Atari Founder: PC Piracy About to be Eradicated

[Bridgetbracer]

we're not dealing with small start ups and mom-and-pop shops here.

We're dealing with companies like EA, who nearly put out Mass Effect with anti piracy so strict that if you went more than a week without your computer being connected to the internet, the game wouldn't work and you would have to go through the fucking hassle of re-registering it all over again or calling customer support to reconnect the game.

And don't forget, in the Windows Vista fine print, it basically says that Microsoft is simply leasing you the right to use it, and at any time they can revoke your right to use it and make you, by law, uninstall Vista.

In fact, that last bit there is still making it through, although in the form of if you install it on more than 2 or 3 PCs, that is.

Not that i blame them too much honestly, its just that the companies who cry out about this and are the biggest advocates of these kinds of things are the biggest companies out there.


Piracy doesn't cause massive job cuts. Poor management and lackluster product does. You don't cut out a significant portion of your development teams.


Then again i'm not advocating it, you have to understand that there are people out there, who aren't horrible scum, who download games because they simply don't have 30 bucks to spend for every The Sims 2 expansion that comes out, or burn 55 bucks after sales tax to find out that Time Shift was a shitty game that would have made for an underwhelming rental.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Y'know, as a writer and artist, I do understand the value of intellectual property. And really I just sort of shake my head and sigh at people who say "I didn't TAKE anything, I just COPIED, so you didn't LOSE anything".

But there is something just as bad going on with the other side of this debate as well, and that is using the word "piracy" to explain or justify pretty much anything the game companies do not like, or want to do. If "Watch The Grass Grow 3: Extreme Grass Growing" only sells thirty-eight copies, it's not because it was a lousy game; it's because of PIRACY. If EA decides that, in order to play Bioshock 2, you have to call the company and verify your identity every time you start up the game, it's to eliminate PIRACY. If Nolan Bushnell wants to implant a chip in every gamer's head and monitor in real-time the games they're playing, it's because of PIRACY, and if you speak out against it then you are obviously in favor of PIRACY.

"Piracy" has become the monster under the bed in the gaming world, and while I certainly do not condone it nor offer any moralistic arguments in its favor, I am growing tired of it being used as some terrible, implacable enemy that all we "good gamers" must make ever-increasing sacrifices to defeat. So much is being said for and against the rights of games developers and publishers, but what about the rights of the people who legitimately pay for these games? Am I going to have to submit to a background check and sign a non-piracy affidavit to download an expansion pack for Spore? Why can't I simply pay for the game and play it?

Certainly, I can register my displeasure by simply not buying the games that apply these onerous restrictions, but what's the point when that lost sale will simply bring about another cry of "PIRACY"?

The temptation to equate this to a certain buzzword circulating in American politics these days is quite strong, but I shall resist!

 

[Dejawesp]

If they cant afford game then they need to accept that they cant have them. They have no right to the games. And they certainly dont have the right to steal them. If they do steal them then they are scum. They might be poor. If they where to steal some bread off the back of a truck to not starve then I would'nt look down on them but to steal *entertainment* just cant be justified because in the end it's me. The honest consumer that has to pay for it.

 

[The Thief]

Very true, Rogue Wolf. The saddest part is that all these digital cavity searches are actually encouraging people to pirate.

 

[Arbre]

blah blah yadda yadda

Scribble Scribble

Let's also consider RTCW: Enemy Territory, released for free. Then came Quake Wars, which despite being an excellent game, seems to suffer to get the success it deserves among gamers (for various reasons).
Point being, which I think is not too far from yours, is that growing a community on game A doesn't necessarily means a proper customer transfer to the next game at all.

Based on this, and the crude reality of money, yes, only money matters, and if quality and appraisal follow, it's even better.

Now, there's a variant there.
If you downloaded a game for free, while it's clearly meant to be bought (a pricey one, not one of those indie titles which grow an online community before finding support on XBLA/Steam/PSN), and liked chapter one, you may be potentially turning into a real customer for a sequel/prequel or another product from the same society or publisher (if you're really into brands as far as the last two are concerned).
There's a potential for conversion here. But it's a thin line here.




Incandescence:

First, I did not imply anything. I directly stated the workings of my viewpoint with regard to developers and publishers and their likely viewpoints on sales numbers. In my opinion, publishers are going to see sales numbers primarily as income, and developers are going to see sales numbers primarily as exposure--an investment on their next game. I do not think that "developers are less concerned about income than publishers," I think that developers do not need to be as concerned about sales numbers as publishers.

