So DRM doesn't stop piracy... what do you think developers should do instead?

[Petromir]

There is the rule of, "No legitimate customer can ever be inconvenienced in a significant way". That's a great start. The issue here is that it is a baby step: Saying that an approach is acceptable is an act of cynicism on our part, because we already know that DRM will never DO anything. We are just trying to make publishers asinine choices not hurt us. What would help is different. For this, we need to realize that positive reinforcement is more effective at changing behavior then punishment. Devs need to start including in games more things which make legit customers lives easier. Mass Effect 2 (And project $10 in general) is one of the best things ive seen so far: Whereas a Pirate would have to go without the new, frequently updated content, or pirate the content separately each time, a legit player will just get it. It won't stop piracy, but it will make just buying the game far more desirable.

I think alot of the DRM issues arent the people putting them there going f**k the consumer. Its often them not really thinking about how much difficulty the DRM will cause.

Plus not all the problems with even the bad DRM choices are entirely the games companies faults. You could cream at least a 3rd of the rage off the ubi DRM in the open days if the servers hadnt been hacked.

 

[Skarvig]

So just wait for them to come on sales, so what your not getting the game as it releases, you can still keepn up a steady stream of recent games on things like steam, d2d, and impulse sales, just lagging 3-8 months behind. Ocassionally you get brand new shit in the deals.

Thanks for giving me advice on something I didn't asked for. Seriously I said I buy things in sales or collections. Thanks for saying what I just said, then?

Anyhow, making games cheaper would make more people just buy the game instead of doing something they can get arrested for.
And making DRM harder is what the cracking scene wants. They do this because there is some kind of competition in it. I mean who wouldn't want to be the guy who beats the unbeatable DRM?

 

[tzimize]

NOTHING.

Instead of focusing on trying to fuck over the pirates, and inevitably hitting your legitimate customers with the fallout, give your legit customers incentives to hold on to the legit game. Things like including the soundtrack, appealing box art and booklets, bonuses for registered games, free DLC... etc. It's all good.

At the end of the day, no matter how horrible and complex your DRM is, it's a matter of time until it is reverse engineered and broken, and when that happens it usually turns out that the legit customers are paying money to have "additional malaware" and inconveniences that the people downloading it for free don't have to put up with. Then why pay?

Agree with everything. Also, the whole industry is wrong. They are selling an expensive product that I cannot possibly know I will like unless I play at least half of it (or the last 20% or so if judging by FF13 ). To ask customers to pay that much for something that they -might- like is madness.

I will in 99 out of 100 cases download before I buy. If the product is bad/doesnt live up to the commercials or trailers or whatever I will delete it and move on. If it is good, I will buy and the creators will enjoy my money for having lived up to their promises/created something worthwhile.

This is the same reason I seldom go to the cinema. I only go if I'm quite sure I will enjoy myself. I would for example NEVER have paid for the new Alice in Wonderland if I knew what a boring experience I would be left with...

As I see it the industry is just butthurt because its not as easy as it used to be to wrap a turd in gold and glitter and sell it as something other than a pile of shit.

 

[Peta Michalek]

Rofl, you think Blizzard has always been a big-name company? They were damn near broke a number of times. Their games were just as good, if not better, before WoW. Great games, no DRM.

Well back then all games in general had laughable DRM, so it's kind of an odd argument...

 

[Twilight_guy]

A short list of possible options:
1. Stop making games, cure the disease by killing the patient.
2. Start publicly executing pirates, Once they know that shit got real they will think twice.
3. Take the time that is usually used to develop a game to instead develop a virus that targets torrent sites.
4. Start producing products for a market that is not full of selfish assholes.
5. Continue to do what you're doing, because then you at least try to stop piracy with DRM.
6. Do nothing and pirated even more by less experiences malicious assholes.
7. Sell stuff on Steam (assuming that it's not single player).
8. None of the above.
9. All of the below.

 

[TheDoctor455]

Since it has been proven over and over again that it simply doesn't work, then it should be scrapped, leaving more money to make the actual game better.

