Crytek - 'We've had enough with piracy. No more PC exclusives.'

http://www.worthplaying.com/article.php?sid=51752

On one hand I sympathize. On the other, I don't understand why they, or any other company that whines about piracy, do nothing about it. Why can't they learn from Valve's positive experience?

I dont really knwo what to say to this.. other then i love crysis and hope they make more sweet games for pc.

On another note, i have two copies of crysis.... one came with my videocard and one i bought before i put my computer together, silly i know hehe :P

Just imagine if Crysis was made for the consoles, it wouldnt be as amazing as it is, and also we wouldnt have all these amazing user made maps and missions.

I must say I am VERY disappointed in Crytek. How can piracy be that big of an issue when your game sold over a million copies in just a few months, which is amazing for any PC-only game, especially one that has such high system requirements. I thought Sins proved that piracy is not that big an issue?

You know what happens when developers start going multiplatform? I'm not being selfish or anything, but when games are developed multiplatform from the start, you get a game that is dumbed down to run on the consoles, both technically and gameplay-wise. This happened with Bioshock, Ghost Recon, Rainbow Six, etc. Crysis is an amazing game, and miles ahead of any console shooter both technically and gameplay-wise, and I don't want Crysis 2 to suffer from "Console-itis". I can care less if they dumb it down and port it AFTER the release of the PC version, but please Crytek, keep the game intact with PC standards!

so sell it on steam, you stupid *****es.fireandcloud

but alas they're stupid and got EA to be their publisher, hence it'll never be on steam only on EA downloader (the steaming pile of poo that is)

[QUOTE="fireandcloud"]so sell it on steam, you stupid *****es.spierdalaj666

but alas they're stupid and got EA to be their publisher, hence it'll never be on steam only on EA downloader (the steaming pile of poo that is)

ah, i like that - it's not on steam but it's on a steaming pile of ****! it sure is, brother. it sure is.

I find this whole piracy fear propaganda .. for one how could they know it's being pirated .. where are they getting these numbers that make them tremble and cry for mama .. who profits from putting this info out there .. ie. what motivates these fear mongers .. to what end .. to what gain.

Not saying piracy doesn't exist .. but saying it affects you bottom line is intellectual dishonesty .. typically pirates are "non-buyers" .. ie. weren't ever going to purchase your products, not because they don't want to, but because they won't ever be able to. How are you going extract money from those who don't have it. It's ludicrous. Besides they technically didn't steal anything tangible that materially benefits them ..(ie. can they eat it, can they sleep on it or under it, can they sell or trade it .. all of these questions resounds with a no!)

The movie industry gives away some 100,000 plus copies of their films all the time called screeners, it's a promotional technique to encourage academy award nominations. Why can't game devs write off these supposed and most likely highly inflated piracy numbers as promotional material and just pray those who get a copy have nothing bad to say about your said product. It's word of mouth that sells product PERIOD!

I'm insulted these devs think its their birthright to be paid for their work, no one has any right to anything other than what nature gives us all freely. Be grateful for what you get and if that isn't enough which it should be if you were zen but i digress seek other sources of INCOMEing elsewhere, and be honest to your consumer base and say thats why you are leaving them behind, not because of some psuedoscience statistical research.

Point in Fact .. Crytek desires more money and they are drooling over the console numbers .. when they should be drooling over the Blizzard World of Warcraft numbers, and StarCraft numbers, and etc.. which generates funds from a solely PC based constituency. Which by the way are HUGE !!

Anyways good luck with that Crytek. :?

I'm insulted these devs think its their birthright to be paid for their work, no one has any right to anything other than what nature gives us all freely. Be grateful for what you get and if that isn't enough which it should be if you were zen but i digress seek other sources of INCOMEing elsewhere, and be honest to your consumer base and say thats why you are leaving them behind, not because of some psuedoscience statistical research.

Point in Fact .. Crytek desires more money and they are drooling over the console numbers .. when they should be drooling over the Blizzard World of Warcraft numbers, and StarCraft numbers, and etc.. which generates funds from a solely PC based constituency. Which by the way are HUGE !!

Anyways good luck with that Crytek. :?

artistry_

my boss saw that line when she walked past me just now and she wants you in. NOW.

lol...honestly....what the heck are you talking about?

PC Play:You confirmed that it's impossible to make Crysis run on an console, but yet there are constant rumors that it's nearly inevitable. Can you finally give us, our readers, and the industry the final answer on that matter? Is Crysis going to be ported to a console?

Cevat Yerli: Crysis as we have seen is impossible. Crysis would have to be largely changed to bring it to Xbox 360 or Playstation 3. Crysis is designed to be PC Exclusive. Our internal focus is not linked to bring Crysis to consoles.

