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Forums - Gaming - Can piracy be a good thing?

code.samurai on 04 October 2008
Bitmap Frogs said:
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.

You are assuming again.  Stop that.  You don't know how the general market will react if they actually reduced the entry price point to $30.  For all you know those people who buy 1 game a month will actually buy three games.  You clearly missed my point that even the niche titles cost an outrageous $60 on the PS360 platforms, their target audience will be turned off by the price before right after they are intrigued by the concept.  Take me for example, I want to buy Heavenly Sword but held back more than 3 times because it does not have any replay value.  It's like an interactive movie, only more than 3x the cost.

 



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Bitmap Frogs on 04 October 2008
code.samurai said:
Bitmap Frogs said:
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.

You are assuming again.  Stop that.  You don't know how the general market will react if they actually reduced the entry price point to $30.  For all you know those people who buy 1 game a month will actually buy three games.  You clearly missed my point that even the niche titles cost an outrageous $60 on the PS360 platforms, their target audience will be turned off by the price before right after they are intrigued by the concept.  Take me for example, I want to buy Heavenly Sword but held back more than 3 times because it does not have any replay value.  It's like an interactive movie, only more than 3x the cost.

 

 

Assuming? You don't think the publishers have done a shitton of market research in order to find the optimum price to maximise profits? Their research shows that pirates like having goodies for free, no price discount will motivate them.

But hey, whatever.

 





Current-gen game collection uploaded on the profile, full of win and good games; also most of my PC games. Lucasfilm Games/LucasArts 1982-2008 (Requiescat In Pace).

code.samurai on 04 October 2008
Bitmap Frogs said:
code.samurai said:
Bitmap Frogs said:

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.

You are assuming again.  Stop that.  You don't know how the general market will react if they actually reduced the entry price point to $30.  For all you know those people who buy 1 game a month will actually buy three games.  You clearly missed my point that even the niche titles cost an outrageous $60 on the PS360 platforms, their target audience will be turned off by the price before right after they are intrigued by the concept.  Take me for example, I want to buy Heavenly Sword but held back more than 3 times because it does not have any replay value.  It's like an interactive movie, only more than 3x the cost.

 

 

Assuming? You don't think the publishers have done a shitton of market research in order to find the optimum price to maximise profits? Their research shows that pirates like having goodies for free, no price discount will motivate them.

But hey, whatever.

 

Marketing research?  No.  The $60 price point for PS360 is standard and most publishers follow it blindly.  Why do you think even games without replay value also costs $60?  It's insane.



jkl2207 on 04 October 2008

Piracy is good for low income families and families on the poverty line which has both parents working. Normally they probably wouldn't even buy such games for their kids at full price, but purchasing games at a substantially reduced rate will:

- give the parents the satisfaction of having their kids happy and playing video games and not having to miss out as much,

- reduce the stress on the family budget, whilst not limiting choices of entertainment you can choose for the family

- Let parents work in a happier state of mind if they do night shift thinking that perhaps their kids are too preoccupied with games to be doing anything naughty outside

- and that in turn has a flow on effect of having kids stay home rather then roam the streets in gangs beating people up. And growing up to doing more harmful things.

- Which in turn makes the streets safer at night.

- Which then benefits the community.

Furthermore I am of the opinion that piracy can be good thing for people who like to try before they buy. I know if I could have tried Fantastic four, GTA4, MGS4 and DMC4 I would have never bought those games. And it could be good for the industry too. Now I know this will be stretching it. If everyone could try a game before they bought it..... now think about it..... would the game developers then have to try harder to make their games better and therefore prove a case to the consumers that their game is worth buying at full price? And that would then have the flow on effect of better games for everyone.

That said I don't pirate, (except really shit movies that I can't find in DVD shops) I just like looking at things from a lateral point of view.



Bitmap Frogs on 04 October 2008
code.samurai said:
Bitmap Frogs said:

Assuming? You don't think the publishers have done a shitton of market research in order to find the optimum price to maximise profits? Their research shows that pirates like having goodies for free, no price discount will motivate them.

But hey, whatever.

 

Marketing research?  No.  The $60 price point for PS360 is standard and most publishers follow it blindly.  Why do you think even games without replay value also costs $60?  It's insane.

 

Yes, they've done the marketing research. The conclusion they reached is that people that have no moral issues downloading games won't be motivated by lower prices, promotions, whatever. The other conclusion they reached is that 60$ is the higher games can be priced before demand goes way down.

The reason the price has become standard is because what goes into the price deciding process is the same across all games and that has nothing to do with the content in the disc itself.

 

 





Current-gen game collection uploaded on the profile, full of win and good games; also most of my PC games. Lucasfilm Games/LucasArts 1982-2008 (Requiescat In Pace).

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code.samurai on 04 October 2008
Bitmap Frogs said:
code.samurai said:
Bitmap Frogs said:

Assuming? You don't think the publishers have done a shitton of market research in order to find the optimum price to maximise profits? Their research shows that pirates like having goodies for free, no price discount will motivate them.

But hey, whatever.

 

Marketing research?  No.  The $60 price point for PS360 is standard and most publishers follow it blindly.  Why do you think even games without replay value also costs $60?  It's insane.

