The ease of piracy & hl2

[Killing2Live]

Chances are they would have bought it if there wasn't a convenient way to steal it.

Downloading games is in no way convienent so more than likely the people pirating games dont have any money to buy it anyways.

 

[poseyjmac]

I figure it's nice to be able to download and play the games i would never have bought anyway. Where's the harm? Nobody lost any money from it...

a very flawed way of thinking..

heres why:

lets say you want to play Halflife2. and lets say you are in a theoretical world where its impossible to pirate games + you have no friends to get a copy from. now what would you do, shell out the $ for hl2 or just not play it ever?(this is rhetorical)

now what the typical person would say is, well i would just never buy it, BUT this response is not genuine because 1. you know that you are not in the theoretical universe i described and 2. you want to prove me wrong so you can continue feeling good about yourself.

however, had you been in this universe where pirating was not possible, your tune might be different and you might buy the game, because as we know human nature, we know that if a human wants something, he will find a way one way or another, if that means getting an extra part time job, then so be it.. but of course, there is no way for you to know, because that universe does not exist.

the point is, dont be so sure that a company didn't lose any money because you pirated the game, because in an alternate universe, MrD could have very well payed money for the game if he thought it was worth it and had no other choice, thus in this present universe, its possible that the lack of the company getting money could be your fault.

 

[ATI4EVER!]

well, i couldn't be bothered reading all the posts, so here are some thngies:

(these are all if pirating means copying onto a disc. I'm not sure if it's with bittorrent. Oh and If you search DOOM 3 on google an add to the left appears with a bittorrent download too. lol)

--with farcry all textures will suck, some textures will look corrupted.
--with other games, you will think you succefully pirated it, but then like at the middle of the game, you will always miss at what you shoot at, preventing you from killing your enemies.
--with flight simulator 2000 (not 2004 or 2002) it does not load past the splash
--with flight simulator 2004 you succesfully install it, but when you try to play, it says "insert disc 4" when u have it inserted. Way around: (obvious) downlaod a no cd crack.

so, there are ways to stop piracy and I'm sure valve is working on it.

--

 

[GuNzABlaZiN]

My friend had a pirated version of Operation Flashpoint, he was playing it for a week and then the game became progressively worse and finally stopped working, now's thats how games should be protected! It should be a paint in the ass to play pirated games.

 

[Citizen 1150421]

i don't know the concept of pirating hmm..
ofcourse it wrong.. but a few of my friends have argued that yes the developers work hard on their games but most of the games don't seem to live up the that 69.99 price tag (canadian dollars). ..that most of the time they catch themselves asking themself if the buy was a wise choice. ( IMO thats terrible if you catch yourself asking that while playing a product that you have anticipated for so long)

pirating will exist because people use it a subtle hint towards the company to MAke their product worth the 70 bucks..

hl2 seems to promise this. but so did doom 3 you know like a kick ass experience. i bought the game and now wish i hadn't cause you know that scare factor? it diminishes within 2 hours. the game play is repetitive, the spawn points are obvious .. the game looks sweet sounds sweet at the end of the day i don't really care for looks and sound i care for the experience...

half life 2 better be good cause if its not then there are gonna be alot of people out there make SURe that the game has proper pirated versions of it out there.. ex. CZ...

.. i just hope hl2 is not another CZ.. which i doubt.

RELEASE THE ****ING GAME>

hl2 will be pirated cause valve has jerked its consumer base around with the delays, and mis-marketing and all.. its a small price they will have to pay.. a determined hacker will figure out a patch to get around steam. the coders are valve are smart.

but hackers are smarted if they are determined...

 

[ATI4EVER!]

yeah, hl2 will kick ass, the movies prove it. and if for some reason it doesn't, well, the physics will save it.

 

[2o3]

Why would anyone want a blag copy of halflife 2. When I bought halflife it was £30 and it has been the best £30 I've spent. If someone said £30 for 5 years of any other entertainment I know I would bite there hand off. Ffs buy the game and the mods. I for one want to give Valve and the mod makers some bling god knows they deserve it.

 

[Lobster]

Obviously the "hackers" will always find a way round steam, but they will need to change things round quite often as valve patch things, the large majority of people who download games arnt patient enough to wait for a crack each week, and will either not bother with it, or go and buy the damn game.