 

[Pyotr Romanov]

I just thought of something... Couldn't they just put huge piles of useless data on the disk that pirates would have to download so it takes them a load of time before they can even install the game? If done correctly, by making it, for example, a necessity for installation, you could make sure the pirates don't just download the rest of the files and leave your extra useless stuff untouched.

This is probably a stupid idea, I´m just typing along as I think.
... It would probably work if the pc were to use bluray, because they could fill the whole damn disk with the useless data. No pirate would ever download a 50gb file, now would they?

 

[Reg5879]

Let the Pirates win, they ain't gonna stop them.

 

[Onyx Oblivion]

I am so depressed that when I google a game name, like Morrowind, one of the search suggestions is "Morrowind torrent". Right up there with mods, cheats, wiki, walkthrough, and the other major suggestions.

Why would you buy morrowind? Its not like bethesda is still selling that game. Buying copies of it anywhere wouldn't give a penny to bethesda.

Because it's on Steam?

 

[Retardinator]

Goodies! That's what. That and limited editions, collector's editions, director's cuts and all that. Also, free DLC - that's why Valve rules. Steam isn't really that great of a DRM but it adds all the extra features that makes it worthwhile. (Not worth an hour of waiting to play, though)

 

[Phoenixlight]

Digital Rights Management is a broad term that includes many different anti-piracy methods and it does generally work. It would be nice though if new games could come down in price to £20.00 and have a demo to let you see if you like it or not.

 

[Lord Honk]

meh, i still think that just NOT using DRM would increase sales xD if you've got a good game (like i hear assassins creed 2 might be) then don't shoo away the potential customers with shitty DRM. I don't pirate games, but i also don't buy games that bog down my experience with copy-protection that seems to trust me less just BECAUSE i bought it.
"Hey, you entered a 16 character key, registered an account that holds your personal data that is VITAL for the game to work, AND you let us check the game version on startup... meh, that ain't enough. We want to know exactly what, where and when you're doing. Sincerely, Ubi/EA/etc"
When I buy a game, i BUY it. i don't rent it, i pay for the privilege of playing the game at my leisure.
now look at me rambling again xD

tl;dr: no drm -> less people annoyed --> more people buy game.

ps: isn't sassins creed cracked now? does that mean that ubi will take out the DRM? pretty please?

 

[Carnagath]

How about developers stop being crooks? I don't like pirating games, it's too much of a hassle and I love my game boxes. I buy Fallout 3 for the PS3, play the hell out of it, amazing game. Then they release the GOTY, I gift my FO3 to a friend and I buy the GOTY, which is a broken piece of shit, everything loads dreadfully slow and it freezes the console every 10 minutes of gameplay. I wait, what, 8 months for a patch, SOME indication that they are working on this. Nothing. Does Bethesda now expect me to ever pay money for any of their games again? With a straight face? I will pirate everything they make on the off chance that it might be playable and, even if it is, I won't pay for it out of spite. Fuck them.

 

[Highlandheadbanger]

I recommend the Dethklok anti-piracy method: global tracking of online downloads and usage of SWAT-like abduction tactics to physically take-down online piracy.

That or we could just stop making games and music all together: cure the disease by killing the patients.

Then again we could just find another way to stop piracy less drastic or encourage Pirates* to grow up and pay a fair price for games like an adult.

*I refer to "Pirates" the same way on refers to the same way the stupid refer to "Mafia thugs" as "Warriors" (I'm looking at you Spike!). You're not making a stand for freedom or beating the Corporations from cheating you, you just a pussy with an underdeveloped Ego, stuck in the perversion of the Id.

 

[vfn4i83]

If they just make better games; games that had the feel and look of a finished and polish real game, I'll bet they will sell way more for longer.

I moving to Linux very soon, games that dont run there or not comply with it security stability will be discarded at sight.

 

[Low Key]

They could do what Hollywood did in some cases, even though it didn't really work that well, which was to inject bad code into torrents so anyone downloading after that would pretty much be screwed. The pirates would have to upload the torrent again, and they the companies could inject the bad code all over again.

That way, no one but the pirates are getting the shaft.