Pirates accidentally preserving gaming history?

[DigitalAtlas]

They will just release hard copies of the games as compilations. There is also already emulators on the PC as well. In fact you can game all the way up to the last gen with emulators although they haven't worked out all the kinks yet with the last gen. This is what emulators and these compilations are for.

Hard copies of Double Fine and Twisted Pixel games aren't coming. Beyond Good and Evil HD is staying digital. This is just fact.

I know all about emulators. It was the DC emulator's lack of cooperation that made me buy an actual DC. Otherwise, I wouldn't have been able to play FFVI without the SNES emulator. And the dolphin emulator is what got me hyped for Last Story's (hopeful) eventual release. Emulators are God-sends, but it'll be a long time before we get a proper emulator for Flower.

 

[ScoopMeister]

Nostalgia overload!

I agree by the way. But who knows? There will most likely be new iterations of Halo and CoD in twenty years time (CoD definitely).

 

[Xanthious]

I know that video game history up to the point of the PSX is preserved damn near perfectly thanks to emulation. Hell I'm pretty sure you can store every console game ever made up through the NES on a simple CD. With a little bit of work a person could throw a PC or laptop inside a arcade cabinet and literally have a machine that will play damn near every console and arcade game up through the PSX.

If it weren't for emulation most of the latter part of video game history would be out of reach to most people. Thanks to emulation though anyone with even the smallest amount of technical know how and somewhat loose morals can experience any point in video games past with a click of the mouse.

Now in a perfect world these seedy collections of console games would instead be preserved in nice shiny reasonably priced collections and made available by the companies that brought them to us originally. However, that is far from the case and that task has fallen to a devoted group of hobbyists that operate in a somewhat legally grey area and do a pretty impressive job of it.

 

[MelasZepheos_v1legacy]

snip.

Except if they wait till the servers are closed, we lose the arcade titles. Yep, they'll be history then, and they'll be history in the Smithsonian exhibit as well as our memories, but to the next generation? They'll be non-existent.

Making back-ups now of DLC and Arcade titles now is the only way to do it.

While I do not support piracy of current games, getting backups up on the net as soon as possible is really the only counter to time for the digital world.

If someone pirates a game to demo it, I have no issue. Demo's should exist for every game. But if they legitimately pirate something they like and spend a lot of time on, then it turns into a crime against the industry they claim to love.

Then again, pirates who play their game still get their stats logged in. Meaning, even if we all pirated DNF and played it for almost a hundred hours, it would still have a likely chance at a sequel even though it hardly made any money.

I suppose the question here is: Do the ends justify the means? In which case, I say that they do. Developers and publishers do not suffer too greatly from the select few who do pirate while history is preserved for all eternity.

I say that's a fair trade for Stacking, Braid, and Cave Story Wii to be playable to all generations.

I can agree about it being necessary to make the backups now before the chance is lost, because that's basically why all the examples I listed are still available, because they were pirated while they were around.

The problem I have is that it almost seems like this argument is trying to justify what pirates are doing now by saying that 'it'll preserve gaming for the future.' I just don't buy it. If they were truly altruistic about this then they'd make the copies now and not distribute them until after the games are no longer available, but instead it's all about this ridiculously immature 'sticking it to the man' crossed with the complete entitlement complex which pirates seem to have.

You don't need pirates in this equation to make it work, all you need are people who make a few backups for eventual release.

I would say that the ends don't justify the means here. The means could be just people thinking longterm, but instead they are people who are actively damaging the industry, and that cannot be justified whatever the ends. A little digging into the online releases of Ultima, Zorc etc reveals people who did it geuinely because they were thinking of the community and preserving the games. If you find a downloadable version of some games they might even have a little text box somewhere saying 'This game has been released so that gamers everwhere can experience it' (when I downloaded one of the Ultima games a while back I had that message included in the manual). What pirates are doing isn't for the good of the community and gaming's history, it's because of entitlement and the belief that gamers 'deserve' games for some unknown reason.

To try and sum up in a less rambling manner, we don't need pirates for this, we don't need pirates for the industry in general, and the ends do not the justify using piracy to achieve them. Great works of art from every other medium have been lost to carelessness and malevolent intent and yet they continue to thrive so I don't see why preserving gaming is so necessary. If the choice was between no piracy, or losing huge chunks of gaming history, I'd take the loss of history to remove piracy.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

They will just release hard copies of the games as compilations. There is also already emulators on the PC as well. In fact you can game all the way up to the last gen with emulators although they haven't worked out all the kinks yet with the last gen. This is what emulators and these compilations are for.

Hard copies of Double Fine and Twisted Pixel games aren't coming. Beyond Good and Evil HD is staying digital. This is just fact.

