View from the Road: When I Was a Pirate

[Towowo2]

I don't think I'm going to feel bad about downloading something that is no longer produced or is excruciatingly rare.

Ahh...The R4.

My aunt bought one for her son. I'm tempted to steal it and then break it everytime I see it.

Just about anything in the world can be used to do something harmful to something else. Will you go around breaking those things?

 

[RMcD94]

I don't think I'm going to feel bad about downloading something that is no longer produced or is excruciatingly rare.

That's still pirating, and you should be sent to prison for being unethical.

Another point, where do you draw the line? Going by your arguments, it's still taking up the developers time/money, etc. Addressed generally. See last post for edits too.

 

[Towowo2]

You have some pretty twisted logic there. What am I supposed to do call up the publisher and ask pretty please if they can do reprint. Get real

 

[everfreeDragon]

I love how delusional pirates get using flawed logic to prove why they are in the right, it's so stupid. There are ways to try a game, as people have mentioned borrow a friends copy or check if it has a demo or something. You have no right to take something people have put time effort and money into and not give them something back for it.

 

[RMcD94]

I love how delusional pirates get using flawed logic to prove why they are in the right, it's so stupid. There are ways to try a game, as people have mentioned borrow a friends copy or check if it has a demo or something. You have no right to take something people have put time effort and money into and not give them something back for it.

Hold on. Let's say there isn't a demo, for whatever reason, lots of games don't have demos.

Therefore your friend has to buy it without trying it, so why should he do that? Also, if you say he can borrow from a friend, you do miss the point.

You have some pretty twisted logic there. What am I supposed to do call up the publisher and ask pretty please if they can do reprint. Get real

I do apologise, I thought the sarcasm was obvious there.

 

[likalaruku]

Picking up burned games in a Chinese electronics store doesn't sound much different from buying used game off Amazon. Sure, someone's getting paid; but the developers don't get a cent of it, & that's how the financially worseoff get their games.

The only people who pirate games are the ones willing to crack the gates, so if companies spend part of their profits "building a wall" that's going to be knocked down, it's reducing what they make. & a lack or DRM is not going to increase piracy, because it's one's concience & morals that prevented paying customers from pirating in the first place, not the threat of breakable DRM.

Since games & anime are probably the most pirated things, all I can say is; the best way to stop piracy is to go on strike & refuse to make anything new for years & years until illegal fan production drops significantly. But they won't, because it's not like you can just put your business in storage & pull it out at a latter date to resume as usual; you'd have to have a mass sacrifice of businesses to make that statement, whereas if you let the piracy continue, you're at least still making SOME money.

Look at what the availability of free manhwa in Korean libraries did for publishers; they were going bankrupt & were forced to cancel the series that everyone was reading for free en-masse.

This story reminds me of fansubs. See, I'm a Mineo Maya fan & I always buy legal copies of his stuff. Patalliro Saiyuki isn't available in English, so I spent $60 per region 2 DVD, which only have 3 episodes each on them. A year or less latter, they're available online for free with english subtitles. I was pissed, but those DVDs were goddamed expencive. Last I checked in the late 90s, it cost $40 American to buy a watermellon, a CD, or visit a movie theater in Japan.

There's also doujinshi as a form of Japanese piracy; fan comics people actually pay to read. The reverse is that the doujinshika put a lot of time & effort into the comics & sell them dirt cheap, being more interested in promoting their artwork to get potential buyers for their legit mangas than making money...money that just ends up wasted on DRM.

People always talk about piracy being normal in China, but isn't it the same in Russia?

 

[dududf]

Was there a sale at the high horse store? I'm seeing these high horses everywhere in this thread.

It's almost kinda funny. Mostly sad, but still kind of funny.

 

[Chipperz]

You aren't entitled to get something for free just because you want to.

If it isn't to the detriment of anyone else then why not?

I am of course assuming they wouldn't buy the game in the first place. I know no one who would have bought it but pirates it instead.

OK, I'm now officially speaking as someone coming to the end of a games design course, who is in the rounds of pitching a game idea to publishers.

I have spent four years of my life designing a game. They have been long, hard years where my only goal has been creating the world from scratch, populating it with a host of NPCs, designing rules, systems, and character creation, building models, writing scripts and dialogue, drawing concept art and breathing life into a creation that is distinctly my own. In that time, I have worked shitty jobs to keep my software up to date, I have gone to college and spent two years being told I'll never get anywhere with what "isn't a real qualification", my grandmother has died never seeing me ammount to anything, I have lived with people who hate me and in bedsits full of rats to save money for the games that I love and want to spend my life making.

If you aren't willing to pay for what I have suffered for, you do not get to play it.

 

[Tharticus]

Ah the R4 cards. Why carry 50 cards when you can download all games into 1? I can see why it's a massive conflict in China. It's been a losing war from the start.

When I enter Chinatown, one of my uncle and cousin went to a shop where they get the PS2 to be "upgraded". When they brought it home, I saw playing it on a burned DVD.

Years later, I figured how much publishers are losing to privacy and it's a losing battle with the DRMs and such.

John Funk really misses the cheap and delicious food back in China. Mmm, thirty-cent steamed buns ...

