Games Piracy - What's your take on it?

[peetee]

'they ended up with my money in the end'
'my friends bought it after I recommended it from playing a pirate version'
'it's too expensive'
'only worth it if you can play multiplayer'

They are just excuses used afterwards to try and justify the piracy. But ultimately it came down to the fact that he wanted to have it, he didn't want to pay for it and he knew he could get away with downloading it.

Use pirate software? Stop posting useless justifications for it!!! Just admit that you do it because you want it, you don't want to pay for it and you know you'll get away with downloading it.

You're a bit dense really.

I did buy it, though I tried it first as I dont want to go buy a game, realise its crap and then not be able to get a refund.
Games are in general too expensive.
Iv got a friend with the pirated version too, hes buying it when price comes down to play online with me, another friend wants my pirated version(iv deleted it now, he can use my DVD and a dodgey serial.) to try and get an impression of full performance etc before he buys.
It can be worth it if theres no multiplayer, I bought portal, I bought HL2EP2, though i didnt try those before I buy, because I trust valve games, I bought COD2, it was crap.

I did want to pay for it, when did I say I never, bit stupid assuming that?
I origionally would have preferred buying off steam as Id heard good reviews, It would have downloaded a lot faster than a torrent for me, but £35+VAT? having a laugh tbh. Rather try it, play through singleplayer then buy it when it was a little cheaper and play the multiplayer element.

Why should people admit they do it because they dont want to pay for something? If i didnt want to pay for anything i download i wouldnt, but i do, its not like my hand is forced? Yea ill get away with it, whats your point? The people who deserve my money get it, the people who dont, dont.
I wish id bloody pirated PES2008 before i bought it, it turned out to be a bigger, buggier version of the demo for me, blind trust in devs and game-names never pays off. Oh and its crap online.

edit your above post was better than the other one, yea this post kinda shows im wound up, but its more wound up because you take what I said and make assumptions and state things that dont really make sense, because iv gone out and bought something, and you're saying iv done it because i dont want to pay..? Sorry if this has any name calling but its just how strongly I feel about it, £30 is a good chunk of what i live off(im a student) so im not gunna throw it around like no tommorow, and the way games are going these days the chances are that £30 would serve you better as a night out, as it would last longer.
They are in a way good justifications towards games, end of the day piracy would still have the bad side of the people who literally pay for NOTHING, but if developers didnt release such crap sometimes it wouldnt push the rest of us to it.

 

[divine`]

I understand some people do do it, i'm just not sure I accept that 90% of people in this tyhread who admit to pirating stuff, also go out and buy it as they all claim to.

 

[Von Luck]

..

 

[div0]

You're a bit dense really.

You cut out part of my quote

Sure some of the other 'justifications' may be factually correct, such as if he hadn't pirated it, then he might not have bought the game afterwards. But its all irrelevant, I've already shown that the same attitude can easily be applied to theft of a tangible item (but lets not go over that again) and that the same 'justifications' would hold true.

I agreed with you that your reasons could (and probably were) factually correct. But again it's irrelevant, you wouldn't have done it in the first place unless you knew you could have got away with it.

That's my point, plain and simple. If you don't get that yet them at least I'll know I'm not the only one who's apparently a bit dense

I understand some people do do it, i'm just not sure I accept that 90% of people in this tyhread who admit to pirating stuff, also go out and buy it as they all claim to.

I would be surprised

Totally agree with that. If we couldn't get away with it, choices would be either:

a) rely on reviews from people who have a different taste in games

or

b) wait until a friend buys it and then decide if you like it

Both of which would, for me, reduce the amount of software I buy, as I HATE paying money for rubbish.

Totally agree. I've never said that all software piracy reduces sales, or even that some piracy doesn't lead to extra sales. Just that people do it because they can get away with it

 

[Reiver]

Agreed, if the game is good and I bother to play it then they deserve the money, otherwise we would have no games full stop. I have to admit tho I didnt look at it this way untill I hit my 20s. I dont think you consider the effort people put into games as a kid.

