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General discussion (archive)GOG, DRM, piracy(48 posts)(48 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted September 12, 2008
I would hardly think it's anything to do with "Closed Hardware". If that was the case, then why didn't this happen in the Dreamcast/PS2 days ?
The Dreamcast, for it's time, was a great machine, and more than capable of matching a well-specced PC, with it's great spec, easy to develop for, online capable, etc..
The same could have been said for the PS2, so surely these systems, especially the multi-million selling PS2, should have killed off the PC.
I think it's all to do with ££ $$, Money, and easy sells. Put out a average game on PC and it sells average, if at all. Put out a average game on consoles and it sells more than even a quality game on PC.
Look at Halo 3, it out sold even Spiderman 3, yet was nothing more than a average sequel. Heck, I thought it was a huge step backwards from Halo 1 on the original Xbox. You can see how rushed it was by playing the early levels, then seeing how much better the graphics get as you progress. It's like it was originally planned for Xbox1, then a quarter of the way through development Bungie shifed over to the 360.
And as for Modding, modding, like in Oblivion, can tell developers how sloppy you have been with your code, interfaces, graphics, etc... On a Console, you are stuck with it, on a PC it's the modders who can fix the problems the developers should have fixed. Oblivion, and STALKER, are 2 known cases where the modders have made the game much better.
Post edited September 12, 2008 by Miner_Willy
Posted September 12, 2008
completely off-topic. i love stalker!
with its modability, its atmosphere, yes - its quirks (stealth play for one), and its firefights, its just such a lovable and fantastic game.
on-topic.
you mention the dreamcast and ps2. in 1999, 2000, an average p.c. could still play a AAA title, maybe not at highest settings, but the job could get done. the difference between an "average" user's hardware and a hardcore gamer's hardware wasn't what it is now. (i run off of a 6800 ultra on its last legs. the graphics i got off of age of conan were... abysmal. yes, i could run it. but at 4 fps with all detail levels and graphic options turned down.)
that was the core of my post's point. p.c. gaming has gotten to a point where it cant actually be done on mainstream machines. integrated graphics chipsets just dont play these games. they weren't meant to, and they cant be forced to. somewhere in the last few years, the p.c. industry has split in two very specific markets, with the majority of p.c. buyers needing just enough processing power to watch a movie and browse the web, with gamers obviously needing MUCH more.
maybe its just something that has been happening in the american market and not in europe? i'm not sure about that part.
Posted September 12, 2008
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damien: you mention the dreamcast and ps2. in 1999, 2000, an average p.c. could still play a AAA title, maybe not at highest settings, but the job could get done. the difference between an "average" user's hardware and a hardcore gamer's hardware wasn't what it is now. (i run off of a 6800 ultra on its last legs. the graphics i got off of age of conan were... abysmal. yes, i could run it. but at 4 fps with all detail levels and graphic options turned down.)
that was the core of my post's point. p.c. gaming has gotten to a point where it cant actually be done on mainstream machines. integrated graphics chipsets just dont play these games. they weren't meant to, and they cant be forced to. somewhere in the last few years, the p.c. industry has split in two very specific markets, with the majority of p.c. buyers needing just enough processing power to watch a movie and browse the web, with gamers obviously needing MUCH more.
maybe its just something that has been happening in the american market and not in europe? i'm not sure about that part.

A average PC, today, would be something like a AthlonX2 3200+, 1Gb RAM, WinXP, 8600GT or a X1650 Pro. This is average, and more than capable of playing today's games at reasonable settings. Entry level, would be more like a single-core A64 or P4, 512Mb to 1Gb, integrated video. Not really capable, but then not really relevant, here.
Mainstream PCs aren't bought by gamers, so I don't see why today's games should run on them. And, the price of hardware today, is far and way cheaper than it was back in 1999. Think how much a ATI 4850 can be had for, as well as a 1Gb stick of DDR2 RAM, then think what could be purchased in 1999 for the same money.
Another thing, I build computers for a living, and I can build a quality PC, minus a screen, thats capable of playing today's games at reasonable levels, for a similar price to a console like the PS3. In 1999, you would have needed to spend nearly 3x the amount of a PS2 to play the same level of quality for that time.
Again, this is all semantics. My original point was against your post about "Closed Hardware", something I disagree with, and think it's more about the money and not the hardware.
Anyway, I respect your opinion, but we'll have to agree to disagree ;)
Posted September 12, 2008
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damien: that was the core of my post's point. p.c. gaming has gotten to a point where it cant actually be done on mainstream machines. integrated graphics chipsets just dont play these games. they weren't meant to, and they cant be forced to. somewhere in the last few years, the p.c. industry has split in two very specific markets, with the majority of p.c. buyers needing just enough processing power to watch a movie and browse the web, with gamers obviously needing MUCH more.

