Piracy...
polycounter lvl 12
I was wondering what everyone thinks about possible solutions to piracy. Basically I find it hard to believe that a PC game could not be piracy protected or have enough stumbling blocks to deter potential pirates.
As an industry we complain about piracy, but in my experience encryption and piracy protection are left until the last minute of the games development, with hardly any investment in it from studio to studio. Our industry leaders openly complain and talk about how its killing our industry, yet no one puts enough investment into fighting it?
I have no software programming experience at all, but find it hard to believe that governments and large corporations can protect there date, when we can not. Not only that but you have examples such as the Playstation 3, which is yet to have any piracy problems at all, although I am lead to believe this is hardware related?
As one of the biggest industry's in the world, not only from a software but also hardware perspective. I find it very hard to believe we could not find a solution to the problem.
I'm just brain farting here, but could these not be possible solutions?
I could be very naive, but just find it a little stupid how we complain about it all the time. Yet no one actually does anything about it apart from hurting the person actually buying the game.
As an industry we complain about piracy, but in my experience encryption and piracy protection are left until the last minute of the games development, with hardly any investment in it from studio to studio. Our industry leaders openly complain and talk about how its killing our industry, yet no one puts enough investment into fighting it?
I have no software programming experience at all, but find it hard to believe that governments and large corporations can protect there date, when we can not. Not only that but you have examples such as the Playstation 3, which is yet to have any piracy problems at all, although I am lead to believe this is hardware related?
As one of the biggest industry's in the world, not only from a software but also hardware perspective. I find it very hard to believe we could not find a solution to the problem.
I'm just brain farting here, but could these not be possible solutions?
- As an industry invest in both Intel and AMD to introduce piracy projection for software on a hardware level (same as PS3?) and over the next 5-8 years introduce it slowly, much like a windows requirements for games.
- As an industry invest in a middle man to provide the highest level of protection, a company who can invest largely in unbreakable encryptions by having a large amount of clients?
I could be very naive, but just find it a little stupid how we complain about it all the time. Yet no one actually does anything about it apart from hurting the person actually buying the game.
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Replies
First purchaser codes and things like that are a good step and I think DLC season passes are a good step towards getting people to keep the game after they buy it (thus also fighting the used game market). I'd really like to see a discussion along those lines rather than yet another thread on piracy which I'm sure will devolve into the usual tired arguments.
Since almost every game is connected to an online system these days with rankings and such all you have to do is offer benefits for those who connect with an account.
People will pay just to see their name on a scoreboard, that's probably also the reason why Call of duty sells so many copies.
Second they should make pirating games more troublesome then buying them. With steam i already feel that this is the case.
Third package deals. I have two younger brothers who are addicted to Call of Duty. With this new release they have both bought copies for pc , a copy for xbox and a copy for playstation. It would be great if you'd be able to pay for example 80 euro's and be able to play the game you've purchased on all systems you own through downloading.
Can a game not simply just have piracy protection that you know.... works? Without all this stupid internet connection, sign up to four different things jibba jabba.
As far as I'm aware, standard piracy protection is simply encryption. Whatever is encrypted can be decrypted. In fact, I have know piracy protection in development where the person making it could literally tell me how long it will take to crack...
One of the splinter cells went over a hundred days without being pirated, and the deterrent wasnt DRM, can't remember what it was but I dunno why they don't just use that. AC2 was also pirate proof for ages, but I think that was DRM based. Either way Ubi are doing something right.
Those are great examples Andreas, will look into both to see if I can find out what they did. When you said AC2 did you mean Assassins Creed 2? As that had DRM always online and was cracked straight away wasn't it?
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1. It's free (duh)
2. Less hassle
3. Disgruntlement
The first one is obviously hard to combat and by far the most prevalent, but I think that many games nowadays aside from indie games are just overpriced.
If we compare movies they cost about as much as a game to make (across the spectrum, depending on movies) but a "AAA" movie still costs only 9-10 bucks and make the same revenues or even more than most games. It's much less of a commitment buying something for 10 bucks than 50 or 60 bucks.
Using myself as an example, I'd say I buy an average amount of games for a gamer, but during things like steam sales I almost go nuts and buy games for far more than I'd usually spend, because they're cheaper. Sometimes I'm not even sure I'll ever have time to play them, but between 2 and 15 bucks is, again, not a big monetary commitment.
