They may be breaking the law, but that doesn't mean they are 100% wrong. Back in the early 1800's, it was illegal to aid and abed run-away slaves. Were those people wrong to help blacks escape? The law was intended to protect publishers from other publishers, because at the time, publishers were the only ones who had the power of distribution. Now individuals have it too and the law just doesn't fit the social organism that is the internet.
What the ** are you on about, just ** up right now, are you kidding me?! This is the comparison you are making?
edited: sorry I need to calm down. I get your point - Copyright law wasn't written for todays copyright issues, I agree it's woefully inept and does more damage than good. But you worded yourself like pirates are some kind of internet heroes! I'm pretty sure even Cory Doctrow would agree this leak is a very bad side of piracy, and not one we want to encourage or celebrate.
Anywho... Crytek will be just fine.
I mean.. 3dsmax and other 3d software is pirated all the time.. and they are still arround
Man ... that's like, even worse than the stolen car comparaison. 3DSmax is NOT marketed to the single, starving artist. It is marketed to CG studios, and movie and advertising companies. Such entities have zero interest in pirating the software, since if they do they can get in real trouble (not to mention the lack of official support), and they also have the budget to purchase licenses anyways.
Warez copies are downloaded by CG enthousiasts, or even pro artists themselves working for an established studio (that means, an actual license fully paid in their profesional environment)
The individual getting a warez copy of max does not hurt any sales, since the app is not intended to that person in the first place (I am not encouraging piracy here, just stating the obvious). And if that person is hired by a game or movie company, it's a guaranteed license seat for Autodesk. Thats why their student program is getting so solid nowadays. Even Ryan Clark is doing something similar with CrazyBump (free if you are currently looking for a job)
Crytek is in a very different situation at the moment.
Why are some people still thinking that "it would have been pirated anyway" or "the leak wont do damage"?
Seriously, how can the leak not do damage? People on the fence don't have to spend money, idiots will play it, get an unfinished product and start spreading shit about the game being bad, having people cancel their orders.
I prefer that a person wanting a game, finds out about the quality of it and their enjoyment of it from reviews and purchase, bad game or not, nothing justifies theft.
Man ... that's like, even worse than the stolen car comparaison. 3DSmax is NOT marketed to the single, starving artist. It is marketed to CG studios, and movie and advertising companies. Such entities have zero interest in pirating the software, since if they do they can get in real trouble (not to mention the lack of official support), and they also have the budget to purchase licenses anyways.
Warez copies are downloaded by CG enthousiasts, or even pro artists themselves working for an established studio (that means, an actual license fully paid in their profesional environment)
The individual getting a warez copy of max does not hurt any sales, since the app is not intended to that person in the first place. And if that person is hired by a game or movie company, it's a guaranteed license seat for Autodesk. Thats why their student program is getting so solid nowadays. Even Ryan Clark is doing something similar with CrazyBump (free if you are currently looking for a job)
Crytek is in a very different situation at the moment.
I'm glad Pior hit this for me so I didn't have to type all of that. I actually talked to Alias employees about Maya back at a Siggraph years ago that said the same thing.
Dunno if this was posted, either way kinda interesting.
As far as pirating this goes though I doubt it'll have a huge effect on sales. It's for three separate platforms, and for the most part, the people who would download this, are the same people who would have pirated it anyway.
Either way though, game looks neat, and I look forward to picking it up whenever it's released.
Why are some people still thinking that "it would have been pirated anyway" or "the leak wont do damage"?
Seriously, how can the leak not do damage? People on the fence don't have to spend money, idiots will play it, get an unfinished product and start spreading shit about the game being bad, having people cancel their orders.
I prefer that a person wanting a game, finds out about the quality of it and their enjoyment of it from reviews and purchase, bad game or not, nothing justifies theft.
Alot of people are also forgetting about the master key portion of the leak as well. I could see that delaying the release of the game as that issue will have to be resolved properly before release.
I wasn't planning on picking this game up, because I've grown somewhat bored of shooters and am tired of playing in cities like New York - but that's looking pretty good, and from what I can tell it doesn't look like it should be too much more visually intensive than the first one, which ran just fine on my system. May well have to pick this up!
Now, concerning the leak, that seriously sucks. And I'm annoyed by the assholes who'd pirate it, and then proceed to talk shit on the developers.
However, I will say - that while yes, of course piracy is a problem, and no I'd never support pirates in their endeavors - I also think that as an honest PC gamer, I get shafted pretty frequently. And not so much because of pirates, but because companies don't just want profits, they want RIDICULOUS profits. Which leaves me, who doesn't like playing on consoles, seeing good games on consoles I'll simply never play - or playing buggy ports, or games with insane DRM setups. "Oh the game might only sell 2.6 million instead of 2.9 million copies - so let's not even bother worrying about a PC version." Yeah, thanks.
Now I'll note I've never had that issue with Crytek games specifically - they've supported PC gamers with quality products for as long as I can tell (hence why I continue to buy them), but just talking in general. There's a reason I've wound up spending more and more time playing indie games over the years. ...it's because there's not a whole lot else for the PC half the time. And it's not all the fault of pirates.
Though, to balance that out, I'll also say that while it has annoyed me in the past with big console releases not making it to PC, that I am really enjoying the creativity and diversity of PC games we've seen from various smaller developers popping up. I might have to miss out on various console titles, but I do love me the opportunity to get in on some awesome steam sales and indie bundles.
Yeah sure Xeno the world is going down - but I dont think that gamedevs are to feel bad because they dont have a 'plan 2' or something.
Or maybe you think that critical thinking and problem solving skills are useless in the current world we live in ? For some reason I tend to think that an intelligent, well rounded physics engine programmer with good observation and teamwork skills is exactly the kind of person that would provide the best education to his/her kids. Same for a well rounded, motivated game artist.
I dont think we have much power to take down religious nonsense and other money/power hungry corporations. And those are the ones to blame, not gamedevs making games while "sitting on their ass"
Or, WAIT! - what if one of the most powerful form of media, aka interactive entertainment, could help shaping a stronger, international culture ?
pior, i think you need to take a jaunt over to the zeitgeist thread if you want to understand the depths of how much xenocratos disagrees with you (and reality)
Yea, I agree over the schrodingers cat side. nobody can guarantee the outcome without the act taking place, without opening the box to see if the cats still alive, but I thought it common sense in this case. If people get it for free and hand it out to friends for nothing then they arent going to the cinema are they? people that were on the fence of seeing it would double take and rather bootleg it to save money. It was a bad film but that has nothing to do with piracy taking out a huge amount of their sales. If the pirated version wasnt there, then alot more people would have gone to the cinema to see it for themselves, common sense. Fox openly admit that they lost an estimated $28 mil due to piracy on that alone, thats not pocket change, thats whats screwing over hundreds of film studios and production houses. Its way MGM cant afford to budget their own films now.
