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Insane game dev asks pirates to email him
cliffski
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Ok, I admit that would be me, doing it here:
http://positech.co.uk/cliffsblog/?p=76
the thing is, I was inspired by this excellent penny arcade strip:
in combination with some other stories regarding games costing more on PC than consoles (and the usage of this as justification for piracy) to think about the thought processes behind people pirating games. Obviously, as a game dev, I'm specifically worried most about my own (see sig).
99% of the time when people flame on an internet forum about piracy, they are either preaching to the converted, or ranting furiously at a company they know is ignoring them.
So I'm trying to be different, and doing something that I suspect may be akin to ignoring the advice of not mentioning the war, or working with children and animals, and I'm actively asking people who specifically pirated my games, to tell me why, and how I could have persuaded them to have bought them instead.
Is this mad? Should we never discuss this? Is it better to keep the devs in one corner, and the pirates in another, and pretend each other do not exist? I think not. I've seen these forums be more grown-up and reasonable than most, and thought it might be possible to have a sensible debate on the issue here.
So forgetting photoshop, forgetting mp3s, forgetting movies, the RIAA, MPAA, BSA etc etc etc, and thinking purely about SMALL BUDGET and indie games..... If you pirate them, why do you? and what would change your mind?
http://positech.co.uk/cliffsblog/?p=76
the thing is, I was inspired by this excellent penny arcade strip:
in combination with some other stories regarding games costing more on PC than consoles (and the usage of this as justification for piracy) to think about the thought processes behind people pirating games. Obviously, as a game dev, I'm specifically worried most about my own (see sig).
99% of the time when people flame on an internet forum about piracy, they are either preaching to the converted, or ranting furiously at a company they know is ignoring them.
So I'm trying to be different, and doing something that I suspect may be akin to ignoring the advice of not mentioning the war, or working with children and animals, and I'm actively asking people who specifically pirated my games, to tell me why, and how I could have persuaded them to have bought them instead.
Is this mad? Should we never discuss this? Is it better to keep the devs in one corner, and the pirates in another, and pretend each other do not exist? I think not. I've seen these forums be more grown-up and reasonable than most, and thought it might be possible to have a sensible debate on the issue here.
So forgetting photoshop, forgetting mp3s, forgetting movies, the RIAA, MPAA, BSA etc etc etc, and thinking purely about SMALL BUDGET and indie games..... If you pirate them, why do you? and what would change your mind?
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I think it falls into three categories.
A) They would rather have the game for free, because free IS free and it's extremely easy to click a link and d/l the game.
C) They want to try out the game before they buy. If they don't like it, they obviously won't buy it, so they fall under the category of simple pirates.
I really don't think you can change a pirates' mind with mere words. There simply just are people out there that don't want to pay for a game and will not pay for a game as long as it remains easy to pirate and escape litigation.
Whilst it's an interesting question, I'm not sure how much of a bite you're going to get here.
Have you considered some other forums? I know at the gametrailers forums they talk a LOT about how much they pirate PC games. Possibly also gamespot and gamefaqs. Although there's also a correlation there with how immature the forums generally are there I'm afraid.
BTW, am I guessing right in that this was partly prompted by that RPS post on Bionic Commando?
I think the only games I've pirated in the last ten years was a copy of Link to the Past, which I have owned and lost (not sold or given away) at some point, so I was able to grey-area through the moral implications. The other was, poetically enough, Sid Meier's Pirates!. which my little brother had insisted I play and put on my PC. It's very good for a day or two, I suggest you give it a try (for money, going through all legal channels).
I can't tell you why pirates steal your shit (though I can guess). I'm proud of my games library, and while I occasionally wish I had never spent that $20.00 on a case of beer or that $30.00 on a pizza, I almost never regret a games purchase.
Can trade TF2 items or whatever else you're interested in. PM me.
Man, that picture is going to haunt him forever on these boards.
I tried to download a torrent of TT only to find that any torrents available for it still don't have Starforce removed, they just include a crack to use once you've already installed the game and Starforce on your PC.
So yeah, that was a failure as pirating goes I guess.
Explanation for those of us who weren't there at the time? As far as I can tell it looks like one of those fake Star-Trek Klingon knives right?
I am puzzled by your inquiry
Surely you jest?
Can trade TF2 items or whatever else you're interested in. PM me.
Its just a random picture on his blog.
.
So,did you actually get any real answers yet?
I've purchased a handful of independent games, with most of them coming from Stardock. In Stardock's case, I bought Galactic Civilizations almost purely because of their stance on DRM (and likewise with GalCiv 2). I want to support developers who choose to trust their customers to be basically honest people who are happy to pay for a product if it's good enough and I've gone far enough to make purchases I probably wouldn't have otherwise. In Stardock's case this was mutually beneficial (they got money; I got awesome games), but even if I hated GalCiv or The Political Machine I'd still be glad on some level that I helped prop up a business model I agree with.
