Stolen Pixels #12: The Economics Lesson

[Shamus Young]

Stolen Pixels #12: The Economics Lesson

You may think that EA's plan to fight piracy is unfair to consumers, but that's simply because you don't understand the economics behind the plan. Shamus Young explains the details in this installment of Stolen Pixels.

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[Odjin]

Great article. If it helps though is something else. Unfortunately many companies start to jump on this bandwagon called "ZOMFG! Piracy kills our business!". Do more such stupid DRM solutions and you can be sure the number of downloaded copies skyrockets like a fireworks rocket... just without the nice fireworks at the end.

 

[Zukhramm]

Hah, really, where did you get the pictures?

 

[Strangeite]

Best comic yet.

 

[pseudoidiot]

Hah, really, where did you get the pictures?

This. I can't imagine those are just stock photos you found somewhere. But they're awesome. As was the comic. Being a regular reader of your site, it's nothing I haven't heard you say before, but luckily I never get tired of reading you write about it.

 

[Zukhramm]

This. I can't imagine those are just stock photos you found somewhere.

Alone, they're not really special, but it's the SAME GUY in all of them! He both does a "presentnig pose", eats ice cream, drink, holdign female legs. I mean, it's just... Well it's funny.

 

[DamienHell]

LOL and THIS is why piracy is on the rise. Fuck this paranoid shit, its another system that inconviencences buying and its clear this system hasn't hindered piracy, look at thepiratebay (its legal to go to their site(just don't download anything)) You will see that Mass Effect is in the top 5 most seeded games on the site. But anyone whos played Mass Effect and had this problem, and has pirated before, will most likely pirate Spore (I don't know how well thats going to work though since spore is a multiplayer game)
This is why if I have a choise I get the game on my 360. PC gaming is being killed by developers not pirates

 

[9of9]

Good pics indeed =)

On the other hand, the article needs fact-checking. No one said anything about having to re-buy the game after your three activations are up (and we're talking about separate activations on different computers, not reinstalls - those are unlimited). When your three activations have been exceeded, you have to call EA customer support, but so far the consensus is that they give out new activations if necessary quite easily and fairly hassle-free.

Of course, far be it from me to defend EA and Bioware in this issue, the DRM is a horrendous pain in the butt. They stand guilty of a greater crime with Mass Effect though in that almost three months since its original launch there is a significant portion of the playerbase for whom the game is completely unplayable (even those with top-of-the-line machines). In three months, the only support we've been offered was a patch that not only didn't fix any bugs, but actually introduced a whole host of new ones to the suckers who thought they could get away with a bug-free game.

 

[Spinwhiz]

bwuahahahahaha loved it Shamus!

 

[Shamus Young]

On the other hand, the article needs fact-checking. No one said anything about having to re-buy the game after your three activations are up (and we're talking about separate activations on different computers, not reinstalls - those are unlimited). When your three activations have been exceeded, you have to call EA customer support, but so far the consensus is that they give out new activations if necessary quite easily and fairly hassle-free.

http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/images/ea_drm.jpg

If they like, EA can send one of their murlocs out to explain away the difference between their stated position and what their software has to say.

I'm hoping they do.

I'll make another comic out of it.

 

[Skrapt]

Made me chuckle and made a good point

Developers need to realize that piracy is not the problem if you release a bad game, or a game with excessive DRM, or a game that is a bad console port. I'm all for trying to curb piracy (even though the effects piracy actually has on profit margins is questionable), however doing it by punishing the honest user who bought the game is simply wrong, because hey guess what? This 3 strike system doesn't even touch the pirates slightly, all it does is inconvenience the honest user a pirate will just go to the pirate bay or whatever and download a new cd key or copy of the game.

 

[scarbunny]

If you missed out on Mass Effect, no need to worry: This scheme is slated to be part of the PC version of Spore as well.

If thats the case Spore will be the first game in a long time I pirate.

See what DRM has done it driven back to a dark place I never thought I'd return to!

 

[Halbert]

I suspect the rise of development costs is going to slow down in the near future. Each generation of graphics starts to look better and better, but it seems like we're getting into an era where each advancement in "cutting edge" graphics don't look much different from each other. If it ends up costing you an extra million dollars in development for a 2% boost in the graphics, I suspect we'll reach a stable plateau. At least for a while.

 

[in_95]

This opens up exciting business opportunities see, you can sell copies of the game that have 10, 20 or more activation opportunities and charge on a sliding scale. It will automatically sense the presence of a DVD writer on your computer too, and add your ip address to a masterlist of "potential pirates" at their offices if you do.

Also, certain areas will be pay per play, you can buy extras to pimp out your UI online, such as a maphack in multiplayer. Truely, the possibilities are endless.

 

[Skrapt]

It will automatically sense the presence of a DVD writer on your computer too, and add your ip address to a masterlist of "potential pirates" at their offices if you do.

So 99.999% of the player base will be labeled as potential pirates? DVD Writers are standard these days and I think it would actually be difficult to find any new computer that only comes with a DVD reader.

Though you are right on the pay per play thing, not necessarily pay per hour or something silly however I think a system like Battlefield Heroes will increasingly become the norm, where you get the major game free however you have to put up with some adverts on menu screens, and you have to pay to get small extras. I think they're calling it micro transactions and it's a route I wouldn't mind the industry taking, because hey I could put up with a whole lot of adverts in menus and maybe a few billboards in game if I got Bioshock or a similarly good game for free. Although I hope it wouldn't advance into an area where you need to pay to complete games or only players who pay get the upper hand in PvP etc. Which means they may be given an unfair advantage, which I don't like.

 

[Abnaxis]

It's like, you're spending too much on game development? Dude, stay with me here: Try not doing that.

*points to Neverwinter Nights 2, among other poorly polished, buggy monstrosities*

Dude, seriously, do not encourage them!

 

[shMerker]

The really fun (and by fun I mean tragic) thing about all this is how immediately self-defeating all of it is. EA develops or licenses a DRM scheme which costs money and has the effect of raising the cost of the product and the inconvenience associated with purchasing it legitimately, which encourages more people to pirate, which speeds up the cracking process, which necessitates making a new DRM scheme. This cycle continues until EA goes out of business because they spend their whole development budget on pissing off their customers.

Shamus, that image you posted appears to be on a restricted part of the site.

 

[Shamus Young]

shMerker: Thanks for the heads up. Hopefully fixed now.

 

[in_95]

So 99.999% of the player base will be labeled as potential pirates?

You really can't be too carefull these days.

 

[Melaisis]

I love you, Shamus.