With more traditional games, theres at least 2 or 3 months between patches, and so the cracks last longer, (MP That is - for singleplayer u just wouldnt update), and in most cases the people are limited to playing with other cracked copies on cracked servers.

Apparently Doom3's first torrent had a peak of 35'000 peers, thats pretty shocking isnt it?, but to spend the rest of the games multiplayer life playing with a bunch of cheap 12 year olds, doesnt exactly attract me, id much rather pay the price and play with adults, and of course support the developers.

 

[acme420]

Obviously the "hackers" will always find a way round steam, but they will need to change things round quite often as valve patch things, the large majority of people who download games arnt patient enough to wait for a crack each week, and will either not bother with it, or go and buy the damn game.

With more traditional games, theres at least 2 or 3 months between patches, and so the cracks last longer, (MP That is - for singleplayer u just wouldnt update), and in most cases the people are limited to playing with other cracked copies on cracked servers.

Apparently Doom3's first torrent had a peak of 35'000 peers, thats pretty shocking isnt it?, but to spend the rest of the games multiplayer life playing with a bunch of cheap 12 year olds, doesnt exactly attract me, id much rather pay the price and play with adults, and of course support the developers.

1. Its called cracking not hacking

2. Games get cracked not because valve jerked their customer base around or any other dumb shit. its a competition to see who can be the first to release nothing more nothing less. they dont do it so johnny 2 shoes can grab it from bittorent they dont give a **** about you they just wanna win the race.

3. randomly generated cd keys are 99.99999999% impossible to crack. you might luck up on a valid key with a keygen 1:100000000000 times.

4. the peak users was over 120,000 and 2 seeds.

5. no ones like wasting their money on crappy games music cd's etc. i saw matrix game i dont remember what it was called (crappy matrix game #1) i played it at compusa i knew then i was never gonna buy it and i didnt download it either. if im not gonna buy a game im not gonna buy it. dont blame piracy on why your shitty game didnt sell. next time make a better game. i downloaded prince of persia sands of time. such a great game i had to buy it. i cant wait for prince of persia 2.

i bought battlefield after i played the demo, i bought ut2k3/4 after i played demo's. i played the demo of juiced and i was looking forward to it. after the demo i am no longer wanting the game i will not buy it nor waste my time downloading it. people buy games they like and dont buy what they dont like.

im not saying all people are like that some people just download everygame whether they like it or not. but the majority of people buy their games. piracy doesnt kill sales. crappy games kill sales.

 

[poseyjmac]

piracy doesnt kill sales. crappy games kill sales.

nope. wrong. whether a game is crappy or not is subjective. not to mention a game like doom3 is praised by many, yet its still being pirated. people pirate games for ease. and if a game is crappy, why would someone download it?

so yes piracy does affect sales.

 

[ATI4EVER!]

Well to be honest, i don't think that to many people would wnat a lame downloaded copy of such a great game like hl2, at least I would want a hard copy, that means that I would also not wnat a downlaoded copy off steam.

 

[Spoonoop]

I rather buy HL 2 than wait 3 months trying to get it free and failing, rather have those 3 months playing Half-Life 2 while my 40-50 dollars or so are going to support Valve on making Half-Life 3 :cheers:

 

[acme420]

nope. wrong. whether a game is crappy or not is subjective. not to mention a game like doom3 is praised by many, yet its still being pirated. people pirate games for ease. and if a game is crappy, why would someone download it?

so yes piracy does affect sales.

lets see download highly anticipated game now to check it out or wait till its in stores in 3 days. which one will most people choose...hmmmmmmmm

do you think people buy crappy games just because they couldnt download em.

the pc version of spiderman2 is out there free for anyone who wants to download it. last i saw there was less than 1000 downloads on bt. wow why didnt they all rush and download it. it was free. how many copies have sold in the stores? like 3? watch activision blame their lackluster sales on piracy. no one wants yout crap ass game activision. you couldnt give it away.

 

[obiwanquinobi]

piracy doesnt kill sales. crappy games kill sales.

