn't seem like an archaic law here), and therefore taking part in it shouldn't really lend itself to positive alignment modifiers or anything. Especially if you seed afterwards.
Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
When you have 250k+ downloads of popular games, you have a problem. The sooner piracy dies, the better for all gamers(paying ones) so I don't understand why people get so defensive when developers come out and attack piracy unless you are the ones pirating as well. A LOT of money is being lost to piracy regardless of whether or not it is the sole issues for lackluster sales. If a developer sees his/her game not selling well and then sees hundreds of thousands of people downloading it for free, they're not going to be happy.
We get unhappy because one, they overstate it to cover up their own problems, and two, they saddle their games with pain in the ass copy protection systems that DON'T stop piracy and only serve to hurt their paying customers.
And who's to blame for these pain in the ass copy protection systems? When a quarter of a million people are using your product for free and the law is too inadequate to do anything about it, you're forced to try different things. Anyways, piracy is a huge problem no matter how you put it. It's not theft, but copyright infringement as has been stated before. But when 94% of your product that you're selling is information, copyright infringement is a lot bigger than the "it's not theft" crowd would have you believe. I don't think people truly comprehend that the vast majority of corporate resources are tied to information. When someone pirates a $50 game, they're "stealing" around $47 of information give or take a few dollars.
Also, how is it their own problems when they realize that there is far more money to be made with consoles where they don't have to deal with piracy than on PCs. Whether or not piracy is the sole issue it is definitely a major factor in determining what a developer does. When more and more developers switch their focus towards consoles, it's not the developers who are having problems, it's PC gamers as they will have less and less to play.
Piracy numbers come from watching torrents, checking number of leechers and number of total downloads.
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First, where do these pirated game numbers come from? I am curious to see them.
Second, my Vampire: The Masquerade: Bloodlines CD1 has been broken. Would it be wrong of me to download the torrent?
edit- Oh my. Not really top 'o the page material.
If you crashed your car and a wheel came off would you steal a wheel to replace it?
No, but I'd copy a wheel. Then we'd both have wheels.
Any attempt to compare data to physical property is horseshit.
Im not comparing data to physical property. Im comparing physical property to physical property.
Last time I checked a CD is made of plastic and is real. Hey, Im holding one in my hand right now!
He's not talking about stealing someone else's CD. He's talking about downloading a torrent for a game he already owns. The issue is licensing - you don't own the software, you never do, you license it. What you own is the media it's printed on. So if the media breaks, well shit, your media is gone but you STILL HAVE THE LICENSE. It is comparable in no way to the analogy you presented.
No, but I'd copy a wheel. Then we'd both have wheels.
Any attempt to compare data to physical property is horseshit.
Im not comparing data to physical property. Im comparing physical property to physical property.
Last time I checked a CD is made of plastic and is real. Hey, Im holding one in my hand right now!
Man, normally I agree with you, but you are so wrong right now.
The reason piracy is illegal is that it is copyright infringement. Using a piece of software without license to do so.
If I were to download an ISO of a game I legitimately own but have a damaged disc, I am not in any way committing theft, all I have acquired is ones and zeros, and nobody has lost anything. If I then use with software, it would only be illegal if I did not have a license to do so, no copyright infringement would have occurred.
I mean, this is talking in terms of the principal of the law, with a smidgen of common sense applied, in reality it would be difficult to find a jury that would understand it....
You buy a game on the pc, there's always a little bit of uncertainty that it'll work properly, that I'll have to start fiddling with settings or editing files to get things running smoothly, have to wait for patches and optimisations, or drop settings to a point that make things playable, but look poor.
When I buy a game for a console, I'm fairly confident it'll work without a hitch.
It may just be plausible that one reason is the convenience of just being able to put the game in, and play it.
but in that vein there is immense satisfaction in spending ~30 minutes when you first install a PC game to tweak and wrangle the settings to get the absolute best performance.
when I bought crysis I jumped right in and played the first mission. looked like crap, ran like crap. after seriously tweaking the inis and the settings i doubled the framerate and ran everything at higher settings.
i was pleased with myself.
I find upgrading my pc immensely satisfying, or opening it up and fixing some kind of terminal problem. Doesn't mean I actively seek out situations where I have to do this. I'm not intimidated by my pc, or fiddling with settings and stuff, but if I've got a situation where I can play something on the pc and have to tweak settings, or drop a disc into a console and play, I'm going to choose the latter.
Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
I would say that this is perfectly moral.
The legal alternative is to get a flash card setup and rip all the games to the flash card yourself. Software exists to do this.
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Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
I would say that this is perfectly moral.
I believe this isn't even illegal, although I have to check to be sure. That might have changed.
So one reason UTIII tanked was because of its lack of singleplayer content. Glad no-one told any of the other UT games about that, they'd be pissed.
