Those who think Piracy is not Holding PC sales Down are Delusional

So next time you see a developer complaining about piracy causing them so much grief on PC, give them a break, they are not making excuses for bad games, they just spent a lot of effort and reasonably want to get rewarded.hamidious

I agree with your post except for the above. There are a few exceptions, but most developers that complain about piracy don't deserve strong sales in the first place.

In most cases yes, but in some cases the games being pirated would not have been bought anyway. Similar to music, many people download songs that they would not have bought if piracy was not an option. harrisi17

the problem is, the devs/publishers dont know that... people use all sorts of excuses to pirate games, like " i wouldnt have bought it anyway" or, "im just trying it and if i like it ill buy it"... but whether they affect sales or not they just get thrown in with the people who are pirating cos they are cheap-skates

Also, where are the review sites? When a big console game is released everybody and their grandma are eager to review it and you hear about it for weeks. When a PC game is released, very few popular PC review sites are left, maybe it's because people don't bother with the reviews, they just pirate the game since they get it for free anyway.hamidious

Amen to that. I'm a bit tired of reading reviews of the games based not on pc version, but xbox or ps...

I STOPPED pirating games. I was pretty much brought up by my brother and dad that it's the best thing to do cause its free.
but then i got older and realized that it was just hurting the industry I love and support.
So that's why I've stoped a good while ago and I buy all my games now. :)
-Origin-

I am the same. And I like having a neat collection to watch in my bookshell except for books.

yes I agree piracy is a problem. But it isn't hurting sales as much as everyone claims it is.

you ask why? look:

a) piracy is the biggest in poor countrys that are just starting to use the PCs as a form of entertaiment (2nd world countrys) in asia, parts of eastern europe, parts of south america and parts of africa. People there 1. don't have the money to buy games or 2. they would buy the game, but they can't, beacose they can't get it in their country and shipping prices to such countrys are normaly preaty high. That was the case in my country in the 80s, piracy adds were basicly in the daily news papper. Things changed now.

b) Another thing is pirates in 1st world countrys, they can have the acces to the games, but in a lot of casses the money is missing, you know it's hard to go through high school/colleage with your parents earning minumum wage (thrust me, I know), while you may save at that point the money to buy a PC or a console you can't really afford to buy a game each week if you still want to eat every day. If piracy wouldn't exsist people there still wouldn't buy the game beacose they can't afford it.

c) sure there are pirates in 1st world countrys that can buy the game beacose they have the money and the acces to games, but I think they are around 10-15% of total pirates in the world. (it's just an edducated gues depending on my expieriance)

as you see the people in casses a and b won't buy games even if you completly eredicate piracy. Going after them with lawyers and suing them is also quite bad for the image of your company since you are taking from the already poor to give it to yourself. Companies should go after the pirates in case c, but thats quite hard to decide who belongs into which category.

note: I don't support piracy in any form, sure I did pirate games till some 2-3 years ago, beacose I basicly fall under the category b, we are whats called lower middle class, my parents are working blue collar jobs with close to minimal wage, there really isn't any money left after all the bills are paid each month to afford a lot of luxus things (well things were better in good old Tito days -.-). My coleage alone cost us 200€ a mont, thats why I was pirating games till some 2 years ago. Then I started to help out in my town, I helped the neighbours, some relatieves, I get a job to mow the lawn, to work in some garden, on a farm,... and thats how I pay for my entertaiment (going out at weekends, games,..). Sure I can't buy a game every 3 days, but 1 each week, or 1 each 2 weeks depending on the game is o.k. well atm I am saving for a new computer. ^^

when I finish the coleage and get a decend job, things would be quite easyer...