Yes they do. As long as you want to keep your studio's head out of the water. Since it's a business, after all, money is a key element that matters a lot, just as much as it does for a publisher.
In fact, sales matter much much more to a studio.

This is what always annoyed me in the balance and power publishers had over studios. A publisher makes money from a catalogue of games. If one games does poorly, arguably other games can succeed.
Now, if a studio's one game does poorly, it's bye bye studio in most cases.

Yet, studios always get raped. Mostly because the publishers, in their position of power, are the ones which keep making money and then, being those with the power to help a game grow, which puts studio into slavery.

There's not enough governmental funding in certain places of the world.

 

[Arbre]

Y'know, as a writer and artist, I do understand the value of intellectual property. And really I just sort of shake my head and sigh at people who say "I didn't TAKE anything, I just COPIED, so you didn't LOSE anything".

But there is something just as bad going on with the other side of this debate as well, and that is using the word "piracy" to explain or justify pretty much anything the game companies do not like, or want to do. If "Watch The Grass Grow 3: Extreme Grass Growing" only sells thirty-eight copies, it's not because it was a lousy game; it's because of PIRACY. If EA decides that, in order to play Bioshock 2, you have to call the company and verify your identity every time you start up the game, it's to eliminate PIRACY. If Nolan Bushnell wants to implant a chip in every gamer's head and monitor in real-time the games they're playing, it's because of PIRACY, and if you speak out against it then you are obviously in favor of PIRACY.

"Piracy" has become the monster under the bed in the gaming world, and while I certainly do not condone it nor offer any moralistic arguments in its favor, I am growing tired of it being used as some terrible, implacable enemy that all we "good gamers" must make ever-increasing sacrifices to defeat. So much is being said for and against the rights of games developers and publishers, but what about the rights of the people who legitimately pay for these games? Am I going to have to submit to a background check and sign a non-piracy affidavit to download an expansion pack for Spore? Why can't I simply pay for the game and play it?

Certainly, I can register my displeasure by simply not buying the games that apply these onerous restrictions, but what's the point when that lost sale will simply bring about another cry of "PIRACY"?

The temptation to equate this to a certain buzzword circulating in American politics these days is quite strong, but I shall resist!

Much true. I must confess, I didn't even read your last line before starting to reply to your post.
It's particularily funny how this situation mirrors economical and political problems faced by countries nowadays, and how the tongue in cheek arguments you present, which are rather close to the truth, are the exact same ones used against problems such as undereployment, violence, justice, terrorism, immigration, etc.

 

[Bridgetbracer]

Dejawesp i don't suppose you hold this same philosophy about cancer drugs, do you? I mean, the cancer drug companies work hard researching these drugs, and some people who just can't afford them end up going to people who manage to make or get their hands on the drugs at a much reduced price, i mean, people at cancer drug research companies could be losing their jobs!

I know the above statement is outlandish, but you replace the gamers with cancer patients, and the game companies with cancer drug manufacturers, and they would be lobbying for foreign drug manufacturers and shipments from those companies to the US to be banned, knowing full well people can't afford to buy their drugs, hoping to get -some- of them have enough life posessions to sell to be able to buy their drugs.


That is how corporations work, and how they treat people. Do i deserve to play your games for free regardless of what damage it does to your pocket? No not really.

Do i deserve to be ripped off to play your game? Fuck no.


There is a middle ground alot of people tread, its called 'download games, buy the ones that are really good and that i really enjoy'


It doesn't make them bad people.

 

[Dejawesp]

Do i deserve to be ripped off to play your game? Fuck no.

Fuck yes.

If I create a game and decide to sell it for $1000 a copy then you have 2 choices.

A: Buy the game
B: Don't buy the game

There are no other acceptable choices

You dont get to decide what is and is'nt a ripoff. Nor do you get to decide what a fair price for the game is and at what price it's perfectly cool for you to steal from me.

Dejawesp i don't suppose you hold this same philosophy about cancer drugs, do you? I mean, the cancer drug companies work hard researching these drugs, and some people who just can't afford them end up going to people who manage to make or get their hands on the drugs at a much reduced price, i mean, people at cancer drug research companies could be losing their jobs!

Legaly if a company does develope a cure for cancer then it's compleatly up to them what to do with it. How much of it they want to make and what price to charge.

Moraly it would be cruel of them to not atleast share how to make it.

