Modern Warfare 2 Was 2009's Most Pirated Game

[elvor0]

Viva la revolution! Soon we will have dedicated servers, mwahahaha! *dons Cuban style hat*

Although they did state a little while back that they were going to add mod tools, which would mean they'd have to add dedicated servers in order to support the mods.

Mind you I STILL haven't bought it or pirated it, I'm supporting the cause. ARE YOU? *insert pointing finger here*

No, no, no...

One member of the team SUGGESTED they MIGHT release the modding tools. Just saying.

Ah hah. Curses.

 

[psychic psycho]

In my favourite article on piracy, Stardock's CEO explained that is where the industry is so fucked up...

http://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/post.aspx?postid=303512

Bare in mind this guy is the CEO of their company, a business man as well as a gamer, and their game Demigod was badly affected by pirates at first. This guy is saying the sorts of measure's Acti-ward used are pointless...

I've read this article before I had seen it in this thread. It's a good read and a very fresh take on piracy. I wish more companies would think like them.

 

[Doug]

In my favourite article on piracy, Stardock's CEO explained that is where the industry is so fucked up...

http://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/post.aspx?postid=303512

Bare in mind this guy is the CEO of their company, a business man as well as a gamer, and their game Demigod was badly affected by pirates at first. This guy is saying the sorts of measure's Acti-ward used are pointless...

I've read this article before I had seen it in this thread. It's a good read and a very fresh take on piracy. I wish more companies would think like them.

Indeedie. Sadly, most of them make conspiracy theorists look open minded. Aside from this article, there have been studies that have shown pirates actually BUY MORE than non-pirates (no, I don't know why either). And yet whenever stuff like this is shown to companies they seem to go 'Oh thats nice' and then blank it from their minds forever.

 

[Sevre]

Out of all the games that deserve it...this definitely does the most.

 

[Caliostro]

Oh dear... normally I don't intrude on other people's conversations, but this is classic? Morality is a social construct? No real bearing on the real world? Maybe when you pull your head out of Atlas shrugged and rejoin the real world, you'll realise how immature you sound.

The reason pirating is immoral: Activision and IW have spent literally millions of dollars and thousands of man hours to create what many agree to be one of the finest shooters of this generation. They ask that, before you play the game, you do your part and give them what is due for such an effort. They spent money making the game (an awful lot of it), it's only fair they ask you for money in order to play it.

Hell, that's not even anything to do with morality. That's basic economics/

Define morality.

Also to quote myself:

Here's some questions for you:

Can you tell me exactly how many people that pirated the game would have bought it if they hadn't managed to pirate it?
Can you tell me how many of those people could have afforded the game anyways?
Can you tell me exactly how many of those didn't buy it out of principle, but still downloaded it to "give it a chance", to see if it was worth buying anyways?
Can you tell me how many people actually bought the game after pirating it?
And how many people bought it through word of mouth after talking about it with someone who did pirate it?
Can you then tell me exactly the differential amount of money influenced by piracy?

Can you provide any of those values exactly? No, you can't. Neither can IW. You know why? Because "piracy" is a slippery slope that the whole business has conveniently turned into the #1 scapegoat. Hell, you can't even objectively tell whether it's more positive or negative.

Unless you can actually provide the above requested data your "basic economics" theory falls flat. Objectively there's no loss in a copy pirated. This is easily provable. The "loss" implied is subjective, wildly unprovable.

You should probably read the rest of the conversation before "intruding".

 

[silverbullet1989]

the fact that IW said the IW.Net on the pc version was very hard to hack if at all hackable, and that you couldnt mod it bla bla bla... im not at all supprised it was this years most pirated game, i knew it would be... As far as i know, only a pirated version can run a form of dedi servers...

If the xbox consumers where told there version of mw2 was not to support p2p but dedi servers, there wudnt be any complaints from them because dedi is better...

What i dont understand though is on the xbox version (which i do own) 4/5 games the host will leave, IW.Net will pick a crap host resulting in another host to be picked instantly... this was to solve the problem with the previous cod4 on the xbox where if the host dropped out the game ended... i never had any problems with that on cod4... so why does mw$ have such bad host problems...

