Hurlshort

We can argue about the publisher model, about copyright and IP law plenty. There are major flaws there. But piracy isn't going to fix any of those problems. It's just a way to get something without paying for it. How is it not immoral to copy someone else's work without permission? We aren't talking about a cure for a disease, we are talking about entertainment media. You can live without it if you don't like the distribution system. Why would anyone bother creating something if they didn't have some protections in place for their work?

Huh? It's copyright infringement, not murder. Even if you think copyright law makes sense, violations of it are like trademark violations. I wouldn't call it "vile" to ignore a government mandated monopoly, even if it does exist legitimately. Vile may be an overstatement, but your statement is basically the opposite direction of his. You are dismissing it as some stick it to the government idea. Piracy, above all else, sticks it to the creator. It is bad. You have a creator, and that creator asks for compensation for their creation. When you pirate, you ignore that basic idea. There is nothing good about that.

Happy Birthday Krook!

Huh, looks like Lord of Flies has a new account.

It was a pretty decent guide before modern science nailed down all the particulars.

If I was hungry enough, I suppose.

Maybe I've just mellowed out in my old age, but your posts have been absolutely delightful lately Volo. I've really been enjoying what you have to say. I know it isn't important to you, but I thought it should be said.

Just finished act 1 as a Jedi Knight on TOR, it was great. You can tell that this storyline got a lot of love, the tie-ins and cinematics are a bit better than what I saw in the trooper and bounty hunter first acts. I've said it before, but TOR is a pretty awesome single player RPG.

Poor Boo, no respect for his brilliant posts

Most definitely. Actually TOR has some of the best cities I've seen in games. The can still feel a bit underpopulated, but they nailed the size and scope of some of these cool places.

Actually I thought the Dwarf city in DA1 was a lot better than Denerim. It felt fairly massive.

Temple of Elemental Evil is actually pretty bad in terms of story and character development, so I'd steer clear of that one. It does have one of the best turn based combat implementations ever though. Arcanum is my favorite on the list.

Baldur's Gate was pretty easy to get around, but it still had a sense of being a city. Denerim was a market with four merchants and a few houses.

Most of my art is from my 5 year old daughter.

LC, I live behind a High School and I get a fantastic firework show during Homecoming. It's a bit late for that, but it could be a holiday kickoff thing? December 1st usually has a lot of those.

Agreed, when I reached Denerim, which was built up as a big deal, it was a huge letdown. It was empty and super tiny.

This crowdfunding stuff is awesome, but it is completely unreasonable to expect it to take over the economic model of how media is developed. The customer is taking on too much risk. The customer is expected too wait to long for the reward. The appeal of crowdfunding lies completely among the hardcore fans. Call me when we get anywhere near a million backers on a project. Are we going start paying writers to write all the books we want directly, and then wait for years while they miss their deadlines? I love George RR Martin, but I'd be furious if I had to wait for seven years after paying for a book to get it. Are we going to start choosing screenplays that we want to get funded, and then fund what actors we want in the leads? That actually sounds like a cool idea, but the average movie costs tens of millions to produce, and then it's only a couple hours in length. Do you really think there are going to be enough fans to raise that type of money? It sounds crazy because it is.

To be honest I have no issue with DRM, I always buy my games so I can't recall a time where a form of DRM effected my gaming experience? I am supportive of any measures to reduce pirating. But remember that resources go into creating and implementing that DRM, resources that could be better used in so many other ways.

That's a great explanation of why DRM exists, FlintlockJazz. No one here likes DRM, I hope everyone understands that. I've never seen anyone post about wanting DRM.

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Piracy-Rate-for-the-PC-is-33-to-1-Says-Bohemia-Interactive-235392.shtml See how he phrased that? 3 legitimate buyers for every 100 pirate attempts. Now this is a crazy number, but he is very clear with what he is saying, unlike the Ubisoft quote which is unclear.

Am I the only one here who thinks that way of interpreting the interview makes absolutely no sense? I mean it would be nice if the interviewer clarified whether he was talking about copies sold versus copies played, but it seems like common sense that the CEO is going to be talking about sales numbers instead of some weird 'played' number that would make no logical sense. He tripped up when he started talking about the f2p numbers, but this interview refocuses on the initial statement, which is more simply 90-95% of certain games are pirated. They are talking about 90-95% of copies sold. http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/09/05/ubisoft-drm-piracy-interview/

Anubite, I'm not arguing with the statements by the Ubisoft CEO, he clearly made some bizarre statements in interviews and never backed them up with solid numbers. I'm arguing with your bad math. 90% of a number is less than that number. 90% of 3 million would be 2.7 million. It is not 60 million. That is simply bad math. Hey, I think 2.7 million is still too high of a quote for a piracy number. But it isn't quite as unreasonable as what you are saying.

Hey, he called your words wise Alan, relax Seriously, nkkkk didn't seem to be gunning for you or making a threat, I think he is just hopeful that DA3 will be better than DA2, and find success because of that.

While I absolutely love the idea of crowdfunding, and it does change the landscape of the publisher/develop relationship, I don't see how it affects copyright. Obsidian still owns the rights to Project Eternity, by crowd funding it we've just freed them up from having to share that copyright or give it over completely to a publisher. Obsidian is promising to release a DRM free version, but that still doesn't mean by funding the game you now own the IP. Also I think you are overstating the impact crowdfunding will have on gaming. It gives a developer leverage in their business practices. It gives a studio like Obsidian a chance to do a project that publishers won't touch. But there are two problems here: 1. We, as the crowdfunders, have now taken on the risks of the publisher. If the game stinks, or fails to get finished, we are out of luck. 2. The Project Eternity numbers are still nowhere near as impressive as a major game release. Obsidian got 70,000+ backers and over $4 million dollars, that's awesome. But those numbers still don't compare to what a typical blockbuster does in their first week of sales.

I finished watching The Wire, all 5 seasons. It was pretty awesome, and I think I can navigate the mean streets of Baltimore now. There were a lot of episodes that made me not want to be a cop, but the way it ended made me feel that it would be a pretty great career if I had to choose something else to do.