Gotta agree with this fella

 

[poseyjmac]

lets see download highly anticipated game now to check it out or wait till its in stores in 3 days. which one will most people choose...hmmmmmmmm

do you think people buy crappy games just because they couldnt download em.

the pc version of spiderman2 is out there free for anyone who wants to download it. last i saw there was less than 1000 downloads on bt. wow why didnt they all rush and download it. it was free. how many copies have sold in the stores? like 3? watch activision blame their lackluster sales on piracy. no one wants yout crap ass game activision. you couldnt give it away.

well more specifically you are half-wrong. piracy does affect sales, as well as crappy games.

 

[kevinb456]

This is the nature of computers AND gaming. As MANY precautions as they take, HL2 will BE pirated, and very very quickly at THAT. Stop worrying ABOUT it, and if you want TO SUPPORT the game then just buy IT. There's not much MORE YOU can do.

ok but NEXT time please dont USE capslock ON randoM words OR LETTERS because its QUITE annoying! PLEASE. thank YOU.

 

[A2597]

I imagion HL2 will be available within a week of release, with steam coded out of it.

Sad, but true. Good news is, if they want MP, they will have to use steam meaning they HAVE to buy the game!

Even UT2k4 can't be played without buying the game. Well..it can, but only on 10-20 servers full of aimbots.

 

[umop]

*slaps forehead*

I havn't laughed that hard in a good while

 

[BoRn[nBk]]

Isnt it obivous? One of the people at Valve put the game on the net because last year when the game was supposed to be releasesd on sept 30 the game wasnt even finished i played the anon of it at my friends house we go the A.I. working on it but it really doesnt matter because Gabe Newell or someone at valve put it on the net then blamed a guy out in russia that was arrested which really was a good hacker but he didnt do it at all if you are like a ghost you can see all there server logs and how would they not see somthing being downloaded that is about 6 gig thats how big the anon is unpacked so someone at valve did that so they could buy another year then too make people beleaive even more they put it on CNN and a bunch of other new stations for people that are gonna diss my ass for my intrest in this just leave it alone or buy into there bull shit

 

[Mechagodzilla]

Hahaha!

Too bad Valve said that the theft was not the cause of the delay.
If you did your homework, you could have saved yourself enough time to learn proper sentence structure.

 

[Krynn72]

I think most people wont put up with the hassle of getting cracked versions. Sure they will be able to play the SP for as long as they want for free, but the real lure is the mp, and its mods. With steam I think that it will be an utter pain in the a$$ to have to deal with mp. Valve will learn what the crackers are doing, and they will fix it. With such a large fanbase, people are loyal to valve and likely wont hesitate to help em out with pirating.

I dont download games simply because thats the person I am. I downloaded the first hitman, and felt like a jacka$$. I uninstalled it and bought it. Didnt like it that much, but I felt better that the developers got my money for their work. And doom3, I personally wont buy it anyways, but im not going to get a warez version.

 

[Wiseman]

You bought a game you didn't like just because you already downloaded it? Damn, that is dedication unknown to most (including me).

Personally, I think pirating would decrease a bit if more companies released better quality demos. Anyone remember Apogee, there shareware copies of their games contained about a third of the game. It kicked ass; you'd know exactly how good the game was before you bought it.

That's why Valve should release the first 4 chapters of HL2 as a demo. Then I could play that to see if the game is actually good (<sarcasm>because I personally think it'll suck</sarcasm>) before I buy it.

I guess a strategy like that wouldn't apply to HL2 all that much, but for a lot of other games it would be nice.

 

[acme420]

reading over what i said before i would like to clarify that i dont think piracy doesnt contribute to poor sales. i just want the game companies to stop lying and saying piracy is the whole reason they didnt make 5000 jillion dollars in sales. piracy eats maybe 2% of their profits. and meaning that the people who were gonna buy the game downloaded it and decided they didnt want to pay for it since they already had it. 2% most everyone else who downloaded it and didnt buy it werent gonna buy it anyway and thats what the game companies dont seem to get. just because they downloaded it doesnt mean they were ever gonna buy it so THAT DOESNT MEAN YOU LOST MONEY./ if i decide im never gonna buy a cheeseburger at mcdonalds and instead eat exclusively at burger king mcdonalds cant blame burger king for them losing sales to me. i was never gonna eat at mcdonalds anyway.


why did i say the same thing in 2 different analogies? i guess i just like analogies. like a pig likes mud on a hot day, or a horny teenager likes boobs i like analogies.

