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[Hurlshort]

Doom had a shareware version, so I'm not sure your example is all that great.  

 

Considering you can get many titles for pennies on the dollar nowadays, what with Steam sales, humble bundles, etc., I'd say the arguments for piracy are pretty weak.  But it has been awhile since we've gone rounds on this, so maybe it's time.    

[Fenixp]

Oh don't play dumb, specific title is beside the point and you know it. And... Well there's a reason why I don't mention price in my arguments.

Edit: I should probably elaborate a little - Whys of piracy are an entirely different issue and I believe they are fairly irrelevant to a discussion about whether piracy hurts, helps or doesn't affect gaming.

Edit 2 - Revenge of the Edit:
All right, just so I don't have to post pointlessly I'll just put this into another edit -
You make it seem like the issue has already been discussed around these boards ad infinity, but my terrible searching skills allow me to find very little on the topic. I am, however, quite interested in viewpoints of this community - you guys often enough seem to back up what you're saying with actual reasoning as opposed to "What I'm saying is right lol", but I absolutely understand if you don't want to go into the same argumentation again and again. Anyway, what I'd like is if any of you could provide me with some links to previous topics discussing this issue, if you know about them at any rate. Don't worry, not about to necro anything, just want to read.

See, where I'm coming from is not a position of firm belief that piracy definitely helps videogames. I've seen some research papers proving that it either does or at the very least doesn't hurt for other media, I've also seen research papers proving the opposite that just didn't feel particularly persuasive to me, and then there are those which just work with implied "Piracy is fine" and "Piracy is wrong" without much reasoning backing up either position, which is ... Well, meh. As Zoraptor correctly pointed out, there's very little credible research concerning videogames and it shows.

 

My personal viewpoint is that piracy makes me comfortable in knowing I will never lose access to my purchased products and if anything ever goes **** up, there's a third party providing for me. I've seen, hell, been part of rampant piracy for most of my life and it largely helped me become the person I am now (you poor souls :-P) I don't know how much of an interest in videogames would I have if I wasn't part of that entire process, so seeing the different point of view is quite difficult for me without sound evidence and actual research into the subject which seems to be lacking, for the most part. I think it would be really cool to see global sale statistics for consoles before and after they got hacked for instance while keeping in mind natural aging process of these devices or how did services like Steam affect piracy and in turn sales data - as it stands tho, none of this has been put trough much research.

 

Frankly, the thought of piracy going away scares the **** out of me without seeing data confirming beyond shadow of a doubt how harmful is it. Currently we have a system which functions relatively well, preserves itself and gives consumer a decent amount of much needed choice. I'm not sure I want Valve, Ubisoft, EA and such to have complete and uncontested control over their properties, in spite of realizing that's their legal right and that that's exactly what they want. Main issue I've got with it is that they don't perceive videogames as art*, they perceive it as a product which can be disposed of after it outlives its usefulness - and when they lose the rights for their intellectual properties after the ridiculous amount of time this takes, without piracy, it's quite likely any trace of these works of art is going to either be completely gone or not available for public.

 

A very natural counter-argument to this would be "Well only buy physical, DRM-free content!" - thing is, pirate sites are what keeps this content alive naturally, organically, without any outside help, legal or financial. I firmly believe purely digital consumption of purely digital content is the way to go, and allowing consumers themselves to care for and preserve your own content is a very logical thing to do. Software pirates are not the enemy - and neither are big publishers, by the way. Still, for decades, they co-existed, yet software sales didn't drop to 0, quite the contrary, they flourished. I feel like taking piracy away would be taking away a powerful 'force of nature' which existed to curate, support and preserve milestones of our past when nobody else did. ... I'm ramblig now.

 

... Holy crap that's one hell of an edit. That's not just revenge of the edit, it's all 6 episodes of edit + extras, this is amazing!

 

* Whether you agree or not on whether videogames are a form of art, they're works of cultural signifance and as such deserve to be preserved. Whenever I refer to videogames as an art form, this is what I have in mind. I think we can all agree on that point :-P

Edited January 12, 2016 by Fenixp

[Keyrock]

We interrupt this game piracy debate to bring you the following game trailer:

 

 

We now return you to your regularly scheduled game piracy debate.