Well, here's the thing. Back in the day UT and UT2003/4 had great AI, I'm not sure how it stands up now, but I suspect it's still better than the absolute shit AI that UT3 shipped with. I mean it's mind numbingly fucking stupid to the point that bots will get stuck on boxes, or they'll take a mission critical item and just go awol with with it.
I think the original UTs had a single player content that was pretty similar to most racing games, in that although there's no story, it's pretty fun to go and just go up those racing tiers versus the AI bots, and one of them had your own team roster you could draft etc. And that's basically good enough for racing games, and it's good enough for UT3.
UT3 has this absolute shit excuse for a story which is a bit like Gears of War without any of the good bits, so all you get is this bunch of shit trying to tell you why you're playing the same map for the 15th time.
Yeah if I'm honest I really preferred the singleplayer "tournament" from UT and UT2004. UT3's story was a joke, and playing through the singleplayer was just dull. At least in
Even that isn't the reason that UT3 didn't sell though. It's simply the fact that nobody even knew the game had released and then nobody really cared once they actually got it. I'm speaking as someone who bought the freaking Special Edition here, the game just doesn't stand up to the competition. About the only thing going for it is mindless deathmatch, and really, I feel other games do it better. Heck, I'd rather play FEAR combat if I just wanted mindless deathmatch, and that's free.
Watching the "making of" on the disc, I couldn't help but be a little awestruck at how much time and effort they spent perfecting visual details and minutiae that nobody was going to be paying attention to after the first five seconds. It's OK to make your weapons (as an example) look nice but they spent a ridiculous amount of time and effort getting all the moving parts and gyroscopic wibbly-wobs onto the things with minutely detailed textured rust and nobody's even going to be looking at them. I compare that to something like Team Fortress 2 where they went with massive, bold colour schemes and art designs, big and simple, and that works because it convey's everything in this fast paced game where everything is rushing through, you can still see all the nuances in the character animation because things look right. It all fits and they didn't spend an inordinate amount of time pasting a thousand moving parts onto the Heavy's minigun.
All I really felt they updated with UT3 was the graphics and that's about it. For that, there's no point in upgrading when UT2004 still looks good and the gameplay is fundamentally the same. Heck, more in-depth in some ways (and at least you've still got the assault mode).
@Darleysam: I bought it for both the MP and the SP. Cliffy B and co. were touting it as something special and how they were putting such an effort into it. They may have hired voice actors and done cutscenes, but that alone doesn't make an SP game. When playing botmatches is still more fun than the actual singleplayer campaign, then you've frigging messed it up somehow.
Anyway, back to the topic at hand. I feel Chris Taylor is right to the extent that you can bring RTS's to the console and that piracy is a problem. However, I also feel that piracy has pretty much become the catch-all excuse for when your game fails to sell the numbers you wanted it to. I really enjoyed Supreme Commander, but frankly, I'm a niche who actually enjoys that type of subset of the RTS genre (which is frankly a niche in itself). I don't expect it to do too much business on the 360 either to be honest. IBy comparison, look at the Dawn of War franchise, which they're still pumping out addon packs for (and in each one, they actually add a LOT to the gameplay, unlike "Forged Alliance", which was essentially a level pack and another side that had little to differentiate it from the other 3 sides (which also had too little to differentiate themselves from each other)).
Sorry, I really enjoyed Supreme Commander, but it's still a niche in a niche, and even there it sold close to 1 million units. I just don't feel that's something to complain about. If he was expecting it to sell like 3 million or something he's just crazy. It's like the devs of The Witcher were pretty freaking happy that their game sold a million, to the extent they're doing a full upgrade to the game for FREE! Let me re-iterate this. They made enough money on the game to re-do it for no additional cost to the buyer. Sure they might get some more sales out of it, but I can't imagine it would be that many.
Sins of a Solar empire is selling well enough to make the devs happy, and I'd be willing to bet it's not going to break 1.5 million at the most (no wagers of private parts, sorry titmouse). Doesn't matter, it's selling enough for the devs to make a profit, create a huge and dedicated fanbase, and establish a franchise.
Although then again, there aren't too many RTS's on the 360, so who knows, it might have a good market.
EDIT: Off-topic, currently listening to GFW podcast. Awesome, they're interviewing Warren Spector and Paul Wedgewood (Splash Damage). Pretty interesting stuff. Apparently they're going to be doing interviews all this week from the GDC.
Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
I would say that this is perfectly moral.
The legal alternative is to get a flash card setup and rip all the games to the flash card yourself. Software exists to do this.
Which is crazy, because the end product is exactly the same, and it is essentially giving superior legal rights to people with the expertise to operate said software.
I think the Nintendo DS is PROOF that piracy does not have a major effect on sales.
Yea I don't believe the 90% DS piracy crap at all.
Of COURSE it's not 90%.
