World of Goo Piracy a scam *Proof in the demo* more info in thread

Now, i don't know how many people downloaded the demo. but heres what the deal is.

their is apparently an article going around claiming that the piracy rate is whoping 90%. i would like to say that is bull****.

The methods of their comparing how many bought the game to how many are playing are simply unacceptable.

2-D boy is taking the "ranked height" of the tower you can make in-game, and how many unique IP's are connected to it vs. sales of product.

 now, heres the thing, You can rank your height on the demo.. Don't believe me? go try it right now. Download the demo.

I haven't personally played the demo myself, but that's assuming that the devs themselves can't differentiate between the demo and the full product, and they probably can.G013M

maybe they didn't want to. 8)

however, i beat the demo, made my entire tower as high as it could go and i was ranked something like 214k. there's just no way you can get that high in the demo.  (it shows peoples ranks like a chart next to your tower)

Well they changed that figure from 90% to 82% after more digging, possibly taking the demo situation into account.

Also IPs connected seems a bit unreliable too, dynamic IP addresses are pretty popular in many countries.

Well they changed that figure from 90% to 82% after more digging, possibly taking the demo situation into account.

Also IPs connected seems a bit unreliable too, dynamic IP addresses are pretty popular in many countries.

nutcrackr

And 82 to 74, and 74 to 66, etc. I don't like piracy, but these numbers are just not in anyway correct.

[QUOTE="nutcrackr"]

Well they changed that figure from 90% to 82% after more digging, possibly taking the demo situation into account.

Also IPs connected seems a bit unreliable too, dynamic IP addresses are pretty popular in many countries.

irelevent

And 82 to 74, and 74 to 66, etc. I don't like piracy, but these numbers are just not in anyway correct.

This thread is stupid *proof in this post* more info following:

Alright, so either

1) It's not a scam, the game is getting pirated a lot and it's sad

or

2) It's a scam, its developers are exaggerating the numbers to generate free advertizing for the game

Either way, discussing the numbers are useless. Even if you disagree with a shameless advertising stunt (which I wouldn't, cause the game deserves all the attention it can generate), all that a thread like this accomplishes is to create more discussion (and therefore attention) about the game.

Just buy the game and love it instead of trying to debunk rather useless numbers.

Well they changed that figure from 90% to 82% after more digging, possibly taking the demo situation into account.

Also IPs connected seems a bit unreliable too, dynamic IP addresses are pretty popular in many countries.

nutcrackr

Did you read the entire article?

"oh, and yes, these numbers are exclusive of the demo… those scores are submitted to a different server entirely."

http://2dboy.com/

their is apparently an article going around claiming that the piracy rate is whoping 90%. i would like to say that is bull****.irelevent

They made an estimate based on the information they have.  They even stated it was only an estimate.

there are factors that we couldn't account for that would make the actual piracy rate lower than our estimate:

• some people install the game on more than one machine
• most people have dynamic IP addresses that change from time to time

there are also factors that would make the actual piracy rate higher than our estimate:

• more than one installation behind the same router/firewall (would be common in an office environment)
• not everyone opts to have their scores submitted

for simplicity's sake, we just assumed those would balance out.  so take take the 90% as a rough estimate.2DBoy

Also, for those crying shenanigans on the dynamic IPs this is where they came up with the lower percentage...

on average, there are 1.3 unique IP addresses per player

on average, a player has 1.15 profiles per installation.

after factoring both of these in, the piracy rate would still be 82%, and we should keep in mind that this number doesn't include those who never opted to submit scores to the leaderboard (it's an option that's off by default).2DBoy

Obviously, the developers have at least crunched the numbers to come up with their figure.  They even debunk your "demo" theory.  What methods did you use to debunk the 90%?

To be honest, I don't think you'd even believe the numbers if a developer leaked a pirated copy that phones home to separate server.

Did you read the entire article?

"oh, and yes, these numbers are exclusive of the demo… those scores are submitted to a different server entirely."

http://2dboy.com/

musclesforcier

Pirates dont like all the facts. It makes them look bad.

So you're assuming they're idiots and don't know how to compensate for things that the entire internet thinks of within 5 minutes. :DMakari

No, they might be liars though :).

I know very little of the facts involved, I am just trying to make the point that people can be wrong on purpose as well as being idiots. 

As for the entire internet figuring it out in 5 minutes, well that's the game of playing public opinion.  Again, I don't claim to know how this will turn out, but pumping out facts and then having them argued is a game.  Let's say you get your story about how pirated your product is out into the media, and then a bunch of internet geeks start to cut down your facts in forums, but those arguments never make it back into the mainstream media, articles, etc.

Well, if you're intended audience for sympathy is the type that doesn't read the geek forums, you've just won, regardless of how many geeks don't agree.  It's all a game, and my example is just that, an example, but it's one way in which you can play the game and win without even having to prove your facts.

[QUOTE="G013M"]I haven't personally played the demo myself, but that's assuming that the devs themselves can't differentiate between the demo and the full product, and they probably can.irelevent

If you did that than its possible

maybe they didn't want to. 8)

however, i beat the demo, made my entire tower as high as it could go and i was ranked something like 214k. there's just no way you can get that high in the demo. (it shows peoples ranks like a chart next to your tower)

all pc devs do these days is whine about piracy. we get it allready people pirate your games, they are like little kids they have to learn whining wont get you anywhere, they have to take action. They should stop whining and look for a solution.Blackfriend8

Hmmm 2D boy is like 2 people who made game + few extra, and its one of best games this year, i understand when pirates copy games from big companies,but these guys deserved some respect

all pc devs do these days is whine about piracy. we get it allready people pirate your games, they are like little kids they have to learn whining wont get you anywhere, they have to take action. They should stop whining and look for a solution.Blackfriend8

To be fair, they weren't exactly whining. They made a point to thank all the people that bought the game and also noted that those who pirated the game probably had no intention of buying it anyway, meaning they didn't suffer in sales because of piracy. And they pointed out that the game that they released with copy-protection (forgot the title) was as frequently pirated as World of Goo (which didn't have any copy-protection), thus confirming that copy-protection really doesn't protect anything (which probably means that they'll continue to release unprotected games in the future).

all pc devs do these days is whine about piracy. we get it allready people pirate your games, they are like little kids they have to learn whining wont get you anywhere, they have to take action. They should stop whining and look for a solution.Blackfriend8

It's not as if developers aren't trying :?

The problem with piracy is that there is never any all-encompassing solution. You can try DRM, but it'll most likely eventually get cracked, or (like in Spore's case), the public will see it as the enemy. You can leave out the DRM but provide incentives to have the actual copy (like what Stardock does), but you'll still get people who don't mind not getting the extras.

The only real way that I can think of to get at least a small amount of control over piracy is to run a closed-box system, but that's virtually impossible to do with a PC.

It's not as if developers aren't trying :? G013M

I agree.

As much as I don't like limited-activation games, I certainly don't hate devs/publishers for trying, they most definitely should. Though hopefully (er..ideally :() they consider the benefit, if there is very little as most suspect, it has given them in combating what they claim they are combating as the reason for such restrictive DRM as well as feedback from gamers --- and reboot the idea!

By far my preference is as long as I'm buying a game on physical media, don't tie it's life existence to a server and limit/hinder it's usefulness. If turning games into services is a necessity to help, don't stop half-way, go full digital-distribution for delivery (else I'll still buy retail if it's an option) and return some better benefits as tradeoff. Just go the Steam benefits route (sans limited-activation DRM) and tie games per user instead of machine. See, easy :P yeah, right...