 

[king John I]

if valve do release a demo then by all means they must NOT include any of the game within it, they should just set up a few chapters separate from the game, with its own multiplayer, that way people get a taste and they dont ruin the first part of the game for themselves.

 

[king John I]

if i decide im never gonna buy a cheeseburger at mcdonalds and instead eat exclusively at burger king mcdonalds cant blame burger king for them losing sales to me. i was never gonna eat at mcdonalds anyway.

but if burger king wasn't there you might eat at mc.donalds because there is no where else? things like that can really subtly effect decisions, if valve deos a lot of focusing on multi player and advertises that then i think those people migth buy the game anyway. As for those people who dont want to play multiplayer the single player package might help reduce dl's.

edit: oh shit, i thought i put this within my other post, oh well, now if someone could merge these posts please...

 

[sHm0zY]

THey have been delayign it all this time to put a super pirate pretector on the disks

 

[kevinb456]

Isnt it obivous? One of the people at Valve put the game on the net because last year when the game was supposed to be releasesd on sept 30 the game wasnt even finished i played the anon of it at my friends house we go the A.I. working on it but it really doesnt matter because Gabe Newell or someone at valve put it on the net then blamed a guy out in russia that was arrested which really was a good hacker but he didnt do it at all if you are like a ghost you can see all there server logs and how would they not see somthing being downloaded that is about 6 gig thats how big the anon is unpacked so someone at valve did that so they could buy another year then too make people beleaive even more they put it on CNN and a bunch of other new stations for people that are gonna diss my ass for my intrest in this just leave it alone or buy into there bull shit

holy shit, i think that has to be the longest ever single sentance ive read!

 

[acme420]

but if burger king wasn't there you might eat at mc.donalds because there is no where else? things like that can really subtly effect decisions, if valve deos a lot of focusing on multi player and advertises that then i think those people migth buy the game anyway. As for those people who dont want to play multiplayer the single player package might help reduce dl's.

edit: oh shit, i thought i put this within my other post, oh well, now if someone could merge these posts please...

No the reason i used the bk vs mickeyD's analogy is because i hate mcdonalds food and if mcdonalds was the only restaurant on earth i would switch to eating dirt.

 

[Eon Blue]

Indeed. Steam will make it hard to pirate HL2.

I'm pretty sure to get access to any of the mods, you'll have to enter your key online. Thus, since I know a lot of people who weren't fans of HL, but bought CS, you're going to be stuck with a pirated, dirty, usless copy of HL2, or, you can just pay the $49.95 (or $59.25 :| Doom 3) and get all the benefits.

Besides, I won't lie. Everything I download, I buy anyway. Bloodrayne was one hell of a game, and I ended up buying it

 

[Intamin]

No the reason i used the bk vs mickeyD's analogy is because i hate mcdonalds food and if mcdonalds was the only restaurant on earth i would switch to eating dirt.

Haha. Isn't it funny how if you analyze just the anology, it itself loses all credibility? (Just a thought, acme, I'm not flaming u or anything )

It's obvious the world is split on this issue. But if we're all still alive and the game industry is thriving, where's the problem? Perhaps an increase in piracy would create a problem, but it's not like game developers and publishers are going out of business daily or anything.

If anything, piracy will most likely decrease do to guilt (hopefully some of these pirates have consciences), advanced anti-cracking technology, and just plain great games.

 

[poseyjmac]

No the reason i used the bk vs mickeyD's analogy is because i hate mcdonalds food and if mcdonalds was the only restaurant on earth i would switch to eating dirt.

but, see thats what you say NOW, in a universe where both restaurants are here. BUT, if you were in a universe where only mcdonalds existed, this could change your outlook, which is why what you said is not valid.

 

[poseyjmac]

If anything, piracy will most likely decrease do to guilt (hopefully some of these pirates have consciences)

now thats the funniest thing ive read in a long time

 

[Intamin]

now thats the funniest thing ive read in a long time

Thanks! My goal is for world peace! Thank you all!

Yeah, anyway...