Does piracy mean we have no future in game dev?

[silviotoledo]

Piracy is a reality. Nobody can stop it!

Anyway there's less piracy in mobiles than in PC ( PC is too much ).

Once mobile games are not expensive, there's still a good market for mobile games.

There's also other ways to pack games inside other products, if the game itself will not sell.
We need to learn different and creative ways to go to the market nowadays.

Anyway, the public that uses piracy today is a little different from the public that pays for games.

People that likes to play also wants to participate more on community and also wants support that the piracy can't provide.

[DST]

This is what I've been talking about. Congratulations to the humble!

http://www.wolfire.com/humble

Note the total amount raised - it's only been for sale since the beginning of may!!!!

[Hblade]

Quick note about Piracy and does it really affect the $ earned?

Here's what I think about piracy. If someone who couldn't afford the game / application pirated the game / application, then that company wont be loosing any money at all because even if they didn't pirate it they still wouldn't be able to afford it so rather they pirated it or not, that company would still have the same currency.

The only way a company would actually loose money by piracy is if someone who CAN afford the game / application chose to not pay because they are greedy and pirate it.

[DST]

What is the difference between can't and won't? This is the issue, especially in places like America. It's common to drive by government housing and see expensive cars out front; People use food stamps to buy junk food;

The other day i saw a woman buy soda with food stamps, and cigarettes with cash. Obviously, she could afford food, but chose to buy cigarettes and get free food from the government instead.

So to play the devil's advocate here, they can argue that if you want something, you'll find a way to find the money. And if you WON"T find the money, then you don't want it badly enough, and shouldn't get it for free.

Piracy circumvents that, and i would say the final output of your justification there is that
Companies are only losing a fraction of what they claim they're losing. For every 100 pirates, only about 10 of them would have bought the game anyway (using the jailbroken iphone comparison).

I think we should all consider the wolfire bundle. There's no reason we couldn't create a GE bundle....

[Hblade]

Yeah, but DST, what I'll say to that is the fact that not everyone CAN get the money no matter HOW bad they want it. they can want it more than anything in the world, but that doesn't mean that the money will come to them. Maybe YOU and people LIKE you can probably find the money because it would come easier.

As for food stamps. We should be able to get them dude we cant even pay all of the bills, not to mention we have to buy the cheapest groceries as possible to even have food in the house. I've had my gaming systems for a while now (before things got bad) and no I wont sell it for 1 week of food.

Anyways what I mean is the people who CAN afford it should not pirate. The people who cant afford it, get it.

I understand what you mean though DST, but try to understand me too

Back to the food stamps, they wouldn't let us have them even in this bad of shape. There's lots more stuff too we have like 6 people in the house and only 1 working. WTF why cant we get food stamps? Government blows thats why

[DST]

What we're talking about is political.

If we are to make special allowances for the poorer people, then that is socialist.
If we are to make people pay for things no matter what, then that is capitalist.

Capitalism = Conservatives tend to favor big business and personal responsibility.
Socialism = Liberals tend to favor government and social responsibility.

The extremes of these forms would be Facism and Communism.

My point is, this concept has been raging for centuries, and is always going back and forth. We cannot hope to come to a conlusion on the topic in one afternoon on a forum thread.

You can be on either side, or in the middle, or you could not care completely. The choice is up to you.

Personally, I'm a little in the middle and a little not caring. I've always been poor, but i do not seek government aid, because i believe a creature must be able to fend for itself. The earth, and nature have always been very specific about that. Species can go extinct if they're not able to cope - Nature is 100% capitalist.

The system of money is a necessary test to force us to work hard, to force us to evolve. That's why there are humans in the first place.

But creativity and art are very fragile; we can't let capitalism ruin them. Canons of proportion take hold and dominate the culture (ever notice how all egyptian artwork looks almost identical? The religious canons restricted their creativity and there is very little artistic evolution or change over 3,000 years of that empire. So when someone says, "walk like an egyptian" you know exactly what they mean - because every single image of a person is in same pose. (I'd argue that it happened to comic books too...silly spandex crap they all look the same)).

Music and video games are all about making yourself feel better when you have no money. I agree that you have a point as well, Hblade. They are above and beyond money, society, even nature....games and music are about fantasy. The normal rules don't apply - that is their very nature. You can't deny people music and art because of lack of money.

I would feel bad about pirating something that if it was reasonably priced - i would never pirate a 20$ game.

I would download a 1,000$ dollar piece of software and crack that. Screw 'em.

I am in the middle.

[Hblade]

Your speach on nature really changed my thoughts about you... :3 in a good way.


But ya know, no one really "Wants" the governmental aid, or any other financial aid because it's just plain silly to have to have them. Some people just need them

[DST]

Yet capitalists would argue that the more you give out, the more people will take. In some people's opinion, giving people anything is a bad thing.

But that argument is only potent if there are systems in place to give people the means to make what they need. Give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day. Teach him how to fish, and he'll eat for the rest of his life.

But i know what you mean, Sometimes you just need money.



No, Piracy does Not mean we have no future in game dev!

[Hblade]

Exactly, it doesnt, affect the game dev at all :3

[krenisis]

Ok I think there are some very important points missing from this conversation that I will bring up now. Game companies themselves are too very responsible for piracy. In the mobile sector!!
But now all they do is change the graphics and release the same game. In my book they are pirates themselves stealing money from people by releasing rehashed games. I played several of thier games and was able to beat the game 1st time playing.
Why??? Iam good but not that good I wish!! I beat the games 1st because they were the exact same games with different graphics. See when this happens it opens the doors to people pissed off looking for free games and cracks. The Game companies need to be responsible if
they want to regain consumer confidence. Right now in the mobile market Microsoft was forced to build a whole new OS where old games and apps dont work in order to start selling games again. Hopefully quaility control will be alot better this time around and developers will have more respect for consumers.
they want to regain consumer confidence or piracy will destroy the industry.

[DST]

to regain consumer confidence or piracy will destroy the industry.

I don't think it's possible for piracy to destroy the industry.


However, there are no excuses on the user's side....stealing is stealing, regardless of quality of what is stolen, or what tactics game companies use.

[krenisis]

Well I dont think companies robbing people is correct ethier.

[Hblade]

....stealing is stealing, regardless of quality

that really struck me... thanks lol now I wont pirate >.> I dont like doing things like that it's just when you want something desperately, you go to extreme measures. I'll try not to pirate again but... Idk

I hate stealing but once you start pirating it's hard to stop, like people who smoke... :3

[krenisis]

So DST says stealing is stealing reguardless of quality?
Well to me stealing is when someone offers a product and the product is falsely advertised or misleads the consumer just so the consumer can spend thier hard earn cash. Thats theft , thats why there are laws against false AD but the government doesnt regulate. The companies dont regulate themselves. So then we regulate them ourselve hehe. FreeStyle

[Hblade]

xD, good speach, kren