That being said, some people will always want things for free, even if it means stealing it, but contrary to piracy figures my personal feeling is that they actually constitute a lower percentage of pirates.
The second one has everything to do with DRM and preventive measures. I hate them. I hate them so much that I see red everytime I encounter them. They affect only one person, and that is the person actually paying for the game or movie. If I put my bluray in I get FBI warnings and in a few cases even trailers that are unskippable. If the movie was downloaded you just click and go, and you're instantly in.
The same for games, but in various other forms. This includes everything from having to always be online to play to only installing a certain number of times or whatnot. It's annoying and an annoyance only paying customers have to deal with.
Steam has done a lot to alleviate this, actually. It still has issues, but it's a very good platform.
Lastly disgruntlement has to do with the top two and the fact that many people nowadays feel like they're essentially playing broken games. Anyone who's shipped a game know how much harder it is to fix or even find bugs today, since games are so much more complex, but for the average customer who doesn't work with producing games it just looks like developers don't give one single shit.
How to deal with this? I honestly have no idea.
My gut feeling is that preventive measures or blocks is the wrong way to go. I'd rather see systems of encouragment and BENEFITS for the paying customers. Not more hassle.
I think the other two are marginal compared to the first to be honest.
edit: thought I'd like to point out that most people use the other two as justifications for the first one.
But as soon as you reduce the price of your product will people not start doubting its value?
There's really only two ways to identify a legitimate user:
- Verify the disc (typical console way of identifying whether or not a game is a legitimate copy)
- DRM (internet authentication/registration)
As it is encryptions biggest role right now is to stop pre-releases of the game (which it does very effectively) by requiring you to hit an internet server in order to decrypt the installation files.
The biggest problem with DRM is that it's intrusive. Which is why it works best when it's put into a library solution or bundled with another application that lets you do other things. Steam for example has a whole social networking side to it as well as a store and it acts as a game library. iTunes is much the same way, it's an all purpose media player as well as used to synch with all Apple products. In both cases they seem less intrusive to the user because they offer other benefits.
Assassin's Creed 2 and Splinter Cell: Conviction both had DRM, not only that but it was probably the shittiest DRM ever conceived because it required a CONSTANT internet connection. CONSTANT. They took the worst part of DRM (intrusiveness) and implemented it in the worst possible way.
Ubisoft eventually patched out this crap after people were calling for boycotts of their games because of it and customers were left with unplayable games while their authentication servers were down.
Considering all of the business they were losing to this which ultimately led to them caving and trashing the idea, I wouldn't call this "doing something right" on any level.
Edit: If you're talking about Chaos Theory (which went over a year unpirated) that was StarForce 3, and it was primarily uncracked for that long because not a lot was known or understood about how it worked at the time as it was pretty much the first major game to use it. Eventually pirates released loads of information on how it worked and like all copy protection, it rapidly became pointless. Which is why even StarForce has moved toward a DRM model.
http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/piracy
As Entity said, 60 euro is just way to much for many of the crap games released now a days that have nearly no play time.
Stop making crap. It's been proven time and time again that good games sell like hotcakes. If you produce a mediocre game, don't expect great sales.
This might be true to some extent but it's one of those phrases that everyone seems to throw around on this topic. The Witcher 2 is a great game but people still pirate the crap out of it.
You were better off sticking with his Witcher 2 reference.
And before people bring it up, yes, you need to be online with Steam to start, but with Steam you can put it offline. (Although offline mode is still broken...Have to be online to put it offline?? wtf?).
Yes, you can make a game impossible to pirate, but not without affecting the players experience, there is a limit to how much you can encrypt stuff, as you need the game to be able to communicate with the computer.
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You do realize that all valve games are cracked as well right? There are even apps like Garena which let you play them online with other people.
You can throw in as much DRM as you want, people will get past it just for shits and giggles.
If you'd read the post above mine I was responding to a reply that stated developers shouldn't alienate customers with DRM, then went on to cite valve as an example. But apparently his example wasn't to that particular point.