Good enough for me.

PC Play:You confirmed that it's impossible to make Crysis run on an console, but yet there are constant rumors that it's nearly inevitable. Can you finally give us, our readers, and the industry the final answer on that matter? Is Crysis going to be ported to a console?

Cevat Yerli: Crysis as we have seen is impossible. Crysis would have to be largely changed to bring it to Xbox 360 or Playstation 3. Crysis is designed to be PC Exclusive. Our internal focus is not linked to bring Crysis to consoles.

Good enough for me.

The_PC_Gamer

Maybe if the online didn't suck as much...Stevendawg

Exactly! If Crytek made a better game then this wouldnt be an issue, the multiplayer was bland and boring...

I'm not particularly upset that Crytek will be developing multiplatform games in the future, so long as they don't dumb them down too much, and actually produce a different version that takes advantage of the PC's capabilities. What I am upset about is the disingenuous whining about piracy. Given how many copies of Crysis they sold, I have a really hard time believing piracy is THAT huge a problem. I'm sure there is pirating going on, and I'm sure it has cost them sales, possibly a lot of them. But this isn't a new situation, they knew that going in, it's a bit too late to squeal about it now.

Moving to a multiplatform format isn't going to help the piracy situation anyways. Console games are pirated just as much or more than PC games, the methods are just different. All Crytek is doing is making an unnecessary excuse for a decision that should net them more profits in the future. That's fine, they certainly have a right to maximize their business, but I find their lying about the reasons to be offensive. If they aren't willing to deal square with the gamers in the media, how can I trust them to deal square with me when it comes to their games in the future?

I think it's because Crytek really thought that only putting it on the pc would make people buy it....and not enough people bought it because they spent so much time and money making crytek engine 2, they were expecting to sell like 10 million copies... and hope to break even with that..... I guess this can also be blamed by a marketing mistake by crytek...

Anyways, I'm not too scared of not seeing anything new from Crytek... they made two games.. they were good yes... but there will be game to replace them of course... someone might buy the rights to Crysis and make their own crysis 2, who knows... if crytek wants to cry about piracy while they sold millions of copies then they SHOULD OF MADE A BETTER GAME!! PEOPLE DON'T BUY GAMES JUST FOR SINGLE PLAYER!! PEOPLE BUY GAMES FOR MULTIPLAYER!!!!!.........

I'm tempted to bring up the fact that console piracy is just as rampant, and in some cases even worse. But I always get the feeling that when developers make these rants, they already know that to be the case. Crysis is a good game, and from their own numbers has sold pretty well. However, I think most people will agree that the issue holding back greater retail success is the game's ultra steep system requirements. I appriciate all the tastey visuals as much as the next guy, but when you make a game that will only run (well) on a tiny percentage of PCs, you're limiting your potential consumer base. It's the thing that more successful PC developers say all the time.

You can't get away from piracy on the PC or consoles. Look at GTA4. That must have been downloaded over 100k times before the game hit retail shelves. It will still sell many many millions, though. Just like starcraft will when it's released later this year. And just like the Orange Box did last year.

Good game, good advertising, and manageable system requirements = successful product. If you forget one of those factors, then piracy really shouldn't be your biggest concern.

As much as I love PC gaming, piracy REALLY is taking a hit on sales. All you people who are coming up with excuses now and again are simply blatantly ignoring this huge flaw with the PC market. This is why we are losing exclusives. This is why we are getting second hand ports. This is why the gaming industry is leaning toward the console market. You can keep making excuses as long as you wish, but honestly, look around you. What exclusives do we get? A whole boatload of less-than-average adventure games and some RTSes?Rottenberry

Uhhh...Lots?

Do I really have to name off trhe big PC exclusive titles that were released in 2007 and will be released in 2008? I don't really feel like it, but there are plenty. There are also a good number of traditionally console exclusive companies moving their games to the pc.