I think you gotta be stupid to believe that people have never done something illegal or downloaded something they shouldnt in this day and age. But it wasnt the point I was making at all, the point was why would someone publically say that they pirate games on a forum that is populated by industry peeps that FUCKING hate piracy!!!! its common sense gone wrong again. Its like you going to a policeman and saying 'hey, I stole this car.' Only difference is you would be in jail for that. And dont say piracy isnt stealing just because its not in physical form cos thats BS too. people get black listed for being idiots all the time and just seems like shooting yourself in the face, would I hire someone who openly pirates? no, because they dont respect and support the industry that they so call love and are part of the problem.
The thread of shame was only a joke, the british wit seems wasted on you unfortunately
Anyway, not arguing about piracy anymore, as people know where I stand. Good luck crytek, the pre orders being made is a good sign and I hope it doesnt affect sales too much.
"If people get it for free and hand it out to friends for nothing then they arent going to the cinema are they?"
That's not a proper comparison at all. You can't copy a theater. If people want to go to see a movie at a theater, they will pay to go see a movie at a theater. If they really just want to watch it at home, they won't go to the theater if they have a copy of their own would they?
"If the pirated version wasnt there, then alot more people would have gone to the cinema to see it for themselves, common sense."
You think that's common sense, but you're confusing correlation with causation. You're saying that people don't buy if they can get it for free. The fact of the matter is, in the past decade, movie profits have been going up, not down. They keep claiming it's hurting their business, yet they keep reporting record profits every year too. Which is it Hollywood? What's really happening is that because people can download those movies, they can tell others about it. The more people who know about the movie, the more people there are that will be aware of that movie when they go to the theater. I don't see how Fox could possibly know how much they "lost", they're doing what you did and they have a reputation for making shit up.
If the "pirated" version wasn't available, they would probably pay to see another movie that they are sure they want to see. They won't take a risk on a movie they aren't certain they want to see when there are movies they are certain of. Would you buy a canned food that has no label? It could be beans, or it might be dog food. Do you want to spend your money to find out? You're exhibiting a huge misconception the industry seems to hold about the file sharing community: "People will buy if they have no other choice." No, they will spend their money elsewhere. Taking away options doesn't make a good more appealing to a customer and you can't make people pay for something they didn't intend to pay for in the first place. That's not a lost sale, but it might be a lost opportunity to gain another customer.
"...would I hire someone who openly pirates? no, because they dont respect and support the industry that they so call love and are part of the problem."
They don't respect and support the industry because they don't subscribe to your preferred business model? Think about your favorite author. Got it? Did you come to know and love that author because you just walked into a book store and bought their book? No, I would be willing to bet that you found that author because someone you know loaned you a book written by the author. Hardly anyone buys a work that they didn't get to try for free first. Sharing works spreads awareness of those works. Sharing works inspires new works. I think people that share works do it because they love them and they want others to come to love them as they do. Neil Gaiman, who once shared your opinion, learned that his books were being shared in Russia.
"Then I started to notice that two things that seemed much more significant. One of which was that places where I was being pirated -- particularly Russia (where people were translating my stuff into Russian and spreading it out into the world) I was selling more and more books. People were discovering me through being pirated. And then they were going out and buying the real books, and when a new book would come out in Russia it would sell more and more copies."
"That's really all this is. It's people lending books. And you can't look on that as a lost sale.... What you're actually doing is advertising. You're reaching more people. You're raising awareness. And understanding that gave me a whole new idea of the shape of copyright and what the web was doing. Because the biggest thing the web was doing is allowing people to hear things, allowing people to read things, allowing people to see things they might never have otherwise seen. And I think, basically, that's an incredibly good thing."
I'm not arguing for infringement. I'm arguing that your conclusions don't fit the data. Yes, it's bad that Crysis 2 makes its first impression with an unfinished version that doesn't put its best face forward, but to blame the people that download it isn't right nor fair. This was likely done by a handful of people, some of which may have been Crytek employees. You can't possibly know their incentives nor their motivations for doing it. Blame those people if you must pass out blame, but don't try to blame a group of people that had nothing to do with it.
edit:
Just to be perfectly clear, I don't think what happened is, at all, good for Crytek's reputation. This is equivalent to someone coming into your portfolio and ripping pieces out. Now your work looks broken and people are judging your merits on that. So yes, it sucks and the people who leaked it are a shameful bunch.
What it basically comes down too, is that Crytek have had their multi-million £ product stolen from them and distributed online without their permission. Whether or not people think piracy is a lost sale or not is irrelevant.
The people downloading Crysis 2 are criminals because they are intentionally and unlawfully gaining access to a product that they have no legal right to access, knowing full well that it is a leak. There isn't an excuse for this...All the rubbish about there not being a PC demo is a really weak argument.
I dont have a copy of Crysis 2 on my hard drive right now because i was brought up to believe that taking something that doesn't belong to me is wrong and its a clear cut and dry moral choice that people are making and that is all there is too it.
It would be nice if Crytek had the right to charge the ISPs for each download of the leaked version. The ISPs would then turn around and charge the customers who downloaded it. The downloaders would have nice $60 additional surprise charge on their bills. Then to be fair on release day those customers would get a legit copy of the final product.
When the game gets released it'll get pirated that day anyways.
Exactly. Suddenly people forgot how massive was theft of MW2 for both PC and X360, yet the game still was a commercial triumph, thanks to online mode mostly.
Exactly. Suddenly people forgot how massive was theft of MW2 for both PC and X360, yet the game still was a commercial triumph, thanks to online mode mostly.
Where does the assumption that people will just pay if they can't get it for free come from? It shows a complete lack of understanding of human behavior. People who can't get something for free that had no intention of paying for it in the first place will not buy it just because that's the only way to get it, they will just spend their money on something they do want to spend it on. If they can't get the latest copy of Starcraft II for free, they won't necessarily just buy it instead. They will, however, probably spend that same money on other things, such as food. So congratulations, you've stopped a single act of infringement, but you've lost an opportunity to spread awareness of your works. Entertainment is a risk purchase for consumers. If they buy it and they don't like it, they rarely can get their money back, but most of the time they can't.