But it's still a decent sized minority of owners, due to its extreme ease and low cost.
I'd like to see some stats on that.
Obviously it's speculation. It would be impossible to have stats.
But my premises are true. AND, if DS piracy is easier than other forms, wouldn't it stand to reason that it is more prolific than other forms? And if it is more prolific, yet DS software sales are wildly successful, what does that suggest about the failure of PC software sales in relation to piracy?
Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
I would say that this is perfectly moral.
The legal alternative is to get a flash card setup and rip all the games to the flash card yourself. Software exists to do this.
Which is crazy, because the end product is exactly the same, and it is essentially giving superior legal rights to people with the expertise to operate said software.
Never said the law made any fucking sense.
edit: and any analyist who claims that 90% of DS owners import flash cards from China (because the Datel crap you can buy in America can't run pirated games or even most homebrew) is pants-on-head retarded. Not in any of the major flash card companies' wildest dreams.
Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
I would say that this is perfectly moral.
The legal alternative is to get a flash card setup and rip all the games to the flash card yourself. Software exists to do this.
Which is crazy, because the end product is exactly the same, and it is essentially giving superior legal rights to people with the expertise to operate said software.
Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
I would say that this is perfectly moral.
I believe this isn't even illegal, although I have to check to be sure. That might have changed.
According to the DMCA, circumventing copyright measures is illegal, yes. According to UK law (and US law IIRC) you have the legal right to make and own backup copies of your media, however, the DMCA means that you can't circument copyright protection measures in order to do so. DMCA as a law restricts the legal rights that you have and should never have frigging existed in the form it does now. But they pushed it through anyway, ain't life grand?
Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
I would say that this is perfectly moral.
I believe this isn't even illegal, although I have to check to be sure. That might have changed.
It is illegal, and has ALWAYS been.
Fair Use only covers back-ups that you make yourself.
Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
I would say that this is perfectly moral.
The legal alternative is to get a flash card setup and rip all the games to the flash card yourself. Software exists to do this.
Which is crazy, because the end product is exactly the same, and it is essentially giving superior legal rights to people with the expertise to operate said software.
People who have an ability in any field generally enjoy superior legal rights over those who don't, unless that ability is to shoplift or send business packages via FedEx when first class would have been acceptable, or something else expressly illegal. The torrent angle gives superior rights to people who know how to use the Internet, but that doesn't mean there ought to be a stack of ROMs burned to DVD on the counter of every Gamestop.
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According to the DMCA, circumventing copyright measures is illegal, yes. According to UK law (and US law IIRC) you have the legal right to make and own backup copies of your media, however, the DMCA means that you can't circument copyright protection measures in order to do so. DMCA as a law restricts the legal rights that you have and should never have frigging existed in the form it does now. But they pushed it through anyway, ain't life grand?
What about Canada? We've typically been a little more consumer-oriented when it comes to copyright law, although, once again, that may have changed. :P
First, where do these pirated game numbers come from? I am curious to see them.
Second, my Vampire: The Masquerade: Bloodlines CD1 has been broken. Would it be wrong of me to download the torrent?
edit- Oh my. Not really top 'o the page material.
On the issues of the broken CD, I can't clearly stated one way or the other how the law would look at it. When you purchased the game you bought the license to use the information on that disc. I doubt said license nullifies itself when a CD breaks so you're still entitled to all the information and thus it might be legal even though it's coming from an illegal source since you own the license. I'm no lawyer so I'm not positive on this, but it isn't clear cut either way. Just don't upload anything. Either way nobody is going to bust down your door for it.
Copyright law in general is very muddled and very inadequate for todays problems.
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Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
I would say that this is perfectly moral.
The legal alternative is to get a flash card setup and rip all the games to the flash card yourself. Software exists to do this.
Which is crazy, because the end product is exactly the same, and it is essentially giving superior legal rights to people with the expertise to operate said software.
No, it is giving the same legal right to everyone.
You are allowed to do whatever you like with YOUR OWN copy of the product. Whatever is within your ability. Complaining that you should be allowed to break the law because of an ability you lack is crazy.
I was under the impression that the law covering "circumvent copyright protection" had a suffix of "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" to account for ripping CDs.
No, it is giving the same legal right to everyone.
You are allowed to do whatever you like with YOUR OWN copy of the product. Whatever is within your ability. Complaining that you should be allowed to break the law because of an ability you lack is crazy.
I just think it is incredibly hypocritical of publishers to basically like to pick and chose whether you have bought a physical product or a license. If I own a license I should be able to do whatever the hell I want with that software for my own personal use, mod it, run it on hardware it wasn't originally intended for (like SCUMM stuff on other devices), back it up, poke around in the code for no reason other than interest, and my right to do this should not be limited by what hardware I own. If I am buying a physical product, then piracy should be entirely legal.
I was under the impression that the law covering "circumvent copyright protection" had a suffix of "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" to account for ripping CDs.