But then you are comparing you stealing videogames for entertainment with a terminaly ill patient needing a cure for cancer which is just disgusting to begin with. Especialy for me where cancer has carved many paths short in the family bloodline.

 

[Samirat]

Piracy hurts the gaming industry, which leads them to drive prices up, which in turn leads to more piracy on the part of the consumer. It's a vicious cycle. Their are a few methods to stop this:

They can make beneficial to have bought the product than to have pirated it. Something like what Stardock does, where the support is only available to those who actually bought it.

They can make it so much of a hassle to pirate the software that it's not worth the effort. Adobe software and Steam are good examples of this, though, of course, piracy still occurs.

They can make it impossible to pirate the games, with something like this chip. And if there are no technical issues, I don't see what the problem is with it. Sure, if there are compatibility issues, this could be a problem, but otherwise, if the pirates don't find a way around it, it seems like a relatively good way to enforce a law that has never yet been completely possible to effect.

Short of finding some way of arresting the people who are breaking the law and harming an entire industry and its legitimate consumers based on purely selfish motives, this seems a good deterrent to pirates.

People have been getting away with piracy for so long that they've gotten used to it, come to expect their games free. Perhaps this will at least serve to jolt them out of their complacency.

 

[Samirat]

It doesn't make them bad people.

Why not? I mean sure, it's not like they're evil people, but what they're doing is bad. And they, like yourself, don't even recognize this. No game should be free. Whether it's good or bad, it costs money to make. People have been at this for so long that they actually believe what they are doing is okay.

 

[Nugoo]

The current system means you need to spend the better part of a day sifting through torrent pages and fileshare networks. Trying out multiple broken game downloads. Then you need to hunt down new cracks for each update and as for online play in most cases you can forget about it. Or go look for pirate servers where you can spend your time in the company of people as corrupted as you. Like you would deserve.

Geting games illegaly today and using them is a hassle. But had there not been effort made against pirating then it would have been like my first paragraph. Google the game name then one zip download later you would have a full game and the game industry would suffer greatly.

Although the anti-pirating effort will allways be weaker party. They have been keeping up the pace quite nicely as with every new generation it gets harder to get illegal games and more unfuriating to operate them

It takes much less than a day to find a pirated copy of a game on the Internet. In fact, it takes less time to find a game on the Internet than in a store.

The problem with 'I can't afford the game' is that it implicitly says 'I have the right to play this game'. And that is not true; you don't have the right to play the game. You only have it when you pay for it. And now I have been thinking (hey, this thread made me change a thought!) steep prices aren't much of an excuse either; there is always ebay and amazon to serve you.

Maybe that is worth looking into; why do people think they have this right to play, no matter what?

The argument isn't that we have an implicit right to play the game, it's that we aren't harming the industry by downloading a game we wouldn't have bought anyway. There's no doubt that it's a selfish argument, but I have doubts as to its inherent immorality.

 

[Girlysprite]

why would you download and play a game that you wouldn't have bought anyways? If its a sorta extended trial I could more or less understand, but something tells me that people pirating the games aren't playing them for just an hour...If a game is worth finishing, which means spending about 10 hours on it at least, it should be considered worth buying huh?

And really, if you wouldn't pay for it, do you really miss it that much if you couldn't pirate it either? With your argument, I think not, so there is still no real reason to download.

ps; if you want to check out a game, demo's do a ok job at it most of the time. Its what I use to judge games these days.

 

[Joeshie]

The problem is that more often than not these solutions only anger legitimate customers and do nothing to stop pirates.

You, like so many others, are completely ignorant on what these measures are trying to achieve. Here, I'll even make it in caps so that you guys can get it into your heads.

THE IDEA IS TO PREVENT NORMAL PEOPLE WHO AREN'T NORMALLY PIRATES FROM PIRATING THE GAME. IF YOU MAKE IT SLIGHTLY MORE DIFFICULT FOR PIRATING, THEN YOU DO ELIMINATE SOME PIRATING BECAUSE SOME PEOPLE WON'T FIND IT WORTH THEIR TIME TO PIRATE.

Also, Malygris hit the nail right on the head. Anyone who tries to justify piracy is most likely an idiot.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

You, like so many others, are completely ignorant on what these measures are trying to achieve.

The problem is Joeshie, that Marfoir is also right. Normal people don't need to pirate games because the pirates do all the work for them. A simple torrent file will get you most games; and the people who have bought them legally have to go through all the 'hardwired' rubbish that can actually damage their machine.