So when a person is faced with risking their money on an uncertain thing, they often choose to spend it on the sure thing than the risk item. That's what drives a lot of file sharing. People don't want to risk money they might need for other things until they can be certain that spending their money is worth it to get that good. No rational person would spend money on something they can't be sure is what they want. That's as foolish as buying unlabeled canned food. That's what entertainment is. You don't know what the content is until you actually observe the content. Not determining the value of the content before you buy it is no different than playing "Let's make a Deal" where people trade a sure thing for the possibility of something better and the only way to do that is to experience it first. Well there's the problem now, isn't there? How can you get the customer to pay for the work behind that content after they've already experienced the content? That's what the goal is after all right? Pay the people who worked on it. It sounds to me that they're selling a service rather than a product.
PC games shouldn't NEED a solid multilayer to prevent people from pirating, there's a reason why a lot of previously pc-exclusive developers starting to focus on consoles first.
I remember buying a laptop that could handle HL2 - I bought it specifically for this reason. The only reason I knew about HL2 was because of the unfinished leak, which was way too much hassle to get up and running myself, but tasted within the PC gamer community. The day HL2 came out, I bought it from a physical shop. In a box. On a Disc.
Quake 3 had a demo plastered over gaming magazines, so it was a no brainer to buy the final version, again, on a disc.
Those days must be long gone. This leak is different in so many ways.
The next news I would like to see is the leaker exposed and up in court with a multi million dollar lawsuit around his/her neck.
@greevar
i understand your view and well... disagree. But I could agree if not for some logical holes that after my post have no desire to argue with you, cause this is like arguing abortion.
Hearing it from Neil Gaiman I totally agree. He gets it and it works for him and it possibly could work for so many others. BUT applied to this case ...not so much.
His books don't really have sequels, so the sure thing has to be his name. Reading one book won't tell you if he's good, but after a couple, you would know. Here's the thing even in a kindle/ipad environment many don't foresee the death of books. For some reason there is for most a human condition* that would like to own the content and at the very least non-paper books don't offer the same quality, experience, etc. as books.
Games however exist within a two-dimensional display controlled by the quality of your equipment. There is no physical equivalent nor better way to play. It is constructed of 10 numbers ;P. Pirated or not, it's the same experience; the only thing that's physical is the box/disc it came in, and thus you don't own anything.
If pirating had acted as a sort of advertising for an 'unknown thing' then why bother pirating a sequel**? You know what you are going to get. And unlike the movie industry video games have generally had a better track record for AAA sequels. There should be less pirating of sequels by that logic(see mw2), discounting newcomers to the market. But its not an old game(different gen) where there would be a substantial amount of people who haven't seen/heard of Crysis***.
Note: and unlike movies there is no Big Screen release at launch day.(physical experience)
The amount of money put into a project like Crysis makes it harder to justify it as advertising. Where for Gaiman its just his time spent, if he publishes then the cost goes up but nowhere near the cost of making Crysis 2. So its easier for him, because he can cheaply and quickly release a new book at the same level. Where for Crytek its three to four years more in development and millions of man hours**** and more if a drastically new engine is needed.
There is a want to play a game if someone decides to pirate and play. Therefore while there is the option to spend money elsewhere, they have decided to spend the time to play it. If people decide they do not agree to DRM then don't play, simple as that; but to pirate for that reason sends an ambiguous message to the author. Same goes to pirating a sequel,
yeah worth my time to play, but not worth my money; so sorry try again
At what point should investors, developers and artists expect this payoff. Moreover how many times have you read horror stories of working for free or 'sweat equity' from artists. The people who find that they don't like it can find that out easily through the demo. The only way I could agree with you on that is if those same people who did not pay but pirated did not play a substantial portion of the single-player game, and or played an insignificant amount of time online. If you don't like a movie you can ask for a refund if you leave within an acceptable amount of time at most theaters.(with achievements now in steam there should be a refund option as well)
*at least a societal condition, weak point I know
**3rd game from that company
***unlike Metal Gear Solid where people didn't want to play the last of a series from a game that was released in the 90's (or 80's if you consider Metal Gear as part of the Solid series.)
****approximately 550 people work at Crytek, assuming 2080 hours in a year(generally accepted hrs in a year by both the government and HR), then (550*2080)*3=3,432,000 man hours per game
Where does the assumption that people will just pay if they can't get it for free come from? It shows a complete lack of understanding of human behavior.
Human behaviour: free is always cheaper.
Starcraft 2 and many other products show that having something that you can't get any other way (multiplayer), will give the customer the ultimate choice that they didn't have beforehand.
Buy and play or don't play is more powerful than buy and play or dont pay and still play.
Which is the reason this leak most likely won't cause much damage anyway that it wouldn't have otherwise, pirates gonna pirate because they still can.
And customers are going to buy it because they want to support it, or are amongst the people who don't know how to pirate something.
I'd wait anyway. No point of playing a partially finished game, go on whining how bad it is and abandon the product before it even had the chance to prove itself.
Where does the assumption that people will just pay if they can't get it for free come from? It shows a complete lack of understanding of human behavior. People who can't get something for free that had no intention of paying for it in the first place will not buy it just because that's the only way to get it, they will just spend their money on something they do want to spend it on. If they can't get the latest copy of Starcraft II for free, they won't necessarily just buy it instead. They will, however, probably spend that same money on other things, such as food. So congratulations, you've stopped a single act of infringement, but you've lost an opportunity to spread awareness of your works. Entertainment is a risk purchase for consumers. If they buy it and they don't like it, they rarely can get their money back, but most of the time they can't.
So when a person is faced with risking their money on an uncertain thing, they often choose to spend it on the sure thing than the risk item. That's what drives a lot of file sharing. People don't want to risk money they might need for other things until they can be certain that spending their money is worth it to get that good. No rational person would spend money on something they can't be sure is what they want. That's as foolish as buying unlabeled canned food. That's what entertainment is. You don't know what the content is until you actually observe the content. Not determining the value of the content before you buy it is no different than playing "Let's make a Deal" where people trade a sure thing for the possibility of something better and the only way to do that is to experience it first. Well there's the problem now, isn't there? How can you get the customer to pay for the work behind that content after they've already experienced the content? That's what the goal is after all right? Pay the people who worked on it. It sounds to me that they're selling a service rather than a product.
How ignorant can you be? Seriously. From my personal experience with friends and other people. There are guys downloading every pieve of digital entertainment they can get their hands on. And they spend endles hours using this content. It is rediculous to assume that a person that spends about 80 % of his freetime on computergaming just completely stops doing that if he has to pay for the content he is using. Of Course this perosn will not buy all the games he pirated. But to asume he will stop playing video games and maybe start to go fishing is just not realistic. Those people will pay for their games if they have to. And even if they only buy 3 games per year because more they can't afford. That are 3 games more than they bought during the last couple of years. So yeah there are financial losses on developer and publisher side. How big those are is up to discussion and can't be estimated easily. But they are there.
