Igncom1 wrote:
Well that some one can live of there art I feel is to kinda abuse it, but each their own.



Art should mean something, and I feel that meaning gets tarnished when you demand money for it or to experience it.



(wow I just wrote that? Must be one of these days.)

I am guessing you aren't an artist. Nothing wrong with that. By the way, art isn't necessarily a painting or a song. Just clearing that up.

Slowhands wrote:
According to Gabe Newell of Valve, piracy is a non-issue:



http://www.gamefront.com/gabe-newell-piracy-is-a-non-issue/



According to Yvan Guillemot, it's destroying the industry.



You choose.

Valve really knows what they're doing. At the start of the Steam Summer Sale, EA attacked Valve saying that the sales cheapened the value of IPs in the eyes of consumers. That's not the way I see it, and I don't think it's the way most people on Steam see it. What Steam does is say, "Do you really, really want this game? Well you can get it right now for full price. Do you kind of want this game, but think it's not worth that much money to you? Well let everyone else who knows they want it buy it now, but you can wait a little bit because the game already has less value to you than to them." When a $60 game releases on Steam, they sell it to everyone who wants to pay $60 for it. Then they sell it to everyone who wouldn't pay $60, but who would pay $50, then $40, $30, etc. They're not lessening the value of the game, they're just making additional sales from the people who already didn't value the game as much as others did.



It's not exactly the same for piracy, because like FinalStrigon said, there are people who would jump at an opportunity for a free game, but I feel that in recent times they're no longer the majority of who ends up becoming pirates. For example, there are a lot of cracked versions of Minecraft, but the majority of people using those are probably kids who can't afford the game or whose parents won't buy it for them, and people who are just cheap are probably the minority there. But still, if a person puts a $40 value on a game, but EA refuses to lower the price from $60, then you could say that EA just lost $40 because that person might now go pirate it. The problem is that publishers tend to claim that they've still lost $60 in that situation, which simply isn't the case. Valve isn't adjusting the way consumers value their games, they're adjusting the games to match the value the customers have for them, which boosts sales and profits more than having tunnel vision does.

Well that some one can live of there art I feel is to kinda abuse it, but each their own.



Art should mean something, and I feel that meaning gets tarnished when you demand money for it or to experience it.



(wow I just wrote that? Must be one of these days.)

Igncom1 wrote:


Artists should not work for money otherwise its not art, and the idea of people not being able to experience their own culture because asshats believe they should have to pay for every cent of it is really really strange to me.

Adoration and respect do not put food on your table, pay the bills or keep you warm at night. With less and less government support for the arts, the artists need a way to pay their bills. Sadly, we do not live in a utopian Federation ala Stark Trek. It's as simple as that. If an artist/musician etc creates a crappy product, I will not pirate or steal their goods, I just won't give them my money. I let my money speak for me.

According to Gabe Newell of Valve, piracy is a non-issue:



http://www.gamefront.com/gabe-newell-piracy-is-a-non-issue/



According to Yvan Guillemot, it's destroying the industry.



You choose.

I feel as though we're getting off topic here. If you want to keep talking about whether or not art should be profitable, feel free to start a new discussion, but this thread was on thin ice from the start considering the topic, so let's try not to get into trouble with our friendly neighborhood forum mods.

Igncom1 wrote:
Well there are many 'kickstarters' that may contradict that idea.



But I understand your cynical and pessimistic opinion.

True, but Kickstarter projects just get the game off the ground. Afterwards, if they don't charge for the game...How do they pay their employees? How about the people who ship out the game (if it goes retail)? The people who make the disks? How about the stores that sell it, they need to pay their employees and inventory and all that? And, can't forget, taxes and bills. The studio making that game has to pay their power bills, their taxes, buy food...



You have to charge money for games, for music, for movies. There's simply too many things going on otherwise you would have to ask people to do as charity work. And while some of it might happen, it would definitely not be enough to keep the whole system moving.

Well there are many 'kickstarters' that may contradict that idea.



But I understand your cynical and pessimistic opinion.

Igncom1 wrote:
Artists should not work for money otherwise its not art, and the idea of people not being able to experience their own culture because asshats believe they should have to pay for every cent of it is really really strange to me.



Personally? Tear down the idea of an gaming industry, and turn it into a form of pay how you feel system so that the cooperation between the customers and producers is whats needed to make a profit, not the forced industrial products of the modern age.

There's a long tradition of people being paid for their art. Look at the Renaissance, for example. Things have just flipped a bit today because, in my [cynicalandpessimistic] opinion, people have gotten worse.



If you give people the chance to only pay what you feel, I guarantee that no money would be made by games anymore. Now, I'd love to be proved wrong, but I doubt I would be. And if game designing wasn't a reliable source of income anymore, most developers would pack up and leave, to find some other way to put food on the table.

Some pirates always will but i agree with the sentiment that if a product is worth paying for, people will.



In the end I feel it comes down to the same reason people who make music also complain about piracy. They think people must always pay for the crap they make, and feel it is wrong for a person to pay for apart of our 'culture' where as I feel it is wrong to be denied it because of a financial issue.