The PC is the most widely distributed gaming system, yet consoles that have 20 million units or so are pulling more impressive numbers in game sales. Piracy has always been the bane of PC gaming. I'm not saying that the PC market isn't lucerative, however without piracy it would be so much more so. Before torrents there were warez and crack sites and now we have torrents and sharing sites and all that crap it is becoming a joke for some people to buy PC games. PC gaming has become even more popular for people because it allows them to download cool games for free, it's such a shame. How many million sellers do PC games have compared to consoles? Sure, I'm not saying it is related to piracy alone, but it is a big part. Marketing is another part, but nobody is convinced that serious money can be made on PC to spend a lot of marketing on it, except for a few exceptions. Also, where are the review sites? When a big console game is released everybody and their grandma are eager to review it and you hear about it for weeks. When a PC game is released, very few popular PC review sites are left, maybe it's because people don't bother with the reviews, they just pirate the game since they get it for free anyway. Yeah yeah, consoles have pirates too, but they are not as many as PC's apparently! So next time you see a developer complaining about piracy causing them so much grief on PC, give them a break, they are not making excuses for bad games, they just spent a lot of effort and reasonably want to get rewarded.hamidious

Yes, you are right, piracy is a serious issue for the PC. It's all because of the torrents sites that make pirating games so easy, I still can't believe that they are still legal, considering the fact that everything on those sites is copyrighted.

Also, fatshodan, you're saying that most developers that complain about piracy don't deserve strong sales, so by this logic, if the game sucks it's alright to pirate it. That's wrong, even if the game is bad, that still doesn't make it right to pirate the game. The PC has the largest userbase, yet console games sell millions upon millions, why is that? Is it because all PC games suck? No, it is because people download games for free.

Explain games like Sins of Solar Empire that are unprotected and still sell well

What companies need to do is make games cheaper

I mean WHO CARES ABOUT LISTENING SOME FANCY ACTOR ACTRESS IN GAME ??? They usualy SUCK + they are expencive to hire = game more expencive

Why dont you just put few talented rookies that could use a buck and save money + make game cheaper = more people will buy it

But noooo, they spend like 9389834289432 milions on advertising alone and than fail,becose no advertisment can replace crappy game

Best advertisment = game scoring high on review sites

And you know why we dont buy games???

Because we dont fall for "shiny effects cool looking boobs baby"

Console users are mostly kids /teens and they fall for that cr*p

Thats why PC users play Fallout,System Shock,Planescape etc. while console users play need for speed and cr*p like that

We dont fall for cheap games (well at least most of us dont)

GREAT GAMES LIKE GRIM FANDANGO dont sell well . Why? because kids like BUTTON MASHIG games and not intelectual,funny,great,games like GF

[QUOTE="-Origin-"]I STOPPED pirating games. I was pretty much brought up by my brother and dad that it's the best thing to do cause its free.
but then i got older and realized that it was just hurting the industry I love and support.
So that's why I've stoped a good while ago and I buy all my games now. :)
MrNacaa

I am the same. And I like having a neat collection to watch in my bookshell except for books.

Explain games like Sins of Solar Empire that are unprotected and still sell well

What companies need to do is make games cheaper

I mean WHO CARES ABOUT LISTENING SOME FANCY ACTOR ACTRESS IN GAME ??? They usualy SUCK + they are expencive to hire = game more expencive

Why dont you just put few talented rookies that could use a buck and save money + make game cheaper = more people will buy it

But noooo, they spend like 9389834289432 milions on advertising alone and than fail,becose no advertisment can replace crappy game

Best advertisment = game scoring high on review sites

Lidve

Everyone is using Sins of a Solar Empire as an example for how well the PC is doing. How well did it sell? I don't know the numbers, but I'd say 1 million, 1.5 million, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. Ok, so a console game sells, what, 3-5 millions, yet there are, according to some figures, 260 million PC gamers, when you look at it this way, it suddenly stops being that impressive.

Also, you're saying we should have only small budget titles, why? What's wrong with having games like Crysis? I see nothing wrong, just like Hollywood. A game that costs millions to develop doesn't automatically mean it's crap.

When i showed game like Baldurs Gate / Planescape and even Mass Effect to some "newbs" they say "afff too much text, whats so good about it ?" etc. and than goes to play NEED FOR SPEED pro street

OMG NEED- HOLD ONE BUTTON (FORWARD) - SPEED? its sooooo dumbed down and give "false worthynes" t player,who think he accomplished something but in reallity he is just allowing to be dumbed down

"fancy MTV speech " omg im cool im 50 cent

Its like tell me 2 kids that listen Mozart????