I know all about emulators. It was the DC emulator's lack of cooperation that made me buy an actual DC. Otherwise, I wouldn't have been able to play FFVI without the SNES emulator. And the dolphin emulator is what got me hyped for Last Story's (hopeful) eventual release. Emulators are God-sends, but it'll be a long time before we get a proper emulator for Flower.

No it is not fact. As soon as they want or need money they will be able to re-release them as a hard copy. Why do you think bands have so many "last" tours? As I said about emulators last gen's emulators are not perfect but they are still being worked on. Yes it will be a long time but you also aren't taking into account that in a new gen they may just move the shop. So would still have access to all the old XBLA and PSN titles just in a new shop. If there is a market and money to be made then money they will make.

Also you don't need a DC emulator for FFVI as PS1 emulator with FFVI works just fine thank you very much. I have nor problems running my PS1 games on it. You just need to shop around for emulators.

 

[CrashBang]

Wouldn't releasing hard copies of compilations of these downloadable games and DLC solve this problem?

And this is why I prefer hard copies of everything. You can lose data, run out of hard drive space, but you can always find more shelf space

A. Fucking. Men.

I almost hate that games can be released digitally due to how we can all lose our games at any second for ticking off the wrong people on the wrong day. But they can't take away the cases on my shelves!

Yes! Exactly! Hard copies of anything are always better. DC are thinking about releasing e-books of their upcoming series' but like hell if I'm gonna be buying them, nothing beats reading an actual book. What if it gets deleted or corrupted? Or what if my laptop breaks? That's everything gone in a Flash (lol, pun)!

 

[DigitalAtlas]

They will just release hard copies of the games as compilations. There is also already emulators on the PC as well. In fact you can game all the way up to the last gen with emulators although they haven't worked out all the kinks yet with the last gen. This is what emulators and these compilations are for.

Hard copies of Double Fine and Twisted Pixel games aren't coming. Beyond Good and Evil HD is staying digital. This is just fact.

I know all about emulators. It was the DC emulator's lack of cooperation that made me buy an actual DC. Otherwise, I wouldn't have been able to play FFVI without the SNES emulator. And the dolphin emulator is what got me hyped for Last Story's (hopeful) eventual release. Emulators are God-sends, but it'll be a long time before we get a proper emulator for Flower.

No it is not fact. As soon as they want or need money they will be able to re-release them as a hard copy. Why do you think bands have so many "last" tours? As I said about emulators last gen's emulators are not perfect but they are still being worked on. Yes it will be a long time but you also aren't taking into account that in a new gen they may just move the shop. So would still have access to all the old XBLA and PSN titles just in a new shop. If there is a market and money to be made then money they will make.

Also you don't need a DC emulator for FFVI as PS1 emulator with FFVI works just fine thank you very much. I have nor problems running my PS1 games on it. You just need to shop around for emulators.

>DC emulator for FFVI

....What? DC=Dreamcast. I said SNES, good sir. But thanks for trying to one-up me, it didn't go well.

I just don't see games spawning in the digital world making it in the AAA-epic physical copy world. That's like Angry Birds being released in a GameStop for PS3. Doesn't make any sense.

I mean, somethings could be carried, but it seems the VC is being ignored entirely for the transfer from Wii to WiiU. Seeing how important backwards compatibility is to Microsoft and Sony, I don't see these games moving. However, it would be easier for them than Nintendo.

 

[BlackSaint09]

Just smiling at this thread here with a little happyness in me.

 

[Spencer Petersen]

Well you don't need to pirate a game to bypass server checks and DRM, all you need is someone who knows how to write a crack, which on its own I think is still legal.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

They will just release hard copies of the games as compilations. There is also already emulators on the PC as well. In fact you can game all the way up to the last gen with emulators although they haven't worked out all the kinks yet with the last gen. This is what emulators and these compilations are for.

Hard copies of Double Fine and Twisted Pixel games aren't coming. Beyond Good and Evil HD is staying digital. This is just fact.

I know all about emulators. It was the DC emulator's lack of cooperation that made me buy an actual DC. Otherwise, I wouldn't have been able to play FFVI without the SNES emulator. And the dolphin emulator is what got me hyped for Last Story's (hopeful) eventual release. Emulators are God-sends, but it'll be a long time before we get a proper emulator for Flower.

No it is not fact. As soon as they want or need money they will be able to re-release them as a hard copy. Why do you think bands have so many "last" tours? As I said about emulators last gen's emulators are not perfect but they are still being worked on. Yes it will be a long time but you also aren't taking into account that in a new gen they may just move the shop. So would still have access to all the old XBLA and PSN titles just in a new shop. If there is a market and money to be made then money they will make.

Also you don't need a DC emulator for FFVI as PS1 emulator with FFVI works just fine thank you very much. I have nor problems running my PS1 games on it. You just need to shop around for emulators.