I would say it's the opposite for me. Up until 3 or 4 years ago I felt a connection to most developers. A feeling that they were enthusiasts like me, out to make a game for people to enjoy. As such I really appreciated their efforts and would never have considered stealing from these guys. Now Devs are either represented by slick PR men or seem to be faceless workhouses with only a few exceptions.
Go on Bethesda's forums and view their attitude to their fans and consumers then go onto the Witcher forums and compare it. CDProjekt have an obvious passion for their subject and they love games and gamers. Pirating the Witcher or EU3 would seem a lot less moral than doing it for the latest FIFA.

 

[peetee]

I agreed with you that your reasons could (and probably were) factually correct. But again it's irrelevant, you wouldn't have done it in the first place unless you knew you could have got away with it.

If I couldnt get away with it I wouldnt have bought the game.
Iv not played games recently but when I do iv just played cs(1.6) but that bores me a bit, WC3/DOTA, or pro-evo(which i play because theres no footy on the tv, and its not really entertaining) which tbh did my fine, infact iv only racked up 3hours and a half on cod4 and iv had it over a week.
Maybes Id have tried a friends copy, Id already tried the ps3 one but couldnt decide whether I liked it as obviously it was using a PS3 pad, so i didnt get the 'feel'.
If id borrowed a friends PC disc(wouldnt have played at theirs since id rather play on my pc with my mouse+keyboard, since thats what id be using) and installed, id have gotten a dodgey CD key(since who gives their mates theirs?) and that would infact have been exactly the same as piracy wouldnt it? And my friend wouldnt even need his disc, because he'd be playing MP, as SP takes a night to complete.
So if I hadnt have done it, I wouldnt have bought it probably, or I would have just found another way to illegally try it.

 

[Mr Blonde]

*Stands up* I'm a long time PC gamer and use pirated copies of games...

I'd hazard a guess and say that at least 90% of the software and games I have on my systems are pirated.

The one game that I do play regularly is a golf mmo and I've pumped well over £2000 into that over the past 2 years. So you could say that I have some disposable income lying about and so buying any game is not a problem..

I guess I'm just a lazy sod and happy in the knowledge that the vast majority of people do 'the right thing' and thus keep things reasonably steady in the industry.

 

[div0]

If I couldnt get away with it I wouldnt have bought the game.

I never said otherwise (see below)

I've never said that all software piracy reduces sales, or even that some piracy doesn't lead to extra sales. Just that people do it because they can get away with it

I've stated before that it is possible for people with pirate copies to go out and buy the game, when they otherwise wouldn't have. Or that their friends might also go out and buy it after seeing the pirate version.

I'm agreeing with all these things and I always have been

But my point all along has been that piracy is illegal/wrong (and I don't think anyone disputes this) and that it doesn't matter what justifications you have for it, the only reason people do it is because they know they are unlikely to get caught.

I've already stated many times that I think the way software manufacturers are trying to prevent piracy is not a good way of going about it. I've pointed out that I think they would be better off trying to encourage sales by offering rewards to genuine customers, rather than features that just add in extra irritations and annoyances.

 

[peetee]

yea guess so, its not so clear cut that its wrong though, theres ethical arguements for both sides.
Could be argued that developers have pushed potential customers to these unethical means with various bad releases, short games, poor performance, buggy etc. Aswell as restricted demos that dont really give a view of the game.
Someone mentioned BF2 as a good demo, i thought it was pants because it only showcased 1 map, which was rubbish, but then people expected the game would include a lot more variation in gameplay, which it didnt. This was even worse for 2142.

 

[div0]

yea guess so, its not so clear cut that its wrong though, theres ethical arguements for both sides.
Could be argued that developers have pushed potential customers to these unethical means with various bad releases, short games, poor performance, buggy etc. Aswell as restricted demos that dont really give a view of the game.
Someone mentioned BF2 as a good demo, i thought it was pants because it only showcased 1 map, which was rubbish, but then people expected the game would include a lot more variation in gameplay, which it didnt. This was even worse for 2142.

Again, I agree

But again, similar comments could be made about other aspects of life.

For example - I recently bought a pair of jeans from a shop. When I went to take them back, they wouldn't give me a refund. They only offered me store credit. I didn't like anything else in the shop so I'm now stuck with useless store credit. I could argue that they have pushed me into a position where I'm going to have to steal my money back. But we all know that I'm not going to do that, because its against the law and more importantly, because I'd get caught.

Again this comes back to my point about software piracy. Your example of bad games/poor demos/buggy releases/etc is certainly a reason for people to not want to buy a game, only to find out that it is rubbish.

