You don't think devs use sales figures when negotiating contracts with publishers? You don't think in-house devs get more resources based on sales figures? You don't think there's one person who would have bought a game they pirated if they couldn't pirate it?phoenix352 said:now the most used argument against piracy is "it hurts the developer" this is just false information.
piracy whole heartily helps the dev by making the game and the dev a household name.
the fact that people play it use the product for free is just a bit of a downside emotionally not financially since non of those were lost sales or lost value, NON OF THEM.
SecondPrize said:You don't think devs use sales figures when negotiating contracts with publishers? You don't think in-house devs get more resources based on sales figures? You don't think there's one person who would have bought a game they pirated if they couldn't pirate it?phoenix352 said:now the most used argument against piracy is "it hurts the developer" this is just false information.
piracy whole heartily helps the dev by making the game and the dev a household name.
the fact that people play it use the product for free is just a bit of a downside emotionally not financially since non of those were lost sales or lost value, NON OF THEM.
Wait. You want to make some vague, undefined "other" to collectively, hive-mind-like, even, "admit" something?lacktheknack said:Maybe pirates should stop trying to depict themselves as free market knights (they're anything but) or even the trampled common folk (they lost that status once they started getting everything for free) and just admit that they've helped cause some crappy stuff to happen because they're freaking greedy. Everyone knows it, they just don't like to admit it.
JazzJack2 said:But piracy doesn't make developers lose money, in fact it does the opposite, devs gain money from piracy.
I get why you want to believe this stuff but it's just not true.Entitled said:I agree with that, but this is only true because there ARE those 5-10% percent of players who buy it after hearing from it through piracy, because they feel the responsibility to support the developers.
You would have to make a case for it to be closed.phoenix352 said:SecondPrize said:You don't think devs use sales figures when negotiating contracts with publishers? You don't think in-house devs get more resources based on sales figures? You don't think there's one person who would have bought a game they pirated if they couldn't pirate it?phoenix352 said:now the most used argument against piracy is "it hurts the developer" this is just false information.
piracy whole heartily helps the dev by making the game and the dev a household name.
the fact that people play it use the product for free is just a bit of a downside emotionally not financially since non of those were lost sales or lost value, NON OF THEM.
Do i think they use sales figures? yes i do.
they use the actual game sales aka people who bought retail\ digital.
do i think they include theoretical sales? hell no.
pirated copy's are not lost sales, case closed.
you cant make business decisions from vague estimates and theoretical sales.
do i personally think out of those people who pirate some one would have bought a copy if he didn't have the option?
of curse some would , just like out of the people who pirate there are those who still buy copies afterwards.
those are just maybes and they work both ways.
you should not be making contracts using estimated numbers based on maybes.
if that's how the industry does business then they have only themselves to blame for it , piracy is still not a cause.
While not specifically at the rise of bittorrent, (which didn't really increase the amount of piracy either just made it more comfortable), but generally with the spread of internet usage in general, game profits did rise pretty rapidly, along with most other entertainment media.JemJar said:I get why you want to believe this stuff but it's just not true.
If it were, the advent of piracy and bittorrent and all that stuff would have seen sales rise exponentially, and it's not the case, certainly not for PC developers.
The funny thing is, we can't really tell. The stories about piracy lsing a few sales, where someone obviously planned to buy a game but decided against it because there was piratebay, are just as anectdotal as the ones about someone wanting to buy it thanks to piracy. Only the above charts are certain. Entertainment is not dying, it's growing like crazy.JemJar said:I do "get" that given that we live in a world of piracy, perhaps piracy does contribute a few sales. But it's like smashing a dam with a wrecking ball - no water can flow through the wrecking ball either, but it's hardly blocking the river any more.
The problem with picking specific games that were killed by piracy, is that they always boil down to a Single Cause Fallacy.JemJar said:Oh, and for a game killed by piracy, NHL Eastside Hockey Manager, made by Sports Interactive, now SI Games. I'm surprised by the line on Wikipedia that "most feel" that it was a lack of advertising issue - that certainly wasn't the going opinion at the time.
It doesn't, the pirated version is a pre-modified version they uploaded to bittorent sites to amuse themselves, actual paying customers get a completely different version.Sgt. Sykes said:Hehe okay I admit this is funny.
But I'd like to know how the game knows it's pirated.
A proper single-player game should never know that.
If it does, it's DRM. If it's DRM, it's obtrusive. If it's obtrusive, some of the legal customers will circumvent it.
What's the in-game scenario when your customers need to crack the game in order to play it? What happens to the devs then?
Yeah.SecondPrize said:I don't like anyone in this story. I believe pirates are pulling us closer to a f2p future (not in a good way), but there isn't anything worse than developers who straight up rip off their competitors. Don't buy this game to show support for developers hit by piracy. Buy Game Dev Story to show support for the above, as well as support for devs who see their products cloned by douches like these.
i made my argument about that in my original post~SecondPrize said:You would have to make a case for it to be closed.phoenix352 said:SecondPrize said:You don't think devs use sales figures when negotiating contracts with publishers? You don't think in-house devs get more resources based on sales figures? You don't think there's one person who would have bought a game they pirated if they couldn't pirate it?phoenix352 said:now the most used argument against piracy is "it hurts the developer" this is just false information.
piracy whole heartily helps the dev by making the game and the dev a household name.
the fact that people play it use the product for free is just a bit of a downside emotionally not financially since non of those were lost sales or lost value, NON OF THEM.