NNooooo they will listen some cr*p called Chamilionare etc

Also, fatshodan, you're saying that most developers that complain about piracy don't deserve strong sales, so by this logic, if the game sucks it's alright to pirate it. col_hannibal

I don't believe he's making that connection at all.

I believe (correct me if wrong) he's saying it's uncanny how the developers that complain about piracy tend to have also have put games out on the market that aren't very good or are games, for a variety of reasons, PC gamers don't or haven't embraced. There's some subjectivity here, but look at the latest from Epic for example.

In my mind, indeed, no developer deserves to have their games pirated. Period. Bottom line. However, they don't all deserve strong sales either.

What's wrong with having games like Crysis? I see nothing wrong, just like Hollywood. A game that costs millions to develop doesn't automatically mean it's crap. col_hannibal

To have GREEEEAT STORY you dont need billions. You need one talented writter or even some old books like lets say SHAKESPEAR or AGATHA CHRISTIE lol

To have GREAT music you dont need ORCHESTRA or something that is 83247872378 dollars... You can have GREEEAT music with 3 instrumets.

Voice acting can be done by programers or some rookies, you dont need JOHN TRAVOLTA lol or some expencive actors

Only things that need more money (but not necesery too much ) = programing , modeling etc.

But even that can be done nicely with mediocore budget.

You dont need to be EA to make great game. Being EA = easier to possibly make great game, but when you are on top, you want more money , and thats why games are mostly made nowdays .. just because of money lol

I don't know why we're circling back to this kind of subject matter? a while ago, I thought we've already evloved to the brainstorming or collective fantasy of how to stop piracy.

Piracy is bad, that's a given; it's just a matter of how serious it is, and whether it can be held as solely (or chiefly) responsible for a given situation (mostly are cases of poor individual game sale).

I think somne people should relax a bit on their moral high horse whenver someone suggested that "piracy might not be the most important factor." Saying such doesn't mean this person support or deny piracy is bad for gaming industry in particular and PC gaming in general.

for example, and it happens all the time: two new released games A & B, both are hacked clean and free for download, yet A sells well while B sells poorly. B's developer went on to say: "while piracy hurts our sale!" There must be something other than piracy, if any gamespotter points this out, doesn't mean that this person denies piracy's negative impact on PC gaming.

last thing: every living system runs its necessary evlotionary course -- PC gaming will evlove as the situation as whole changes. Now we've already can see that WoW becomes more and more popular and Sims type of game remains strong. These games appeal to not only regular, hardcore gamers, but also to mass, causal gamers who aren't quite savvy in PC hardware and p2p stuff, What PC gaming will become, we just have to see. if somehow one day we'll have only WoW and Sims N to play...well, that is that.

Everyone is using Sins of a Solar Empire as an example for how well the PC is doing. How well did it sell? I don't know the numbers, but I'd say 1 million, 1.5 million, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. Ok, so a console game sells, what, 3-5 millions, yet there are, according to some figures, 260 million PC gamers, when you look at it this way, it suddenly stops being that impressive.

Also, you're saying we should have only small budget titles, why? What's wrong with having games like Crysis? I see nothing wrong, just like Hollywood. A game that costs millions to develop doesn't automatically mean it's crap.

col_hannibal

yes all console games sell millions:roll:

yes it affects, ppl rarely buy PS3 here cus there are no pirated PS3.

-Gray_Fox-

You, my friend, are sooooooooooooooooooooooo wrong....

"Compounding the impact of this feat is the size of Stardock when compared against whom it beat in sales. With under 50 employees, Stardock's product bested Activision/Blizzard, which has 3,000+ employees, and EA which has over 9,000."

Thats what im talking about.

[QUOTE="Enosh88"]

a) piracy is the biggest in poor countrys that are just starting to use the PCs as a form of entertaiment (2nd world countrys) in asia, parts of eastern europe, parts of south america and parts of africa. People there 1. don't have the money to buy games or 2. they would buy the game, but they can't, beacose they can't get it in their country and shipping prices to such countrys are normaly preaty high. That was the case in my country in the 80s, piracy adds were basicly in the daily news papper. Things changed now.

dziunglius

I live in Lithuania(the 2nd world country ur talking about here) and i agree that piracy is quite popular here. The average person in lithuania gets about 1800 lithuanian litas, which is a bit less than 400 dollars a month. Games cost 20-40 dollars so spending 1/10th of your wage on a single game... come on... none of you would do that(I guess). And even then almost every month, there are at least 3-4 games worth getting. Noone of people living in my country would be able to spend so much. I personaly would buy games if they'd cost like 5 dollars each as my finances don't allow me to buy the expensive games. The only game i'm gonna get is Diablo 3. It's the only game worth the money...