Is price a factor for me? Sure. I'm far more likely to impulse buy a $20 (or less) game based solely on reviews than a $50 game. In fact, I almost never buy $50 games both because of the price and the large backlog of games I already own and still haven't even played through. Along those lines, I've probably spent more on apps & games for the iPod Touch since the App Store opened than I have on games this year. It's hard to say no to something that's only $1 or $5 or even $10, especially when they're just a click or two away. With that said, I did buy Portal (and the Orange Box) based almost exclusively a friend showing it off for about 5 minutes and that cost me like $60. It was worth every penny even considering I don't care for TF2 and haven't gotten around to Episode 2 yet.
Based on personal observations, I think we can group pirates into three main groups. You have those who truly use piracy to sample games (or whatever the product may be) and buy what they like. Honestly, this is probably a small group compared to the others as it's kind of hard to justify spending money on something you already "have" other than the fact that it is the right thing to do. The second group pirates because they see no real value in what they're pirating. They'd pirate anything they can get away with. If something's cheap or good enough they may buy it if it's convenient, but I don't know if they could be counted on to do that consistently. Finally, you have compulsive pirates. They can't help but grab everything they can get their hands on regardless of what it is or how much it costs.
The latter two groups are probably not worth worrying about/bothering with. You can't stop them--they'll find a way around any protection schemes you might come up with and even if you do perform a miracle and prevent their piracy of your product they probably won't buy it, anyway. If nothing else they'll turn to easier prey and then all you've done is annoy legitimate customers while doing very little to improve sales.
Democracy 2 is pretty rad.
There was a heated argument about something unimportant on SE++ and he was pretty much the only one opposed to said argument. So, someone posted that picture and said: "This is the guy you're arguing with." then it turned into a thread about bashing him.
Not to hijack, but that's what happened.
This is a good topic, but I think the answer is simply this: People are cheap and would rather get something for nothing.
This really, some people just don't want to pay. No matter what else you do some people will, when given the option not to pay, just take it without a second (or indeed first) thought. Even if some form of unbreakable game came along (yeah yeah impossible I know, hypothetical and all that) some in this category might buy the game, but all that would likely happen is that they'd just not play the game as for them its a case of 'free or nothing'.
Although I would say that if theres some intrusive and/or annoying copy protection/DRM etc attached to a game that pirating can get round relatively simply (especially if its seen as easier to pirate than jump through the hoops that the game makes you), then you might start getting some pirating who would otherwise buy.
Actually, it was in G&T, in the Canadian Copyright thread. Apparently, anyone opposed to overreaching DRM is a filthy pirate, etc etc, eThuggery abound, and then as posted above.
Oh and he told a few mods to STFU, which was intelligent.
Can trade TF2 items or whatever else you're interested in. PM me.
Tom wishes to play games. Sometimes he has money, more often than not he doesn't. If he really budgeted himself, he could purchase the games he really wanted, but not all of them and certainly not when it mattered, a week or two when it is first released.
Tom also likes to be well versed/experience a lot of games. Sometimes this is the case for pirates, most of the time not, but I think it's interesting.
Tom downloads games. The real blockbusters are played till the end, but most of the time he never finishes a game. He has a binder of 200 cds, but has played each one for 4-5 hours.
That's what I tend to see around me. If they didn't have a a mod chip or some sort of device to do this, then they wouldn't buy the games at all and would probably wait till they dropped in price, aside from the blockbusters.
Edit: I thought we could be open here,my shrink told me to be open,why can't you let me open up, apotheos?
I just don't see why I should pay twice.
Please stop derailing this thread with this line of inquiry.
Please don't consider this request as me disagreeing with you either (pretty please), but I'm here to maintain order and this is just a ad hominem slide into despair.
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No discussion on how to pirate, or places that help people pirate
猿も木から落ちる
because it's a different product? when I wanted to play dark messiah and my pc wasn't working I went and bought the X Box version because it is a different product and there's no real basis for me not paying for it other than "well I don't want to".
Moral justifications for piracy are almost always awful.
You say that, Apo says this (as he definitely should):
So I think you need to realise that there's a difference between people not talking about in on PA because we're mature and pay for games, and not talking about it because you'd be banned pretty quickly. For the record, I don't pirate, but Chance's statement made me lol irl. I just don't think PA is some bastion of morality in regards to pirating, or at least there's no proof of it.