I don't really see much difference, actually. Back then (well, that might not be exactly '99), if you wanted to play fancy 3D games, you needed a 3D accelerator. Now, if you want to play fancy 3D games, you need a proper videocard.
The problem isn't that the gap is larger, but that more games are on the other side of the gap. Look at Blizzard: they haven't been taken with the obsession to exploit cutting-edge hardware, and are still making AAA titles.
Posted September 12, 2008
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Miner_Willy: Again, this is all semantics. My original point was against your post about "Closed Hardware", something I disagree with, and think it's more about the money and not the hardware.
Anyway, I respect your opinion, but we'll have to agree to disagree ;)

definitely semantics. i'd agree with you 100% that it's money based, but i'd add that developing and supporting titles for closed console platforms is cheaper than doing the same for the p.c. with its near infinite configurations / setups, etc. every patch costs money. every time a glitch pops up in nvidia gpus, but not in ati gpus - that costs money. testing on xp and vista costs money. etc. etc.
but, we're way off topic - sorry about that.
tied back to the topic, i just see publishers like EA as chicken little, crying piracy wolf all the time simply because it suits their corporate strategy. to mis-quote my first post: i just think its a ruse used to cut development costs by switching to cheaper platforms.
also, re: blizzard. they're a strange beast. they haven't been taken with the high-end obsession because their bread and butter relies on being able to run on just about anything made in the last 8 years. WOW is the 800lb gorilla in the p.c. gameroom (and it provides mostly piracy free revenue, too) and its success relies on its accessibility (in game design and graphics).
i dont think the hardware requirements for diablo 3 will be as forgiving, tho.
(that game looks phenomenal... every time i see screengrabs from it, i keep wondering how amazing it would be to port old infinity engine games into it...)
Post edited September 12, 2008 by damien
Posted September 12, 2008
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damien: definitely semantics. i'd agree with you 100% that it's money based, but i'd add that developing and supporting titles for closed console platforms is cheaper than doing the same for the p.c. with its near infinite configurations / setups, etc. every patch costs money. every time a glitch pops up in nvidia gpus, but not in ati gpus - that costs money. testing on xp and vista costs money. etc. etc.
but, we're way off topic - sorry about that.

Yep, you're right, and we've gone off onto something else.
And I agree about Diablo 3 ;-) but again, thats another topic.
Posted September 12, 2008
i'm still not convinced that piracy has much (when you cut through corporate-speak and a lot of b.s.) to do with the perceived "decline" of p.c. gaming.