Nope.
The issue is a contradiction between Fair Use and DRM. Consumers tend to err on the side of Fair Use.
I was under the impression that the law covering "circumvent copyright protection" had a suffix of "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" to account for ripping CDs.
It does? How exactly do they define "very easy" then?
I despise wishy washy wording in legal matters and contracts.
UT3 sold poorly due to it coming out in the same time frame as both TF2 and Quake Enemy Territory. Both of which are better games that basically do the same thing but better. Not to mention CoD4 which not only has better multiplayer but has a superb single player campaign.
People that play multiplayer shooters in that vein typically stick with one for a few months if not longer. UT3 had no chance verse the competition. Pirating had nothing to do with its poor sales.
Crysis is a so so shooter at best. Do I like t sure, but even on my Core 2 Duo 2.66g, 8800gtx, 4g ram vista 64 box I get lousy framerate and had to drop the res well below my monitors default res especially once I hit the space ship. The game is either poorly optimized or is made for future tech.
I was under the impression that the law covering "circumvent copyright protection" had a suffix of "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" to account for ripping CDs.
Nope.
The issue is a contradiction between Fair Use and DRM. Consumers tend to err on the side of Fair Use.
Ok, let me put it this way.
If I buy a CD, and intend to listen to songs on it off my iPod in addition to listening to the disc on my HiFi, but my CD drive in my PC breaks, it would be perfectly moral (imo) to download MP3s of it, and listen to them on my iPod.
It probably would be illegal, but it damn well shouldn't be.
Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
I would say that this is perfectly moral.
I believe this isn't even illegal, although I have to check to be sure. That might have changed.
According to the DMCA, circumventing copyright measures is illegal, yes. According to UK law (and US law IIRC) you have the legal right to make and own backup copies of your media, however, the DMCA means that you can't circument copyright protection measures in order to do so. DMCA as a law restricts the legal rights that you have and should never have frigging existed in the form it does now. But they pushed it through anyway, ain't life grand?
But the DMCA only applies if you break copy protection. Copying Windows CDs, for example, doesn't apply because they don't have any copy protection. I don't think whatever the DS uses counts either, Nintendo's "ROMs are illegal always have been nahhhh" stance to the contrary.
So it's illegal for me to obtain the rom from some outside source then put it on a flash card, but it isn't illegal for me to dump the rom of a game I own and then put it on a flash card. I'd say that makes sense, because you're proving ownership by doing it yourself.
Same goes for PC games, I'd imagine. Go ahead and make an ISO of the game you just bought, but I'll be damned if I go near the one on the internet.
UT3 sold poorly due to it coming out in the same time frame as both TF2 and Quake Enemy Territory. Both of which are better games that basically do the same thing but better. Not to mention CoD4 which not only has better multiplayer but has a superb single player campaign.
People that play multiplayer shooters in that vein typically stick with one for a few months if not longer. UT3 had no chance verse the competition. Pirating had nothing to do with its poor sales.
Largely agree
Crysis is a so so shooter at best. Do I like t sure, but even on my Core 2 Duo 2.66g, 8800gtx, 4g ram vista 64 box I get lousy framerate and had to drop the res well below my monitors default res especially once I hit the space ship. The game is either poorly optimized or is made for future tech.
Largely disagree.
I loved Crysis, and to be honest my spec is lower than yours and I find it runs really well on the 2nd highest resolution (no real noticable difference) with everything set to high. Heck, I'm using the "Natural" mod, which makes it look even more awesome.
I will agree that the engine has features meant for "future" PC's, but that sort of thing has been standard in PC games for a long time (Heck, I remember John Carmack talking about the extreme levels of details they were packing into textures for Doom III that would only be useable in future when graphics cards had 512MB RAM). I find it's very playable today's machines.
I was under the impression that the law covering "circumvent copyright protection" had a suffix of "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" to account for ripping CDs.
Nope.
The issue is a contradiction between Fair Use and DRM. Consumers tend to err on the side of Fair Use.
Ok, let me put it this way.
If I buy a CD, and intend to listen to songs on it off my iPod in addition to listening to the disc on my HiFi, but my CD drive in my PC breaks, it would be perfectly moral (imo) to download MP3s of it, and listen to them on my iPod.
It probably would be illegal, but it damn well shouldn't be.
Is it legal or moral for you to let other people download it from you?
I was under the impression that the law covering "circumvent copyright protection" had a suffix of "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" to account for ripping CDs.
Nope.
The issue is a contradiction between Fair Use and DRM. Consumers tend to err on the side of Fair Use.
Ok, let me put it this way.
If I buy a CD, and intend to listen to songs on it off my iPod in addition to listening to the disc on my HiFi, but my CD drive in my PC breaks, it would be perfectly moral (imo) to download MP3s of it, and listen to them on my iPod.