Edit: Didn't quote it evidently
Sorry, english isn't my first language and I always have a hard time structuring my sentences properly :P
But even if we were talking about DRM, Valve's method (Steam) is pretty solid. I don't know how familiar you are with the PC versions of Arkham Asylum/City, but it's pretty bad. Quite a few people lost their saves because of it.
But then the question is, how do single player games deal with piracy?
DRM is going to kill video games like it's killing hollywood and the music industry. Put out Solid products not just fucking halo//dood wearing power suit//health regenerating "realistic" shooters...
Louis CK proved that DRM sucks and Quality works.
You can't force people to be moral, lol. Make them WANT to buy it.
Another way to deal with the issue is to not try to use the sale of copies as your source of revenue. Shift the transaction from selling copies to selling another part of the development cycle, like special services only paying customers get and let the game be a promotional tool for those value-added services. Make your paying customers VIPs and the rest are your PR army. Hey, maybe implement an incentive system to reward people for sharing copies of the game? Also, selling insider access might loosen the wallets of the people that want more intimate access to their beloved developers. Tiered support rewards could give even those with a tight budget the opportunity to put money into a game they love. You just have to think of creative ways to make it easier for people to give you their money.
There are several reasons why people choose to download unauthorized copies rather than buy it:
1. Games are a risk purchase. If you buy a game and don't like it, you don't get a refund. This runs counter to all other goods on the market as you can always return a microwave you don't like for a refund.
2. They are expensive and a luxury. If it costs too much, they'll either not play it or find a way to play it for less. Not all games are considered to be worth the price applied to them. The customer may be willing to buy your game, but your price repels them. So they download or buy used.
3. Consumers don't need the games, but developers need them as customers. The power is clearly on the consumers' side.
4. You can't make legal backups. Console games are the most notorious for this. If your disc is damaged, you have to pay for a new copy or pay for a replacement direct from the publisher (if they offer it at all).
5. This is up to personal preference but, it's a PITA to drive to the store to buy a game when all you really need is the data on the disc and not the disc itself. Digital distribution makes for a much better market for games and you don't have to use up your HDD for games you aren't playing as services like Steam store your games for you to download at your leisure. If you can't get digital downloads from the publisher, then your only option is to download it for free.
6. The game isn't available in your country because of legal issues that are immaterial to the consumer or you're just not considered worth serving. Or on the other hand, the price is too high in your country because it costs a month's worth of income due to a weaker currency. Cutting out a whole segment of customers because they can't pay the arbitrary price you set to it is not the best idea. Every sale, regardless of how much they pay, is better than not having that customer at all. Digital goods have the highest price elasticity.
As greevar just said it is the nature of technology.
Price is of course the main issue. I don't think the "make something good enough that people will WANT to buy it" will work. There will always be those who just know that it is easier to spend a night or a couple of hours searching and downloading than to fork over 30 - 60 bucks.
Seems that everyone is kinda beating a dead horse. If it is sold, it will be stolen. If it is given away for free... it will STILL be stolen. lol
Exactly.. Even the Charity Indie bundle ( I think it was a year ago), for which YOU could choose how much to pay for (you could buy 10 games and all for just 1$ to 1 mil. $, for instance) and it had been pirated the hell out of it. They basically stole a almost free for-charity-only bundle. That's humanity right there.
But there was another very clever drm.. erm.. I think it was for a german drawn point and click game.. They basically provided you with a pair of 10-or-more sided dices of some sort, with runes on them (apparently only a few copies shared dices with the same pattern), and everytime you fired up the game, it asked you to place the dices with the shown runes on top and highlight the rune that was, for instace, 2 sides right of it.. So you basically had to have a legit copy of the game to play it... In theory at least, it didn't work as well as planned... But it's too complicated for AAA games though, some would be too lazy to look at dices before they started the game, resulting in flaming and some would maybe be too confused by that system, again, resulting in flaming.. but it's a cool idea nonetheless, i think
edit:
that's what i meant:
You're not going to fix the problem by trying to find a way to force people to choose either to buy or not play. There isn't a lock out there that can't be defeated. It's also disrespectful to your paying customers to show them you assume they are going to violate you. You just have to accept the fact that people are going to do what comes naturally (sharing information, regardless if it has a price tag attached to it) and form a business model that leverages this behavior. If people insist on sharing games across the internet, then monetize the sharing somehow. You can't fight it, so use it. The publishing industry seems to be hell-bent on moving the clock backwards to when they could pretend that this stuff didn't happen. It always did, though. It was just not so visible.
