I tried it back in the day when you'd just rent a game, burn the disc and use a mod chip device. But after like a month, I realized that I had devalued gaming and it just wasn't as fun. I had all these burnt CD and DVD-R's laying around with sharpie written titles on them, and it just felt... empty.

I haven't done it since nor will I ever do it again. Not only because it just sucks not having the real game, but because it's just ethically wrong.

Oh, and emulators suck... period.

If it's a game I've never been able to play due to region-locking or rarity, then I've emulated a handful of those. Like, maybe 5 total in my life. But these days, I feel guilty about it and just spend the money. I'd rather own the game anyway.

I had pirated a lot of PC games in the past. They're not pirated anymore. I bought used copies of them all. Console stuff, no. Now disabling the region locking on all my older systems, hell yes. TV shows, movies. Nope, buy the blurays/DVDs. Make my own encodes, from my DVR, on shows that don't come out on BD, for whatever reason. Music, hardly buy anything. Don't have bootlegs anymore. All replaced with used copies.

Any pirated PC programs I use to use are gone. They were'nt worth the money to buy them. All crap. And found free alternatives. I don't bother with emulation. I have my old systems. When I did use dolphin. I dumped my games. I bought most of the good games on GC and Wii. But still run badly. So I stopped caring. The only exception to this is when I twitch stream. I have to use an emulator for my handhelds. Thanks Nintendo for no video out. Or DS player.

My xbox 360 with LT3.0, pc games, Wii hombrew, and rooms

Care to elaborate why they suck? All of them in general or just a few?

Pirating is crime punishable under copyright right laws and you could face prosecution therefore this thread is asking you to confess to an enforceable crime ... I would advice everyone to avoid any major confession.

But this is an interesting topic, I started playing video game in late 80's early 90's back in does days, we used to play PC games on floppy disks. Piracy was rampant in does days mostly due to how easy it was to reproduce the game, all that was require is to put a piece of tape on the disks and it could be copied. This tape process would also work with VHS and cassette tape. So movies and music were also having major issues with piracy.

I was either too young or since the internet wasn't has convenient back in the days, I can say that I never played a pirated game on my NES, SNES, N64 or Gameboy & Gameboy Advance consoles. They would have some 100 games in 1 cartridge, I think these were legit since all the game used to sucks. This also meant that you would only get to play what ever your family finance could afford. This meant a very small gaming library consisting of 1-2 games a year. Most of the game were played from renting them from blockbuster and sharing owned/rented games at school.

The introduction of CD did help the gaming industry to protect against piracy for a while. CD writers were very expensive and proper software was needed to crack copyright protection. But all it took was for one friend in your circle to get a CD writer and then pirated copies were readily available. During high school I think piracy was so bad on PC that I don't think anyone was buying a PC game other then Blizzard games. Online gaming became more popular and Blizzard was one of the company that were good at battling against Piracy...

I guess when your young and don't have any money, Piracy is just a way of accessing games that you otherwise could never play. Piracy when your poor is just an outlet toward what you want but can't get with your funds. It's easy for young people to justify piracy.

It's not until your older and start having your own money that you realize the moral dilemma of piracy. You justify piracy with the fact that they're just corporation inflating price only wanting to make profit or would only purchase games from Developer you would hold high respect. I have never tried or own a pirated version of any of Blizzard games.

The worst pirated consoles by far have to be the PSP, DS and Xbox. The original Xbox was only on the market 4 years, the main reason Microsoft stop production and kill off the consoles around summer 2005 was because of Piracy. In 2005 every pawn shop and flea market was selling Xbox console with hard drive that contain almost the entire Xbox library. People could buy a Xbox and modders would for a small fee mod their machine with the entire Xbox library. Nintendo business was really impacted by piracy when R4 card hit the market. I know quite a few people that have own NDS and never purchase a game. I have never own a PSP but I know that it was has easy has the NDS to get full access to the PSP library.

I think the era of piracy and buying used games is a problem of past consoles going forward, the PS4 has manage to kill Xbox one on marketing side with Microsoft proposed always online policy. But's it's clear that all three consoles makers are adopting an always online policy or at least enhance experience by being always online. There many gamer like me that are ready to abandon disc and are happy growing our steam and console digital library. Constant steam sales and consoles digital sales is the best weapon in the fight against piracy and second hand sales. Game Service like EA Access will kill off second hand sales. NFL 15 which release just over 6 months ago is now on EA access. We are still willing to pay a premium on playing a most anticipated game like Halo 5 and uncharted 4, but a new release that we only have a mild interest is much more appealing 3-4 month down the road when they offer a 50% off discount online. Online library now offer the most convenient services and great value on older games.

I don't know where you are coming from but I seriously doubt anyone will get persecuted because they "confessed" on a random internet board with a random nickname how bad he pirated or still does. Yes, your ip is trackable. End of story.

But thanks for your report, it is basically what I "went through" in my youth

The worst I've done is a ROM for Ace Attorney: Investigations 2 for access to an english translation.

And I own the Japanese version of the game anyway.

I only emulate/pirate if it's really absolutely necessary. The only example that comes to my mind right now would be Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance. (C'mon, I ain't got a spare 100 bucks to buy Gamecube games.)

The latter... I don't know enough about aLkaLinNE to say the other thing. 

But in my defence I don't DL video games, and I mostly DL TV shows.