Edited January 12, 2016 by Keyrock

[Hurlshort]

Oh don't play dumb, specific title is beside the point and you know it. And... Well there's a reason why I don't mention price in my arguments.

 

Uh, you are the one that brought up Doom.

 

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/59648-piracy/

 

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/66262-piracy-or-not/?hl=starforce

 

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/56968-crysis-2-pirated/page-3?hl=starforce&do=findComment&comment=1096753

 

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/54266-ubisoft-drm-confirmed-to-boot-you-from-your-singleplayer-game-when-the-net-drops-out/?hl=starforce

 

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/54212-an-interesting-article-about-piracy/?hl=starforce

 

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/54115-the-age-of-new-drm/?hl=starforce

 

Basically I put in Starforce and it brought up a ton of conversations on piracy.  

 

Could it be that we spent the entirety of 2015 without a long discussion on piracy?

Edited January 12, 2016 by Hurlshot

[sorophx]

they don't perceive videogames as art

uh-oh! don't go there, man. this is the second most popular topic here after piracy 

[Oner]

 

Could it be that we spent the entirety of 2015 without a long discussion on piracy?

 

I seriously doubt that.

[Fenixp]

uh-oh! don't go there, man. this is the second most popular topic here after piracy 

There, happy now? :-P

 

Uh, you are the one that brought up Doom.

Well yes, but the title is completely irrelevant. Replace it with UFO (X-COM), TES: Arena, whatever :-P

 

Anyway, thank you for going trough the effort of finding these for me. Most discussion seem to be concerned with whether piracy is stealing or not and whether it's a "nice thing to do" - which I should have expected I guess, but it doesn't particularly interest me. Anyway, some interesting points were raised at the very least.

[Hurlshort]

Well I do think it is an interesting viewpoint that you bring up, that basically you never would have become a big fan of games if it weren't for piracy.  I think most of us were young and dumb at some point and probably pirated a game or two growing up.  It is hard to resist that temptation as a 13-year old, particularly back in the days when the internet was pretty wide open.  

 

But I look back on that time as me doing something dumb.  Most of my favorite gaming companies from those days are dead and buried, and while we can debate how much damage was done to them by piracy, it certainly did not help them transition to the new era.

[Mamoulian War]

 

Source for the "cultural and social importance"? Would love to see the research behind that statement.

That's the part of my statement you take issue with, really? Every widespread phenomena has some cultural and social importance, all you need to do to get that is to live in a country where piracy runs rampant. Heck, there are countries which would apply mods on a game, rebrand it and sell it under a different name - now that's genuinely harmful piracy, but denying its cultural impact on countries where it actually happens would be a little silly.

 

Anyway, the bit of my statement you actually should have taken issue with is the bit which goes on about *what* kind of importance that is, in other words, opening up to western market before it even properly arrived, because that's based purely on anecdotal evidence and my own experience.

 

Edit: We would never talk about Doom in school if a classmate didn't bring a floppy (floppies?) with a copy from his uncle, which then quickly spread around. Majority of the games which formed my childhood were pirated - not that we knew that'S even a thing back then. And a big part of early purchases from me and my friends were based on excitement for next installments of those games or at least games which were similar. I moved around quite a lot when I was a kid/teenager so I experienced more than a single collective where this happened. Naturally, I might have just gotten lucky and what I experienced might not have been an indicative of majority at all.

 

 

Actually this is what happened in every east european country. Every gamer was a pirate at some point, because there were no shops, which sold games here. After the shops started to open and they got older with proper jobs. they just stopped to pirate and start to spent ****loads of money on games. The guy which had 15 years ago the biggest collection of pirated games, that I have ever seen has now one of the biggest Steam Libraries I have ever seen. Like it or not, piracy in youth opens first the heart, and in middle age it opens the wallet big time. That is a fact, which I have experienced in my surrounding with almost everyone, who have ever played a pirated game, when I was a kid.

[Mamoulian War]

Doom had a shareware version, so I'm not sure your example is all that great.  