But if they knew they would get caught downloading the pirate software (like me stealing back my £50), then they'd just live with the fact that lots of games suck and so its probably not worth buying most games. And yes, I agree that in this case, it could well end up meaning that games companies actually sell less games. But its still true that the main reason people pirate software, is because they get away with it.

 

[stoofa]

Again, I agree

But again, similar comments could be made about other aspects of life.

For example - I recently bought a pair of jeans from a shop. When I went to take them back, they wouldn't give me a refund. They only offered me store credit. I didn't like anything else in the shop so I'm now stuck with useless store credit. I could argue that they have pushed me into a position where I'm going to have to steal my money back. But we all know that I'm not going to do that, because its against the law and more importantly, because I'd get caught.

Again this comes back to my point about software piracy. Your example of bad games/poor demos/buggy releases/etc is certainly a reason for people to not want to buy a game, only to find out that it is rubbish.

But if they knew they would get caught downloading the pirate software (like me stealing back my £50), then they'd just live with the fact that lots of games suck and so its probably not worth buying most games. And yes, I agree that in this case, it could well end up meaning that games companies actually sell less games. But its still true that the main reason people pirate software, is because they get away with it.

I don't see how you could even thing about arguing that the shop has pushed you into stealing back your £50.
You roughly knew what jeans you wanted (Reviews)
You went in and saw the jeans. (Demo)
You had the opportunity to try them on (Checked compatability)
So what exactly was your reason for returning them?

If they were damaged then you'd have got a refund.
So I can only assume you wanted to return them because you had changed your mind.
So there was no way you were entitled to a refund, you weren't entitled to even get store credit.

 

[Chronictank]

I don't see how you could even thing about arguing that the shop has pushed you into stealing back your £50.
You roughly knew what jeans you wanted (Reviews)
You went in and saw the jeans. (Demo)
You had the opportunity to try them on (Checked compatability)
So what exactly was your reason for returning them?

The highlighted point doesnt happen with software tho
You install it and it doesnt run well/or at all you cant return it, so in reality you didnt check compatibility

Your point also falls over at #2, some games don't have a demo and in the majority of cases as discussed earlier the demo is not enough to "see" the game properly. So relating to your example you get to see one trouser leg on the jean to make your decision instead of the whole product

 

[v0n]

People pirate software for 3 reasons:

1) They want to have it
2) They don't want to pay for it (/edit - before trying it out first)
3) They know they can get away with pirating it

I think you're wrong all three counts. I would say it's more of a:

1) They can have it (it's available to them in one free form or another)
2) They wouldn't pay that much for it
3) Therefore they know it makes no difference to the maker

Case and point: Adobe Photoshop. Just about any guy with computer and good camera on the planet has it on their PC, but if they were to pay £550 retail price tag for it they simply wouldn't. No software on a PC at home is really worth that much in real terms, especially not in majority of countries in the world where monthly income per head is below £200. So on one hand Adobe Photoshop is industry standard because everyone from student to retired grandpa use it, knows it and swears by it and on the other hand if had superduper protection and was uncrackable within few years the £550 package and its status as standard would be replaced by something from Corel for 1/4 of the price. Same goes for £700 Office packages. Same goes for ££££ server licensing.

On the other hand, £10 MS Works and £8 worth of anti virus package, you don't see that pirated very often, do you.

You get 19 year old students as IT support with thorough knowledge of server platforms, exchange and SQL duplications and you think how did they learn the skill - from PC magazine while sitting on bog in their dorm? Or young developers clicking around £2000 worth of MSDN package faster than you can read labels on all the CDs inside. Content designers with knowledge of everything from photoshop to director. Those skills don't grow on trees in Amazon, it's all hands on experience.

Games. Even in terms of pure statistics - if everyone on these forums bought every single game they slated at some point in the last few years, none of us would ever reach for our wallets again. And in terms of intelectual property loss vs "don't you have ethics", it's probably somewhere between reading a book you borowed from your mate (thus "stole money from author" if we were to contuinue to throw dramatic labels at it) and letting your mate listen to large excerpt of CD in your car ( because using anology "try before you buy" is stealing, it is just like taking last slice of bread from musicians cold hands, or, for that matter, nicking £500 LCD from Dixons, right? ).