To your argument of bringing publicity to your product by people whi share it. Nice opinion and I think every artist, writer, developer is free to take that road. But if the creators of a product rather take less publicity but legally bought products than its their choice and the customer has to accept that.
Only because the internet gives to opportunity to have riskless and free software distribution doesn't give you any right to use those opportunitys.
About people who are willing to spend their money on entertainment where they don't know what they will get. Are you that silly to claim that there is no way of getting an impression of a product?
Dude just use the fucking internet. You can find 1000's of opinions of a given product. Be it customer reviews, forums, blogs or tests about the product.
You seem to be very young because there was a time were there was abolutely no other way to judge the product you are about to buy. Remember NES times? The text on the boxes were not even translated into my language (not talking about the game it self or the manual) All you could do was read reviews about the thing you were about to buy. And it worked.
Today its so much easier to know what you will buy. Of course if you insist on a preorder and release day gaming experience you will have a certain risk that the product might not be what you've expected. But then again: Every game has its preview tests weeks before their release. That should be enough to judge the product. Although demos are getting rares they are there. You have gameplay video footage all over the net. Using a priated copy to judge the quality of a game is just a cheap excuse.
All I expect from you and all other retards promoting piracy is the following: Buy it and play. Or don't buy it and don't play it. If it isn't worth your money it shouldn't be worth your time and vice versa.
Oh and a last thing:
If everyone would use the possibility of getting a pirated copy all this wouldn't work. THe quality of the games you are enjoying for free is paid by 100.000 thousand of customers who are willing to support a product. What gives you justification to rely on those paying customers for your free of charge entertainment?
I didnt read the whole thread but I think Crytek gets a lot of exposure with the leak. Maybe they even leaked it by themselfs. Wouldn't be the first time such things happen. Like "forgotten" iphones 4 in a cafe accidently delivered high-end graphic cards to a user...I could continue here...basically it's fast and low-cost marketing.
People will like the DX9 version and buy the proper one too. Only people who would crack also the final version won't buy the final and play the leak.
Even some people who never intended to buy Cry2 will do now because they feel to support the devs now.
Abandoning the PC will not happen because of the sales and piracy is a problem of Xbox too.
Speaking of all the moral discussion here I think a lot of people should take a look on their own HD for their cracked photoshop, 3dsmax and other tools they have there.
My opinion to this leak: Step further there is nothing to see here.
greevar: either ur trying to justify ur piracy, or ur just stupid. DECENT people recognize value and are fully capable of weighing the risks of purchasing a product. A PC game is $50 (or euros). Yes, its a fair sum of money for some... but those who cannot afford the game cant afford a computer in the first place. There is NO excuse for piracy. NON!!!
I didnt read the whole thread but I think Crytek gets a lot of exposure with the leak. Maybe they even leaked it by themselfs. Wouldn't be the first time such things happen. Like "forgotten" iphones 4 in a cafe accidently delivered high-end graphic cards to a user...I could continue here...basically it's fast and low-cost marketing.
People will like the DX9 version and buy the proper one too. Only people who would crack also the final version won't buy the final and play the leak.
Even some people who never intended to buy Cry2 will do now because they feel to support the devs now.
Abandoning the PC will not happen because of the sales and piracy is a problem of Xbox too.
Speaking of all the moral discussion here I think a lot of people should take a look on their own HD for their cracked photoshop, 3dsmax and other tools they have there.
My opinion to this leak: Step further there is nothing to see here.
Its really great to hear that people are liking the game and that alot of people are pre ordering now but I cant help but think a few hundred people pre ordering it and the tens of thousands of people downloading it for nothing. The good thing is its not final build so its not a massive loss as they will have to download it again when the final build is cracked on release or actually go out and buy it. Lucky Crytek have the console releases though which are sure to do well.
greevar - ........ignore. your point makes no sense to me Im afraid and I cant be bothered to argue. You win, lets all go pirate and rape the entertainment industry completely. Jobs are over rated anyway.
Oh man, some of these people... total dopes. I hate to say it, but there's some pretty naive things being thrown around in this thread.
Development costs for big projects like these need a lot of financial justification behind them in order for them to be greenlit. The people who make the big decisions on what platforms to release on take piracy as a legitimate concern.
If you want a great example, look at Crysis 1. Crytek was originally a huge supporter of the PC platform and they made games exclusively for them because they didn't think consoles were powerful enough to run their games. After release, Crysis was tops on the torrent sites and the number of patch downloads versus retail sales basically proved that there were a ton of people playing the pirated game, months after the game was out. If you want to use the excuse that they were just trying it out, scrap that notion.
I think the extent that Crysis was pirated really eroded Crytek's confidence in the PC platform. Now they're developing a multi-platform release, and there were some suggestions that the piracy of the original game factored into this decision. Now THIS happens. What exactly does having your game leaked months before release speak for the state of PC gaming and it's profitability?
I don't think people should be fooling themselves with situations like these. It's just downright wrong, and it's only going to damage the confidence in the PC platform which is already in a heap anyway. In order to sustain these projects with high production values, people that play these games ought to vote with their dollars. Often, that's just not the case. You can rack up any sort of theoretical value of marketing, or people who are just demoing the game to whatever extent you'd like. What matters at the end of the day is real sales figures with real money. Doing it any other way just makes it impossible to justify the costs of these projects to the people that finance them.
Yeah I don't quite understand the relation to MW2's situation either. MW2 was big on its brand-awareness alone, Crysis made nowhere near its download rate. (On an unrelated note It's a shame Kotick is screwing Activision to the ground because it's one of the best mech sims i've ever played.)
Speaking of all the moral discussion here I think a lot of people should take a look on their own HD for their cracked photoshop, 3dsmax and other tools they have there.
What?
It doesn't excuse this blatant piracy of early software and dangerously smeary chicken littles dishing the whine before Crytek had the chance to polish and finish. Also, for the record, I use Blender, which is cracked because i downloaded it off the internet for free
Yeah I don't quite understand the relation to MW2's situation either. MW2 was big on its brand-awareness alone, Crysis made nowhere near its download rate.
What?
It doesn't excuse this blatant piracy of early software and dangerously smeary chicken littles dishing the whine before Crytek had the chance to polish and finish. Also, for the record, I use Blender, which is cracked because i downloaded it off the internet for free
......shit you got me.
You probably have some stray mp3 somewhere, IT TOTALLY INVALIDATES EVERYTHING YOU SAY!!
I must use the invalidator-argument in every discussion I ever make, it sounds so perfect.
Really sad news, I hate to hear stuff like this. I bought the first Crysis and the expansion, I loved it. I'll be buying the X360 version on the day of the release, hope everything will work out okay. Damn shame.