>DC emulator for FFVI

....What? DC=Dreamcast. I said SNES, good sir. But thanks for trying to one-up me, it didn't go well.

I just don't see games spawning in the digital world making it in the AAA-epic physical copy world. That's like Angry Birds being released in a GameStop for PS3. Doesn't make any sense.

I mean, somethings could be carried, but it seems the VC is being ignored entirely for the transfer from Wii to WiiU. Seeing how important backwards compatibility is to Microsoft and Sony, I don't see these games moving. However, it would be easier for them than Nintendo.

Well a massive compilation of games like Angry Birds could always happen whether it is a phsycial copy or another digital re-release. We will have to see about the VC they could easily transfer over things over time but the VC was never that great anyway since when you lost something you had to redownload it as it wasn't tied to an account. If there is backlash they will do something.

From the way you phrased it you sounded like you were using a Dreamcast for FFVI.

 

[Claytor Frits]

Hard copies of games and arcade games are great, but again you run into disc rot or just general degrading. sadly I have gone through 2 copies of FF7 and FF9 for that alone. and I'm not buying a digital copy just to have it go away one day. I support pirating on a few levels, but being able to torrent the complete NES collection and to replay some of the games from my childhood I love, and keeping them on my external means more to me then having the 400+ cartridges id have to have shelving for, not to mention all the other systems from games I love or collections I desire, I would need a 3 bedroom house just for myself.

 

[Enkidu88]

By the time we get around to the Xbox market shutting down, the video game companies will have already perfected their Assault Droid DRM scheme.

That's right! A completely free assault droid just for you!

And if you even think about pirating, it will blow a hole in your chest six inches wide. Modding your console will result in it removing your eyes with spoons, and cheating will be dealt with by electrodes attached to your most delicate parts channeling searing plasma.

But you know what?

For an assault droid hanging around the house, I might be willing to put up with that.

 

[Sikachu]

Be wary of writing anything positive about piracy on The Escapist forum - it's an organ for expanding the revenues of the games industry rather than free and rational discourse and you could easily face mod wrath.

For my part I think that there should be a ten year limit on copyright infringement in videogames, and thereafter old games should have their sources opened for the good of the community. I think this is actually true for software in general, as restricting that information for longer doesn't doesn't really provide much in the way of extra incentive to innovate.

 

[Vault101]

They will just be rereleased throughout the ages. Evil businessman and corporations will cynically take our money again and again. The worst part is that we'll probably never call BS on it.

what? buying a product for a price is...well usually the done thing, I dont see games as any different

why shoudl we get them for free?

 

[veloper]

The multiplayer experience of an old game is lost to world anyway, without a big community.

Old singleplayer game history will always remain accessible through emulation on the PC (kinda not legal, but meh).

 

[WilliamRLBaker]

It goes away? no game data doesn't go away and neither does dlc...Microsoft and developers hold the key to those and they are kept we could see them again one day.
Pirates aren't the ones keeping this stuff secure others whom own the property are...

 

[Dapz]

*Reads*

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I guess.

I think piracy is forever going to be a double-edged sword. In its favour are all the points made here, and against it is the devastating amounts of money it can cost game companies. Some, like EA or Activision are never gonna have anything to worry about, but when I see people pirating indie games like Briad, it's kinda depressing. The arguments on each side are both very strong, and neither point is gonna go away/become invalid anytime soon so I doubt the piracy argument will ever truly be resolved.

 

[Pink Gregory]

Be wary of writing anything positive about piracy on The Escapist forum - it's an organ for expanding the revenues of the games industry rather than free and rational discourse and you could easily face mod wrath.

For my part I think that there should be a ten year limit on copyright infringement in videogames, and thereafter old games should have their sources opened for the good of the community. I think this is actually true for software in general, as restricting that information for longer doesn't doesn't really provide much in the way of extra incentive to innovate.

Isn't that how copyrighted works go into public domain, a number of years after the copyright owner's death?
of course, difficult to quantify with games, seeing as so many work on them...

 

[The Unworthy Gentleman]

Wouldn't releasing hard copies of compilations of these downloadable games and DLC solve this problem?

You'd think so, but they would charge for these compilations and that's the very problem. People who've bought things as a download will eventually be screwed over and won't be able to redownload something that they've already paid for.

OT: It's one of the few upsides that piracy has for the industry. However, there should be an actual solution to this provided by the service you used to get the games that you've paid for. The only way to solve this is to use account continuity and then allow users to log in and redownload games. You would also need to make it possible to have these games transferable otherwise you're left with games you can't play. I think this xkcd comic highlights the issue well:

NOTE: It should be made clear that I in no way am an advocate of piracy. I merely say that downloadable content and games should be available after the service is taken offline, currently the only way to get them is through pirating and it must change.