 

[div0]

I don't see how you could even thing about arguing that the shop has pushed you into stealing back your £50.
You roughly knew what jeans you wanted (Reviews)
You went in and saw the jeans. (Demo)
You had the opportunity to try them on (Checked compatability)

They weren't for me

So what exactly was your reason for returning them?

They were a present and even though they were the right size, they didn't fit correctly

 

[Jack Bauer]

lol, this argument is going in round abouts, I think we can all agree that basically piracy is wrong. However so is a lot of the substandard content that game developers deliver. Maybe a better demo system would improve things, say a time limited system, altho this isnt likely as it would just increase piracy I would think. Also increasing availablity via download would help, this has come along way with steam. I dont think lowering prices is a good idea as this is just going to result in even worse games in the long run.

 

[div0]

I think you're wrong all three counts. I would say it's more of a:

1) They can have it (it's available to them in one free form or another)
2) They wouldn't pay that much for it
3) Therefore they know it makes no difference to the maker

Not to argue semantics, but isn't your option 1 the same as my option 3?

Your option 2, I would agree with, but isn't it fundamentally the same thing as my option 2. The choice is, pay whatever the retail price is, or download a pirated copy. Not wanting to pay for something, and not wanting to pay the asking price, pretty much amount to the same thing in this case imo. But I agree that your wording is probably more valid

I'm not sure how you could dismiss my option 1, if they didn't 'want' it, they wouldn't have it?!?!

But I'm happy to accept that you may not share my view on it

 

[div0]

lol, this argument is going in round abouts

I know, and I feel I'm partly responsible for that. I just got tired of making the same point over and over, because several people would bring up an argument against something that had already been asked and answered at least once before in the thread.

I don't even think that many people disagree with the points that most people are making. Fundamentally most people seem to agree with the key points that other people are making, and really now are just arguing over the wording of certain details.

Certainly I agree with most of the arguments for why piracy isn't ALWAYS a bad thing when it comes to sales. I'm not sure it is actually quite as positive as some people make out, but I would agree that there are times when it could lead to a sale, that may not have otherwise occurred. But I've already voiced these thoughts, and still some people seem to have got a bit heated and decided that my arguments were from someone sitting on a high horse preaching to everyone to improve on their morals. But that is totally not the case.

But I really think people need to accept that most piracy occurs as a simple result of the fact the people know they won't get caught. Other justifications are pretty irrelevant imo - because if that simple fact wasn't true, then most people wouldn't do it.

 

[peetee]

Maybes putting the time+money invested into copy protection would be better spent getting games out of beta instead of releasing beta standard games as gold.

stoofa+v0n mate great points.
Div0 you're entitled to a refund and not store credit in the jeans scenario arnt you? if they are not worn, receipt is still in posession etc?

Chronic theres plenty of games that have miffed minimum specs etc, and its perfectly acceptable for a someone to say the performance is just not good enough.
Pro-evo2008 - didnt say you needed under 4gb of ram, as if you had 4gb installed you couldnt play.
Cant remember what had problems with 8800s when they first came out, but there was a few games wasnt there?
When BF2 came out it had a fx5600 listed in suitable cards, obviously when you get mid/lower end of a generation speeds do fluctuate, and memory speeds etc, so a card which already benchmarked crap in the game with everything turned down had the chance to run even worse with certain people. Ontop of that theres driver issues with games etc.

 

[v0n]

Not to argue semantics, but isn't your option 1 the same as my option 3?
Your option 2, I would agree with, but isn't it fundamentally the same thing as my option 2.
I'm not sure how you could dismiss my option 1, if they didn't 'want' it, they wouldn't have it?!?!

It probably IS in semantics, and basic perception. In your words pirates are like people who want to drive a certain car, so they go to airport, steal it, have fun, then go and burn it somewhere in the woods. In my words pirates are like people who work at airport parking and given opportunity to drive customer cars, take them for a ride and have fun with it over weekend, then return them to parking lot and pretend it never happened. Both scenarios essentially wrong and outrageous to their own degree, but one should always be treated as immoral crime with serious consequences, whereas the other one is just worthy a kick in a teeth and firing the lot from work at best....

 

[ChrisJSY]

I got the pirate version of starcraft when I lost a few cd's...have the key still
Sue me?