Not that Pc gaming doesnt have it's problems, but its not in the dire straits your trying to say it is. It's people and companies like you that perpetuate this crazy notion that the PC as a gaming platform is dead and dying, when that just isnt the case. Faulty information like that hurts the industry as much as anything else

As much as I love PC gaming, piracy REALLY is taking a hit on sales. All you people who are coming up with excuses now and again are simply blatantly ignoring this huge flaw with the PC market. This is why we are losing exclusives. This is why we are getting second hand ports. This is why the gaming industry is leaning toward the console market. You can keep making excuses as long as you wish, but honestly, look around you. What exclusives do we get? A whole boatload of less-than-average adventure games and some RTSes?Rottenberry

1. Piracy affects both PC gaming and console gaming. No one can say how "equally" but console piracy is extremely high in places like Brazil, China, Mexico and the Middle East where the price of consoles far exceed their converted prices in NA, EU and JPN (I believe the Wii in Brazil is worth nearly $1000 USD at retail but don't quote me on that).
2. The only "flaw" in the PC market is developers like Crytek who *cry* about piracy when they could be like Stardock Games and actually do something about it and overcome the problem with an intelligent solution.
3. "Exclusives" are irrelevant these days. Every game is pretty much put on evey platform. They are a dying breed. Just because a game goes to a console doesn't mean they HAVE to "dumb-down" the experience because of hardware limitations, they "dumb them down" for the reason of drawing more sales from the larger casual market. See: BioShock Consoles are more than capable of providing a high-quality gaming experience it is just that developers don't make many of them because of the draw of large profits from crap.
4. There are a cited 263 million online PC gamers in the world. World of WarCraft alone exceeds Xbox Live's total membership numbers. If it is "leaning towards console gaming" it must only be in NA because outside of NA, PC gaming is the far more popular gaming platform, especially in Europe and China (GT5 is being brought to PC in China by Sony/Polyphony).

Yea i dont know why PC is only getting the flack for the piracy, when there are tons of people out there with modded consoles with hundreds of games on them.

I think there are just more people that cant afford a computer and grab a console instead, so obviously they will sell more.

lol...

Maximum truth...

my opinion is that it all comes down to choice......while there are definitely less pc exclusives nowadays, pc gaming is definitely not dying. it's just the nature of the industry to progress towards a more profitable pattern, and going multi-plat seems to be just that. while it might hurt the feelings of certain niche gamers ( who are sometimes very immature, i must sadly add )remember, in the world of business, not taking the easy way out is probably the dumbest thing a company can pull. i don't see why we should care about the reasons these devs and companies come up with when the situation itself is fully understandable.

Really ironic how guys in this forum is yet defending the piracy epidemic but eh do what you want. Another PC developer has yet again went to the console market.

Rottenberry posted his opinion on PC pirating issues and look how people are jumping on him. Same guys who were defending Crytek at the time to ridicule Epic Games and Peter Molyenux for their thoughts/decisions about the PC market.

Makes me a sad panda face.

Really ironic how guys in this forum is yet defending the piracy epidemic but eh do what you want. Another PC developer has yet again went to the console market.

Rottenberry posted his opinion on PC pirating issues and look how people are jumping on him. Same guys who were defending Crytek at the time to ridicule Epic Games and Peter Molyenux for their thoughts/decisions about the PC market.

Makes me a sad panda face.

OoSuperMarioO

Only thing that's sad is how you constantly feel the need to createthese false stories to give your argument momentum. Nobody is defending piracy. The only thing people are saying is that it's silly to blame piracy when there are so many other things wrong with their business model.

Why don't you answer these questions, if you dare:

- If piracy is so rampant, why does itseem to affect some companies (Crytek/Epic) more than others (valve, Blizzard)?

- If your reason for droping a platforms exclusivity is piracy, why would you move to a platform with just as much, if not more piracy?

- What is so special about Crytek going multiplat? Exclusive 3rd parties are a thing of the past. There are very few companies releasing games for a single platform these days, on the pc or consoles, so why is this Crytek news so special?

Any answers?

[QUOTE="OoSuperMarioO"]

Really ironic how guys in this forum is yet defending the piracy epidemic but eh do what you want. Another PC developer has yet again went to the console market.

Rottenberry posted his opinion on PC pirating issues and look how people are jumping on him. Same guys who were defending Crytek at the time to ridicule Epic Games and Peter Molyenux for their thoughts/decisions about the PC market.

Makes me a sad panda face.

TeamR

Only thing that's sad is how you constantly feel the need to createthese false stories to give your argument momentum. Nobody is defending piracy. The only thing people are saying is that it's silly to blame piracy when there are so many other things wrong with their business model.

Why don't you answer these questions, if you dare:

- If piracy is so rampant, why does itseem to affect some companies (Crytek/Epic) more than others (valve, Blizzard)?

- If your reason for droping a platforms exclusivity is piracy, why would you move to a platform with just as much, if not more piracy?

- What is so special about Crytek going multiplat? Exclusive 3rd parties are a thing of the past. There are very few companies releasing games for a single platform these days, on the pc or consoles, so why is this Crytek news so special?

Any answers?

Piracy is a major problem on the PC platform. Please guys just please stop pirating...