It probably would be illegal, but it damn well shouldn't be.
The problem is you cannot differ between someone who has the CD and thus license to the songs for personal use, and someone who just wants them for free. Until a method of doing so manifests itself, it will continue to be illegal mainly because those downloads will always come from illegal sources.
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I was under the impression that the law covering "circumvent copyright protection" had a suffix of "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" to account for ripping CDs.
Nope.
The issue is a contradiction between Fair Use and DRM. Consumers tend to err on the side of Fair Use.
Ok, let me put it this way.
If I buy a CD, and intend to listen to songs on it off my iPod in addition to listening to the disc on my HiFi, but my CD drive in my PC breaks, it would be perfectly moral (imo) to download MP3s of it, and listen to them on my iPod.
It probably would be illegal, but it damn well shouldn't be.
Is it legal or moral for you to let other people download it from you?
It would be entirely legal if I made people accept an agreement stating that they would only download material off me that they were licensed to use, and that they would be entirely responsible for any legal repercussions of them downloading content that they are not licensed to access.
I was under the impression that the law covering "circumvent copyright protection" had a suffix of "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" to account for ripping CDs.
Nope.
The issue is a contradiction between Fair Use and DRM. Consumers tend to err on the side of Fair Use.
Ok, let me put it this way.
If I buy a CD, and intend to listen to songs on it off my iPod in addition to listening to the disc on my HiFi, but my CD drive in my PC breaks, it would be perfectly moral (imo) to download MP3s of it, and listen to them on my iPod.
It probably would be illegal, but it damn well shouldn't be.
The problem is you cannot differ between someone who has the CD and thus license to the songs for personal use, and someone who just wants them for free. Until a method of doing so manifests itself, it will continue to be illegal mainly because those downloads will always come from illegal sources.
My impression is that the authorities generally go after the uploaders, not the downloaders. However, the nature of sharing programs generally makes them into the same thing.
I was under the impression that the law covering "circumvent copyright protection" had a suffix of "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" to account for ripping CDs.
Nope.
The issue is a contradiction between Fair Use and DRM. Consumers tend to err on the side of Fair Use.
Ok, let me put it this way.
If I buy a CD, and intend to listen to songs on it off my iPod in addition to listening to the disc on my HiFi, but my CD drive in my PC breaks, it would be perfectly moral (imo) to download MP3s of it, and listen to them on my iPod.
It probably would be illegal, but it damn well shouldn't be.
Is it legal or moral for you to let other people download it from you?
It would be entirely legal if I made people accept an agreement stating that they would only download material off me that they were licensed to use, and that they would be entirely responsible for any legal repercussions of them downloading content that they are not licensed to access.
No, it wouldn't. Every fucking ROM site has that disclaimer, and they get shut down all the time. ITT internet lawyers.
Oh, and the DMCA doesn't have any such "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" clause, although that'd certainly be nice. The CD Digital Audio standard was made without copy protection entirely, because at the time CD burners cost thousands of dollars, hard drives were small, internet connections were slow, and audio compression algorithms largely sucked.
I was under the impression that the law covering "circumvent copyright protection" had a suffix of "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" to account for ripping CDs.
Nope.
The issue is a contradiction between Fair Use and DRM. Consumers tend to err on the side of Fair Use.
Ok, let me put it this way.
If I buy a CD, and intend to listen to songs on it off my iPod in addition to listening to the disc on my HiFi, but my CD drive in my PC breaks, it would be perfectly moral (imo) to download MP3s of it, and listen to them on my iPod.
It probably would be illegal, but it damn well shouldn't be.
The problem is you cannot differ between someone who has the CD and thus license to the songs for personal use, and someone who just wants them for free. Until a method of doing so manifests itself, it will continue to be illegal mainly because those downloads will always come from illegal sources.
My impression is that the authorities generally go after the uploaders, not the downloaders. However, the nature of sharing programs generally makes them into the same thing.
They go after uploaders because it is an open and shut case. With downloading you have to prove that the person knew that it was an illegal source. However, since it is 100% illegal to redistribute even free things without permission, uploading is guaranteed to be proven illegal in any case.
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UT3 sold poorly due to it coming out in the same time frame as both TF2 and Quake Enemy Territory. Both of which are better games that basically do the same thing but better. Not to mention CoD4 which not only has better multiplayer but has a superb single player campaign.
People that play multiplayer shooters in that vein typically stick with one for a few months if not longer. UT3 had no chance verse the competition. Pirating had nothing to do with its poor sales.
Largely agree
Crysis is a so so shooter at best. Do I like t sure, but even on my Core 2 Duo 2.66g, 8800gtx, 4g ram vista 64 box I get lousy framerate and had to drop the res well below my monitors default res especially once I hit the space ship. The game is either poorly optimized or is made for future tech.
Largely disagree.