Yeah I don't quite understand the relation to MW2's situation either. MW2 was big on its brand-awareness alone ... it's one of the best mech sims i've ever played.)
aren't we *slightly* confusing mech warrior 2 with (call of duty) modern warfare 2 here?
way to go assmunchers...ruining the combined effort of a ton of talented people trying to deliver an awesome experience just because your too fucking greedy to cough up the money for something you dont even deserve
Gonna share a few somewhat on-topic links, hopefully we'll keep this discussion healthy instead of malicious. First off, Gaiman has a few interesting things to say concerning piracy of his books, and how they actually had a positive effect in the end.
Yea I already thought this awhile ago. Which is why when I create my first game its something I wouldnt fight. It gets the word out one way or another any publicity is good publicity. Plenty of polycounters will repudiate this but piracy gives you a new audience of ppl who wouldnt experience it otherwise. Yes Piracy is morally bad, but if you cant fix it you have to deal with it regardless of how much it may upset you. If you cant beat them use them(however that may be).
Yes, but the thing is, would you openly say "go ahead and pirate my game, I don't mind, I think it helps"
This thread has gotten so out of hand :P I was under the assumption that everyone on here wanted to work in the games industry at some point (like myself) or already does. So how can people on here condone piracy....
No I would still actively protect my copyright for the "mass" public since only 5-15 percent of users would have pirated anyways(hopefully in a average statistics POV). But the main point I want to get it is protect what is yours but if you can fix piracy and keep the mass happy do it. But if you cant use those pirates the best you can to benefit you.I'm not condoning anything here. I just believe if you cant beat them use them at least
5-15 would be awesome, I mean, I'm not saying that absolutely everyone who downloaded it would've bought it, but if you compare raw amount of downloads to sales it can be a bit more depressing.
What I'm saying it, at one point they'll push a bit too much, like posting links to torrents of your games on other forums, or even your game forum, and then you'll have to push back.
Yes, so they said "Piracy continues to damage the PC packaged goods market and the PC development community," but I don't think they should be pointing out the piracy community here, saying they are damaging the PC gaming community. To my knowledge it sounds like it was a Internal leak, therefore their own employee(s) are the one who has hurt them in the long run, the one's that let "piracy" happen. Yeah I know you can't know the potential of your one-hundred and something employee's and what they'll do but it's as if they are not calling out themselves. It seems they are targeting the piracy community to take the wrap for their own internal problem.
Of course I could be wrong and I'm willing to accept that. Maybe I just have a misunderstanding but that's just my opinion.
What you have described is a form of piracy. Leaks happen because piracy groups have connections with people with access to content - usually not the actual developers/movie makers, but outside vendors, folks associated with distribution, QA, publicity/marketing, stuff like that. But that doesn't matter. The problem that EA is referencing is not how the game was leaked, but the frictionless nature of piracy on the PC. All they are doing is saying, "Hey, ain't that a shame."
I don't know why I have to explain this, but I'm not advocating that people just take shit and not support the people who create it. That's entirely NOT what I'm on about. What I am talking about is coming to grips with the reality that works can and will be copied/shared. It's just a reality of this age. It's been going on ever since recording was invented. No law or protective measure will ever stop it. What I'm trying to suggest is to use it rather than fight it. If you can't stop it from hurting you, use it to help you. But maybe I should just shut up because my income isn't affected by this? I'm sick and tired of being accused of being some ignorant child who, lacking any experience in the industry, doesn't know a lick about what he's talking about. I'm 30, I'm married, and I have my first child on the way. So don't try to tell me that I don't understand the implications of this all.
I'm not an idiot. I know people have jobs that depend on these games making money. I know that when sales fail to meet expectations, publishers tend to not fund future projects and people loose jobs. Anybody with an I.Q. above room temperature would know that. I'm not advocating that people just get everything for free and not contribute one cent to the people who make this stuff. I'm just one person that has come to the realization that the way things have traditionally been done are obsolete. You must see that don't you? And anybody who has an ounce of understanding of marketing knows that the more eyes that are focused on your goods, the more people talk about it and the more people know of it. Sharing art builds awareness. You want your prospective customers to be aware of your goods because they will tell others. If they won't pay for copies of your game, then adapt your strategy so they don't have to buy the game, but you still make money from its existence.
But you won't take me seriously will you? I'm just an idiot that rambles on far too long about his point of view because he cares a whole hell of a lot that this industry learns to adapt and survive. I'm not your enemy, I'm on your side. I just have a different opinion about how to solve the problem. Stop treating me like I'm the enemy. Your real opponents to the future of this industry are the people that exploit your work so they can make obscene amounts of money. So they made an investment and expect a return on that investment? So what? They don't give a rip about your art, they only care about money.
So when a person is faced with risking their money on an uncertain thing, they often choose to spend it on the sure thing than the risk item. That's what drives a lot of file sharing. People don't want to risk money they might need for other things until they can be certain that spending their money is worth it to get that good. No rational person would spend money on something they can't be sure is what they want. That's as foolish as buying unlabeled canned food. That's what entertainment is. You don't know what the content is until you actually observe the content. Not determining the value of the content before you buy it is no different than playing "Let's make a Deal" where people trade a sure thing for the possibility of something better and the only way to do that is to experience it first. Well there's the problem now, isn't there? How can you get the customer to pay for the work behind that content after they've already experienced the content? That's what the goal is after all right? Pay the people who worked on it. It sounds to me that they're selling a service rather than a product.
I often hear this as an excuse for piracy - people download stolen games because they need to "check it out" before buying.
Cmon, seriously, this is 2011, every worthy game has a demo or videoreview.
Replies
What the ** are you on about, just ** up right now, are you kidding me?! This is the comparison you are making?
edited: sorry I need to calm down. I get your point - Copyright law wasn't written for todays copyright issues, I agree it's woefully inept and does more damage than good. But you worded yourself like pirates are some kind of internet heroes! I'm pretty sure even Cory Doctrow would agree this leak is a very bad side of piracy, and not one we want to encourage or celebrate.
Spot on , that's one hell of a broken comparison.
This is a shame for crytek, I know a lot of you guys worked damn hard on it to see it get leaked in an unfinished form.
Man ... that's like, even worse than the stolen car comparaison. 3DSmax is NOT marketed to the single, starving artist. It is marketed to CG studios, and movie and advertising companies. Such entities have zero interest in pirating the software, since if they do they can get in real trouble (not to mention the lack of official support), and they also have the budget to purchase licenses anyways.
