Spore Most Pirated Game of 2008?

Anti-piracy measures be damned; Spore takes the cake this year with the highest number of illegal PC game downloads on BitTorrent.

Instead of halting software piracy, the initially harsh DRM implemented in Will Wright's evolutionary masterpiece Spore seems to be having the opposite effect. TorrentFreak reports Spore is the most illegally downloaded game on BitTorrent this year, with an estimated 1.7 million downloads and counting. That's also not counting other forms of software piracy.

Previously, EA's Mariam Sughayer minimized early reports of a high volume of illegal Spore downloads. "People need to recognize that every BitTorrent download doesn't represent a successful copy of a game, let alone a lost sale," said in an interview with Gamasutra this fall. Suhayer noted some individuals EA spoke with reported incomplete or glitchy downloads. Even so, TorrentFreak stands by its figures.

For 2008, Spore topped TorrentFreak's BitTorrent list with over 1,700,000 estimated downloads. Another EA hit, The Sims 2, came in second at about 1,150,000. Assassins Creed takes third with 1,070,000. Here's the full list and the total number of estimated BitTorrent downloads for each title as of last week.

1. Spore (1,700,000)
2. The Sims 2 (1,150,000)
3. Assassins Creed (1,070,000)
4. Crysis (940,000)
5. Command & Conquer 3 (860,000)
6. Call of Duty 4 (830,000)
7. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (740,000)
8. Fallout 3 (645,000)
9. Far Cry 2 (585,000)
10. Pro Evolution Soccer 2009 (470,000)

Permalink

way to go. now the next EA game is going to ship with an armed escort to supervise your game instalation and take the DVD back and leave, and you'll have to call EA everytime you want to start the game and ask for a 64 digit authorization code that is only good for 5 minutes, and then again during every 20 minutes of gameplay.

Yay for civil protest in Cyberspace!

GoldenShadow:
way to go. now the next EA game is going to ship with an armed escort to supervise your game instalation and take the DVD back and leave, and you'll have to call EA everytime you want to start the game and ask for a 64 digit authorization code that is only good for 5 minutes, and then again during every 20 minutes of gameplay.

Sorry friend, but even EA isn't that stupid. They know exactly what happened here is what we all know it is: they put on DRM that was the equivalent of locking the consumer in a jail cell with a big burly fellow named "Bubba" and consumers decided that they could keep their $60 and get Spore on the internets w/o all that being bent over. You know how I know that they know? Because they tried to dismiss it by lying about how bad it was. You can only lie if you know the truth, otherwise it's just a misstatement.

Wow like 4 of the top 5 games pirated were made by EA. Interesting.

Wait... wasn't this reported earlier?

the_tramp:
Wait... wasn't this reported earlier?

Yeah, but now it's official. And I must say, the backlash of EA's DRM is delicious. mmmmm... Irony...

Well was no surprise that most of top 10 are EA as most on that list were not worth the £40 they were been sold at. I'm just disappointed that fallout is in that list as Bethesda one of few companies who have common sense when comes to DRM issue and should be supported and that one of few games worth the £40 especially the PC version since the G.E.C.K tool kit coming out soon.

Nathan Meunier:
Spore Most Pirated Game of 2008?

Previously, EA's Mariam Sughayer minimized early reports of a high volume of illegal Spore downloads. "People need to recognize that every BitTorrent download doesn't represent a successful copy of a game, let alone a lost sale," said in an interview with Gamasutra this fall. Suhayer noted some individuals EA spoke with reported incomplete or glitchy downloads. Even so, TorrentFreak stands by its figures.

Permalink

That kills me that EA have gone from 'every download is a lost sale, we've lost this many millions due to piracy' to now, 'DRM didn't cost us that many sales, most of them were in fact yadda yadda yadda whatever'.

Yes a disappointment to see Fallout3 and GTA SA on there, especially when SA on steam was like $10 one weekend.

Also, to be fair, EA do the biggest selling games , so its no surprise to see they're the biggest victims of piracy.