I loved Crysis, and to be honest my spec is lower than yours and I find it runs really well on the 2nd highest resolution (no real noticable difference) with everything set to high. Heck, I'm using the "Natural" mod, which makes it look even more awesome.
I will agree that the engine has features meant for "future" PC's, but that sort of thing has been standard in PC games for a long time (Heck, I remember John Carmack talking about the extreme levels of details they were packing into textures for Doom III that would only be useable in future when graphics cards had 512MB RAM). I find it's very playable today's machines.
I’ll admit I was trying top play the game at 1920x1200 to start I had to drop resolution twice once to 1680x1050 and finally to 1200x800 to get a smooth framerate. I was also playing in dx10 mode. The only reason I switched to Vista was to play Crysis as it as 'meant' to be played. So that plays into my disappointment, not to mention I cannot bet the VToL section for the life of me. As an aside I can play CoD4 and Bioshock at 1920x1200 with everything cranked to max as a comparison.
Posts
The recent Warcraft III patch just removed the disc requirement while playing, which is nice.
It's only relevant for the publishers who back the development of many major titles. All the people who invest in games see that piracy is rampant on PC so why bother spending money for games on PC? Sure Blizzard and the Sims can do it but the safer bet is on consoles.
The bottom line is that piracy and the belief (false or not) of a downward trend in across the board PC game sales has people with the money scared. I believe this is way people like Chris Taylor and the Epic guys keep saying the things they do. They constantly get to hear from their publishers how they just don't want to invest in PC games as it is too risky.
Im not comparing data to physical property. Im comparing physical property to physical property.
Last time I checked a CD is made of plastic and is real. Hey, Im holding one in my hand right now!
Like, it's inconvenient for me to have to change cards on a DS to switch games; is it wrong for me to get a flash card setup and download all the ROMs as long as I own the original games? Hell no, right?
And who's to blame for these pain in the ass copy protection systems? When a quarter of a million people are using your product for free and the law is too inadequate to do anything about it, you're forced to try different things. Anyways, piracy is a huge problem no matter how you put it. It's not theft, but copyright infringement as has been stated before. But when 94% of your product that you're selling is information, copyright infringement is a lot bigger than the "it's not theft" crowd would have you believe. I don't think people truly comprehend that the vast majority of corporate resources are tied to information. When someone pirates a $50 game, they're "stealing" around $47 of information give or take a few dollars.
Also, how is it their own problems when they realize that there is far more money to be made with consoles where they don't have to deal with piracy than on PCs. Whether or not piracy is the sole issue it is definitely a major factor in determining what a developer does. When more and more developers switch their focus towards consoles, it's not the developers who are having problems, it's PC gamers as they will have less and less to play.
Piracy numbers come from watching torrents, checking number of leechers and number of total downloads.
He's not talking about stealing someone else's CD. He's talking about downloading a torrent for a game he already owns. The issue is licensing - you don't own the software, you never do, you license it. What you own is the media it's printed on. So if the media breaks, well shit, your media is gone but you STILL HAVE THE LICENSE. It is comparable in no way to the analogy you presented.
Man, normally I agree with you, but you are so wrong right now.
The reason piracy is illegal is that it is copyright infringement. Using a piece of software without license to do so.
If I were to download an ISO of a game I legitimately own but have a damaged disc, I am not in any way committing theft, all I have acquired is ones and zeros, and nobody has lost anything. If I then use with software, it would only be illegal if I did not have a license to do so, no copyright infringement would have occurred.
I mean, this is talking in terms of the principal of the law, with a smidgen of common sense applied, in reality it would be difficult to find a jury that would understand it....
Shit, so you mean that if I torrent up a copy of a game, an official pressed disc teleports off of a retail shelf and into my computer?
The CD is just some five cent packaging. You're paying $50 (or whatever amount) for the data on it.
I find upgrading my pc immensely satisfying, or opening it up and fixing some kind of terminal problem. Doesn't mean I actively seek out situations where I have to do this. I'm not intimidated by my pc, or fiddling with settings and stuff, but if I've got a situation where I can play something on the pc and have to tweak settings, or drop a disc into a console and play, I'm going to choose the latter.
No denies that.
The question is how much of an effect, and are anti-piracy measures actually cost effective.
And do strict anti-piracy measures harm sales more than they help them. Anyone here remember Starforce?
I would say that this is perfectly moral.
The legal alternative is to get a flash card setup and rip all the games to the flash card yourself. Software exists to do this.
I believe this isn't even illegal, although I have to check to be sure. That might have changed.
Yeah if I'm honest I really preferred the singleplayer "tournament" from UT and UT2004. UT3's story was a joke, and playing through the singleplayer was just dull. At least in
Even that isn't the reason that UT3 didn't sell though. It's simply the fact that nobody even knew the game had released and then nobody really cared once they actually got it. I'm speaking as someone who bought the freaking Special Edition here, the game just doesn't stand up to the competition. About the only thing going for it is mindless deathmatch, and really, I feel other games do it better. Heck, I'd rather play FEAR combat if I just wanted mindless deathmatch, and that's free.