Warez copies are downloaded by CG enthousiasts, or even pro artists themselves working for an established studio (that means, an actual license fully paid in their profesional environment)
The individual getting a warez copy of max does not hurt any sales, since the app is not intended to that person in the first place (I am not encouraging piracy here, just stating the obvious). And if that person is hired by a game or movie company, it's a guaranteed license seat for Autodesk. Thats why their student program is getting so solid nowadays. Even Ryan Clark is doing something similar with CrazyBump (free if you are currently looking for a job)
Crytek is in a very different situation at the moment.
Seriously, how can the leak not do damage? People on the fence don't have to spend money, idiots will play it, get an unfinished product and start spreading shit about the game being bad, having people cancel their orders.
I prefer that a person wanting a game, finds out about the quality of it and their enjoyment of it from reviews and purchase, bad game or not, nothing justifies theft.
I'm glad Pior hit this for me so I didn't have to type all of that. I actually talked to Alias employees about Maya back at a Siggraph years ago that said the same thing.
Wait what?! God damnit :poly122:
Dunno if this was posted, either way kinda interesting.
As far as pirating this goes though I doubt it'll have a huge effect on sales. It's for three separate platforms, and for the most part, the people who would download this, are the same people who would have pirated it anyway.
Either way though, game looks neat, and I look forward to picking it up whenever it's released.
Alot of people are also forgetting about the master key portion of the leak as well. I could see that delaying the release of the game as that issue will have to be resolved properly before release.
I don't know what this means, maybe you do?
Now, concerning the leak, that seriously sucks. And I'm annoyed by the assholes who'd pirate it, and then proceed to talk shit on the developers.
However, I will say - that while yes, of course piracy is a problem, and no I'd never support pirates in their endeavors - I also think that as an honest PC gamer, I get shafted pretty frequently. And not so much because of pirates, but because companies don't just want profits, they want RIDICULOUS profits. Which leaves me, who doesn't like playing on consoles, seeing good games on consoles I'll simply never play - or playing buggy ports, or games with insane DRM setups. "Oh the game might only sell 2.6 million instead of 2.9 million copies - so let's not even bother worrying about a PC version." Yeah, thanks.
Now I'll note I've never had that issue with Crytek games specifically - they've supported PC gamers with quality products for as long as I can tell (hence why I continue to buy them), but just talking in general. There's a reason I've wound up spending more and more time playing indie games over the years. ...it's because there's not a whole lot else for the PC half the time. And it's not all the fault of pirates.
Though, to balance that out, I'll also say that while it has annoyed me in the past with big console releases not making it to PC, that I am really enjoying the creativity and diversity of PC games we've seen from various smaller developers popping up. I might have to miss out on various console titles, but I do love me the opportunity to get in on some awesome steam sales and indie bundles.
Or maybe you think that critical thinking and problem solving skills are useless in the current world we live in ? For some reason I tend to think that an intelligent, well rounded physics engine programmer with good observation and teamwork skills is exactly the kind of person that would provide the best education to his/her kids. Same for a well rounded, motivated game artist.
I dont think we have much power to take down religious nonsense and other money/power hungry corporations. And those are the ones to blame, not gamedevs making games while "sitting on their ass"
Or, WAIT! - what if one of the most powerful form of media, aka interactive entertainment, could help shaping a stronger, international culture ?
Contributing to this is good enough, I think.
Is there a way to block GD altogether? Like just take it off of my forum list?
"If people get it for free and hand it out to friends for nothing then they arent going to the cinema are they?"
That's not a proper comparison at all. You can't copy a theater. If people want to go to see a movie at a theater, they will pay to go see a movie at a theater. If they really just want to watch it at home, they won't go to the theater if they have a copy of their own would they?
"If the pirated version wasnt there, then alot more people would have gone to the cinema to see it for themselves, common sense."
You think that's common sense, but you're confusing correlation with causation. You're saying that people don't buy if they can get it for free. The fact of the matter is, in the past decade, movie profits have been going up, not down. They keep claiming it's hurting their business, yet they keep reporting record profits every year too. Which is it Hollywood? What's really happening is that because people can download those movies, they can tell others about it. The more people who know about the movie, the more people there are that will be aware of that movie when they go to the theater. I don't see how Fox could possibly know how much they "lost", they're doing what you did and they have a reputation for making shit up.
If the "pirated" version wasn't available, they would probably pay to see another movie that they are sure they want to see. They won't take a risk on a movie they aren't certain they want to see when there are movies they are certain of. Would you buy a canned food that has no label? It could be beans, or it might be dog food. Do you want to spend your money to find out? You're exhibiting a huge misconception the industry seems to hold about the file sharing community: "People will buy if they have no other choice." No, they will spend their money elsewhere. Taking away options doesn't make a good more appealing to a customer and you can't make people pay for something they didn't intend to pay for in the first place. That's not a lost sale, but it might be a lost opportunity to gain another customer.
"...would I hire someone who openly pirates? no, because they dont respect and support the industry that they so call love and are part of the problem."
They don't respect and support the industry because they don't subscribe to your preferred business model? Think about your favorite author. Got it? Did you come to know and love that author because you just walked into a book store and bought their book? No, I would be willing to bet that you found that author because someone you know loaned you a book written by the author. Hardly anyone buys a work that they didn't get to try for free first. Sharing works spreads awareness of those works. Sharing works inspires new works. I think people that share works do it because they love them and they want others to come to love them as they do. Neil Gaiman, who once shared your opinion, learned that his books were being shared in Russia.
"Then I started to notice that two things that seemed much more significant. One of which was that places where I was being pirated -- particularly Russia (where people were translating my stuff into Russian and spreading it out into the world) I was selling more and more books. People were discovering me through being pirated. And then they were going out and buying the real books, and when a new book would come out in Russia it would sell more and more copies."
"That's really all this is. It's people lending books. And you can't look on that as a lost sale.... What you're actually doing is advertising. You're reaching more people. You're raising awareness. And understanding that gave me a whole new idea of the shape of copyright and what the web was doing. Because the biggest thing the web was doing is allowing people to hear things, allowing people to read things, allowing people to see things they might never have otherwise seen. And I think, basically, that's an incredibly good thing."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=0Qkyt1wXNlI
I'm not arguing for infringement. I'm arguing that your conclusions don't fit the data. Yes, it's bad that Crysis 2 makes its first impression with an unfinished version that doesn't put its best face forward, but to blame the people that download it isn't right nor fair. This was likely done by a handful of people, some of which may have been Crytek employees. You can't possibly know their incentives nor their motivations for doing it. Blame those people if you must pass out blame, but don't try to blame a group of people that had nothing to do with it.
edit:
Just to be perfectly clear, I don't think what happened is, at all, good for Crytek's reputation. This is equivalent to someone coming into your portfolio and ripping pieces out. Now your work looks broken and people are judging your merits on that. So yes, it sucks and the people who leaked it are a shameful bunch.