 

Considering you can get many titles for pennies on the dollar nowadays, what with Steam sales, humble bundles, etc., I'd say the arguments for piracy are pretty weak.  But it has been awhile since we've gone rounds on this, so maybe it's time.  

 

You could not buy the non-shareware version of Doom in East Europe, because something like credit cards did not exist at that time here among average populace.

[Mamoulian War]

 

Could it be that we spent the entirety of 2015 without a long discussion on piracy?

 

I seriously doubt that.

 

 

It is very hard to believe, but 2015 is really the most quiet year in piracy/anti-piracy debate on this board

 

Probably, that;s because GOG released to much awesomeness from kickstarters, that people simple did not have time to complain about big publishers and their DRM sillyness:P

[Majek]

All of that happened in Slovenia and other ex-yugoslavia countries as well. Back in Yugoslavia in C64 times, games were broadcast over radio so you could record them for an hour and then play. So how could it be any different later on.

[Sarex]

I don't think most people in Yug even knew what piracy was until year 2000. I know I thought I was buying legit games for a while (although I was a kid then), then the internet kind of changed that.

[Keyrock]

It's true, before the internet took off, it was literally impossible to buy legal copies of many games in Eastern Bloc countries.  If you wanted a game your choice was to buy a pirated copy.  Period.  There was no other choice.  It wasn't thought of as piracy because there was no other option.

Edited January 12, 2016 by Keyrock

[Malcador]

Guess we have 2 years to pirate as much as we can.

 

Lack of piracy isn't amazing news for consumers, really.

[Nonek]

Lack of piracy isn't amazing news for consumers, really.

 

 

Good one.

[Fenixp]

Good one.

It really isn't, positives of piracy are fairly easy to point out and prove, yet negatives are up for scrutiny. There's a reason why most argumentation against piracy you see tends to be along the lines of "It's bad" backed up by "It's common knowledge" or something along those lines. We still have ways to go when it comes to wrapping our heads around this whole digital revolution thing.

[Darkpriest]

I admit when i was young i had a collection of pirated games. Now i have steam origin gog libraries and i probably did not even touch like 60% of games there....

 

Try to make a point to parents to spend 25-40USD on a single "computer game" in a country where average monthly wage was at 480USD

Edited January 13, 2016 by Darkpriest

[mkreku]

 

Source for the "cultural and social importance"? Would love to see the research behind that statement.

That's the part of my statement you take issue with, really? Every widespread phenomena has some cultural and social importance, all you need to do to get that is to live in a country where piracy runs rampant. Heck, there are countries which would apply mods on a game, rebrand it and sell it under a different name - now that's genuinely harmful piracy, but denying its cultural impact on countries where it actually happens would be a little silly.

 

Anyway, the bit of my statement you actually should have taken issue with is the bit which goes on about *what* kind of importance that is, in other words, opening up to western market before it even properly arrived, because that's based purely on anecdotal evidence and my own experience.

 

Edit: We would never talk about Doom in school if a classmate didn't bring a floppy (floppies?) with a copy from his uncle, which then quickly spread around. Majority of the games which formed my childhood were pirated - not that we knew that'S even a thing back then. And a big part of early purchases from me and my friends were based on excitement for next installments of those games or at least games which were similar. I moved around quite a lot when I was a kid/teenager so I experienced more than a single collective where this happened. Naturally, I might have just gotten lucky and what I experienced might not have been an indicative of majority at all.

 

 

I'm just calling you out on your bull****.

 

You write all these words about cultural significance and preserving of blah blah, to justify not paying for other people's work. It's nauseating.

 

It's just your opinion and it's worthless.

[Chilloutman]

 

 

Source for the "cultural and social importance"? Would love to see the research behind that statement.

That's the part of my statement you take issue with, really? Every widespread phenomena has some cultural and social importance, all you need to do to get that is to live in a country where piracy runs rampant. Heck, there are countries which would apply mods on a game, rebrand it and sell it under a different name - now that's genuinely harmful piracy, but denying its cultural impact on countries where it actually happens would be a little silly.

 

Anyway, the bit of my statement you actually should have taken issue with is the bit which goes on about *what* kind of importance that is, in other words, opening up to western market before it even properly arrived, because that's based purely on anecdotal evidence and my own experience.