 

Yes, they've done the marketing research. The conclusion they reached is that people that have no moral issues downloading games won't be motivated by lower prices, promotions, whatever. The other conclusion they reached is that 60$ is the higher games can be priced before demand goes way down.

The reason the price has become standard is because what goes into the price deciding process is the same across all games and that has nothing to do with the content in the disc itself.

 

 

I'll grant you that they probably have budget for research.  But what the hell did that tell them regarding the market?  It seems that with all their fancy research it should have told them how to sell to as much people as possible, but clearly they're just a bunch of morons because they have no idea what people wants case in point the success of Nintendo and Apple.  Nintendo beat their marketing research to a pulp, Sony was clearly baffled by how the public reacted to their Ultimate Gaming Rig.  As for apple, they're cashing it in selling music and software at a price point that people consider to be reasonable.



jlauro on 04 October 2008

Also Nintendo may have shovelware, but it's often released at $19 or $29 instead of $49. There are some games that try to release at $49 that are not worth it, but in general they tend to be more reasonably priced at launch.

PS3 and 360 have some value games now too. However, most of the PS3/60 seem to launch at $60 no matter what.



Bitmap Frogs on 04 October 2008

Whatever the level of ability of their research departments, piracy is bad.





Current-gen game collection uploaded on the profile, full of win and good games; also most of my PC games. Lucasfilm Games/LucasArts 1982-2008 (Requiescat In Pace).

Lord N on 04 October 2008
Bitmap Frogs said:

 

The hell it isn't. The first industry that got hit was music and while the big recording labels that everyone likes to mention when justifying piracy took a hit but still keep chugging along, independent labels who took their time and risked money producing albums for promising yet relatively unknown artists have died by the dozens.

Niche genres that were barely holding have been killed by piracy. Token example: opera - labels used to assemble orchestras and singers in studios to record operas, that fed instrument players, it fed the singers, it fed the studio workers, etc. This was barely profitable but it was profitable and there was a market for it. Then piracy came and *poof* that economic activity is now gone. Mind you, the ph4t EMI execs are still raking in massive wages managing their back catalogue but all those small guys who made a living can not anymore.

But don't worry and keep pretending piracy is fair and it doesn't hurt anyone. We all know those kind of statements exist only because piracy benefits you so arguing it's validity validates your behaviour.

To be honest, piracy would not be a problem if people used it just to expand their consumption of cultural products. In other words, if you used to spend 100$ in albums before and now on top of downloading dozens of cd's you still bought 100$ worth of music per year it wouldn't be a problem. The real issue is that people at large have reduced their spending to 0 (or close to) and pirate everything.

 

The music industry took a hit because:

-People got sick and tired of paying $20 for a CD with 2 or 3 good songs and 10 filler tracks.

-The industry began demonizing the very people their music targeted as "thieves" and "pirates". It also didn't help when they started threatening them with legal action.

 



 

Consoles owned: Saturn, Dreamcast, PS1, PS2, PSP, DS, PS3

Bitmap Frogs on 04 October 2008
Lord N said:
Bitmap Frogs said:

 

The hell it isn't. The first industry that got hit was music and while the big recording labels that everyone likes to mention when justifying piracy took a hit but still keep chugging along, independent labels who took their time and risked money producing albums for promising yet relatively unknown artists have died by the dozens.

Niche genres that were barely holding have been killed by piracy. Token example: opera - labels used to assemble orchestras and singers in studios to record operas, that fed instrument players, it fed the singers, it fed the studio workers, etc. This was barely profitable but it was profitable and there was a market for it. Then piracy came and *poof* that economic activity is now gone. Mind you, the ph4t EMI execs are still raking in massive wages managing their back catalogue but all those small guys who made a living can not anymore.

But don't worry and keep pretending piracy is fair and it doesn't hurt anyone. We all know those kind of statements exist only because piracy benefits you so arguing it's validity validates your behaviour.

To be honest, piracy would not be a problem if people used it just to expand their consumption of cultural products. In other words, if you used to spend 100$ in albums before and now on top of downloading dozens of cd's you still bought 100$ worth of music per year it wouldn't be a problem. The real issue is that people at large have reduced their spending to 0 (or close to) and pirate everything.

 

The music industry took a hit because:

-People got sick and tired of paying $20 for a CD with 2 or 3 good songs and 10 filler tracks.

-The industry began demonizing the very people their music targeted as "thieves" and "pirates". It also didn't help when they started threatening them with legal action.

 

 

The music industry took a hit because all of a sudden they had an option: instead of paying 20$ for a CD, they paid 0$.

And as far as demonizing people and threating legal action, I repeat what would you do if your office got cleaned up everyday. Let me guess: you'd be demonizing the thieves and speaking to the cops ASAP. But since in this instance you are the thief, it makes it all fair and good - after all, it's you who is profiting from the crime.

As I said, the whole p2p deal would be awesome if people kept their spending habits and just used them to expand their consumption of cultural products. The problem is that most people switched to full-piracy-mode. That's when shit hit the fan.





Current-gen game collection uploaded on the profile, full of win and good games; also most of my PC games. Lucasfilm Games/LucasArts 1982-2008 (Requiescat In Pace).