What it basically comes down too, is that Crytek have had their multi-million £ product stolen from them and distributed online without their permission. Whether or not people think piracy is a lost sale or not is irrelevant.
The people downloading Crysis 2 are criminals because they are intentionally and unlawfully gaining access to a product that they have no legal right to access, knowing full well that it is a leak. There isn't an excuse for this...All the rubbish about there not being a PC demo is a really weak argument.
I dont have a copy of Crysis 2 on my hard drive right now because i was brought up to believe that taking something that doesn't belong to me is wrong and its a clear cut and dry moral choice that people are making and that is all there is too it.
Exactly. Suddenly people forgot how massive was theft of MW2 for both PC and X360, yet the game still was a commercial triumph, thanks to online mode mostly.
Where does the assumption that people will just pay if they can't get it for free come from? It shows a complete lack of understanding of human behavior. People who can't get something for free that had no intention of paying for it in the first place will not buy it just because that's the only way to get it, they will just spend their money on something they do want to spend it on. If they can't get the latest copy of Starcraft II for free, they won't necessarily just buy it instead. They will, however, probably spend that same money on other things, such as food. So congratulations, you've stopped a single act of infringement, but you've lost an opportunity to spread awareness of your works. Entertainment is a risk purchase for consumers. If they buy it and they don't like it, they rarely can get their money back, but most of the time they can't.
So when a person is faced with risking their money on an uncertain thing, they often choose to spend it on the sure thing than the risk item. That's what drives a lot of file sharing. People don't want to risk money they might need for other things until they can be certain that spending their money is worth it to get that good. No rational person would spend money on something they can't be sure is what they want. That's as foolish as buying unlabeled canned food. That's what entertainment is. You don't know what the content is until you actually observe the content. Not determining the value of the content before you buy it is no different than playing "Let's make a Deal" where people trade a sure thing for the possibility of something better and the only way to do that is to experience it first. Well there's the problem now, isn't there? How can you get the customer to pay for the work behind that content after they've already experienced the content? That's what the goal is after all right? Pay the people who worked on it. It sounds to me that they're selling a service rather than a product.
Quake 3 had a demo plastered over gaming magazines, so it was a no brainer to buy the final version, again, on a disc.
Those days must be long gone. This leak is different in so many ways.
The next news I would like to see is the leaker exposed and up in court with a multi million dollar lawsuit around his/her neck.
This is just terrible beyond words.. I can only imagine the atmosphere at the office......
i understand your view and well... disagree. But I could agree if not for some logical holes that after my post have no desire to argue with you, cause this is like arguing abortion.
Hearing it from Neil Gaiman I totally agree. He gets it and it works for him and it possibly could work for so many others. BUT applied to this case ...not so much.
His books don't really have sequels, so the sure thing has to be his name. Reading one book won't tell you if he's good, but after a couple, you would know. Here's the thing even in a kindle/ipad environment many don't foresee the death of books. For some reason there is for most a human condition* that would like to own the content and at the very least non-paper books don't offer the same quality, experience, etc. as books.
Games however exist within a two-dimensional display controlled by the quality of your equipment. There is no physical equivalent nor better way to play. It is constructed of 10 numbers ;P. Pirated or not, it's the same experience; the only thing that's physical is the box/disc it came in, and thus you don't own anything.
If pirating had acted as a sort of advertising for an 'unknown thing' then why bother pirating a sequel**? You know what you are going to get. And unlike the movie industry video games have generally had a better track record for AAA sequels. There should be less pirating of sequels by that logic(see mw2), discounting newcomers to the market. But its not an old game(different gen) where there would be a substantial amount of people who haven't seen/heard of Crysis***.
Note: and unlike movies there is no Big Screen release at launch day.(physical experience)
The amount of money put into a project like Crysis makes it harder to justify it as advertising. Where for Gaiman its just his time spent, if he publishes then the cost goes up but nowhere near the cost of making Crysis 2. So its easier for him, because he can cheaply and quickly release a new book at the same level. Where for Crytek its three to four years more in development and millions of man hours**** and more if a drastically new engine is needed.
There is a want to play a game if someone decides to pirate and play. Therefore while there is the option to spend money elsewhere, they have decided to spend the time to play it. If people decide they do not agree to DRM then don't play, simple as that; but to pirate for that reason sends an ambiguous message to the author. Same goes to pirating a sequel, At what point should investors, developers and artists expect this payoff. Moreover how many times have you read horror stories of working for free or 'sweat equity' from artists. The people who find that they don't like it can find that out easily through the demo. The only way I could agree with you on that is if those same people who did not pay but pirated did not play a substantial portion of the single-player game, and or played an insignificant amount of time online. If you don't like a movie you can ask for a refund if you leave within an acceptable amount of time at most theaters.(with achievements now in steam there should be a refund option as well)
*at least a societal condition, weak point I know
**3rd game from that company
***unlike Metal Gear Solid where people didn't want to play the last of a series from a game that was released in the 90's (or 80's if you consider Metal Gear as part of the Solid series.)
****approximately 550 people work at Crytek, assuming 2080 hours in a year(generally accepted hrs in a year by both the government and HR), then (550*2080)*3=3,432,000 man hours per game
Human behaviour: free is always cheaper.
Starcraft 2 and many other products show that having something that you can't get any other way (multiplayer), will give the customer the ultimate choice that they didn't have beforehand.
Buy and play or don't play is more powerful than buy and play or dont pay and still play.
Which is the reason this leak most likely won't cause much damage anyway that it wouldn't have otherwise, pirates gonna pirate because they still can.
And customers are going to buy it because they want to support it, or are amongst the people who don't know how to pirate something.
Another black day for PC-gaming future...
How ignorant can you be? Seriously. From my personal experience with friends and other people. There are guys downloading every pieve of digital entertainment they can get their hands on. And they spend endles hours using this content. It is rediculous to assume that a person that spends about 80 % of his freetime on computergaming just completely stops doing that if he has to pay for the content he is using. Of Course this perosn will not buy all the games he pirated. But to asume he will stop playing video games and maybe start to go fishing is just not realistic. Those people will pay for their games if they have to. And even if they only buy 3 games per year because more they can't afford. That are 3 games more than they bought during the last couple of years. So yeah there are financial losses on developer and publisher side. How big those are is up to discussion and can't be estimated easily. But they are there.
To your argument of bringing publicity to your product by people whi share it. Nice opinion and I think every artist, writer, developer is free to take that road. But if the creators of a product rather take less publicity but legally bought products than its their choice and the customer has to accept that.
Only because the internet gives to opportunity to have riskless and free software distribution doesn't give you any right to use those opportunitys.
