Poll: Does pirating a game to test it make it okay?

[Silverfox99]

From my perspective it is never morally right to pirate a game. All of the justifications I have read about why it is acceptable to pirate a game are about personal convenience. Morals are not about making your life easier, they are about doing the right thing.

Piracy debates are not a moral issue, in the sense that one side claims that it's "moral" while the other side claims that it's immoral.

It's a debate about whether or not it should be a morral issue to begin with, where one side is claiming that it's immoral, while the other is claiming that it has nothing to do with morality, just practicality.

I'm yet to see any standing argument for why piracy is immoral to begin with. People are only bringing up variations of the same two, the argument from legality, and the argument from econmic necessity.

The latter obviouly doesn't apply in this case, when we are talking about people who are generally willing to spend their money in the gaming industry.

The former can be either obviously ridiculous, "Piracy is immoral because the glorious USA legal system says so", or hidden as a concern for Artist Rights (that only stretch as far as the legal system happens to guarantee them).

First, the op asking if piracy was OK. Many of the posters before me had stated that it is illegal so I didn't need to comment on if it was legal or not. That is why I posted on the moral aspect of the piracy.

Second, why is the moral aspect of piracy so hard for people to grasp? Do you own the game? Did you make it? The answer is an obvious no. The people who do own the game say that you can use it if you pay them. Doing anything but paying them before you play the game is immoral because the game is not your game. For me this doesn't have anything to do with what is legal. Its more about the golden rule for me. I don't want someone using my stuff without my permission. So I respect game companies (regardless of what I think about them) and don't use their game until I pay them (another way to look at it would be by paying you are getting the companies permission to use the game.) Its simple. I don't use what is not mine without getting permission first.

 

[crazyrabbits]

Some people are up on the times, and some people know when things just dont work as intended.

At the end of the day, it's $20 on Steam. It's not that big of a loss if it doesn't work.

If you want to try out a game and see how it looks/feels, go online and watch a playthrough. If you don't know if your specs are high enough, either drop the $20 and risk it or don't buy it. Not my problem if they don't have the cash.

As I said, "compatibility" is pretty much the worst excuse to pirate a game. I can understand if you want to down a backup copy/lost your original game/don't have the income, but saying, "I don't know if my laptop can play it" is a pretty damn weak excuse.

 

[White-Death]

Just tell your friend to watch a playthrough online and see if he likes the plot/has an impression on gameplay.

And a playthrough online helps determine if your computer has the system requirments to run it....how?

Makes me wonder how many escapists actually read the OT or just jump in to comment without knowing what they are talking about.

There are plenty of free utilities you can use online to find if your computer meets the specs for a product. It's not an issue.

I kind of assumed that utilities like that were common knowledge at this point (the OP didn't address it), but seeing your response, I guess some people aren't up with the times.

Only problem is that the utilities only work about half the time anyway, a few utilities say my friends laptop SHOULD run Sword of the Stars 2 and Sins of a Solar Empire, but can it? Fuuuck no.

Some people are up on the times, and some people know when things just dont work as intended.

My cock up when quoting,I forgot to separate my two points,one directed at specs not portraying the games stability and performance,and one directed at OP.
Sorry.

 

[Entitled]

But how many people can be expected to buy the game after they pirate it? I know all of us here at the Escapist are cherubs and would never pirate a game to get out of paying for it, but the rest of the world isn't that nice.

The main point: A lot of people aren't going to buy the game after they download it for free.

There is a logical fallacy in there. Of course, a number of pirates are freeloaders, but it is not the act of visiting Piratebay that turned them into freeloaders, but the very decision that they don't want to care about the industry, and their method of getting their games is just a consequence of that.

Let's look at it this way:

Person A buys one game every month, that he can afford. After he plays through them, he spends the rest of the month watching paint dry.

Person B pirates 3-4 games a month, then buys the one that he found the best, to reward it's creators.

Person C pirates 3-4 games a month, then happily that he spared money this way, spends it on various other luxories.