[QUOTE="-Gray_Fox-"]

yes it affects, ppl rarely buy PS3 here cus there are no pirated PS3.

dziunglius

You, my friend, are sooooooooooooooooooooooo wrong....

[QUOTE="dziunglius"][QUOTE="Enosh88"]

a) piracy is the biggest in poor countrys that are just starting to use the PCs as a form of entertaiment (2nd world countrys) in asia, parts of eastern europe, parts of south america and parts of africa. People there 1. don't have the money to buy games or 2. they would buy the game, but they can't, beacose they can't get it in their country and shipping prices to such countrys are normaly preaty high. That was the case in my country in the 80s, piracy adds were basicly in the daily news papper. Things changed now.

-Gray_Fox-

I live in Lithuania(the 2nd world country ur talking about here) and i agree that piracy is quite popular here. The average person in lithuania gets about 1800 lithuanian litas, which is a bit less than 400 dollars a month. Games cost 20-40 dollars so spending 1/10th of your wage on a single game... come on... none of you would do that(I guess). And even then almost every month, there are at least 3-4 games worth getting. Noone of people living in my country would be able to spend so much. I personaly would buy games if they'd cost like 5 dollars each as my finances don't allow me to buy the expensive games. The only game i'm gonna get is Diablo 3. It's the only game worth the money...

For that money you could get really good graphic card

In honest world - people who dont have money should play only free games. But why would you miss the party when you can download game without being "arrested"

My country is also poor.

My mother work on GOOD WORKPLACE and she get about 500$ monthly. (for our standards - great)

I have brother + sister + my parents are divorced + we live with grandfather

500 mothly we must pay BILLS FOOD ETC

AND YOU WANT ME TO SPEND 60 $ on game ? + 400 $ on console ??? just to play games HAHA

its allready 460 $

for that money i can buy DECENT pc (play free games) + work on it so i can earn few bucks

[QUOTE="col_hannibal"]Also, fatshodan, you're saying that most developers that complain about piracy don't deserve strong sales, so by this logic, if the game sucks it's alright to pirate it. Nitrous2O

I don't believe he's making that connection at all.

I believe (correct me if wrong) he's saying it's uncanny how the developers that complain about piracy tend to have also have put games out on the market that aren't very good or are games, for a variety of reasons, PC gamers don't or haven't embraced. There's some subjectivity here, but look at the latest from Epic for example.

In my mind, indeed, no developer deserves to have their games pirated. Period. Bottom line. However, they don't all deserve strong sales either.

[QUOTE="col_hannibal"]What's wrong with having games like Crysis? I see nothing wrong, just like Hollywood. A game that costs millions to develop doesn't automatically mean it's crap. Lidve

To have GREEEEAT STORY you dont need billions. You need one talented writter or even some old books like lets say SHAKESPEAR or AGATHA CHRISTIE lol

To have GREAT music you dont need ORCHESTRA or something that is 83247872378 dollars... You can have GREEEAT music with 3 instrumets.

Voice acting can be done by programers or some rookies, you dont need JOHN TRAVOLTA lol or some expencive actors

Only things that need more money (but not necesery too much ) = programing , modeling etc.

But even that can be done nicely with mediocore budget.

You dont need to be EA to make great game. Being EA = easier to possibly make great game, but when you are on top, you want more money , and thats why games are mostly made nowdays .. just because of money lol

The thing is the gaming industry is all about money, just like the music industry, film industry, etc. It's a business, and developers have every right to complain about their products not earning them enough money.

[QUOTE="dziunglius"][QUOTE="-Gray_Fox-"]

yes it affects, ppl rarely buy PS3 here cus there are no pirated PS3.