Watching the "making of" on the disc, I couldn't help but be a little awestruck at how much time and effort they spent perfecting visual details and minutiae that nobody was going to be paying attention to after the first five seconds. It's OK to make your weapons (as an example) look nice but they spent a ridiculous amount of time and effort getting all the moving parts and gyroscopic wibbly-wobs onto the things with minutely detailed textured rust and nobody's even going to be looking at them. I compare that to something like Team Fortress 2 where they went with massive, bold colour schemes and art designs, big and simple, and that works because it convey's everything in this fast paced game where everything is rushing through, you can still see all the nuances in the character animation because things look right. It all fits and they didn't spend an inordinate amount of time pasting a thousand moving parts onto the Heavy's minigun.
All I really felt they updated with UT3 was the graphics and that's about it. For that, there's no point in upgrading when UT2004 still looks good and the gameplay is fundamentally the same. Heck, more in-depth in some ways (and at least you've still got the assault mode).
@Darleysam: I bought it for both the MP and the SP. Cliffy B and co. were touting it as something special and how they were putting such an effort into it. They may have hired voice actors and done cutscenes, but that alone doesn't make an SP game. When playing botmatches is still more fun than the actual singleplayer campaign, then you've frigging messed it up somehow.
Anyway, back to the topic at hand. I feel Chris Taylor is right to the extent that you can bring RTS's to the console and that piracy is a problem. However, I also feel that piracy has pretty much become the catch-all excuse for when your game fails to sell the numbers you wanted it to. I really enjoyed Supreme Commander, but frankly, I'm a niche who actually enjoys that type of subset of the RTS genre (which is frankly a niche in itself). I don't expect it to do too much business on the 360 either to be honest. IBy comparison, look at the Dawn of War franchise, which they're still pumping out addon packs for (and in each one, they actually add a LOT to the gameplay, unlike "Forged Alliance", which was essentially a level pack and another side that had little to differentiate it from the other 3 sides (which also had too little to differentiate themselves from each other)).
Sorry, I really enjoyed Supreme Commander, but it's still a niche in a niche, and even there it sold close to 1 million units. I just don't feel that's something to complain about. If he was expecting it to sell like 3 million or something he's just crazy. It's like the devs of The Witcher were pretty freaking happy that their game sold a million, to the extent they're doing a full upgrade to the game for FREE! Let me re-iterate this. They made enough money on the game to re-do it for no additional cost to the buyer. Sure they might get some more sales out of it, but I can't imagine it would be that many.
Sins of a Solar empire is selling well enough to make the devs happy, and I'd be willing to bet it's not going to break 1.5 million at the most (no wagers of private parts, sorry titmouse). Doesn't matter, it's selling enough for the devs to make a profit, create a huge and dedicated fanbase, and establish a franchise.
Although then again, there aren't too many RTS's on the 360, so who knows, it might have a good market.
EDIT: Off-topic, currently listening to GFW podcast. Awesome, they're interviewing Warren Spector and Paul Wedgewood (Splash Damage). Pretty interesting stuff. Apparently they're going to be doing interviews all this week from the GDC.
Which is crazy, because the end product is exactly the same, and it is essentially giving superior legal rights to people with the expertise to operate said software.
Obviously it's speculation. It would be impossible to have stats.
But my premises are true. AND, if DS piracy is easier than other forms, wouldn't it stand to reason that it is more prolific than other forms? And if it is more prolific, yet DS software sales are wildly successful, what does that suggest about the failure of PC software sales in relation to piracy?
Never said the law made any fucking sense.
edit: and any analyist who claims that 90% of DS owners import flash cards from China (because the Datel crap you can buy in America can't run pirated games or even most homebrew) is pants-on-head retarded. Not in any of the major flash card companies' wildest dreams.
hi5
According to the DMCA, circumventing copyright measures is illegal, yes. According to UK law (and US law IIRC) you have the legal right to make and own backup copies of your media, however, the DMCA means that you can't circument copyright protection measures in order to do so. DMCA as a law restricts the legal rights that you have and should never have frigging existed in the form it does now. But they pushed it through anyway, ain't life grand?
It is illegal, and has ALWAYS been.
Fair Use only covers back-ups that you make yourself.
People who have an ability in any field generally enjoy superior legal rights over those who don't, unless that ability is to shoplift or send business packages via FedEx when first class would have been acceptable, or something else expressly illegal. The torrent angle gives superior rights to people who know how to use the Internet, but that doesn't mean there ought to be a stack of ROMs burned to DVD on the counter of every Gamestop.