It's very tasty I know.

 

[Capo Taco]

so when the designers throw the next curve ball, they are that much more ready for it. Video game Designers perpetuate pirating with DRM and ways to stop them from getting the games, there would be no pirates if their was nothing stopping them from getting the game illegally.

Wow. DRM really does attract sales. Non-playing pirate sales. They should just stop shipping the game altogether and spend all time making DRM.

 

[RMcD94]

You aren't entitled to get something for free just because you want to.

If it isn't to the detriment of anyone else then why not?

I am of course assuming they wouldn't buy the game in the first place. I know no one who would have bought it but pirates it instead.

OK, I'm now officially speaking as someone coming to the end of a games design course, who is in the rounds of pitching a game idea to publishers.

I have spent four years of my life designing a game. They have been long, hard years where my only goal has been creating the world from scratch, populating it with a host of NPCs, designing rules, systems, and character creation, building models, writing scripts and dialogue, drawing concept art and breathing life into a creation that is distinctly my own. In that time, I have worked shitty jobs to keep my software up to date, I have gone to college and spent two years being told I'll never get anywhere with what "isn't a real qualification", my grandmother has died never seeing me ammount to anything, I have lived with people who hate me and in bedsits full of rats to save money for the games that I love and want to spend my life making.

If you aren't willing to pay for what I have suffered for, you do not get to play it.

Assuming I wouldn't have bought the game in the first place:

1. I pirate and play the game and like it, and then tell my friends about it. Free advertising for you.
2. I pirate and play the game and don't mention it at all to anyone. Nothing to you.
3. I don't pirate the game, and don't play it. Nothing to you.

So, there's a difference between 2 and 3 apart from me losing out?

 

[The Random One]

2. I pirate and play the game and don't mention it at all to anyone. Nothing to you.
3. I don't pirate the game, and don't play it. Nothing to you.

So, there's a difference between 2 and 3 apart from me losing out?

Yes. C, who didn't want to pirate, have had the same enjoyment you did while doing 2. C is the one who is paying the developers so that they can pay they workers and release more games. Only now C feels like an idiot because he coughed up $60, which he felt was well spent, until he realized you played the same game and didn't pay a dime.

Think of the C.

 

[MasterSplinter]

There's another reason people on developing country's pirate, mainly they (me included) have a grudge against first world country's that bleed us out, and that keep doing it. So we pirate and think "fuck them" they ain't getting MY pesos. And I'm enjoying their product.

I know none of the fine people developing games aren't actually "bad guys", but they enjoyed the opportunities that the "bad guys" gave them, so fuck them too for not knowing.

 

[Tirnor]

Skimp on fancy packaging to keep distribution and production costs down, just get the disc in stores, and sell it for 60 RMB ($8.78).

This is the part I love.

So, how much is your $60 dollar game really worth if you are willing to sell it at a 85% loss?

I think the reason companies don't do this overly much is the fact that word gets around fast on this here thingamabob called the Internet. If you think pirates feel entitled to steal now, just wait until they hear that you sell the same game to people with a low rent zip code for 85% less and somehow still make a profit. Heck, every time Steam isn't on the up and up with Aussie pricing, they burn straw-Gordons in effigy.

Suddenly, they aren't stealing $60.. they are stealing $9.. minus the cost of the DVDs they are providing themselves. Almost a wash, really...

Edit: Wrong percentages... ugh, too long since my school days.

 

[Domoslaf]

So basically what you're saying is: "Stealing is bad unless you can't afford the thing and everyone around you is doing the same"? That's some very dodgy logic.

There are a lot of countries in which some things are considerably cheaper than in the US and some considerably more expensive. That's just basic economics. Now publishers set their prices with only the biggest markets like US, UK and Japan im mind, and sell their games for pretty much the same prices in the rest of the world, like these three countries were the only ones that mattered.

Now it's very nice of you (the author) to acknowledge there are in fact a few other countries in the world, but how that enlightened notion had led you to a belief that these countries are free to pirate as they please is beyond me.

Oh, and I'm from Poland. Games are also crazy expensive here, especially by your "let's compare it to the cost of the most basic articles, like food" standard. We make do, thankyouverymuch, without your lincense to pirate.

 

[GoodApprentice]

There was a student in my dorm from China. He was as big of a gamer as I was, but there wasn't a single piece of legal software in his whole vast collection. He couldn't care less about the morality of his aquisitions, and what's more, he didn't even realize that there was an issue with pirating software.

Although lots of people in the western hemisphere download illegal software, at least we think about the implications of the act and hotly debate the ethics involved. In places like China, piracy is not a moral "issue" at all and no one thinks twice about the process.

I think that changing their buying habits will require a great deal of persuasion. Lowering the price of software alone won't cut it. They will buy whatever version is cheapest mostly because they feel no moral connection with software developers (especially those not based in China).

