Piracy Poll

[Slougi]

XBox is already cracked

It's not.

 

[Smiff]

sorry i have to disagree with that (aprentice).. buying a game to "collect value" is nonsense (since if you want to look at it that way, originals devalue far more than copies - originals lose more value than the copy ever had or cost to make), buy a game because (1) you want to play it (legally and without hassle) and (2) you want to reward the people that made it and support the future existance of more games that you will like, and so on in a fulfulling circle.

 

[aprentice]

sorry i have to disagree with that (aprentice).. buying a game to "collect value" is nonsense (since if you want to look at it that way, originals devalue far more than copies - originals lose more value than the copy ever had or cost to make), buy a game because (1) you want to play it (legally and without hassle) and (2) you want to reward the people that made it and support the future existance of more games that you will like, and so on in a fulfulling circle.

I dont buy games for their value, I buy to play them and to show them off. How much value does a pirate cd hold and how much value does the original hold? Can you sell a pirate cd or can you sell a original cd when you need money. Do pirate cds come with nice boxes? If i remember my post correctly I did not state that I was buying for collecting value.

 

[Smiff]

well "showing them off" i'm not sure what to make of. The monetary value of any item is equal to whatever you can get someone to pay for it... typically an original will fetch a considerably higher price than a copy. However a game is not an investment* (not a simple one anyway) - when you play by the rules (i..e don't pirate) you are paying a sum of money in return for an amount of "fun". How you value fun varies fom person to person, what is certain is that you are paying for it.

*Unless you really do treat games as a straight investment, in which you will nearly always lose. Or, perhaps more realistically you could subtract your sale price from purchase price and base value on the difference.

What it comes down to is seperating monetary value from other forms forms of value, such as prestige, what you think packaging is worth, the importance you put on legality, how much you think the people who made it deserve, the convenience of the distribution channel to you and so on... all this varies from person to person. Of course, if the price is fixed (as it is in a shop for example), a simple yes/no decision can be made about whether or not any particular item is a good buy for you.

 

[aprentice]

...when you play by the rules (i..e don't pirate) you are paying a sum of money in return for an amount of "fun". How you value fun varies fom person to person, what is certain is that you are paying for it.

What it comes down to is seperating monetary value from other forms forms of value, such as prestige, what you think packaging is worth, the importance you put on legality, and so on... all this varies from person to person. Of course, if the price is fixed (as it is in a shop for example), a simple yes/no decision can be made about whether or not any particular item is a good buy for you.

This isnt about value really, is this the only point your able to argue with me about?

 

[Smiff]

i think it is all about value.

val·ue Pronunciation Key (vly)
n.
An amount, as of goods, services, or money, considered to be a fair and suitable equivalent for something else; a fair price or return.
Monetary or material worth: the fluctuating value of gold and silver.
Worth in usefulness or importance to the possessor; utility or merit: the value of an education.
A principle, standard, or quality considered worthwhile or desirable: “The speech was a summons back to the patrician values of restraint and responsibility” (Jonathan Alter).
Precise meaning or import, as of a word.
Mathematics. An assigned or calculated numerical quantity.
Music. The relative duration of a tone or rest.
The relative darkness or lightness of a color. See table at color.
Linguistics. The sound quality of a letter or diphthong.
One of a series of specified values: issued a stamp of new value.

i don't see how you can discuss piracy without discussing value

 

[Slougi]

Because having the real thing will always be more valuable than a copy, even if the value is fictional. Besides, some games cost more now than they did on release day.

 

[Smiff]

so erm on the topic, yes piracy must have an affect on game companies, but since no one will ever know how much piracy is going on, or how poeple would act if piracy was not available to them, there will never be a definitive answer as to how much and in what way piracy effects those companies. I think a better more useful question is "What can games companies and consumers do to ensure both are kept as happy as possible in their relationship?" (no offense to topic starter).

 

[flow``]

better game protection against piracy, and better quality games (even if we have to suffer the long dev time)

i would gradly buy a game if it was deemed good in my eyes.

also, more demo disc would be great.. they used to have seasonal demos for the psx, which i loved, b/c i could check out new games w/o having to rent/buy it to see.

i used to pay 4.99 for those demos, which would save me a lot afterwards since i didnt have the internet back then and i never really trust one person's view on a game - whereas i like to "see to believe"

 

[pj64er]

Piracy has to hurt the industry somewhere, but for now, its not really showing up. Statistically, (if i remember right) the video game industry has been growing (almost) exponentially. look at PSOne, it is arguably the most pirated system ever, did anyone notice Sony suffering from it?