What about Canada? We've typically been a little more consumer-oriented when it comes to copyright law, although, once again, that may have changed. :P
EDIT: I think Evander's right.
On the issues of the broken CD, I can't clearly stated one way or the other how the law would look at it. When you purchased the game you bought the license to use the information on that disc. I doubt said license nullifies itself when a CD breaks so you're still entitled to all the information and thus it might be legal even though it's coming from an illegal source since you own the license. I'm no lawyer so I'm not positive on this, but it isn't clear cut either way. Just don't upload anything. Either way nobody is going to bust down your door for it.
Copyright law in general is very muddled and very inadequate for todays problems.
No, it is giving the same legal right to everyone.
You are allowed to do whatever you like with YOUR OWN copy of the product. Whatever is within your ability. Complaining that you should be allowed to break the law because of an ability you lack is crazy.
Edit:
I just think it is incredibly hypocritical of publishers to basically like to pick and chose whether you have bought a physical product or a license. If I own a license I should be able to do whatever the hell I want with that software for my own personal use, mod it, run it on hardware it wasn't originally intended for (like SCUMM stuff on other devices), back it up, poke around in the code for no reason other than interest, and my right to do this should not be limited by what hardware I own. If I am buying a physical product, then piracy should be entirely legal.
'The man' wants to have it's cake and eat it.
Nope.
The issue is a contradiction between Fair Use and DRM. Consumers tend to err on the side of Fair Use.
It does? How exactly do they define "very easy" then?
I despise wishy washy wording in legal matters and contracts.
People that play multiplayer shooters in that vein typically stick with one for a few months if not longer. UT3 had no chance verse the competition. Pirating had nothing to do with its poor sales.
Crysis is a so so shooter at best. Do I like t sure, but even on my Core 2 Duo 2.66g, 8800gtx, 4g ram vista 64 box I get lousy framerate and had to drop the res well below my monitors default res especially once I hit the space ship. The game is either poorly optimized or is made for future tech.
Ok, let me put it this way.
If I buy a CD, and intend to listen to songs on it off my iPod in addition to listening to the disc on my HiFi, but my CD drive in my PC breaks, it would be perfectly moral (imo) to download MP3s of it, and listen to them on my iPod.
It probably would be illegal, but it damn well shouldn't be.
But the DMCA only applies if you break copy protection. Copying Windows CDs, for example, doesn't apply because they don't have any copy protection. I don't think whatever the DS uses counts either, Nintendo's "ROMs are illegal always have been nahhhh" stance to the contrary.
Same goes for PC games, I'd imagine. Go ahead and make an ISO of the game you just bought, but I'll be damned if I go near the one on the internet.
Largely agree
Largely disagree.
I loved Crysis, and to be honest my spec is lower than yours and I find it runs really well on the 2nd highest resolution (no real noticable difference) with everything set to high. Heck, I'm using the "Natural" mod, which makes it look even more awesome.
I will agree that the engine has features meant for "future" PC's, but that sort of thing has been standard in PC games for a long time (Heck, I remember John Carmack talking about the extreme levels of details they were packing into textures for Doom III that would only be useable in future when graphics cards had 512MB RAM). I find it's very playable today's machines.
Is it legal or moral for you to let other people download it from you?
The problem is you cannot differ between someone who has the CD and thus license to the songs for personal use, and someone who just wants them for free. Until a method of doing so manifests itself, it will continue to be illegal mainly because those downloads will always come from illegal sources.
It would be entirely legal if I made people accept an agreement stating that they would only download material off me that they were licensed to use, and that they would be entirely responsible for any legal repercussions of them downloading content that they are not licensed to access.
My impression is that the authorities generally go after the uploaders, not the downloaders. However, the nature of sharing programs generally makes them into the same thing.
No, it wouldn't. Every fucking ROM site has that disclaimer, and they get shut down all the time. ITT internet lawyers.
Oh, and the DMCA doesn't have any such "Unless said copy protection is very easy to circumvent" clause, although that'd certainly be nice. The CD Digital Audio standard was made without copy protection entirely, because at the time CD burners cost thousands of dollars, hard drives were small, internet connections were slow, and audio compression algorithms largely sucked.
They go after uploaders because it is an open and shut case. With downloading you have to prove that the person knew that it was an illegal source. However, since it is 100% illegal to redistribute even free things without permission, uploading is guaranteed to be proven illegal in any case.
I’ll admit I was trying top play the game at 1920x1200 to start I had to drop resolution twice once to 1680x1050 and finally to 1200x800 to get a smooth framerate. I was also playing in dx10 mode. The only reason I switched to Vista was to play Crysis as it as 'meant' to be played. So that plays into my disappointment, not to mention I cannot bet the VToL section for the life of me. As an aside I can play CoD4 and Bioshock at 1920x1200 with everything cranked to max as a comparison.