I couldn't care any less by you guys wanting debate out of this. Fact is Crytek just went multiplatform due to "Piracy".

Piracy is a major problem on the PC platform. Please guys just please stop pirating...

OoSuperMarioO

Yeah, I didn't think you could.

And in the end, it's that sort of attitude that really hurts the industry. Instead of finding real solutions to problems, too many people are just content to keep chasing the same ghosts. So you can keep begging for people to stop pirating. It didn't help a thousand years ago, and it won't help now. You can act like piracy is killing the PC while the GTA4 torrents break a million downloads. You aren't helping anybody by perpetuating a stereotype that doesn't even exist.

[QUOTE="OoSuperMarioO"]

I couldn't care any less by you guys wanting debate out of this. Fact is Crytek just went multiplatform due to "Piracy".

Piracy is a major problem on the PC platform. Please guys just please stop pirating...

TeamR

Yeah, I didn't think you could.

And in the end, it's that sort of attitude that really hurts the industry. Instead of finding real solutions to problems, too many people are just content to keep chasing the same ghosts. So you can keep begging for people to stop pirating. It didn't help a thousand years ago, and it won't help now. You can act like piracy is killing the PC while the GTA4 torrents break a million downloads. You aren't helping anybody by perpetuating a stereotype that doesn't even exist.

For the record I invest plenty of money into PC hardware and software to support this platform.

Edit: Good Day.

I couldn't care any less by you guys wanting debate out of this. Fact is Crytek just went multiplatform due to "Piracy".

Piracy is a major problem on the PC platform. Please guys just please stop pirating...

OoSuperMarioO

i'm sure that piracy has a huge impact on sales of games. thinking otherwise would be simply turning one's head away from the problem. and saying that there are tons more people pirating console games is neither here nor there, cuz it's offset by the fact that console games still sell really well.

anyway, i hope devs stop being so petty about releasing games in places like steam. i mean, there are 15 million people who have registered steam accounts - don't they want to tap into that and see if steam users would like to buy their games? lucasarts? ea (with your steam lite)? monolith? the 15 million users are waiting~!

Yea... I'm sure it is people like me. Let's watch the finger pointing shall we.

For the record I invest plenty of money into PC hardware and software to support this platform.

Edit: Good Day.

OoSuperMarioO

Yeah, people like you.

It's like the boy who cried wolf. Everyone is going around foretelling doom and gloom at the hands of piracy. Companies are busy amping up their useless copy protection and all that nonsense....meanwhile, people forget to make a good product.

How is it that a small time dev house can release a PC game with zero copy protection and it outsells a big release like UT3? Because it's a better product, and people buy good products.

I'll answer one of my earlier questions for you: "If piracy is so rampant, why does itseem to affect some companies (Crytek/Epic) more than others (valve, Blizzard)?"

Why? Because companies like Blizzard and Valve have discovered that when a good product(good game) is accessible by a large number of people (modest system reqs), it's sales potential goes through the roof. UT3 was not a good product. Crysis was only playable on the best hardware. Ubisoft spent more effort applying copy protection on Assasin's Creed than testing the game, or at least giving PC users a quick way to exit the game! So complaining about piracy won't fix the underlying problems with too many PC games released these days: They simply arent any good.

T oo many pc games suffer from symptoms like crappy port-itis, or insane system requirementitis, or over zealous copy protection. Too many Pc gamers are just overall, incomplete products. Released in a far too unfinished state and left for the community to fix. I could go on all day about the problems with Pc gaming, but piracy, as bad as it is, doesn't make my top 10.

There are too many successful PC games to blame piracy. And when people, like you, plant seeds in people's head that such-and-such a game didn't sell well because of piracy, it masks the real problem. And the real problem is that such-and-such a game didn't sell well because, more than likely, it was a crummy product

PC Play:You confirmed that it's impossible to make Crysis run on an console, but yet there are constant rumors that it's nearly inevitable. Can you finally give us, our readers, and the industry the final answer on that matter? Is Crysis going to be ported to a console?

Cevat Yerli: Crysis as we have seen is impossible. Crysis would have to be largely changed to bring it to Xbox 360 or Playstation 3. Crysis is designed to be PC Exclusive. Our internal focus is not linked to bring Crysis to consoles.

Good enough for me.

The_PC_Gamer

While I feel Crytek is being plain stupid here, I agree. So long as the Crysis series remains exclusive to the PC, I'll be happy enough (I really hope they don't decide to make Crysis 2 and 3 multiplat, unless they're smart and design it for the PC first, then accomodate for the consoles, but that... just about never happens).

He didn't say it as a fact.. but statistics do show this will most likely happen. I've really been expecting this to happen for quite awhile now sadly..