You are basically saying, that piracy itself is a temptation, and B will eventually turn into C, while A is safe because he has no addictive substance on his hard drive or in his browser memory.

I, on the other hand, say that A could just as easily turn into C as B could, the reason why neither of them does is because they have the same moral conviction, not because those bits of data being on your hard drive is so different from it being an arm's reach away on the Internet.

Besides, there are multiple studies suggesting that piarates ARE the biggest consumers of the legal media industry.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2010/05/file-sharers-are-content-industrys-largest-customers/

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/120147-Survey-Indicates-Music-Pirates-Are-Biggest-Music-Buyers

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2009/04/study-pirates-buy-tons-more-music-than-average-folks/

 

[Uratoh]

I pirated Skyrim to see if it'd run on my computer. It did, I had a ton of fun playing it, so I bought it. Then it went on sale on steam a couple weeks later...but that's another issue entirely XD.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Also, I know that pirating a game for testing should be last resort, but if it DOES come down to a last resort, should you go that far?

Is this question directed right at me or are you just asking in general?

Well, either way, here is my answer: Still no.

It's very easy to say "I just want to try this one out" and try it for a while...then you try it for a little while longer....then a little while longer....then you're done with the game and decide "You know, I didn't like it very much, I'm not going to buy it". If your system isn't very good, either you take the risk like everyone else or don't play PC games.

To me it ain't about the system requirements all that much. When it is though I found that System Requirements Lab isn't that reliable. It can give me some pointers but multiple times it told me I can't run games I could and I couldn't run games it said I could.

But more importantly, for me, is that these days I most often buy new IP's. And I don't have access to a rental option or a return policy when we're talking about PC games. Often a new game PC game costs between ?40 and ?50. It's quite a lot for a developer to ask me to spend that kind of money purely on faith especially in the current economic climate. In my opinion releasing a demo is nothing more than a basic costumer service.

That said, I haven't pirated a game in years. Can't even remember the last one.

 

[fenrizz]

At the end of the day, it's $20 on Steam. It's not that big of a loss if it doesn't work.

If you want to try out a game and see how it looks/feels, go online and watch a playthrough. If you don't know if your specs are high enough, either drop the $20 and risk it or don't buy it. Not my problem if they don't have the cash.

As I said, "compatibility" is pretty much the worst excuse to pirate a game. I can understand if you want to down a backup copy/lost your original game/don't have the income, but saying, "I don't know if my laptop can play it" is a pretty damn weak excuse.

Why waste $20 on something that does not work when it can be avoided?
That 's just silly.

Also, it's not about piracy.
In fact, he's not even pirating the game.
It's not a damn excuse, he's merely downloading it for the purpose of finding out whether or not the laptop in question can even play the game, something that seems to be unclear at this point in time.

To sum up:
download game to check if works, works, buys game, not piracy.

 

[Snotnarok]

It's perfectly okay when there's no demo. Here's why:

1- They lie about system requirements
2- Reviews aren't enough and often enough gameplay vids aren't either.
3- Publishers release shitty/unfinished games all the time, they try and cheat your cash? Cheat right back to see if it's crap or not.
4- See 1, they lie about system requirements ALL THE TIME.


Seriously if you disagree with me I don't care, I figure you think about it like this: pubs release unfinished games or extremely crappy ports all the time and they don't mind stealing your cash that way so why not TEST the damned game on your machine instead of trusting bastards in companies? If you feel okay with trusting people? That's fine but I've been burned and you know what? There's no refund for games you can't play.

I couldn't play BlackOps for 6 months, it took them 6 months to fix the problem with dual core machines. So I owned a game I couldn't play because they fucked up. Saints Row 2 & GTA IV are notoriously bad ports that take far more power than their system requirements state, and I'm sure they didn't make the effort to change the requirements of their GoTY editions.