 

[Xersues]

I've said it before and I'll say it again, people that pirate a game were not going to buy it anyway.

Consider it "clock-tower tax". These people that weren't going to buy the game now have some entertainment, to keep some of them from realizing their life sucks, they hate everything and everyone, climb a clock-tower and kill everyone in sight. That's worth the 500+ million they made right? Greedy bastards. And yes, I work for a software company, and don't care people pirate software I helped make, they sincerely weren't going to buy the damn thing. Who cares, penalizing the actual market with DRM is just BS!

MW2 is just garbage imo, its just not that different from the first one, which wasn't that great for me anyway.

Software is an infinite resource once it's been made. Its can be replicated by anyone, and redistributed. There is no "loss" only the absence of profit to the developer. Most "loss" that these companies pull out of there ass is speculation. This isn't bootleg copies being sold on the street, while it exists, they are not selling 4.1m copies.

 

[shotgun ko]

Well duh, MW2 was 2009's most popular game, so naturally it would be the most pirated.

 

[Lucane]

Wonder why people call it MewTwo?

Sorry if it's been said before but MewTwo= Mod~ern~warfare~Two becuase that shorthand version is speakable and is a pokemon.

Sounds silly. MW2 is shorter hahaha.

Wonder why people call it MewTwo?

Sorry if it's been said before but MewTwo= Mod~ern~warfare~Two becuase that shorthand version is speakable and is a pokemon.

But the Pokemon is considerably more awesome than the game.

Hey It wasn't my idea ^^; I just figured out what it ment.

 

[Pink_Pirate]

ok.. so the biggest selling game is the most pirated... won't this dispel the myth that pirating actually affects gaming sales? oh wait.. no .. the gaming companies wont let it go, they just can help seeing 4 million copies pirated.. and thinking about how much money they could have made.

 

[tmujir955]

You say Spore was the most Pirated game..I thought it was World Of Goo?

It was until they introduced that awesome sale.

 

[tkioz]

overhyped generic first person shooter sold well and was pirated a lot? slow news day?

 

[Doug]

Indeedie. Sadly, most of them make conspiracy theorists look open minded. Aside from this article, there have been studies that have shown pirates actually BUY MORE than non-pirates (no, I don't know why either). And yet whenever stuff like this is shown to companies they seem to go 'Oh thats nice' and then blank it from their minds forever.

I think because the desire to possess something is not necessarily identical as the desire to buy something. We buy things not just because we want them, but because we want the joy of buying it. The same enthusiasm that stokes the desire to possess also fans the flames of our desire to buy.

Humans are complex, contradictory creatures when it comes to economics. I mean, the guy who came up with this:

got rich off it. If people were willing to pay for someone to take a *rock* and put it in a box, maybe we shouldn't be so surprised to find out pirates also purchase more games legitimately.

Oh sweet jesus, people bought *pet* rocks? Actually paided actual money for rock, straw, and a cardboard box? I need to come up with something like that!

Also, awesome pic.

Anywho, I think I see what you mean, and it would explain why pirates are also the best customers overall...

 

[Royas]

[
Let's say I build an awesome gaming computer in my garage and I put it up for sale on Craigslist or whatever. I say I want $500 for it but I say I won't accept returns. Are you telling me that if you want that computer, but you aren't sure it's worth the price, it would be OK for you to steal it?

That's not a good comparison to piracy, though. There is a reason the crimes of theft and piracy are treated differently in most legal systems. With theft, I walk in and actually take your computer. You no longer have it, you can't sell it, you can't use it. It's GONE! You have just suffered an actual, real loss.

With piracy, I walk in and use a magical device to make a perfect copy of your computer, then leave with the copy. You still have your computer, you can still sell it, you can still use it. It just happens that now I have it also. You have suffered a theoretical loss, in that I might have purchased it had I not been able to copy it, but it's not as obvious nor as certain a loss as it would have been in a theft situation.

You can't compare the theft of physical objects with copying software, they are too different. It's not a good analogy. Oh, and no, of course it wouldn't be ok to take the computer. I don't see any reason to not copy it, though.