I think piracy is a legit problem. But it really should be a challenge after seeing how Stardock has dealt with it. I'm just hoping more developers will follow Stardock and GPG's footsteps instead of giving up on this great platform.

Ughhh many of the problems in PC gaming have existed before (bugs, optimization etc.), its only with the popularity of torrents in '03 that PC game sales have continued to decrease, while console and Nvidia sales rise. Stating that there is as much console piracy and looking at China and Brazil has to be for the luls, compare console numbers between NA+Europe vs PAL, you will see why it is small. Anyways getting your Xbox360 to play pirated games requires you to never play online, a sacrifice not many people will make.

People also keep on using Stardock as an example, they make nieche games and their biggest seller sold 300'000 units, hardly the industry model.

yea, this **** **** SUCKS! I am sorry but I am a little angry atm. I love Crysis

http://www.worthplaying.com/article.php?sid=51752

On one hand I sympathize. On the other, I don't understand why they, or any other company that whines about piracy, do nothing about it. Why can't they learn from Valve's positive experience?

Qixote

its only with the popularity of torrents in '03 that PC game sales have continued to decrease, while console and Nvidia sales rise.

People also keep on using Stardock as an example, they make nieche games and their biggest seller sold 300'000 units, hardly the industry model.

Nikalai_88

So where exactly are you pulling those numbers from? If we're just going to make up stats then two can play at that game....

....2007 was the biggest year for PC game sales EVER

Also, stardock is a great example because they topped the PC sales charts when Sins was released. They are still ranked #2 according to NPD (so it's not the whole picture). They've most certainly pushed well over 300k units by now. http://www.gamespot.com/news/index.html?tag=nav-top;news&navclk=news (bottom of page)

And this is from a developer who has less staff than some companies' art departments. A game with absolutely no protection against piracy.

Sins and stardock are perfect examples of companies releasing good games and being rewarded for it. There is abolutely no way Epic or Crytek can make a real argument about piracy when companies like stardock find inventive ways around the problem.

piracy is a big problem.

what is the solution ??

piracy is a big problem.

what is the solution ??

-Intellectual-

Short of turning the world into an oppressive, unified dystopia where there is no freedom and all manner of restrictions, monitoring, and punitive measures are in place for everything under the sun? There is no solution.

Really ironic how guys in this forum is yet defending the piracy epidemic but eh do what you want. Another PC developer has yet again went to the console market.

OoSuperMarioO

But Crytek were looking for a PS3 programmer about 6months ago to port the Crytek2 engine over... they were always intending to eventually go multiplatform but this is just an excuse to make it look like the PC community forced them, when instead its because they want more money ;-)

The only thing that would make piracy on the PC worse is that you need a modded console but PC's are good to go straight away. A solution to stop piracy is to improve online content, therefore they can check for legit copies.

[QUOTE="OoSuperMarioO"]

Really ironic how guys in this forum is yet defending the piracy epidemic but eh do what you want. Another PC developer has yet again went to the console market.

DJGOON

But Crytek were looking for a PS3 programmer about 6months ago to port the Crytek2 engine over... they were always intending to eventually go multiplatform but this is just an excuse to make it look like the PC community forced them, when instead its because they want more money ;-)

The only thing that would make piracy on the PC worse is that you need a modded console but PC's are good to go straight away. A solution to stop piracy is to improve online content, therefore they can check for legit copies.

Don't do that Crytek becuase its meant to be a pc exclusive and if you hate pirates why don't you go out find them and kill them.

And wee seem to keep losing pc exculcives and getting dumbed down games it should the other way round.

piracy is a big problem.

what is the solution ??

-Intellectual-

You make buying the game a more attractive option. Piracy is easy to do, doesn't cost anything obviously, and is more convenient since you don't have to insert the CD every time.

Examples to make it attractive in the first place:

-A game that is actually worth playing is a good start
-Demos that provide an accurate representation of the gameplay and performance
-No horse**** system requirements
-Tone down the copy protection. CD-Key is far enough.
-Good tech support

Examples to make it more so than piracy:

-A good manual FFS
-Collector's Editions should contain actual physical collector items like Figurines, Map, Art Book etc and not rely on things that anybody could just download
-Awesome Multiplayer
-User Content that is shared primarily through the game (so CD-key can be checked)
-Maybe some sort of system when you only pay for what modes you want to play eg. only buying the multiplayer for Call of Duty 4 if you don't want to play the singleplayer, therefore you pay less for it. This should not been seen as an opportunity to charge more than the market price for extra modes, but it would be difficult to enforce.