For an indie developer, my guess would be if you have:
1. Set a reasonable price for the product
2. Released a demo which lets me taste the MAJOR game mechanics to see if I like them (That is- if you have driving levels, but I don't get to play one- I don't know how your game handles driving levels)
and
3. Found a way to give me incentive to buy through extras (cloth map in Neverwinter Nights) or even an instruction book containing an art section.
You know, for a small developer, maybe for number 3 you mail everyone who registers their serial number something extra, like box art signed, I don't know, I'm thinking "out loud."
The deck is stacked against you, so I think your OP is a step in a good direction toward creative problem solving. Good luck!
Which again, is pretty shitty justification no? If you can't afford nice things, you don't get to have nice things. That's how our society works. You don't just get to have things because you want them. The guy who said "I downloaded Oblivion to try it out and deleted it after a week" is a fun example too. You can finish and conquer around 90% of games, including Oblivion, in a week. You didn't download it to try it out. You just took it.
If you want to try a game out, buy it. If you want to know if you'll like it before you buy it, read reviews, ask your friends if it is good. If you don't want to play games without demos, just don't play them. Do your part in telling devs that not having a demo is uncool. If you buy the game and hate it, that's your bad luck. I bought Hitman 2, it sucked ass, I still have it and I'm not particularly mad because I understand that every time you buy a game you run the risk of it sucking ass.
A big grey area for me, though exists in both music and software: when the items are no longer in production and available for mainstream purchase. If I can buy something, I usually will. However, if the item is unavailable for purchase-- and I mean as a new, unmolested item, I start to get wary. Buying used is something I don't mind from my local EB, where I can take it back if there's a problem; but buying a copy of a game/music only to find it's scratched and the seller doesn't care; I'm not willing to waste my cash.
This is becoming a little less common now with Steam/Gametap resurrecting the classics, but Direct Download has always scared me, quite frankly. There's always a back-of-my-mind fear that my software, that I paid for, will disappear.
tl;dr: My opinion is that if a company is not making an active effort to make their software available, piracy shouldn't be an issue for them. If you want money for your products, make them easily available to me. No jumping through hoops, no eBay sellers, no complex internet searches and hiked prices for this rare piece of plastic, just sell me your product.
EDIT:
So true. My original copies of Splinter Cell and Halo cost me all of 10 bucks. When the used copies are available, fair priced, and backed by a quality guarantee, go used.
XBL: LiquidSnake2061
Sure,it's the right thing to wait until you can,but come on, we all now that there are loads of people who break under this kind of "pressure".
I also 'pirated' the PC version of King Kong. Starforce...
My Alpha Centauri disc broke, and I couldn't find a new one, so I 'pirated' that too, although I ended up buying another copy next time I saw it.
I play a bunch of Snes/megadrive games I own on emulators too.
I backed up all my oxbox games and mostly played them off the hard drive, not having to worry about discs, and shorter load times for the win. I do the same with all my DVDs, and my DS games.
Basically, if you offer your product to customers without DRM, or with good DRM (Steam, for example), and are open and honest about the software they are buying then there is not many legitimate excuses for piracy.
Edit:
^This. I have gotten pretty much every 360 game I wanted to play from it's first 18 months, and some more recent all for under £10 by just being patient. Some I disliked, and some I loved.
Edit2: I have 'pirated' a few games for benchmark purposes, to see if it will run well enough on my PC whenever it hasn't had a demo, and either deleted it if it won't run well, or deleted it and bought it if it did. Min spec is often a terrible guide these days.
XBL/PSN/Steam: APZonerunner
I purchase games because if I like a game enough to want it, then I want sequels for it, more games along the same lines, and more products from that same developer. I want them to know that this is a good thing and I'm willing to pay to get more of it in future. "Good" or "Evil" doesn't come into it, I'm doing this so that I get to have fun.
It's also in particular why I make a point of purchasing the indie games that I've tried demos for and enjoyed. Honestly, there have been one or two games that weren't that great, that I wouldn't ordinarily purchased if they were from a big name developer. But I bought them from an indie because I want to get something better in future using the same concept.
Tetris DS and Clubhouse Games and other assorted portable first party games that are out of print, however...
The few times I do it it's
D) They want the game, and would like to legitimately purchase it but it's difficult to find and no longer in print.
Switch: 6200-8149-0919 / Wii U: maximumzero / 3DS: 0860-3352-3335 / eBay Shop
Yeah? I did buy it. I tried to pirate it because even when I tried to install it the legit copy would not run. I don't have any issue with cracking or pirating a game that I've already frigging paid for. Yes I know, it drives piracy figures up, abloo abloo. Sod it, I bought it, I am GOING to try and play it.
They never told you on the box if it had starforce, a lot of the time I only found out after buying it. If the law was properly enforced I would have been able to get a refund, but I would basically have to take the publisher to court to ever get that, and lord knows they would be able to outlaywer me.