Danimal, Modern Booty: Pirates Destroying Their Platform

By: Dan Wise aka Danimal

There was a time long ago, when developers could make PC games without worrying too much about piracy. In today’s age of high end PCs, the owners of these computers are seemingly killing their own platform. The PC market is still alive, but publishers are feeling threatened for releasing hotly anticipated titles for the platform. Gamers will buy systems that cost anywhere from $1,500 to $3,000+ and they have the know-how for pirating games. Console gamers are much more numerous and the consoles cost hundreds less, so they feel no need to pirate games. Some console gamers have the ability to pirate software, but it’s a much more complicated process than for PC software.

The ramifications of these actions are being felt all throughout the game industry as Cliff Bleszinski of Epic Games claimed in an interview with Total Video Games, “The person who is savvy enough to want to have a good PC to upgrade their video card, is a person who is savvy enough to know [BitTorrent] to know all the elements so they can pirate software.” His method for combating the piracy issue is to completely cut off PC development. He stated in the interview that they will not develop Gears of War 2 for PC. This makes sense, if the cost for developing the game (even if it is a port) does not meet with the profit goals, then the only option left is to cut the losses.

Crytek felt the effects of rampant pirating earlier this year when the released Crysis exclusively on the PC. While the game sold a respectable one million copies, the game’s business manager Harald Steeley stated in an Edge-Online article that “the level of piracy was the highest of any I’ve experienced on a project.” Crytek’s president Cevat Yerli could not reveal any specific numbers, but he made a comparison between console sales and PC sales. “Similar games on consoles sell factors of 4-5 more,” he said in an interview with PC Play. 

The PC market seems like an oddball market at times. The gamer base of the market is one of the most loyal in the industry. Ask any PC gamer where their loyalties lie, and they will tell you PC any day of the week. They will often scoff at console gamers, holding themselves on a pedestal claiming that their games are the pinnacle of excellence. At the same time, these gamers are very intelligent and they know that if there is a work-around for attaining a game, they will take it. Piracy was rampant in the late 1990′s with the release of CD-RWs and PC developers fought this with CD keys. That strategy worked for a time, but the Internet has turned to be both a great ally and an insidious foe. With the introduction of P2P and Bit Torrent in the 2000s, there is no stopping the pirates.

I miss the day when my economy class computer could run the titles that were popular, but today it seems as though the companies only care about pushing the graphical envelop. The tech industry is obsessed with one-upping everything that is released. Games from major studios are always lauded as a “halo killer” which scares me somewhat. Why are companies striving to one-up each other instead of making quality titles? What happened to the days where games could be great without a ton of visual flair? Star Craft is nearing the decade mark in its life span, and yet I still pop in the game because I think it is fun. I will admit that I am not innocent when it comes to this matter, but I will say that I have bought nearly every game I have ever owned. I buy games either because I like the developer, or that it meets my preferences for what a good game is. I will not claim to have an answer to solve this problem, but I can only suggest that more attention should be directed towards game play than graphics. If they can do this, then they could cover the cost of the titles that do get pirated. If more people are able to play your game, then you are bound to sell more titles. Piracy will always be a problem, but there are ways to avert disaster.