 

[aprentice]

so erm on the topic, yes piracy must have an affect on game companies, but since no one will ever know how much piracy is going on, or how poeple would act if piracy was not available to them, there will never be a definitive answer as to how much and in what way piracy effects those companies. I think a better more useful question is "What can games companies and consumers do to ensure both are kept as happy as possible in their relationship?" (no offense to topic starter).

Why must smiff always think hes right? Smiff, you are wrong, dead wrong. (No offense to smiff) My questions is sufficient enough and more straight foward. Also, yes, game companies dont know how much piracy is going on, thats why i said "potential profit" in a previous post.

 

[Josep]

righht...

i've bought all my sega saturn games legally, and don't exactly consider myself an idiot. since for forever i'll have the game and you'll have something of no value at all except a little hdd space

waaiiit a sec, going to back to what jaz and flow had to say against me, i know they would, PLEASE READ MY entire post, damn, the sentence right after it jeez:happy: what i was pointing out in the idiot part was the view that most people that pirate the hell out of games...we are all that way sometimes, at least if you don't exactly have all that much money to spend on games all the time...

 

[EdgeBlade]

Well...

Yeah, the gaming industry is growing huge, and fast, but just imagine how big it would be without piracy...

And aprentice, I think I know what you mean. I value the games that I've bought and wouldn't get rid of them even though I never really play them. But they look great on my cd rack.
Is that close to anything that you mean? I don't really show off my games, but I'm sure if I had the chance to show off to some one that would be impressed I'd say "Hey, check this out...".

 

[aprentice]

Re: Well...

Yeah, the gaming industry is growing huge, and fast, but just imagine how big it would be without piracy...

And aprentice, I think I know what you mean. I value the games that I've bought and wouldn't get rid of them even though I never really play them. But they look great on my cd rack.
Is that close to anything that you mean? I don't really show off my games, but I'm sure if I had the chance to show off to some one that would be impressed I'd say "Hey, check this out...".

Exactly

 

[Jaz]

look at PSOne, it is arguably the most pirated system ever, did anyone notice Sony suffering from it?

Very true. But it's still wrong.

 

[EddyB43]

I'm surprised that no one as yet has come up with the opposite angle - does piracy HELP the games industry? For example, if a pirate gets an illegal free copy of a game, he may find he likes the genre and decide to get other games (legally or otherwise) from that genre and series. Hell, let's just assume the pirate gets pangs of guilt, and actually buys a copy of the game he originally pirated. That's one extra sale the games company would never have seen.

Also, some of the anti-piracy measures are problematic. I remember when Championship Manager 3 was released for the PC, some legitimate buyers could not play the game because the CD copy protection used was unreadable with their CD drives.

As a final note, PC Zone in the UK did an article over the last 2 months on the issues of piracy, the text may be up on their website.

 

[EdgeBlade]

Like I said before... "Most everyone that pirates stuff will support it in one way or another."

 

[Smiff]

i wouldn't go as far as to say piracy is good for games companies, sure you can come up with examples where e.g. somebody has bought a game after pirating it, but the truth is I think more likely that for every case like this, there are 10 of people pirating instead of purchasing.

On the flipside, I heard (don't know if this is true or not) that Looking Glass Studios went bust due to poor retail sales of System Shock 2, allegedly due to a high rate of piracy of this game.. I don't know if this is true, but it is very sad that a good company disappeared, presumably meaning no chance of a sequel. In general, I would think that it's the most popular games that are pirated the most, so the makers of the best games are losing the most right? Which seems wrong (morally).

I noticed some mixed opinions on anti-piracy technology, my opinion is that spending time and money on this is a bad idea, people love the challenge of cracking it and you're taking resources that could have gone into making the game better or lowering prices... perhaps the best solution is make pirates feel bad about what they're doing and somehow give the message that it's not "cool" to pirate stuff.... this is going to take some clever marketing.

 

[flow``]

well regardless, you can't just put out a system that reads regular cds roms w/ no anti-piracy protection at all. and usually only the companies making the system put forth efford to anti-piracy measures, and tell any 3rd party game makers how to add support for their protection. so i see no real loss in time/effort.

 

[Smiff]

you have to license the tech., it costs, i don't know how much... would be interesting to know. And to know how many people are put off by the simplest anti-copy tech... suppose 80% of potential pirates are put off by just making the CD too big. The only anti-copy system i've seen that impresses me is Half-Life's keys + WON; sure you can crack it for youself and make as many copies as you like, but to play online you gotta have that key.. very elegant. Come to think of it, Half-Life is the best value game purchase i've ever made, they deserve their £20 and then some.