If I didn't test games every so often I'd never have bought them because there's no way to know. FEAR, Fallout 3 & New Vegas, Deus EX:HR were all games I were on the fence with, I yoinked then I bought. And if you don't believe me I have them all on steam to view.

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

Is it okay to hotwire a car to "test drive" it? Or to read a book in the bookshop in its entirety before buying it?

I'm not equating piracy with theft, because it isn't (nor is it a crime in the UK, it's an offence), but illustrating the stupid question that the OP could have answered himself if he had thought for 30 seconds prior to writing the question.

 

[RubyT]

Piracy is the illegal DISTRIBUTION of copyrighted works.

As far as I know, nobody has yet been sued for/charged with just downloading something.

So if you just grab the game, it isn't piracy.

If you buy it afterwards, it isn't even ethically wrong.

I don't see why people try so hard to make life difficult...

 

[fenrizz]

Is it okay to hotwire a car to "test drive" it? Or to read a book in the bookshop in its entirety before buying it?

I'm not equating piracy with theft, because it isn't (nor is it a crime in the UK, it's an offence), but illustrating the stupid question that the OP could have answered himself if he had thought for 30 seconds prior to writing the question.

My god man, that is not what OP asked at all.

He was unsure if a laptop could run the game.
That is hardly the same as stealing a car or reading an entire book in a bookstore.
It's more like a colorblind person flipping through a book that is printed in green on red pages, to check if he could even read said book.

 

[The_Echo]

Legally, it's not OK. It never is.

Ethically, however... I think that pirating a game to test if it works or give yourself a demo when none are available are ethically sound reasons to pirate, so long as you actually do purchase the game if it works or you like it, and then delete the pirated copy if it doesn't work/you don't like it.

 

[Entitled]

First, the op asking if piracy was OK. Many of the posters before me had stated that it is illegal so I didn't need to comment on if it was legal or not. That is why I posted on the moral aspect of the piracy.

Second, why is the moral aspect of piracy so hard for people to grasp? Do you own the game? Did you make it? The answer is an obvious no. The people who do own the game say that you can use it if you pay them. Doing anything but paying them before you play the game is immoral because the game is not your game.

First of all, no, I didn't make it, but most often the IP holder didn't make it either. Did Disney make Star Wars? Because that's who is going to get paid if you by an Original Trilogy Blu-ray instead of pirating it.


This is what I called a hidden variation of the "argument from legality" at the end of my post. Because it boils down to "whoever owns the legal copyright is The Owner, and therefore it has a moral right to Owning It."

What we call IP, what copyright protects, is not property that someone "owns" in the same way as someone can own a physical property. It is protecting ideas, knowledge, data about how to do something.

How could a song, a story, or a game, be "owned" by a single person, while also selling ownership of copies of it to anyone who pays?

By your logic, the Tolkien Estate still owns the Lord of the Rings novels, and I'm taking away their property from them if I download it.

So who owns The Wonderful Wizard of Oz? L. Frank Baum's heirs? Am I still taking away property from them if I download it? How about Oliver Twist? Don Quijote? The Decameron? If they are truly owned by someone, then I assume they can be inherited in the will of their owners like any other property.

So what if Notch says that you are not allowed to make Let's play vidos of Minecraft? That you are not allowed to take screenshots by using his property? If Valve says that you are not allowed to quote from their Portal? That you are not allowed to sell your used copies?

You see, copyright isn't about protecting property, it's about giving a set of government-granted monopolies to IP holders, that allow them to charge for usage of their IP under certain reasonable conditions. It often involves arbitarily drawn lines, (90 years are still IP, but 91 are Public Domain, this video is Fair Use but that remix is not, using your copy together with too may people is illegal, but selling it to them is not).

You can claim that the artists' SHOULD have real ownership rights. That there shouldn't be Fair Use, no Public Doain, no consumer rights, no public rights, only total IP holder rights. So pirating OZ is just as bad as pirating anything else, and re-selling your Assassins' Creed game even if Ubisoft doesn't want you to, is immoral because you should always respect their wishes.