-Gray_Fox-

You, my friend, are sooooooooooooooooooooooo wrong....

i was pointing ant the second part of your sentence there are no pirated PS3 ;)

The thing is the gaming industry is all about money, just like the music industry, film industry, etc. It's a business, and developers have every right to complain about their products not earning them enough money. col_hannibal

Yes,its all about money - but it shouldnt be about money.

It should be about something you love, devs that make game because they want to create something unique,something that they can call their own world and than showing that to us (players)

Reason why most of "poor countries" hate america and such big countries is this:

Your kids grow up in "perfect world". They have everything they want (while others often dont have nothing to eat)

BUT THEY DONT HAVE MANNERS

THEY DONT RESPECT OTHER CULTURES ,THEY DONT RESPECT ANYTHING.

THEY THINK IF THEY LIVE IN PERFECT WORLD EVERYONE DOES! THAT IS FAR FROM TRUE.

What is even worse, you see those kids going around shouting stuffs like "omg arabia sucks,europe sucks" but they dont know (or dont want to realise) that they should thank EUROPE and similar countries for DISCOVERING america, moving there ,killing natives and creating homes for you. So show little respect

EDIT lol i said EUROPE and similar countries lolollollo

btw. most of you (not you but reffering to those kids / teens / guys whatever) dont know a thing, if i asked you to find BIAFRA on world map most of you wouldnt know lol

But you brag around saying "we are best" but actualy you are not best, other people that live around you are- but kids like yourself that listen cliche 50 cent and go **** alike all around - not

Lidve

omg, i love you.

Reason why most of "poor countries" hate america and such big countries is this:

Your kids grow up in "perfect world". They have everything they want (while others often dont have nothing to eat)

BUT THEY DONT HAVE MANNERS

THEY DONT RESPECT OTHER CULTURES ,THEY DONT RESPECT ANYTHING.

THEY THINK IF THEY LIVE IN PERFECT WORLD EVERYONE DOES! THAT IS FAR FROM TRUE.

What is even worse, you see those kids going around shouting stuffs like "omg arabia sucks,europe sucks" but they dont know (or dont want to realise) that they should thank EUROPE and similar countries for DISCOVERING america, moving there ,killing natives and creating homes for you. So show little respect

EDIT lol i said EUROPE and similar countries lolollollo

btw. most of you (not you but reffering to those kids / teens / guys whatever) dont know a thing, if i asked you to find BIAFRA on world map most of you wouldnt know lol

But you brag around saying "we are best" but actualy you are not best, other people that live around you are- but kids like yourself that listen cliche 50 cent and go **** alike all around - not

Lidve

I beg your pardon? Who is showing disdain, prejudice and a lack of respect here? Looks like it's you, Lidve. You do not describe the average citizen of the USA, most of us don't have hate or dislike of other nations. We just don't spend a lot of time worrying about them. We have our own problems to keep track of. And stop thinking we have some kind of "perfect world" over here, we have hunger, we have poverty, we have senseless killing. It's not nearly as bad as in many other nations, but it exists, have no doubt about it.

Oh, and it was most likely the Americas were discovered by Asians crossing the Bering Strait thousands of years ago. The Europeans didn't discover a damned thing, there were already people here when they arrived. You can't discover a place that is already inhabited, it's already been discovered by the people there, thank you very much. I may be of European descent, that doesn't mean I need to lie to myself about what my ancestors really did and what they really were.

To get back on topic to some extent, I'm sure that piracy does affect PC game sales somewhat. They affect console game sales at least as much. The difference in sales between consoles and PC's is easily explained. The installed base of PC's includes office machines, systems bought to run specific processes, units just for grandma to use for email, that sort of thing. The majority of PC's are not gaming units and are owned by people who think solitaire and minesweeper are the only games around. In the meantime, every single console out there was bought to game with. You can't compare the installed bases that way, it's not a valid comparison unless you can say how many PC's are actually being used for gaming.