About people who are willing to spend their money on entertainment where they don't know what they will get. Are you that silly to claim that there is no way of getting an impression of a product?
Dude just use the fucking internet. You can find 1000's of opinions of a given product. Be it customer reviews, forums, blogs or tests about the product.
You seem to be very young because there was a time were there was abolutely no other way to judge the product you are about to buy. Remember NES times? The text on the boxes were not even translated into my language (not talking about the game it self or the manual) All you could do was read reviews about the thing you were about to buy. And it worked.
Today its so much easier to know what you will buy. Of course if you insist on a preorder and release day gaming experience you will have a certain risk that the product might not be what you've expected. But then again: Every game has its preview tests weeks before their release. That should be enough to judge the product. Although demos are getting rares they are there. You have gameplay video footage all over the net. Using a priated copy to judge the quality of a game is just a cheap excuse.
All I expect from you and all other retards promoting piracy is the following: Buy it and play. Or don't buy it and don't play it. If it isn't worth your money it shouldn't be worth your time and vice versa.
Oh and a last thing:
If everyone would use the possibility of getting a pirated copy all this wouldn't work. THe quality of the games you are enjoying for free is paid by 100.000 thousand of customers who are willing to support a product. What gives you justification to rely on those paying customers for your free of charge entertainment?
People will like the DX9 version and buy the proper one too. Only people who would crack also the final version won't buy the final and play the leak.
Even some people who never intended to buy Cry2 will do now because they feel to support the devs now.
Abandoning the PC will not happen because of the sales and piracy is a problem of Xbox too.
Speaking of all the moral discussion here I think a lot of people should take a look on their own HD for their cracked photoshop, 3dsmax and other tools they have there.
My opinion to this leak: Step further there is nothing to see here.
Bullshit. :poly118::poly127:
greevar - ........ignore. your point makes no sense to me Im afraid and I cant be bothered to argue. You win, lets all go pirate and rape the entertainment industry completely. Jobs are over rated anyway.
honestly, i'm starting to wonder why you're still welcome on this forum.
Development costs for big projects like these need a lot of financial justification behind them in order for them to be greenlit. The people who make the big decisions on what platforms to release on take piracy as a legitimate concern.
If you want a great example, look at Crysis 1. Crytek was originally a huge supporter of the PC platform and they made games exclusively for them because they didn't think consoles were powerful enough to run their games. After release, Crysis was tops on the torrent sites and the number of patch downloads versus retail sales basically proved that there were a ton of people playing the pirated game, months after the game was out. If you want to use the excuse that they were just trying it out, scrap that notion.
I think the extent that Crysis was pirated really eroded Crytek's confidence in the PC platform. Now they're developing a multi-platform release, and there were some suggestions that the piracy of the original game factored into this decision. Now THIS happens. What exactly does having your game leaked months before release speak for the state of PC gaming and it's profitability?
I don't think people should be fooling themselves with situations like these. It's just downright wrong, and it's only going to damage the confidence in the PC platform which is already in a heap anyway. In order to sustain these projects with high production values, people that play these games ought to vote with their dollars. Often, that's just not the case. You can rack up any sort of theoretical value of marketing, or people who are just demoing the game to whatever extent you'd like. What matters at the end of the day is real sales figures with real money. Doing it any other way just makes it impossible to justify the costs of these projects to the people that finance them.
What?
It doesn't excuse this blatant piracy of early software and dangerously smeary chicken littles dishing the whine before Crytek had the chance to polish and finish. Also, for the record, I use Blender, which is cracked because i downloaded it off the internet for free
......shit you got me.
You probably have some stray mp3 somewhere, IT TOTALLY INVALIDATES EVERYTHING YOU SAY!!
I must use the invalidator-argument in every discussion I ever make, it sounds so perfect.
Face it:
Your company has a severe security problem if it's possible to steal a full dev-build just three months before release out of the company.
I also think people should really calm down here a bit. I think this is handled way too emotional...
aren't we *slightly* confusing mech warrior 2 with (call of duty) modern warfare 2 here?
[ame]
And I just read this little article earlier today. It brings up some really good arguments that I think apply well to the discussion here.
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/32761/Opinion_Game_Developers_Should_Love_Their_Pirates.php
Yes, but the thing is, would you openly say "go ahead and pirate my game, I don't mind, I think it helps"
hilarious
HAHAHAHAAAA!! Those posts are long enough, pointless enough, and full of "mod troll" enough to think it's cookepuss/acrobat fly
That guy is the main reason I don't go to GA often, and the reason why I don't post there at all anymore.
5-15 would be awesome, I mean, I'm not saying that absolutely everyone who downloaded it would've bought it, but if you compare raw amount of downloads to sales it can be a bit more depressing.
What I'm saying it, at one point they'll push a bit too much, like posting links to torrents of your games on other forums, or even your game forum, and then you'll have to push back.
What you have described is a form of piracy. Leaks happen because piracy groups have connections with people with access to content - usually not the actual developers/movie makers, but outside vendors, folks associated with distribution, QA, publicity/marketing, stuff like that. But that doesn't matter. The problem that EA is referencing is not how the game was leaked, but the frictionless nature of piracy on the PC. All they are doing is saying, "Hey, ain't that a shame."
I'm not an idiot. I know people have jobs that depend on these games making money. I know that when sales fail to meet expectations, publishers tend to not fund future projects and people loose jobs. Anybody with an I.Q. above room temperature would know that. I'm not advocating that people just get everything for free and not contribute one cent to the people who make this stuff. I'm just one person that has come to the realization that the way things have traditionally been done are obsolete. You must see that don't you? And anybody who has an ounce of understanding of marketing knows that the more eyes that are focused on your goods, the more people talk about it and the more people know of it. Sharing art builds awareness. You want your prospective customers to be aware of your goods because they will tell others. If they won't pay for copies of your game, then adapt your strategy so they don't have to buy the game, but you still make money from its existence.
But you won't take me seriously will you? I'm just an idiot that rambles on far too long about his point of view because he cares a whole hell of a lot that this industry learns to adapt and survive. I'm not your enemy, I'm on your side. I just have a different opinion about how to solve the problem. Stop treating me like I'm the enemy. Your real opponents to the future of this industry are the people that exploit your work so they can make obscene amounts of money. So they made an investment and expect a return on that investment? So what? They don't give a rip about your art, they only care about money.
I often hear this as an excuse for piracy - people download stolen games because they need to "check it out" before buying.
Cmon, seriously, this is 2011, every worthy game has a demo or videoreview.
Hmm, Crysis 2 seems to be lacking one for the PC community, and I'm not gonna buy it for my xbox.