The game industry is bargaining from a weak position: Games are just data and data is easy to copy by its nature. You can't look at games as a "product", but you can look at games development as a service that people pay for. No, I don't have a magic bullet solution. That's not possible for one person to come up with. It's going to take many people, through trial and error, to figure out what people will pay for in the development of games. Attitudes have to change in the industry because the general public won't. What you expect from people is antithetical to human nature.
Games are an art form and as an art form they are communication. By saying people can't share games on the internet, it's no different telling them that can't say this or that on the internet. You're censoring communication. Games tell stories, impart emotions, and teach lessons about life. You can't stop people from sharing that. Sharing stories, feelings, and knowledge is what our society it built upon. This acquiescence to marketing concerns is much newer than art itself. It's impossible and irresponsible to censor any form of speech for the sake of profit.
Why should it be a crime for people violate a business model, especially one that is predicated on controlling speech?
"The job of any entrepreneur is to construct a use case and a business case that allow them to make money, given the current constraints of society and technology. They do not get to dismantle civil liberties, even if they cant make money otherwise." - Rick Falkvinge
Now, don't take this as my assertion that I want the games industry to go bankrupt or scale down. If that's what you take away from this, then you missed the point. Just because you can't keep doing business as the industry has for the past 40 years, doesn't mean that the industry will collapse. Only those unwilling to change will fail.
exactly. how can they restrict YOUR OWN copy/product? like not playing offline type of DRM.... ARGH!!
They solved most of their piracy issues with battle.net, but went a bit overboard with the "drm" on Starcraft 2, it often has issues playing single player offline.
http://blog.wolfire.com/2010/05/Another-view-of-game-piracy
http://www.tcs.cam.ac.uk/story_type/site_trail_story/interview-gabe-newell/
http://www.geekwire.com/2011/experiments-video-game-economics-valves-gabe-newell
http://notch.tumblr.com/post/1121596044/how-piracy-works
High School Musical hit 5 SKU's in 1 development, and very easily outsold God of War.
As did Scooby Doo.
Publishers take a look at those numbers, and feel that games like God of War are not worth making, and shitty liscenced titles are, because THOSE are what sell.
Okami, Viewtiful Joe, and Ico were commercial flops, yet all scored over 90 on Metacritic.
I can't STAND when game quality is sacrificed to prevent piracy however. For example, I've played MMOs where the mouse cursor is bound to the graphics engine instead of the hardware. (Something to do with automated gold farming programs relying on screen coordinates.) Anyway, a slight drop in fps makes it feel like the whole game is about to crash... all to prevent someone from violating the TOS, which is moot because pirates will ALWAYS find a way around your security. (Sure enough, they did.)
At the end pf the day, a copyright is only as good as its enforcement.
I think digital distribution still has some way to go before it's easier for me to buy the game then download it. Took me 3 days to download a single game on Steam where it would have taken me around 1 hour on a filesharing service.
While I totally agree with that, I think, unfortunately, that the point still remains. People don't like those games, and they do like the "crap" ones. We can't make people buy stuff they don't want to buy. The fact is that people just don't like those games like Okami and Ico. Lots of people do. But most don't.
I think we'll just have to face the fact that those type of games won't be more than a niche.
Have you tried switching it to japanese servers? ^__^
Steam is being pounded around christmas like no other platform, so while you're right it's still not the best point to judge steam at, as during any other time you'll get solid 10mbytes/sec if you have the bandwidth for it.
That's sadly just the result of bad marketing, but the counter-point still stands, people pirate good and bad games, and as the humble bundle shows, they'll even pirate a pack of really great games that they could've gotten for just 1 cent if they wished to.
I know that the servers are getting their ass kicked and having people constantly trying to download their games only helps to keep the servers down.. But I still think that they might need to implement some kind of queue system so people actually gets their games instead of everyone downloading painfully slow, having to wait so long for a game to download kinda defeats the purpose of digital distribution. But you're right, usually Steam works quite well, all though I've had a few connection problems in past.