There actually isn't a "decline," it just exists in the mind of the big name publishers (EA, Ubisoft, etc.) Well, there is actually, but it really doesn't exist but does since they "think" it does. WTF am I on?
Piracy and stuff actually doesn't do that much. But since the publishers DO think that it is a major problem, they pay a lot of liscensing DRM for games (DRM is equivelent to the biggest joke ever. Games usually are pirated BEFORE they get released). With all the money lost on the liscensing, and the percieved loss because of piracy, they decide that PC game is unprofitable and decide to not support it. Without their support, PC gaming pretty much "dies." So actually, DRM (which ironically was suppose to do the opposite) actually killed PC gaming.
But that isn't to say piracy is no small thing. It is SO easy to pirate these days, that many people don't even blink before deciding to download a game. It is also easily justifiable. "Oh, I own the 360 version so I can download this," "Oh this game was shit, so I'm going to just download this," "I don't agree with what the developers did, so I'm going to download this" are some of the many excuses that people use when they decide to pirate. If you look at it at the right angle and in the right context, you would agree with them. DRM free games (Oblivion, Sins of a Solar Empire) actually do a lot (and when I say a lot, I mean A LOT) better than games that employ more draconian DRM.
But the publishers that own the rights probably are poor (Interplay). Steam (which recently added X-COM) also can host games that actually utilize effective, yet subtle DRM. Either way, the disappointing games PC developers are churning out are attracting the resale of older games, and they will probably end up being released one way or another.
Post edited September 12, 2008 by vindKtiv
Posted September 12, 2008
all of my posts in this thread are really just me stirring up ideas and whatnot. i'm just as full of **** as anyone else here, and i'm not really talking in this thread to prove anything, or to win or lose debates, just to see what ideas come back at me.
so, re: the ease of pirating - circa 2008.
to nudge this tangential again, and then back on track, how much revenue is lost to piracy versus game resales? (ie: kid A selling a ps3 game to gamestop for $15, gamestop then selling, buying back and selling again that same copy for profit without ever having to pay the publisher except on that first purchase)
to my knowledge there isn't a resale p.c. market. (outside of ebay, craigslist and game collector's sites...)
why don't we hear publisher's bitching about resale every other press release?
as plainly as i can put it:
why have the publishers decided to inflate the piracy threat while keeping its displeasure with the console game resale market to grumblings within the industry?
im curious as to why the great pirate horde, and not gamestop and its ilk, is public enemy number one to publishers?
i mean, as easy as pirating is for the average computer savvy user in 2008, certainly going to your nearest mall and buying a used copy of last year's madden game is easier? in both cases, EA has made $0.00.
one of the things that attracted me to GOG was the concept of digital distribution without repressive DRM schemes attached to what i buy. its why i have supported stardock for years, and slitherine, and manifesto games, paradox / gamer's gate (for a while), etc. (even steam's mild and unobtrusive DRM is fine by me.) its about more than the product to me, its the principle of how i bought it.
i keep hoping that if enough of us, as consumers, vote with our wallets about our displeasure with intrusive and restrictive DRM schemes that publishers will be forced to admit that it was all a storm in a teacup; that getting the news media to run stories about evil pirates (oh the imagery... skull and crossbones and bloody sabres...) was a lot easier to do than it would have been to get them to run stories about football mums buying and selling the same copy of madden 2008 twenty times over in video game "stores" whose business models most closely resemble that of a pawn shop.
Post edited September 12, 2008 by damien
Posted September 12, 2008
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damien: all of my posts in this thread are really just me stirring up ideas and whatnot. i'm just as full of **** as anyone else here, and i'm not really talking in this thread to prove anything, or to win or lose debates, just to see what ideas come back at me.
so, re: the ease of pirating - circa 2008.
to nudge this tangential again, and then back on track, how much revenue is lost to piracy versus game resales? (ie: kid A selling a ps3 game to gamestop for $15, gamestop then selling, buying back and selling again that same copy for profit without ever having to pay the publisher except on that first purchase)
to my knowledge there isn't a resale p.c. market. (outside of ebay, craigslist and game collector's sites...)
why don't we hear publisher's bitching about resale every other press release?
as plainly as i can put it:
why have the publishers decided to inflate the piracy threat while keeping its displeasure with the console game resale market to grumblings within the industry?
im curious as to why the great pirate horde, and not gamestop and its ilk, is public enemy number one to publishers?
i mean, as easy as pirating is for the average computer savvy user in 2008, certainly going to your nearest mall and buying a used copy of last year's madden game is easier? in both cases, EA has made $0.00.
one of the things that attracted me to GOG was the concept of digital distribution without repressive DRM schemes attached to what i buy. its why i have supported stardock for years, and slitherine, and manifesto games, paradox / gamer's gate (for a while), etc. (even steam's mild and unobtrusive DRM is fine by me.) its about more than the product to me, its the principle of how i bought it.
i keep hoping that if enough of us, as consumers, vote with our wallets about our displeasure with intrusive and restrictive DRM schemes that publishers will be forced to admit that it was all a storm in a teacup; that getting the news media to run stories about evil pirates (oh the imagery... skull and crossbones and bloody sabres...) was a lot easier to do than it would have been to get them to run stories about football mums buying and selling the same copy of madden 2008 twenty times over in video game "stores" whose business models most closely resemble that of a pawn shop.

Interesting point I have never thought about it like this. I for one was very mad when they decided to stop reselling used PC games do to the DRM that they had (E.G. one time use CD keys. as much as I love using steam it is the biggest culprite of this).
Posted September 13, 2008
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damien: why don't we hear publisher's bitching about resale every other press release?

