http://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/post.aspx?postid=303512&p=2

Read, discuss:

I'll be honest, I read that less as an article about piracy, and more an article on how game developers aren't biz wizzes, which makes sense to me. Many geeks tend to be so caught up in the idea of a thing (can I make graphics that are better than anyone else's) that they lose sight of the prize (who would buy it if I did).

I found the article interesting, but fairly obvious when put in context. Also, I have no problem with Sins, but I don't think that it should be used as a template for all games, and in that I think we should be glad that there are "stupid" companies out there that make games like Crysis. I mean, I don't have a rig that can play it, but I'm sure someone does.

- J

"I found the article interesting, but fairly obvious when put in context"

I'm not sure that it is really, like most insightful things its very obvious when you think about it. However there are so many games that require a pc from the last year or so to run 'at their best' - why is this?

I still think Doom, System Shock 2 and Fallout 2 are fantastic games even though they look like crap by todays standards, hell i even spent an hour or so playing the original asteroids arcade machine and the graphics for that were glowing white outlines of a triangle (spaceship) and irregular polygons (asteroids).

"I think we should be glad that there are "stupid" companies out there that make games like Crysis. I mean, I don't have a rig that can play it, but I'm sure someone does."

Well yes but if the only new thing in a game is the 'better graphics' and nothing else then it seesm like a bit of a waste. Better games (i'm thinking things like Stalker and SPORE here) use mroe powerful systems to do more interesting things.

The argument FOR constantly pushing boundaries (or rather required system specs) is that last years cutting edge is next years mainstream. Or in other words what was once expensive will be affordable eventually. If specs didn't improve we would be stuck with 286's.

However this argument is losing force since the 'mainstream' (by that i mean non-gaming) system spec is getting further and further from the gaming system spec in terms of performance (though not in terms of cost since the cost of a mainstream and gaming PC are both falling).

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However thats skirting around the central issues which for me are:

Piracy cannot be avoided so why piss off people who have bought your software?

If you want to avoid piracy make sure you offer benefits to people who bought your game (like frequent streaming patches and updates from something like Stardock or Steam for example)

If you need to sell 500,000 copies and you assume 1% market penetration you assume 5,000,000 people have the hardware to run your game. (i would argue that market penetration percentages are much higher for gaming software but the thrust of the argument holds true)

Read something very similar back in the days when GalCiv2 launched. I agree with Stardock's stance on not needing CD Keys, and not catering to hardcore gamers and pirates... Abandonware aside (which most titles I'd still pay for if the company would sell them), I don't pirate games or software. I HAVE one of those hardcore systems with godly specs and an 8800GTX card, and still the games I'm usually playing are BF1942/Nam, Master of Orion 2, Dawn of War, and Sim freakin Tower. Yes I love my godly specs for when I loose 4 hours to a skirmish on SuCom, and I wouldn't have wished for a lesser system on my playthrough of Crysis, but my core interest is in games that are fun, not pretty.

I'm going to give Sins of a Solar Empire a chance, GalCiv2 held my interest for a brief period but the challenge wasn't there, and I wasn't fond of how saved ship designs would only come available if you had the research for 100% of every tiny device used on it. It was always simply easier to design a new ship than to try unlock one of my saved ones. But they did get my money for it, and again when the expansion came out.

StarDock's only loosing point with me is the use of a launcher like Valve's Steam, which to me was even MORE pointless because SD didn't use CD Keys where Steam is built-in piracy blocking.

Anyways, most here know my opinion on launchers, Steam in particular...

Lightbulb:

Well yes but if the only new thing in a game is the 'better graphics' and nothing else then it seesm like a bit of a waste. Better games (i'm thinking things like Stalker and SPORE here) use mroe powerful systems to do more interesting things.

Oi, Crysis was great to play.

"'better graphics' and nothing else then it seesm like a bit of a waste"

Ya, I don't really think Crysis was just about "better graphics". I think the amazing physics added a huge amount of appeal to people. What Crysis lacked was a good story structure.. and I imagine there's going to be a game not too far off with the amazing graphics, physics, and atmosphere all combined with an amazing story. But by then the graphics and physics will be yesterdays news, so nobody will thank Crysis for being one of the first to do those things so amazingly. So, I would say Crysis was a major leap for gaming... but for different reasons then, say.. SPORE will be.

I think Crysis always gets a bad rap, just because people love to vote for the underdog, for whatever reason. Pity, I guess.

Btw, this is coming from someone who absolutely loved GalCiv 2

Was an interesting read. I agree with the writer about piracy being more a scapegoat for the industries failings (as it is in the music industry atm) than the root cause of it all.

My major problem with PC gaming is that, when a new flashy title comes it, my first thought often isnt "how much will that game cost" but "how much would a rig upgrade cost to run that thing?" Games like Crysis, DoomIII etc will not run smoothly in super pretty mode on the kind of machine I can afford; & when played without all the sparkly effects whats left is a pretty mediocre experience. DVDs, Console games etc dont have this issue where the game seems to have been made with a hypothetical system in mind, then as an afterthought broken down for those of us who cant afford gaming monolith PCs. So when given a choise between buying, for example, COD4 on PC or X360, ill always chose 360 because I know that all ill have to buy to get the game working is the game, & not a new graphics card/processor to go with it.

More importantly, however, PC gaming is possibly the only modern entertainment medium I can think of where the expectation is pay full price or nothing. Console games & DVDs I can rent before deciding if worth buying. Music I can hear on the radio/on TV or listen on the internet before buying. PC gaming doesnt have this option. Sure we get screenshots, flashy CGI videotrailers/scripted gameplay movies & maybe a demo (thats usually buggy, short & gives very little infomation about the game that makes it stand out from all the others. RTS tutorial demos being paticularly guilty of this); but none of these things really let us experience the game & make a decision about whether its worth buying.

