Todd Hollenshead talks about Pirates

(GK-Duck) #1

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6449421.stm

BTW, who’s leaking the screen shots? :shock:

(SniperSteve) #2

There should be ways around the piracy without nerfing the PC to a console level.

(Sauron|EFG) #3

Maybe one of the private beta testers found out how to capture screen shots? Doesn’t mean a copy is “out there”…

(BondyBoy007) #4

it was on the inquirer yesterday, nice to see bbc have picked up on it

http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=38179

(iwound) #5

Apparently developers are the worst culprits.

The id executive even pointed out the general attitude problems among developers themselves who feel it’s okay to download all sorts of media they didn’t pay for. He said developers need to take a long look at themselves: if they have gigs of South Park on their system are they part of the problem?

(Rahabib) #6

In the case of QW it would seem that the are making too big of a deal of this. Most modern online multiplayer games are very hard to get around. Single Player games on the other hand I can see a huge deal but with games that are entirely multiplayer like WOW, and CSS etc. its hard to get into a public server with a cracked key/ID unless its stolen from another person. I may be naive, but I don’t know anyone who plays a game made in the last couple of years that can play online on public servers.

Besides, there are console mods that allow you to play pirated games too, and if they just shut down the PC gaming development, all those pirates who love to game will just refocus their attention on console games.

(ayatollah) #7

I don’t think they are making a big deal out of it. Piracy happens yes, it is difficult to play online with pirated copies yes, but id also make other games. I think the example of QW is used just because it is currently in development.

Piracy is a big deal to developers/publishers and they shouldn’t have the point of view that it doesn’t matter if its an online game.

(M8DNanite) #8

Yeah, id Softwares multiplayer part has never been cracked. On the other hand with modded XBOX360 you can play online with a pirated copy.

One thing is good with consoles compared to PC in esports is that no one can play online with modified content ie. no aimbots in consoles for example.

#9

For Doom3: It would be good if I could have payed for how many levels I played. Then I would have payed for perhaps 1/3 to half the game.

(SKaREO) #10

Verify cd keys online, it works well for Valve with Steam. Online distribution is the only way to go these days, sadly. It ruins the retailers, unless they all move online and everyone buys games that way. Single-player offline games are so yesterday! If that’s what you want though, go to the console. Let the PC dominate online gaming. :nod:

(Svanire) #11

I love this lost sales crap.

How can you lose something which you’ve never gotten? The majority of people who download games will not buy it.

Personally I will buy quality games. ETQW will be a guaranteed purchase because I trust that SD will roll out a quality product.

Anti piracy methods like DRM will forever plague the legitimate user not the hackers. Nothing will stop hackers from cracking any form of anti piracy it only hinders paying customers.

People download games because they are expensive or they want to try before they buy.

When the majority of developers produce quality games and cater towards the community instead of share holders piracy will significantly decrease.

(Kruspe) #12

There was another article a week or so ago about id and another company or two leaving their “PC roots” and developing for consoles too. Really, it looks more like they are just using piracy as a scapegoat to keep from losing any fans who feel betrayed by this move.

For starters, piracy has been around on the computer for quite some time. Take Doom for instance. People could just let their friends borrow the disks to install it, and they were good to go. Yet, low and behold, id and a bunch of other companies all managed to do extremely well.

As others have pointed out, there’s also this assumption that any pirated copy would have been bought if it couldn’t have been pirated. This is of course another pile of bs. We can’t possibly know how many would or wouldn’t have been bought. I think we can all agree though that assuming all pirated copies would have been bought legitimately at full price is just slightly biased.

As for consoles, consoles are pirated just as much as PC games. In the US it actually isn’t that bad at all, but if you travel to Mexico for instance, you can find pirated console games easier then legitimate ones.

Personally, I’d take the word of a guy with a ponytail and soul patch, who just happens to be the CEO of id, with a grain of salt.

(AnarchyAngel) #13

Got it in one that’s my sentiments exactly.

(BondyBoy007) #14

Wasn’t Doom the 1st game to be shareware (ppl were encouraged to distribute it further), then if you liked it you could unlock the rest of it by purchasing a key?

So I don’t think Doom is the best example to pick

(organon) #15

Every game I played significant time (e.g. more than 2 hours) I have bought or it was free in the first place.
I think the only thing I ever pirated was 3dstudio max. But that I didn’t use for too long either, had it installed only a few weeks or so.

Blender/Gimp/PovRay/Inkscape are my general tools now when I do some artwork.
I prefer coding though. And the GNU toolchain is free fortunately and I prefer it by far over the Microsoft environment I have to use at work.

(carnage) #16

if you agree that its mainly single player games that suffer from piracy then i’d say console are far worse for piracy than PC, PC games are often more multilayer focused where consoles (at least in the recent past) have been almost entirely built around single player

in the day of the PS2 at least half the people i knew owned one had had it cracked and most of there games were pirated. although my PS2 was not cracked it still dint stop me lending/swapping games with friends to play though many single player games

the idea that leaving the PC will stop pirates imo is a load of bull

(Gringo) #17

This sums it up perfectly. If I really want a game i’ll most certainly buy it. If I dont really want a certain game I would d/l it. If I cant d/l it then i’ll just leave it.

(leifhv) #18

Semantics. Try to grasp the actual issue here instead.

The fact is that game developers are moving over to consoles since they make more money there. One of the reasons they make more money on consoles is that it is much harder to pirate a game there.

You can whine and stamp your foot all you want but that want change the above fact.

‘Download and try before you buy’ is also part of the problem…you can’t do that on consoles so the procedure on consoles is ‘Buy and try’, which in the end means more money to the game companies which is (generally) all that is matters for them.

(leifhv) #19

So why the **** do you think they are moving over to the consoles then?! Do you think it’s part of an conspiracy to kill PC gaming just to be evil??

This is just plain wrong…compared to the market size the pirate problem is much larger on the PC. If you look at the new consoles (which is obviously what the ID&co does) there is no piracy at all except for some freaks with ancient XBox 360 firmwares, hacked DVD players and no online connection.

:roll:

(Gringo) #20

Not necessarily buy and try. More likely rent and try or buy and try and bring it back. Game over here allows u a 14 day no questions asked returned. At least they used to.

It also depends what console ur on about for how hard it is to pirate.

This is also part of the problem. Its simple economics. Make games affordable and good and people will buy them. Produce crap at over inflated prices and u push people to the black market.