Do i think they use sales figures? yes i do.
they use the actual game sales aka people who bought retail\ digital.
do i think they include theoretical sales? hell no.
pirated copy's are not lost sales, case closed.
you cant make business decisions from vague estimates and theoretical sales.
do i personally think out of those people who pirate some one would have bought a copy if he didn't have the option?
of curse some would , just like out of the people who pirate there are those who still buy copies afterwards.
those are just maybes and they work both ways.
you should not be making contracts using estimated numbers based on maybes.
if that's how the industry does business then they have only themselves to blame for it , piracy is still not a cause.
You yourself admitted that some pirates would have purchased a copy if piracy was unavailable. THERE'S YOUR LOST SALE RIGHT THERE. Not theoretical, an actual 1 to add to the list of sales.
I'm not saying they deserve a working game. For clarification I meant that the "message" was being delivered in a ham fisted manner. In the altered torrent version every company will go bust because of piracy 100% of the time no matter what. That isn't what happens in real life, a pirated copy doesn't automatically mean a lost sale.dmase said:Heavy handed? Ending up fucking most of the people that play your game because of some pirates is heavy handed. These people basically went to go steal this company's product their version deserves to be bricked in my opinion.Ilikemilkshake said:It's a bit heavy handed but still kind of funny, especially that the pirates then went on the forums and started complaining.
OP: wow that is impressive. Never though about it until now but companies could post up virus filled games all over torrent sites to give the pirates their just deserts... they can call it scurvy.
No, I mean that in a general sense. What if there is no NEED for sob stories, because piracy is not evil?J Tyran said:Well then at least someone is actually considering there is no real reason for piracy other than the fact that some people simply do not want to pay, which is true because cases like this prove all of the sob stories (great description btw) are bullshit.
Not wanting to pay someone for something they created is wrong, no other way around it. Sure its not the same as theft but its taking something for nothing and not giving someone their fair due, anyone trying to justify it needs to realign their morals. Putting self entitlement ahead of fair due is one thing when it comes to big publishers that make billions but its a another when it comes to hard working devs that rely on their income for their bread and butter.
At the end of the day I have no personal ax to grind over piracy, I have no issues with some types of piracy either. Like when people pirate a TV show or film that for whatever reason had restricted availability in their region but they later buy the BD/DVD. Same goes for when publishers go out of their way to avoid selling or supporting a game outside of certain countries, thats pants on head retarded and its their own fault if it gets copied.
I just wish the train of bullshit excuses would go away when people simply want a product without paying for it.
Are you kidding? I don't have calculations. I'm talking about sales figures. Your pirate who goes on to buy the game adds 1 to the total sales figure. He is accounted for. I'm not sure where you came up with the idea that my 'calculations' would not account for this. My pirate who would have purchased the game if not for piracy does not add 1 to the sales figure. We agreed that developers use these sales figures in their relations with publishers. Therefore, the person who pirates the game when he would have purchased it instead is doing harm to the developer in not adding to the sales figure. He would have purchased it. He did not because piracy exists. The developer has a weaker position in their next negotiation because of this person.phoenix352 said:i made my argument about that in my original post~SecondPrize said:You would have to make a case for it to be closed.phoenix352 said:SecondPrize said:You don't think devs use sales figures when negotiating contracts with publishers? You don't think in-house devs get more resources based on sales figures? You don't think there's one person who would have bought a game they pirated if they couldn't pirate it?phoenix352 said:now the most used argument against piracy is "it hurts the developer" this is just false information.
piracy whole heartily helps the dev by making the game and the dev a household name.
the fact that people play it use the product for free is just a bit of a downside emotionally not financially since non of those were lost sales or lost value, NON OF THEM.
Do i think they use sales figures? yes i do.
they use the actual game sales aka people who bought retail\ digital.
do i think they include theoretical sales? hell no.
pirated copy's are not lost sales, case closed.
you cant make business decisions from vague estimates and theoretical sales.
do i personally think out of those people who pirate some one would have bought a copy if he didn't have the option?
of curse some would , just like out of the people who pirate there are those who still buy copies afterwards.
those are just maybes and they work both ways.
you should not be making contracts using estimated numbers based on maybes.
if that's how the industry does business then they have only themselves to blame for it , piracy is still not a cause.
You yourself admitted that some pirates would have purchased a copy if piracy was unavailable. THERE'S YOUR LOST SALE RIGHT THERE. Not theoretical, an actual 1 to add to the list of sales.
yeah i admitted that i THINK there would be some who would pay for that game.
but you cant count sales based on THOUGHT , the only way for you to count that as a lost sale would be if you had the knowledge that some of those people would 100% buy that game if the piracy option was not available but you cant know that and that's the whole point. there's no way to get accurate numbers on any of this meaning you count lost sales on theoretical information.
on that note what do you then say to a pirate that bought that same game he pirated later ?
based on your calculations that's still a "lost sale" in the sales figures even if the pirate got it legit.
the publisher only sees that a new copy was sold but doesn't see less pirated copy's.
and then just claims like the rest that even tho sales were high piracy " crippled" half of it or some other nonsense like that.
its inherently a flawed system and should not be used.