Can piracy be a good thing?

[Bitmap Frogs]

code.samurai said:

cwbys21 said:

code.samurai said:

^ You're wrong piracy is not what's driving prices to go up it's corporations that are looking to make more money who dictates what the price will be.  If the games prices were reasonably low however, there would be lesser pirates.  Imagine $10 games.  Piracy would not disappear but it would significantly lessened, hence the developers would have cash on their pockets.  How many niche PS360 games have you seen floating around in the games bin tagged 60 that clearly will never be bought?  The prices are ridiculous.

 

I can imagine $10 games, I can also imagine graphics staying at nes or snes levels because of it.  And with packaging and shipping I can imagine the whole video gaming business being forced to DD or everyone going bankrupt.

 

Not necessarily, I'm sure there is a sweetspot somewhere between cost and development that is still a reasonable cost.  A $60 price point for a game?  People look at that and scoff, murmuring "I'm not going to spend $60 for a game."  Who do you think thought up a $60 price point?  Developers?  No.  Artists?  No.  Corporation?  Yes, because they think they can pay off the development if they can charge more for games, but what these morons don't understand is that nobody will buy their non-AAA games hence they will not be earning much.  Now that I thought about it, I think PS360 games are usually priced at $60 a pop and so if you look at it it's mostly the corporation's fault.  Now if they priced it at a more reasonable cost and actually tried to find a sweet spot, maybe they will make more sales and less people would actually look to pirate their games.

 

But it's a vicious cycle. As piracy increases, companies need to draw more money from the guys who actually buy games in order to make even. They can't go and say "hey, let's make this one 30$ and see what happens" because research data shows the guys who are getting the games for 0$ won't start spending money to buy them legit even if they sell for a smaller price.

The only people who react to lower pricepoints are those who buy games legit. Such buyer will buy one game at 60$ or two at 30$. But the people who are used to spend 0,20c (aka cost of the DVD) won't settle for anything more expensive.