Piracy seems to be becoming the industry scapegoat. Sales down? Pirates. Company ailing? Pirates. Leaky roof? I'm not sure how, but the pirates are responsible. The truth is that a lot of games don't sell well for a lot of reasons. Crysis, for example, required a very good computer to run at high levels. Not a lot of people have such a computer, yet it still sold over a million units. Not bad for a game that only something like (guessing here) 5% of the PC owning population could really run. I don't think piracy was the issue here.

i think its been established that crysis has done 1.5 million to date. crytek seem to be doing well since they opened up new offices and bought another developer.

now how many copies has MGS sold so far, considering it had a massive marketting budget. I saw ads for it in the cinema and TV, but never seen an ad for crysis. Has it sold 2 to 3 million so far?

i think its been established that crysis has done 1.5 million to date. crytek seem to be doing well since they opened up new offices and bought another developer.

now how many copies has MGS sold so far, considering it had a massive marketting budget. I saw ads for it in the cinema and TV, but never seen an ad for crysis. Has it sold 2 to 3 million so far?

crozon

mgs4 sold 3 million.

1st of all if it wasnt for piracy pc gaming would have killed anyother console on market today.

2nd more than 50% of money is being drained down bec of piracy

Yes piracy is worst in poor countries in asia

one pirated game is definetly = 1 lost sale bec lots of ppl i know would have gone and bought game if pirated versions of games were not avilable for 2$ in every corner of street.Yes they wouldnt have bought as much games as they buy pirated but definately they would have bought some games

I don't know why we're circling back to this kind of subject matter? a while ago, I thought we've already evloved to the brainstorming or collective fantasy of how to stop piracy.

Piracy is bad, that's a given; it's just a matter of how serious it is, and whether it can be held as solely (or chiefly) responsible for a given situation (mostly are cases of poor individual game sale).

I think somne people should relax a bit on their moral high horse whenver someone suggested that "piracy might not be the most important factor." Saying such doesn't mean this person support or deny piracy is bad for gaming industry in particular and PC gaming in general.

for example, and it happens all the time: two new released games A & B, both are hacked clean and free for download, yet A sells well while B sells poorly. B's developer went on to say: "while piracy hurts our sale!" There must be something other than piracy, if any gamespotter points this out, doesn't mean that this person denies piracy's negative impact on PC gaming.

last thing: every living system runs its necessary evlotionary course -- PC gaming will evlove as the situation as whole changes. Now we've already can see that WoW becomes more and more popular and Sims type of game remains strong. These games appeal to not only regular, hardcore gamers, but also to mass, causal gamers who aren't quite savvy in PC hardware and p2p stuff, What PC gaming will become, we just have to see. if somehow one day we'll have only WoW and Sims N to play...well, that is that.

teardropmina

I am sorry but arguing that 'there are other reasons for a games sales numbers' is so... lacking a better term: duh! that I am not sure what you are trying to state or how you are using it as a reason to prove that 'piracy is not that big of a problem.' You can just as easily argue that the big seller would have sold more and I will use Crysis/Crytek as an example.

Furthermore look at the sales difference between CoD4 on the Xbox360 and the PC, Infinity Ward stated that piracy on the pc was a big problem and that the Xbox360 version sold better. Now the install base for the Xbox360 was less than 20 million, while Nvidia was stating that there are 10's of millions gaming grade GPU's in the market and that the sales are larger than of the next gen consoles. Not only that but Nvidia's dedicated GPU sales were so large that they were having billion dollar quarters and earned Forbe's Company of the Year, while in the same financial period PC sales fell.

Some other things;

-Money does not matter: Developer's most likely have families and kids they have to put theough school and collage. When Interplay was choosing between making a sequal to Icewind Dale or Planescape they choce Icewind Dale because it was cheaper. Arguing money 'should not matter' is stupid because lets face it; it does matter.

-Stardock: Its great that they are happy with their sales, but Sins had CD-KEY's and was primarily an online game... and it only sold 200,000 in the 1st month, hardly a 'big seller'

-PC gamers like better games: this is just silly; Fallout, Planescape Torment and System Shock 2 were not huge sellers and looking at the user score for many multiplatform titles they recieved nearly the same ones on the PC as they did on console (Bioshock big exception)

-Piracy is big in 3rd world countries: There was an article/rant from a developer at Iron Lore (sp?) where he stated piracy numbers were at about 80% in North America, 90% in Europe and off the charts in Asia. Even then people in those countries still buy consumer electronics, cars the computers necessary to play those games.

