I get it, but i'll never agree with you. If you have so many legit games, why do you pirate? Why bother? It's simple, don't play the games with Steam DRM. It's not like there is a shortage of DRM-free games or anything. The fact that you have a few dozen legit games doesn't make piracy less wrong in any possible way. There's no excuse for piracy, period. You want to protest against DRM? Boycott games with DRM. This is the only way for this kind of thing to be taken seriously.

I was aware of the always on DRM and I still bought the game on release. Also two friends of mine bought it because they couldn't get past the DRM. Disaster, shmisaster, I still have no trouble imagining that the DRM actually did have a positive feedback on the game's sales, just not Ubisoft's overall reputation.

First of all, all that whole legal mumbo jumbo does give the publishers *some* responsibility either way. In some areas of the world more than in others but the point is that there's a legal arrangement between a publisher and their players, not between publisher and whiny forum bastards.

And even only taking that whole financial background into account: when doing their analysis, whose complaints have more impact on a publisher's policies? People who have already proven their interest in the publisher's franchises and their willingness to purchase their products and who are contacting the publisher through official channels? Or the delusional kids on the web who believe that the purchase they haven't made has even the slightest impact on the universe?

*hundreds


And I don't want them to "take me seriously", I just want to bankrupt them, and I think that if all of us did the same, they'd go bankrupt - EA, Ubisoft, etc. Truth be told, I don't pirate that much anyway, as there aren't that many games worth pirating anymore. Most of the ones I do are games that are unavailable for purchase from any "legit" sources .

I doubt any serious business makes any distinction, the people complaining on the internet are just as much a potential customer as those who send an email to support or whatever. They aren't a loyalty rewards members club their a business and they exist to make money.

If a publisher's PR dept noticed there was lots of noise on forums and the like about the always-online DRM, they would take that into account, it's how any company would operate. They certainly wouldn't think "Oh well they aren't paying customers they're just pirates so screw em MUHAHAHAHA!", I mean lolwut how do you even know who is a paying customer and who's a pirate. The only people who are irrelevant in this situation are those that remain silent.

So you think publishers can't distinguish people talking to their support (which additionally is documented and analyzed in many cases - chat logs are kept, phone calls recorded) and who actually describe trouble with the product and use the company's resources to solve and clarify things from whiny posts on forums and in comments sections beneath articles?

Well that's just customer support for specific technical issues right? Every publisher is aware of their public image, especially on the internet. I would be surprised if PR depts don't try to gauge what the general opinion of the public is of them and their games.

If a publisher's PR dude went around all the internet looking at comment sections of news sites and forums and found an overwhelming negativity toward something the company was doing, you can bet they would rethink it. Even if the people on the internet don't represent a "majority" of their customers.

LOL! Funny how a simple question about "this game" coming to GOG become a piracy debate :P

Holy hell 0-0 I didn't expect this to go in this direction. I just wanted to know if it was coming to GoG or not lol. I was just curious since it's just a million time's easier to play games on GoG games with my friend's on different computers in my house then it is on steam....since I can't. Thanks though for everyone making this an interesting debate :3

A better question regarding piracy is: If expansions without the main game are out of market, and the expansions are just now bundled with the newest version of the game, would that make the piracy of those expansions justified?

Interesting questions can arise out of anything. Even anything that many people consider a black and white issue, like piracy.

It's always funny when pirates keep repeating how piracy isn't stealing to help themselves sleep at night. Especially that one pic "piracy isn't stealing; piracy creates a copy", haven't they heard of "copy protection"? It's still illegal no matter how you put it.

I'm not sure where in the article he says that.

I did find this on the last page underneath "Consumers", though:

Manslaughter is not the same as murder. Both illegal, yes, but an important distinction nonetheless.

Who cares? Even if you had millions of games it still wouldn't make you any better than the cheapskate pirate that never bought one single game. There aren't "better" pirates, there are pirates. You're a pirate, that's all.

Fine, but do it the right way, don't play their games at all. By pirating games you are just acting like a pirate who is self-entitled to free games, not like someone who is genuinely interested in changing the industry.

Oh, and by the way, piracy will not make the big companies go bankrupt. They'll either come up with draconian DRM (like always-online) or new business models (F2P). You're just helping to kill the traditional retail market and publishers will change their focus. If piracy keeps growing, they won't die, they'll just adapt.

Blizzard is one of the biggest companies focused on PC gaming and it has already fully embraced always-online DRM and F2P (with the upcoming Heroes of the Storm and that card game) and it worked. It won't take long before other companies adopt the same model (EA already did an experiment with SimCity).

Hahahaha, no, thanks. Not all of us are criminals, you know. I'm not pirating games just because a particular publisher/developer did something i don't agree with. If i have to, i'll do it the right and LEGAL way: i WON'T buy nor play the game (which is what i did with Rayman Legends because of a shitty move by Ubisoft). Have you ever heard of something like honesty? Well, not everyone wants to use people's hard work for free just to get free games.

Don't you think you're being a little self-entitled here? If a particular game is not available in a "legit" store you pirate it? Doesn't sound fair at all.

Let's say you run a small company. Would you think it would be fair if some people stole your products because you're not offering them at the specific supermarket they want? Let's be clear here (before i fall victim to the strawman fallacy), i'm not saying that piracy and stealing are the same thing, i'm making an analogy.

I really don't buy into the "if i don't agree with it, i'll pirate it" mentality.

Mongols, Franks, Byzantines, oh wait, wrong game.