piracy not a big deal!!

Microsoft uses new drives in the 360s that are sold now and pirates thus far haven't been able to change the firmware, modding the console with chips still works, but is a lot more complicated.

And to the Steam thing: I think its not that hard to get those games too.

And no matter what publishers and developers do games will always get pirated.It's just that it's harder to do on consoles and that most of the PC users are already "hardcore" enough to know that they can easily get all the games they want.

Okay so does it affect the market, thats what I'm saying?

Everyone is buying games, its only a small segement of the market that is doing piracy on games. The majority of the market are the casuals, which then don't even worry about piracy. They just buy the games and play them.

And what options are these ?

DRM ? Bioshock, Spore   -   hacked

Steam games ? HL2      -    hacked

StarForce ? Colin McRae Rally 2005, Splinter Cell Chaos Theory    -      it wasn't easy, but hacked

@woopdeedoo: your right, developers cannot stop piracy. That won't stop them from trying tho.

@ecurbj: I may have misunderstood the point you were making in your first post. I don't think piracy hurts sales, as the people who pirate the game are generally people who would not but the game if they had to pay for it. However, the developers tend to not see it that way. The tomshardware people disagree with me, btw. They say piracy does effect the market in that video article. I believe they know more than me, so piracy probably does effect the market.

@Barozi: I guess I should rephrase. I believe that developers have more possibilities on the PC to prevent piracy. Of course, no method is perfect at preventing piracy, but they still seem to have more options than they do on consoles.

The XBOX 360 may have a new HDD that makes it more difficult to hack, but if it does get hacked, the game developers can do nothing about it.

I liked that video, thanks for sharing. Their speculation about how so many x360 titles were leaked so early is interesting simply because that they are all hyped titles and it's possible that there are groups out there trying to prove a point. That said, last year Mario Galaxy was leaked weeks before it's official release.

@ecurbj: Traditionally I think you'd of been correct in asserting that only the "hardcore" pirate games. This generation though that has most certainly changed, with less experienced people simply getting their consoles modded professionally. From there getting the games is about as hard as getting a dvd movie. If you look at the PSP and DS specifically, they are both absurdly easy to pirate with, one needing a quick flash, the other operating on card that requires about as much tech savvy as transfering photos to and from a memory card.

Another point I see neglected in this video and by people on these forums is simply the availability and ease of use. DS flash cards are available from some local stores and guides for use are included or widely available online. On places like craigslist there are tons of people advertising PSP flashing/unlocking and I'm sure the less savvy user could easily find out what they need to get pirated games once they get it flashed. They have clip-on modchips for Wii now (ie: no soldering, but i personally think this is a poor design). Most x360 drives can be flashed and this isn't too hard to learn about. If the user is in doubt there are loads of places that will do this for them.

In terms of services like steam, each console has their own service. AFAIK, only WiiWare is able to be pirated while PSN/XBLA games are not.

The best way to end piracy is by making games free and seeking alternative sources of revenue, such as in-game content stores or in-game advertising.

I'd rather pay a sticker price than see my games filled with product placement and ads or face micro-transactions for 85% of the content.

Right, if that were the case the Wii might as well be the most powerful console because no games are going to even push the Wii.