But if you believe that only legal Copyright Infringement can count as harming the artist's ownership, then you are still basically arguing from legality.

 

[Ilikemilkshake]

If your system isn't very good, either you take the risk like everyone else or don't play PC games.

"take a risk like everyone else?" Yeah because that's being a responsible consumer.

How many other types products do you spend $60 dollars on without knowing if you can actually use it? I'd wager not many because that would be really stupid. Yet with games there's a culture of pre-ordering and buying day one which leads to lots of people being disappointed.

I've never pirated myself (other than a few emulators for games 10-15 years old) but honestly between DRM, Online passes and a lack of demos.. Pirates frequently offer a better service than publishers so I find it hard to judge anyone who pirates.

 

[Entitled]

Is it okay... to read a book in the bookshop in its entirety before buying it?

Is it OK to read a newspaper that someone left on the table?

Is it OK with street musicians without tipping them a few bucks?

The difference between these is only that newspaper publishers can't make their papers self-destruct, and that street musicians can't lock down the entire street for their performance, while bookshops can throw you out.

But believe me, they would grab the opportunity with both hands if they could.

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

Is it OK to read a newspaper that someone left on the table?

Is it OK with street musicians without tipping them a few bucks?

Yes and Yes.

The answer is, look for a demo to run, or install it via your Steam account. Both are lawful solutions.

 

[Canadish]

Morally speaking, I can't see a reason why anyone would say it's wrong these days.

As other people have said, the publishers lie about system requirements for PC games way too often and demos are few and far between these days.

At the same time, I think it's only becoming more and more obvious how useless "professional" reviews are these days because they're all saddled with conflicting interests, so you can't really turn to them for an accurate picture of things.

If a game is new, there is no word of mouth yet.

DRM means lending a game is impossible, unlike with a book or movie.

So the only place you can turn is the marketing, which (I shouldn't need to say) is all spin, hype, and photo-shopped pictures that lie to you about what you're getting.


Technology is so anti-consumer these days that it's really the only one-up we have over these guys. It's the only way to get a fair and accurate picture.

The responsibility we all have to bear however is to not get greedy and choose not to pay. If the game is bad, uninstall that shit and never look back.
If it's good and you want to keep playing, give those guys your money.
So far the statistics are on our side, and show that pirating doesn't really dent sales.

To just write it off as stealing is just being way to heavy handed with it. I'm not really one to support that kind of moral absolutism.
Things are grey enough as they are now, and with M$ and the like are looking to try force interactive advertisements and DRM that scans users faces, it's going to become harder and harder to argue against users bypassing these invasions of privacy.

Good or ill, there are going to be some really interesting debates coming up in the next year or two about this topic.

 

[TelHybrid]

Legally, no.

Morally, grey area.

Personal view morally, yes.

 

[TwiZtah]

No it is not (although I've found my stance on piracy to be one of the harshest on this site...basically, it's never OK unless you literally can't get the item in question due to it's age).

There are sites that you can go to that will tell you these things.

http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/cyri (like this one! I'm sure there are others but this is the one I personally use)

When you buy a car, do you not test it first? I have bought more games since I started testing them through piracy, because now I know I like a game and am not as scared of buying it.

 

[Daygall65]

Actually sub-genre question that I feel IS relevant. Hypothetical situation.


I bought ME3 retail, on launch because I wanted to support that kind of game. 3 parts space saga???

HELL YA I Want to send the message *MAKE MORE STUFF LIKE THIS*

But because of the fiasco that is Origin, I left the game rapped with it's receipt taped to the front, and pirated the game full cracked.

Is that wrong also...?

OT: Though the idea of *pirate to test* might be valid... I have to say, it's to far on the dark grey spectrum of these "grey issues." For me to feel anywhere near confidant in saying that... It'd have to be either A: SO OLD you can't find it, or B: Region locked and you can't buy it without an expensive import.

Just my $0.2