With new release PC titles edging increasingly over £40 off the shelf, there are too many reasons not to buy a PC game for me to justify that pricetag. A console game I can rent for £5 before deciding wheter to pay £50 for the full thing. I dont have that luxury with PC games & so, with a few exceptions like STALKER, Medieval II (although I wish I hadnt) & The Orange Box; for the mostpart I simply dont buy new PC titles anymore.

Excellent article. Obviously he's a developer who's smarter than the average bear. My only complaint is that I play almost exclusively first person shooters, probably the most pirated genre. So while piracy might not kill PC gaming, it might well kill (or at least severely bitch-slap) my favorite genre. Thus I'll have a more limited selection of games. :-(

I just spent over $1100 on an upgrade specifically for COD4 and for Crysis, basically a second computer except I'm migrating my old video card. When I play through my backlog of games except for Crysis, I'll upgrade my video card too. So there is some game-driven upgrading going on, although I certainly agree it's not a basis for a sound business model.

Thread has been dead for a while, but after I saw some discussion in another thread, I figured I'd drag it up rather than create a new one.

Cousin_IT:

More importantly, however, PC gaming is possibly the only modern entertainment medium I can think of where the expectation is pay full price or nothing. Console games & DVDs I can rent before deciding if worth buying. Music I can hear on the radio/on TV or listen on the internet before buying. PC gaming doesnt have this option. Sure we get screenshots, flashy CGI videotrailers/scripted gameplay movies & maybe a demo (thats usually buggy, short & gives very little infomation about the game that makes it stand out from all the others. RTS tutorial demos being paticularly guilty of this); but none of these things really let us experience the game & make a decision about whether its worth buying.

I find this to be one of the most important points in the defence of piracy. I don't know how many times I've been "tricked" into buying a ridiculous CD just because the singles were good while the rest of the album was filler. Same goes for game demos and movie trailers - both can be used to completely misrepresent the full product. It seems that recently, more and more people are being burnt by dodgy product designed to create money rather than an enjoyable experience, and with the costs quickly adding up ($30 AUD on a cd, $15 to see a movie, or $100+ on a game) piracy is gaining more support.

I tend to have the one opinion for all forms of piracy, which has also received some support by recent research into its effects on sales: Piracy doesn't so much lose customers, as gain publicity it wouldn't have gained otherwise. Until recently, I hadn't bought a console game for about 1-2 years, and the last PC game I'd bought was Red Alert 2, back when it was new. Since investing in a decent PC that can actually run a good game, renewing my love of gaming, and even deciding to expand my music catalogue, I went a'downloadin to find something that met my standards. I'll admit that I've downloaded many a game, gotten copies of others from friends, and have a pretty extensive mp3 collection. But in doing so, I've also gone out and bought a few hundred dollars worth of PC games, and somewhere in the thousands worth of CDs, all product that I wouldn't have touched otherwise.

For example: Half life. Until 6 months ago, I'd never played any of the series, and I ignored the hype surrounding it as pure fanboyism. Then a friend mentioned he had a copy of the original Half Life I could have. Played through it, loved it, went out and bought the Orange box on the next payday, am waiting eagerly for the next installments, and have even gone and ordered a legal copy of the original online.

Same with music - I read a review about DJ Shadow a few years back. I was relatively new to that side of hip hop at the time, and was a bit wary about spending cash just by a review. So I download the album. Hey, this is pretty awesome. Download some more - oh wow, all his stuff is great. Over the next few months I'd bought every album I could find of his, and gone to 2 gigs, plus spreading the word to other friends. In addition to that, I've gone on to check out other artists in a similar style, on his label, or featured on his albums, and bought a lot of their albums as well.

Then there's the material that I just can't get unless I download it - ultra rare funk tracks, underground artists from other countries that don't sell outside their homeland, old school games that just seem to be sold anywhere anymore. Surely me enjoying that product is fine if it's the only way I can get it?

I do also find that high game prices and delayed release dates, particularly here in Australia, tend to cause increased piracy as well. I don't feel as bad about "tearing money out of developer's hands" when I know that most of the shelf price is triple markup purely for retailer profit.

I won't deny that piracy has negative effects - there'll always be those bad eggs that just take the easy way, cop everything they can for free, and never give anything back (not even seeding the files!). To me at least, piracy seems to be inevitable, and with the amount of positive points it has, it should become part of the business plan, rather than the "try and fight a tide" approach that is most popular at current. Thoughts?

P.S. Don't even get me started on the "Piracy supports Terrorism" malarkey that seems to be running wild lately.

Here's a grey area: In china, the official games you find in government-allowed stores that presumably send some money back to the original company are all burns. Or, at best, official remakes of the original, in which about 75% of the writing has been translated. It's kinda funny, they generally get tired of it after about 3 hours of gameplay.
So says, MyChinesFriend, eagle warrior, of Tenochtitlan.

ps. pardon the aoe II expansion reference

tiredinnuendo:
Also, I have no problem with Sins, but I don't think that it should be used as a template for all games, and in that I think we should be glad that there are "stupid" companies out there that make games like Crysis. I mean, I don't have a rig that can play it, but I'm sure someone does.

- J

This is a fair point. I intend to snap up Sins ASAP and loved Gal Civs 1/2 but there are some other games I like that could only have come from game designers with fewer business scruples. IToan extent we should be thankful that there are still lots of high profile business idiots running around making games that aren't optimally geared to profit. But only an extent. Those idiots have their cons too.