There's been a number of times I've grabbed a NO-CD crack, despite having the original CD; mainly because it constantly accesses it during play, which shreds my CD players shelf-life.

With Pirates doing all the work, all anti-piracy methods are just little Sudoku things to keep the pirates interested.

 

[Samirat]

This thread needs to be locked before the stupidity gets so dense a black hole forms in the region of the The Escapist's servers and sucks us all in.

What?? Just be quiet.

 

[Nugoo]

why would you download and play a game that you wouldn't have bought anyways? If its a sorta extended trial I could more or less understand, but something tells me that people pirating the games aren't playing them for just an hour...If a game is worth finishing, which means spending about 10 hours on it at least, it should be considered worth buying huh?

When you can't afford the game it doesn't matter how much you think it's worth.

 

[Cerebrus13]

If I download a game I never had intentions of buying, what has the industry lost?

 

[BobIsTheBob]

You, like so many others, are completely ignorant on what these measures are trying to achieve. Here, I'll even make it in caps so that you guys can get it into your heads.

THE IDEA IS TO PREVENT NORMAL PEOPLE WHO AREN'T NORMALLY PIRATES FROM PIRATING THE GAME. IF YOU MAKE IT SLIGHTLY MORE DIFFICULT FOR PIRATING, THEN YOU DO ELIMINATE SOME PIRATING BECAUSE SOME PEOPLE WON'T FIND IT WORTH THEIR TIME TO PIRATE.

Wow you're utterly gullible if you believe that horseshit.

If that's the idea, why would they need to keep making these increasingly insane forms of DRM? A simple CD check (like an older less nazi version of SecuROM, yes I know - boo, hiss, etc...) is impossible to defeat for most of the population. Sure, they can go and download cracks. Yeah you know what? "Normal" people are fucking clueless when it comes to cracking software and are even less knowledgable about where to get those things, so your argument falls apart right there. Further, if they get it from someone who's gone through the trouble of already cracking it you can bet they or whoever they got it from was beyond your definition of a 'normal' computer user. So, who are they targetting with these stupid DRM schemes? Certainly not the dumbass computer user next door, that's for sure (who's probably playing any games on a console anyway).

Honestly, this is a disturbing trend. And the number of sheep (Dejawesp) that are just fine with companies controlling their actions is just sickening. Seriously, if you feel that's fine, why not give up your civil liberties? It's not like us good people who are paying for our software have anything to fear right? The system is clearly infallible.

Those of you are arguing FOR piracy, especially on the grounds of "I can't afford it..." You really need to shut the fuck up. Seriously. Your arguments are invalid. Unless that software is necessary for you to live, you have NO reason to pirate it. NONE. As a software developer, I'm a little beyond disgusted by the rationalization people use to copy what they want without paying for said copy. Sure, if your sister is being held by the Russian Mafia and they're threatening to kill her if you don't download and play Quake 4 from beginning to end, I can condone that. But fuck, really now, when's THAT going to happen? See how stupid that is? That's how I feel when I read the rationale behind piracy. If you can't afford it, you can't afford it. Suck it up, we can't have everything we want in life. I mean fuck, I want to be rich, so I should just be able to print money off. If only...

For the person who said "what about buying from e-bay?" This is a good idea in theory, however thanks to asshole companies like 2K/Bioware/EA the idea of resale is going to die. If I use up my 3 activations and sell the game and the next guy buys it, are they going to activate the game for him? He's been informed he's a horrible pirate, and even though he's paid for his game, he must now phone whatever company (with long distance charges for a lot of people) to beg for permission to play. And it's up to the mouth breather on the other end to allow or deny... honestly, how can you NOT have a problem with that? That'd be like me selling my car and having to ask the dealer for permission to do so. Don't give me that "buying a license" bullshit, that's just another deflection to try and get away with trying to kill the 2nd hand business. This is the current form of SecuROM copy protection that's going to be rammed into the ass of Spore and is already festering the PC version of Mass Effect.

When the companies become just as immoral/illegal (EULAs are so filled with invalid clauses they should be completely outlawed) as the pirates, then they become just as much a villian as the pirates. When it comes to ridiculous forms of DRM, keep this in mind: TWO WRONGS A RIGHT DOES NOT MAKE.

Frankly I can't wait for the day when EA/Bioware/2K/Rockstar/etc... say "fuck it" and leave the PC gaming industry. We'll finally be free of the same old shit that's been clogging up the system for a very long time.

This sums things up better than I ever could. [http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2008/5/9/]