You know what amazes me? The torrent sites are notorious and very well known and easy to access. It basically slaps your face with the fact that it hosts piracy and yet none of these companies are taking any legal action to take care of it. Not one bit. Grim_Wolf88

Instead they play around with programs that add hassle to the honest consumer and only prove to be a much welcomed challenge to a crackteam. They basically ignore the whole piracy issue altogether really and it does come across as nothing but them looking for a scapegoat.Grim_Wolf88

1st of all if it wasnt for piracy pc gaming would have killed anyother console on market today.

2nd more than 50% of money is being drained down bec of piracy

Yes piracy is worst in poor countries in asia

one pirated game is definetly = 1 lost sale bec lots of ppl i know would have gone and bought game if pirated versions of games were not avilable for 2$ in every corner of street.Yes they wouldnt have bought as much games as they buy pirated but definitely they would have bought some games

The PC is the most widely distributed gaming system, yet consoles that have 20 million units or so are pulling more impressive numbers in game sales. Piracy has always been the bane of PC gaming. I'm not saying that the PC market isn't lucerative, however without piracy it would be so much more so. Before torrents there were warez and crack sites and now we have torrents and sharing sites and all that crap it is becoming a joke for some people to buy PC games. PC gaming has become even more popular for people because it allows them to download cool games for free, it's such a shame. How many million sellers do PC games have compared to consoles? Sure, I'm not saying it is related to piracy alone, but it is a big part. Marketing is another part, but nobody is convinced that serious money can be made on PC to spend a lot of marketing on it, except for a few exceptions. Also, where are the review sites? When a big console game is released everybody and their grandma are eager to review it and you hear about it for weeks. When a PC game is released, very few popular PC review sites are left, maybe it's because people don't bother with the reviews, they just pirate the game since they get it for free anyway. Yeah yeah, consoles have pirates too, but they are not as many as PC's apparently! So next time you see a developer complaining about piracy causing them so much grief on PC, give them a break, they are not making excuses for bad games, they just spent a lot of effort and reasonably want to get rewarded.hamidious

TO much to read..... oh well i dont care any way..... PC is the best system, IMO, and more games should be made for it!

1st of all if it wasnt for piracy pc gaming would have killed anyother console on market today.
sandeep410

2nd more than 50% of money is being drained down bec of piracy

sandeep410

where did you get this number? I say 76.5% of the people in the world like to eat banana candy.

Yes piracy is worst in poor countries in asia

one pirated game is definetly = 1 lost sale bec lots of ppl i know would have gone and bought game if pirated versions of games were not avilable for 2$ in every corner of street.Yes they wouldnt have bought as much games as they buy pirated but definately they would have bought some games

sandeep410

I say 76.5% of the people in the world like to eat banana candy.

foggy666

-Piracy is big in 3rd world countries: There was an article/rant from a developer at Iron Lore (sp?) where he stated piracy numbers were at about 80% in North America, 90% in Europe and off the charts in Asia. Even then people in those countries still buy consumer electronics, cars the computers necessary to play those games.

Nikalai_88

Unfortunately, he destroyed all crediblity he might have had by giving an 80% piracy rate figure for North America. I really have a hard time swallowing that one. Out of the several dozen gamers I know personally in my area, I think one downloads games. And he only does it to see if the game plays well, if he doesn't like it, he deletes it. If he likes it, he buys a retail copy. If the figure of 80% was accurate, I'd expect a couple more than that to be regular, hardcore pirates.

yes I agree piracy is a problem. But it isn't hurting sales as much as everyone claims it is.

you ask why? look:

a) piracy is the biggest in poor countrys that are just starting to use the PCs as a form of entertaiment (2nd world countrys) in asia, parts of eastern europe, parts of south america and parts of africa. People there 1. don't have the money to buy games or 2. they would buy the game, but they can't, beacose they can't get it in their country and shipping prices to such countrys are normaly preaty high. That was the case in my country in the 80s, piracy adds were basicly in the daily news papper. Things changed now.

b) Another thing is pirates in 1st world countrys, they can have the acces to the games, but in a lot of casses the money is missing, you know it's hard to go through high school/colleage with your parents earning minumum wage (thrust me, I know), while you may save at that point the money to buy a PC or a console you can't really afford to buy a game each week if you still want to eat every day. If piracy wouldn't exsist people there still wouldn't buy the game beacose they can't afford it.