Artists should not work for money otherwise its not art, and the idea of people not being able to experience their own culture because asshats believe they should have to pay for every cent of it is really really strange to me.



Personally? Tear down the idea of an gaming industry, and turn it into a form of pay how you feel system so that the cooperation between the customers and producers is whats needed to make a profit, not the forced industrial products of the modern age.

Stardock has a good way of controlling it with updates going to legit customers, though I am sure pirates get around that too.

Even with games people want to play, pirates will pirate it anyway. And, being the pessimist I am, I figure most people will still jump at the chance to get a free game. Especially one that they've been looking forward to for a long time. Valve and Bethesda might not know how many of their games they're losing to piracy, or they simple don't care, as they make enough off of what they do sell.



And, personally, I think that Ubisoft CEO is exaggerating. That is an astounding highly amount of piracy...There must be some kind of condition that he left out.



But I doubt I can convince you otherwise. I, personally, pay little attention to what developers are doing. I just see a game, and if it looks good, I get it. I play it, have my fun, and move on to the next game, and just deal with whatever is there that I need to do to play it.

FinalStrigon wrote:
I think that something definitely needs to be done about pirating. So, yes, I say measures are needed.



How to do it, though, I have no idea. I like some things developers have done, like having a bit of code in somewhere where if the game isn't activated/registered, it breaks. Something along the lines of Arkham Asylum slowly degrading Batman's cape, until you can't glide anymore.



The trick is just finding something that hurts pirates but not customers. And that's just, in my opinion, going to be a very hard trick.

One of the major problems is that almost whatever measure you take, it's possible for pirates to undo and remove it, meaning the only people affected are customers.



As far as I'm concerned, the best way for publishers and developers to avoid piracy is to make a game people want to play. If you release games that are subpar or that were grossly exaggerated by advertising, you generally get more people pirating the game; at least, that's how I feel about it. I've never heard devs like Valve or Bethesda really discussing piracy or saying they're losing a large amount of business due to pirates. On the other hand, there are a few Ubisoft games that were met with questionable or unfavorable reviews, i.e. Anno 2070.



And really, if you look at how the community feels about certain publishers, generally, the ones least liked are the ones who are known for being pretty aggressive with their anti-piracy and/or have disappointed fans before with subpar releases.



Of course, this is just the general impression I've gotten over the past few years; you're free to convince me otherwise.

I think that something definitely needs to be done about pirating. So, yes, I say measures are needed.



How to do it, though, I have no idea. I like some things developers have done, like having a bit of code in somewhere where if the game isn't activated/registered, it breaks. Something along the lines of Arkham Asylum slowly degrading Batman's cape, until you can't glide anymore.



The trick is just finding something that hurts pirates but not customers. And that's just, in my opinion, going to be a very hard trick.

defekt wrote:
Publishers tend to equate one downloaded file being directly equal one lost sale, which simply isn’t true. Fallacies such as this are trotted out every time the DRM debate kicks off and Ubisoft have been among the worst offenders for grossly exaggerating what they perceived to be lost sales due to piracy. Guillemot has said this before and never backs any of it up with credible research; once again he’s plucked “93% piracy” out of his arse and spouted it as gospel. To put if bluntly, Guillemot is a snip and thusly Ubisoft behaves like a snip (cf. Uplay PC activity logging) hence their dreadful reputation amongst the gaming industry.

Firstly, you should probably adjust your post before you get in trouble with the mods (see changes in quote)



Secondly, I agree with this completely. I backed it up earlier when I talked about Steam; if someone is willing to pay $40 for a game, but does not put $60 of value on the game, if Ubisoft refuses to sell it for a lower price, then that person pirates it, it is NOT a "lost sale." A lost sale would imply that this person would have paid if a pirated version weren't available, which isn't the case.



Although, now that I think about it, Ubisoft probably has a significant amount of these lost sales; with their ruthless DRM schemes, there are probably a lot of people who would pay for the game, but simply don't want to support Ubisoft and also want to avoid the hassle of DRM that paying customers are forced to trudge through.

DRM doesn't work

Always online doesn't work

CD-Keys don't work.



The only way to reduce piracy is to make good games and respect your customers. Pirates are not potential customers. They pirate the game either because they do not want to support the company or the game is not worth the cost.



95% piracy (which is most likely a made up number) does not hurt Ubisoft's sales, because the vast majority of pirates weren't going to buy the game either way.

Igncom1 wrote:
How do you even judge piracy?



Is this a case of Ubisoft getting 95% less purchases then expected, and so are attributing it to piracy?

You don't you pull numbers out of your ass. There is no way any game company is getting a 95% piracy rate.

Harel55 wrote:
I didn't think of that. How do you measure piracy if you can't track pirates. Sure you can count downloads on all the pirates websites you can find, but there will always be more that you missed.

Just add some percents like 30%, 50%, whatever and you'll get 95% piracy

I didn't think of that. How do you measure piracy if you can't track pirates. Sure you can count downloads on all the pirates websites you can find, but there will always be more that you missed.

How do you even judge piracy?



Is this a case of Ubisoft getting 95% less purchases then expected, and so are attributing it to piracy?