 

Edit: We would never talk about Doom in school if a classmate didn't bring a floppy (floppies?) with a copy from his uncle, which then quickly spread around. Majority of the games which formed my childhood were pirated - not that we knew that'S even a thing back then. And a big part of early purchases from me and my friends were based on excitement for next installments of those games or at least games which were similar. I moved around quite a lot when I was a kid/teenager so I experienced more than a single collective where this happened. Naturally, I might have just gotten lucky and what I experienced might not have been an indicative of majority at all.

 

 

I'm just calling you out on your bull****.

 

You write all these words about cultural significance and preserving of blah blah, to justify not paying for other people's work. It's nauseating.

 

It's just your opinion and it's worthless.

 

who is not from east europe will never understand probably, but I am pretty sure that for example guys from CD project pirated like crazy when they were young

Edited January 13, 2016 by Chilloutman

[Mamoulian War]

They even confesed to it, in one of their interviews. :-P

 

The biggest pirates in the EE, were the first people who opened the first official games shop in the region as well.

[apolloooo]

to the moon sequel, finding paradise officially announced:

 

https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2016/01/12/to-the-moon-sequel-finding-paradise/

 

https://youtu.be/gF5kvAdlgJU

Edited January 13, 2016 by apolloooo

[Amentep]

Try to make a point to parents to spend 25-40USD on a single "computer game" in a country where average monthly wage was at 480USD

 

Not that it matters much because I'm sure everyone's opinion is well entrenched, but this argument only can really be sustained if owning a video game had joined food, water and shelter as the basic necessities of life.  Otherwise its a luxury, and one nobody had to have to live.

 

Don't get me wrong, I understand that the way the market worked there were places in Eastern Europe that games were not legally available and pirating was the only way for many to play some games.  But lets not pretend that people would have collapsed and died if they'd not been able to play the game and lets not pretend that all the piracy in the world was poor people in far away places where games weren't really being distributed either. 

Edited January 13, 2016 by Amentep

[Chilloutman]

 

Try to make a point to parents to spend 25-40USD on a single "computer game" in a country where average monthly wage was at 480USD

 

Not that it matters much because I'm sure everyone's opinion is well entrenched, but this argument only can really be sustained if owning a video game had joined food, water and shelter as the basic necessities of life.  Otherwise its a luxury, and one nobody had to have to live.

 

Don't get me wrong, I understand that the way the market worked there were places in Eastern Europe that games were not legally available and pirating was the only way for many to play some games.  But lets not pretend that people would have collapsed and died if they'd not been able to play the game and lets not pretend that all the piracy in the world was poor people in far away places where games weren't really being distributed either.

 

Is anyone stating something like that? All we are saying that all that years of pirating brought us to gaming and we are now spending money on it. But without pirating there would not be that large population of gamers, doubt that there will be any dev studios either, so you can say that best game of last year was brought to you by pirates

Edited January 13, 2016 by Chilloutman

[Amentep]

 

 

Try to make a point to parents to spend 25-40USD on a single "computer game" in a country where average monthly wage was at 480USD

 

Not that it matters much because I'm sure everyone's opinion is well entrenched, but this argument only can really be sustained if owning a video game had joined food, water and shelter as the basic necessities of life.  Otherwise its a luxury, and one nobody had to have to live.

 

Don't get me wrong, I understand that the way the market worked there were places in Eastern Europe that games were not legally available and pirating was the only way for many to play some games.  But lets not pretend that people would have collapsed and died if they'd not been able to play the game and lets not pretend that all the piracy in the world was poor people in far away places where games weren't really being distributed either.

 

Is anyone stating something like that? All we are saying that all that years of pirating brought us to gaming and we are now spending money on it. But without pirating there would not be that large population of gamers, doubt that there will be any dev studios either, so you can say that best game of last year was brought to you by pirates

 

Perhaps I misread it, I thought Darkpriest was pointing out income levels as a good rationale for pirating games, hence my response.

 

That there were positive effects from pirating (more companies, a sustainable market created through early piracy) are all fine arguments to make.  That doesn't appear to be the argument I was responding to, however.