c) sure there are pirates in 1st world countrys that can buy the game beacose they have the money and the acces to games, but I think they are around 10-15% of total pirates in the world. (it's just an edducated gues depending on my expieriance)

as you see the people in casses a and b won't buy games even if you completly eredicate piracy. Going after them with lawyers and suing them is also quite bad for the image of your company since you are taking from the already poor to give it to yourself. Companies should go after the pirates in case c, but thats quite hard to decide who belongs into which category.

note: I don't support piracy in any form, sure I did pirate games till some 2-3 years ago, beacose I basicly fall under the category b, we are whats called lower middle class, my parents are working blue collar jobs with close to minimal wage, there really isn't any money left after all the bills are paid each month to afford a lot of luxus things (well things were better in good old Tito days -.-). My coleage alone cost us 200€ a mont, thats why I was pirating games till some 2 years ago. Then I started to help out in my town, I helped the neighbours, some relatieves, I get a job to mow the lawn, to work in some garden, on a farm,... and thats how I pay for my entertaiment (going out at weekends, games,..). Sure I can't buy a game every 3 days, but 1 each week, or 1 each 2 weeks depending on the game is o.k. well atm I am saving for a new computer. ^^

when I finish the coleage and get a decend job, things would be quite easyer...

Enosh88

ur totally wrong may..

Several people have quoted sales figures as proof that piracy is having a massive impact on PC game sales. I thought by now the fact that those figures do not included digital download and MMO subsciptions was common knowledge. When all of that is finally included you will likely see a very different picture about which platform sells better. If you need proof check out one of the current PC only gaming magazines. They had an article about this and quoted the person who leads the team that complies the sales data. It might have been PC Gamer but I also read several magazines out of England. (PC Zone, Total PC Gaming, and PC Gamer).

Other people brought up advertising in an effort to support their point of view. The PC has no dedicated backer. The X-Box 360, Wii, and Playstation 3 do. Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony pumps lots of money into pushing their consoles. You can be almost certain that any ad for a cross platform title that focuses on one version of the game was paid for by the console manufacturer. Until someone *cough*Microsoft*cough* starts treating the PC the same way the unbalanced advertising will continue.

Crysis has been brought up and that is a good thing. Cost has always been a big reason for people leaving the PC. How often have you heard the you must upgrade or SLI hype? When so many people simple cannot be bothered to play a game with anything less than maximum video settings is it any surprise that Crysis was didn't sell well?

While I am not trying to say piracy isn't an issue I don't believe it is as big a pain in the pocket book that PC developers try to say it is. Besides, it really hard to feel bad for them when they keep complaining about piracy but never tell us who their sources are. I'd like to have a look at this data myself.

ur totally wrong may..

KisukexD

well then good that you specified where I am wrong and why and didn't just say "you are wrong"

oh wait...

It maybe be blown out of context but the fact of the matter is if you go to any torrent sites its just so easy to pirate them and losing support like never before. i am just wondering how pc gaming is going to be like in the future. People starting to not care that much about it anymore which is not a good sign. This is a very touchy subject. True that you can't blame 100% all to piracy but we also can't ignore just how easy it is to just go out there and pirate a game just like that.

And also i noticed that everytime something like this comes out i feel like people are defending piracy and causing a big debate like this one going in circles over and over. While this is going on for the meantime we are losing support left and right by the time this "piracy debate is finished" I just dont get it anymore. Sure it can be lies about poor sales due to piracy but thats just it. PC's will alwasy be blamed for pirating and because of this the support for future titles are at high risk. One thing for sure is i don't support piracy and debates like these should change their strategy at least. Look at it in all angles at least not just from one side. That way you know whats really going on and whos telling the truth whatnot.

Because the bottomline is debates like these is not helping ths platform at all it is just allowing the game companies to just move on while we throw a fight back and fourth.

1st of all if it wasnt for piracy pc gaming would have killed anyother console on market today.

sandeep410

Then why are there more people posting about console games than PC games? Surely the pirates wouldn't avoid the forums just because they didn't pay for what they're playing.