I just hope Rockstar don't fall foul of deciding to release statements essentially saying 'nah nah you can't break the protection on GTA IV so yah boo sucks'.

bue519:
Wow like 4 of the top 5 games pirated were made by EA. Interesting.

And the fifth one was made by Ubisoft, the other big DRM criminal as far as forcing their customers to bend over and take a broomstick up the ass is concerned.

In everyone's eagerness to pounce on Spore for being the most pirated game, look at number two! The Sims 2 was stolen an estimated 1.1 million times this year? That game has been out for four years! Assuming the piracy rate was much higher closer to its release and has gradually decline to 1.1 million copies stolen, that's a mind-boggling number of Sims 2 releases that were played with zero monetary transaction. How can Maxis afford to keep making games if this keeps up? Everyone loses if they shut down. =(

The only surprise on that list was C&C 3. That many people care (or.. don't care, I guess) about C&C to steal it? Hmm.

Blank__:
How can Maxis afford to keep making games if this keeps up? Everyone loses if they shut down. =(

1.1 million pirated copies matters little when you sell a hundred million copies (Sims series has done that).

So long as valve continues to exist, I am content
(but oh sweet irony)

From a different thread:

ElArabDeMagnifico:
Oh, one thing I want to say about Assassin's Creed - a lot of people had to pirate it/crack it to actually play the damned thing:

Should be the first minute that shows him trying to bypass everything and rip an entirely new CD because of the copy protection.

Blank__:

The only surprise on that list was C&C 3. That many people care (or.. don't care, I guess) about C&C to steal it? Hmm.

C&C 3 I can understand as has same bull**** DRM as spore and while I love the C&C series will refuse to have SecuROM even touch my new PC after hassle with it with old one with spore.

I hate pirates, I really do, I have my reasons and they've all been stated somewhere by someone that's not me so I'll save you the boredom of my personal ranting.

C&C 3 was horrid at launch. Multiplayer was crashing 2/3 games. After like 6 months there came a patch to fix it. I feel sorry for everyone who bought that game legit and wants to reinstall at some point to play multiplayer and gets faced with: "OH YEAH LOL, WE SHIPPED A BUGGED ASSED GAME SO DOWNLOAD THIS PATCH BEFORE EVEN TRYING TO PLAY PLZKTHX"
I get why it was pirated. With the way some games launch, you shouldn't buy them until they ship anew with patch included.

My housemate bought Fallout 3 for PC and Xbox 360. We both play it on the 360 since the game refuses to run properly on our PC's (They're definitely high end machines).

To be honest, I'm beginning to lose faith in PC gaming development. It's too damned bug ridden. Give me a mouse + keyboard on a console, available in all games and I'll never even look at PC gaming again.

It just goes to show you that no matter what you try to do to protect your IP, someone out there is smarter and more driven to break it. Tell someone that you've designed an advanced DRM and what's the first thing that they'll want to do: get around it!

I hope so, because EA needs to be taken down by any means neccisary.

but they probably make up for it by nickle and diming console gamers with DLC microtransactions -_-

Spore isn't a surprise, but [I]The Sims 2[/i]? I suppose it makes sense, what with many pirates being quite casual gamers...

I have to admit, I don't blame them. I'm very anti-pirate, but I really wish I didn't buy this game, but rather stole it instead. After I lost interest in it's shallow gameplay I at least wouldn't have been down 50 bucks.

Nurb:
I hope so, because EA needs to be taken down by any means neccisary.

but they probably make up for it by nickle and diming console gamers with DLC microtransactions -_-

EA isn't a bad company, they just make bad decisions from time to time. DLC counteract the reselling of games so I fully support it.

In the computer world if you say something is unbreakable you're just making yourself a target. DRM's don't work, they can just frustrate your customers and make them stop buying your products. There will always be somebody more determined to break into your game then you were in protecting it.

Leasing Spore from EA is not what customers want. Now people who didn't even pay for it have unlimited access to it. Think about that quote from Star Wars, the more EA tightens it's grip, the more customers will slip through their fingers; and good riddance too, they've brought down so many games by limiting development time and money and publishing games that weren't even finished until a year after their release.