 

[poiuppx]

The irony is, any anime fan could have told you about this ages ago. Every con, every 'neighborhood store', you'll find some, ahem, 'Import DVDs', from presumably Importland, with- depending on the 'Importers' -poorly translated subtitles, stolen fansubs, or straight rips from official DVDs in the really balsier cases. The 'importer' price is typically microscopic... my local store sells 'Importland' anime movies for around 4$ a pop, full series sets for around 20-25$. We all know where it's coming from, and most of my friends make a point to avoid them, especially when the official stuff exists.

Except... what about where and when it doesn't exist? What about older shows no one ever licenced and probably never will? It's a grey area even my staunchest fellow anti-piracy types are willing to overlook at times...

Now, I admit, I've yet to see games being handled the same around my slice of the States. I can't speak to that kind of rip-and-sell action being mentioned for China. But I am left to wonder by what means legitimate business could possibly penetrate such a market. How would you? How COULD you, when you're competing against your own product being sold for so much less it's insane? By what means could any big time company fight this battle and win?

I think at this stage, the only smart move would be to work through the government; the Chinese officials have incredible power when it comes to affecting the way business is conducted. If they could somehow be sweet-talked into coming onboard and cracking down- and seriously, NO clue how you'd do that -then it would become possible then and only then. Until then... China's a lost cause for the games market as a whole.

 

[Shjade]

Always such a troublesome conversation.

I've downloaded games in the past. Er, downloaded through unofficial channels, that is. Not games that are supposed to be acquired that way. Well, I mean, I've gotten some games that were supposed to be downloaded, too, but - wait, I'm getting off message. Point being, I'm no innocent. That said, I can't think of one I've snagged that I wasn't assessing for a buy prior to purchase.

I know that doesn't make it any better than intending to simply keep the illegitimate copy, but I can't help thinking of it via the bookstore analogy: you're in the market for a good novel so you go to the bookstore. You walk down the aisle of your favorite genre. Let's just say it's the comics aisle. There are several series here you've read sections of in the past, series you can rely on to satisfy. If you see a new volume out in these series there's no need to hesitate in picking it up to add to your collection. Oh look, the next issue of Fables is out! Awesome. *snags volume thirteen* Great, that'll be tasty later. (Edit: to clarify, I'm referring to purchasing this book, not snagging it as in theft.)

A couple of shelves below that there's a series you've never touched - let's say Queen & Country. That's a very different book: still a comic, sure, but it's black & white compared to the full color of Fables; Q&C is much more down to earth compared to the high fantasy mixed with the real world present in the other series; Q&C comes in pretty hefty collections so it's a bit of an investment (granted it's not what I'd call expensive but hey, books - it's the average price, as most games tend to fall in the same price range). Perhaps there are folks who'd like the cover enough to buy into a new book series based on the cover alone or who could be convinced by the info on the back of the book blurb. Personally, I'm not the type. I prefer to take the book down and page through it first as, even if the content described on the back is fascinating, any number of things could turn me off about the book itself:

-weak dialog

-weak characterization

-unappealing art style (not "bad" art, just art that doesn't appeal; From Hell falls into this category, for instance)

-illegible writing (see From Hell again - all the narration in that is in this headache-inducing scribbled cursive I couldn't stand for more than a few pages of squinting)

-failure to match marketing (blurb says murder mystery, story turns out to be unwanted harem comedy)

And so on. So I take the book off the shelf and spend a few minutes paging through it to see if I actually enjoy reading it. If not, I put it back on the shelf mostly unread. If so, I buy the book. In the same vein, I tended (I guess I should say "tend," but I can't think of the last time I ripped something - Steam is so good to me) to download things when I couldn't find gameplay demos to try them out prior to purchase. It's the test-drive model. It seems rather foolish to just dive into a purchase without knowing anything more about it than "it has really cool commercials!" Considering I can be fairly picky in my gaming tastes I find it very helpful to have some hands-on time first. Ends don't justify the means and all that, I know. Just saying that, in my case, if all games had playable demos I don't think I'd have ever ripped anything - it's such a bother, really, all that p2p stuff. Not justification, just one person's explanation.

This is compared to, returning the book analogy, the guys who just sit in the manga aisle and read through an entire series there in the store without buying anything. I...really don't know what to make of that.

 

[FaceFaceFace]

I don't understand how pirates, at least of modern games, can keep justifying themselves. It doesn't matter that a pirate isn't a lost sale, it's that they got something for free that someone else had to pay for. If everyone decided to pirate, games would make no money and would stop existing. By pirating, you are basically saying you are better than everyone else. And no, it's not the same as reselling a game, because someone had to actually buy it first. Unlike with pirating, there is no way 90% of a game's players could have bought a game secondhand.

 

[Luke Cartner]

OK, ignoring the whole piracy argument which in my opinion always ends in people yelling at each other John asked an important question. How can game companies compete in a market where piracy is accepted.

Many open source companies (redhat and apache for example) offer their products for free.
Yet companies are willing to spend millions of dollars on these products and not because they want to support open source.
Why? Value add.

Game companies need to get over that the medium their product was on can simply be copied without any payment. Rather than trying to stop piracy they should focus on ways to make people not want to pirate.
Its not about whats right or wrong, the reality is game companies are banking on the good will of their customers simply not to pirate the games. Ultimately it will be the companies that increase that good will that succeed in the long term.