Piracy; really just a question of morality?

After seeing the recent trend of utilizing DRM to it's fullest to stop piracy. I'm compelled to make another topic on this rehashed subject. But this time, it'll be a from a pirate's point of view.

Most of the people believe (usually, the first-world ppl) that piracy is actually one's unwillingness to spend money on something. But in reality, that's just a pixel of a 4k screen. In my experience, almost all of the pirates I've ever seen or met, pirated games because they couldn't buy them. Don't get me wrong now, it's not that they've a bad job or something. It's just something that they can't be blamed for. It was not their choice to born in a third world country. Take me for an example, I'm a High School student. The concept of part-time job is non-existent. Even if you are in College, that concept is still a far fetched one. So people here rely on their parents till they get a 'proper' job of their own. Now my dad never prohibits me from buying games. But the reason why I still don't, is that, I'll be putting a big Goddamn burden on my whole family if I do. My father has a diploma in Cardiology and has an MRCP degree. But just because he's living in a third world country, his salary is a disappointingly dazzling $1000. $100 every month goes for the house rent, $400 for the utility bills (just last month's electricity bill came with an awesome figure of $360), $100 for my brother and my School fee and the rest goes for the miscellaneous.

In the end, there are hardly any savings left. So, now I ask you, is a $60 game affordable for us? of course not.

The most logical option is to NOT play any games. And that's certainly justified well. Games are a form of entertainment, and any entertainment is luxury. Luxury is not someone's right.

The second most logical option is to wait for the price drop and buy it when it's dirt cheap. Now that's certainly sounds good. But as I mentioned before, we have to rely on our parents. In most Eastern cultures, we do. I'm lucky to have an understanding father. But most people aren't. Retail shops are non-existent so there's no way you could save up your pocket money and then buy the game secretly. Sales come online and online shopping requires a credit card. That's self-explanatory as to why I put this in the second most logical option.

The Third most logical option is that devs themselves should try and figure out a remedy for this. If devs don't have the time, then it's us to find out. As an example, let's just say that games should have regional prices. Prices that vary from region to region depending on the consumer power. Like if all games were around $10 in my country where the average salary of a working man is $450, games should be a little bit more affordable. The piracy will reduce drastically. But again, even the most rich people don't want to spend more money when they can spend less. So there's a 90% probability that people will try and figure out a way to buy games from regions where they're cheap. That's why I put this in the third most logical option.

So, what solution do you have to present to tackle this ever-growing ubiquitous problem? Which options sounds the most logical? and what more options do you have to present?

I'll be happy to see your views on it.

A lot of content creators said pirate it if you cant buy it, i may share my thoughts on this ,but i just wanted to say this for now

Make em $10-20 for the 3rd world countries. Also humble bundle is your friend.

No you aren't. You never gave me your games. It's a sin.

Really? please specify who?

@top_lel: Salty? Glad that I kicked you out from my origin and steam friends list. :)

Being poor, not having enough resources to purchase games/videos/music or whatever is not an excuse, piracy is robbery. You are stealing another person´s property and by purchasing pirated merchandise you are actually encouraging a crime.

BTW I also live in a third world country, I, like your father are a college graduate ( Veterinary Surgeon ) , have two masters degree and a PhD and make pretty much what your father makes a month, I send my kids to private schools and there are months that my income barely covers my needs, however you will never ever see in my possessions pirated merchandise of any type, when I want something I save by pennies in order ti acquire it.

Being honest is doing the right thing even when nobody is looking, it´s a matter of principle. Purchasing pirated merchandise tells a lot about the type of person you are.

You'll soon come back to me.

Oh my, such anger. I know that piracy is bad and I've already said this a thousand times (not on the internet but irl) that the first thing I'll do after getting a job is to buy all the games I've ever pirated. I write the name of every game I pirate in my personal diary for that. It's because of my religion. It's a serious offense.

You too stopped pirating after getting a job. I'm talking about what you do before getting a job. Saving up money is not the most liable option, reasons I've mentioned in the OP. Not playing any games in this modern age is just out of question most of the times when life itself is too damn depressing at many levels. I've asked about what do you suggest. Not what you think about me.

@top_lel: Nope. you are blocked.

What you are actually saying is that only after you get a job you will become an honest person, before that you will be the scumbag that steals another person´s property.

Tresspasers will be shot and survivors will be shot twice.

It depends on which developers you ask. Many are in full agreeance that you should pirate if you otherwise can't afford to game. The reasons being that in either scenario you don't give them money, but at least in the case of pirating you can potentially become a fan who buys more games in the future, you tell many other people to buy it, and many devs are passionate enough that they simply want anyone to play their game no matter what.

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It was nice to have your opinion. Thanks for sharing.

You will soon unblock me.

I agree on the part that a pirate might become a potential fan in the future who buys games. Most of the people I've seen who pirated games in their student life, grew up and after getting a job started buying the games.

Piracy is completely justified in the case of abandonware and software not available in one's region. Region locking and lazy publishers shouldn't keep good games out of gamer's hands.

Also, another more grey area is piracy to replace a damaged/corrupt physical copy of a game where the owner bought the license to use the software and shouldn't be required to buy a second license to continue using said software.

I'm one of them.

I've given thousands of dollars to devs since I could afford to do so. The biggest chunks of money I've spent has gone to devs who I pirated the games of way back when I was a kid and couldn't afford to play anything. On top of that, I can't imagine how many people over the years I've encouraged to also buy games from my favorite devs.

Here's a good video that puts things into perspective that I see pop up every time I come across a discussion about piracy.

One of his first comments is that in places where his books were being pirated he was also selling MORE books because more people were able to discover him.

It's really worth watching for anyone who misunderstands piracy, or is a general naysayer of the idea.

I pirate games because I hate DRM. PC Gaming actually aint expensive at all.

So because you hate DRM you think its ok to steal? im surprised by you lulu i thought you were a bigger person than that.

But i have and never will pirate , its stealing and stealing is bad no matter how you look at it

Piracy can be both good and bad. As much as piracy can cost developers sales; I believe that it can also lead to developers getting sales that they otherwise never would have received.

For example, I pirate stuff that I'm not sure whether it is a quality product or not and I don't want to waste my money on something that I would end up not liking. But after I pirate it, if I like the product, I always buy it and give the developer of the product their well deserved money, so they can make more awesome products.

Without piracy, there would have been many products that I have purchased that I never would have purchased because I would not have wanted to take the risk of purchasing a product that I wasn't sure about and couldn't try out first.

People who pirate anything make me sad. It makes me want to scream "YOUR RUINING THE THINGS YOU LOVE! PLEASE STOP!"

This.