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Kasz216 on 27 January 2010
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AnthonyW86 said:
Kasz216 said:
AnthonyW86 said:
daggy said:

How about the third option: Make good games and sell what PC gamers want?

PC gaming has been increasing well, and right now there are more game developers on PC than in all consoles combined. Indie games (which are mostly single-player) are rising extremely fast on PC.

You dont really believe that do you? No matter how good a game is, if people can get it for free by pirating it most of them will.

And again this kind of system could eventually work. If they program PC version to get tiny parts of the game online during gameplay, it would be as piracy proof as WoW.

Incorrect.  According to current economic theory people WANT to pay for stuff at a fair price.  It's build in to our sociological makeup to WANT to purchase products.


People would rather pay a fair price then pirate.

I understand that, but i also think most people will feel like ''a thief of their own money'' if they buy a game when most people are getting practically for free by pirating it. So that way they would feel like they are being treated unfairly.

Anyways i hope most off us agree that being able to ban out piracy would be a good thing. And i really don't think Ubisofts approach is such a bad idea

Most people WOULDN'T be getting it for free though.  Because most people WANT to pay for stuff.

Banning piracy really wouldn't be a good thing... it would likely be completly irrelevent when it comes to sales in the western world.

The positive and negative effects of piracy have both been shown in the data to be very slight and hardly detectable if detectable at all statistically.


In the "less-developed" world... piracy would likely mosty be a non-factor in gaming... but positive in other software markets... and maybe some gaming with franchises such as Mario.

 

Microsoft has a little heard motto... "Don't pirate, but if you do... pirate us."   This is because when pirates "graduate" to being able to afford things like Windows and Office there is a VERY high correlation of them buying the product they pirated... because they've gotten used to the product.

 

Whether the same effect would carry over to videogames is unknown, and unlikely since gameplay changes drastically from game to game, and few people pay attention to company... however for brands like Mario and Call of Duty... stuff that isn't going away for generations... piracy could actually help those brands build up equity in developing markets and among people who are still "developing income."

 

The current situation is actually most profitable for buisnesses.  They can build up userbase while also getting concessions of different kinds from governments for "piracy losses" that can be expanded into ridiculious numbers.

 

 

Heck look at Microsoft on this matter though.  They're actually allowing people with pirated Windows 7 to get free updates.