Console games are closer to a physical product that way. You actually own them, can sell them, or rent them. For PC games, this illusion has long since faded, for consoles, it's likely in the publishers' interests to keep it up. The product is, with no strings attached, obviously a more attractive one - just imagine what'd happen if console games required online activation, and revoking that if you wished to play it on another console.
I don't live anywhere near the US, so I don't know about the prevalence of renting console games, but it can be they're simply not losing that much money through second-hand sales so they'd bother. Then again, it's debatable whether the lost sales through piracy are reason enough to include intrusive DRM. (I'm leaning towards "no", considering the ridiculousness of some of these copy protection schemes. Though I find even "please insert the CD" check annoying enough to bypass them for all the games I've bought.)
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damien: i keep hoping that if enough of us, as consumers, vote with our wallets about our displeasure with intrusive and restrictive DRM schemes

There's the catch: how do you vote against just the DRM scheme with your wallet? The sales lost to piracy are pretty hard to estimate, so publishers might as well chalk up the lost sales to that, leading to even stricter copy protection.
Though Spore's Amazon ratings suggest a possible better alternative. Out of 2219 customer reviews, 2018 are of the lowest possible score, mostly due to the DRM.
Posted September 13, 2008
I think everyone here is missing the point. Piracy is a strawman.
DRM isn't trying to stop Pirates, EA knows fully well that there's no way for them to do that. The DRM is a way for them to effectively put a shelf life on games. You want to play your 5 year old copy of Spore again? Run out of activations? Aw that's too bad, but the good news is you can buy a whole new copy of it!
It's an ingenious solution to an old problem. Once software has reached market saturation, it's unsellable.
The test of whether I'm right or not, watch the price of Spore. If it hasn't dropped by Christmas, their business model is working.
Posted September 13, 2008
Typically most games will reach a saturation point of, 'people who want this game, have already bought it' within 6 months to a year. Price drops, usually 5-10$ happen after then. I was saying by Christmas because Spore is a special case. It's a Sim's type game and it's no accident it's out right now. People who want the game, will buy it between now and Thanksgiving. People who are don't care so much about it, or want to buy it for someone else will buy it between Thanksgiving and Christmas. This is usually where the price drop happens. I expect a lot of software that released recently to do the same thing, with notable exceptions being mamorpagers.
Posted September 13, 2008
To some extent, I don't believe there is a saturation point, on the PC, at least anywhere near the consoles. On consoles, you will always have the hardware to run the game, you will never have to think about whether you need a upgrade or not. On PC, you may not be able to afford the hardware to run, for example, Crysis, for 6 months. Then, 6 months later, you buy Crysis, and maybe even some other games that you couldn't run before.
I know a few people who still haven't played Crysis simply because they are still on single-core PCs with DX9 hardware, not even SM3 capable.
Then of course, we have GOG, and we're all buying these games (again ?).
Post edited September 13, 2008 by Miner_Willy
Posted September 13, 2008
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Tsukiakariyume: I think everyone here is missing the point. Piracy is a strawman.
DRM isn't trying to stop Pirates, EA knows fully well that there's no way for them to do that. The DRM is a way for them to effectively put a shelf life on games. You want to play your 5 year old copy of Spore again? Run out of activations? Aw that's too bad, but the good news is you can buy a whole new copy of it!

There goes all EBay user (and other Ebay-like places) sales of EA's Securom-protected games.
It's an ingenious solution to an old problem. Once software has reached market saturation, it's unsellable.

Agreed.
I doubt anyone will want to buy Mass Effect PC version from another user over Ebay or Amazon, since who knows how many activations the copy of the game has left.
Unless the guy just feels like finding a cracked version of the game or something. I don't even think MEPC has been cracked yet.
The test of whether I'm right or not, watch the price of Spore. If it hasn't dropped by Christmas, their business model is working.

I might buy Spore -- you know, when it costs the price of a console game rental.
Posted September 13, 2008
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Tsukiakariyume: I think everyone here is missing the point. Piracy is a strawman.
DRM isn't trying to stop Pirates, EA knows fully well that there's no way for them to do that. The DRM is a way for them to effectively put a shelf life on games. You want to play your 5 year old copy of Spore again? Run out of activations? Aw that's too bad, but the good news is you can buy a whole new copy of it!
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MysterD: There goes all EBay user (and other Ebay-like places) sales of EA's Securom-protected games.
It's an ingenious solution to an old problem. Once software has reached market saturation, it's unsellable.

Agreed.
I doubt anyone will want to buy Mass Effect PC version from another user over Ebay or Amazon, since who knows how many activations the copy of the game has left.
Unless the guy just feels like finding a cracked version of the game or something. I don't even think MEPC has been cracked yet.
The test of whether I'm right or not, watch the price of Spore. If it hasn't dropped by Christmas, their business model is working.

I might buy Spore -- you know, when it costs the price of a console game rental.

mass effect PC was cracked 3 days after retail release. there was an attempt 1 day after release with a crack but that crashed the game for many ppl.
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This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussion (archive)GOG, DRM, piracy(48 posts)(48 posts)
(48 posts)