"They Wonder Why People Don't Make PC Games Any More"

[ShagnWagn]

Also, think about it, what's easier:

1) I have a gaming PC, and would like to play Crysis without paying for it. Torrent + mount.

2) I have a PSP (easiest console to mod) and would like to play Monster Hunter 2 without paying for it. In that case, you need to find a person who already has a hacked PSP, and get him to mod it for you.

3) I have a 360, and would like to play Halo 3 for free, but I'm afraid I might get banned from XBL. I doubt many people will take a step forward.

The old Starfarce days made it more difficult to do it on the PC than on a console IMO, but unfortunately hosed a LOT of legitimate purchase owner's computers too. I was burned a few times from this. I never got my Toca Race Driver 2 or Postal 2 to work with the original disc. Never would have had to reinstall WinXP if it weren't for Starfarce.

I don't know why anybody would try to play online with a hacked copy. They are just asking for it.

There will always be people who blindly buy everything without trying and like getting bent over at the counter. There are those in the middle that don't have the money to blow on crappy games and two or three bad ones in a row means no games for a few months. Then there will always be people who will spend 20 hours figuring out how to play a game free for 30 minutes (people doing it just for the challenge, worst case scenario?). My guess is there are far more people in the first two categories than the last. Cheapskates, tinkering hackers, packrats (people who just like the idea of having a huge library of software), and people who can't afford the game anyway fill most of the last category. The developers/publishers (of music/movies/games) are trying to draw blood from a turnip.

 

[Dethred]

You know what I don't understand?


I am the only person I know that has a relatively high-end PC. Everyone else I know wishes they had what I have, and my brother comes over and plays his games he bought for the PC (on MY PC), but he owns a 7 year-old Windows98 Laptop. He has a PS3 and an Xbox 360 but he visits a few times a week to play 10-15 hours of Star Wars Galaxies. He also complains about how slow his PC is. I always tell him to just spend the money and have me build him a PC, and he says its too expensive. Meanwhile he's buying a $60 console game on a weekly basis and doesn't understand that most PC games can be found for around $40 on release, AND he would have a faster all-around PC experience. Oh well.

I also have a friend that wishes he could afford a better GPU, and he owns all three Consoles released in the past 2 years.

I just don't understand why people buy consoles and tons of games in these situations.

 

[Shottah_king]

1.Every time I have a guest over my house, they are always amazed about my computer. I upgrade usually every 2-3 yrs anyway so why not add in a $400 video card (which only costs me $200 because I sell the previous one on ebay). So for all of you using cost as a factor for PC Gaming, most of us here even if it wasn't for gaming, would still upgrade our computers because its just part of our nature.

2. I don't play games enough to invest in a console, I only really like strategy games and first person shooters.

3. In the future when I have a bit more money to spend I might consider an Xbox360 to go along with a HDTV, but my computer will still be the main thing in my life.

4. Yeah a PC cost a lot to upgrade, but the time i spend on it and its worth to me completely exceeds the 1,000 I might spend every 2-3 yrs to upgrade it. I can spend an entire day on my computer doing just about everything from gaming, to homework, to web surfing, to enhancing digital photographs. So for me the PC Annihilates all other platforms.

5. Right now I only really play World in Conflict and UT3, and to be honest I don't really have time to play the other games I bought. Some may wonder why did I even purchase the others; answer: well I don't want to see the PC Game industry die in 2008.

 

[TerranUp16]

The PC's doing fine- even the NPD says as much.

"The PC games sales landscape is changing to one that is increasingly reliant on digital sources of revenue," NPD analyst Anita Frazier told GameSpot. "Our sales reflect the retail climate but there is a lot of gaming sales activity that is generated from digital downloads and subscriptions. I think the PC market continues to be quite healthy and we're continuing to work on how to get our arms around the spending that occurs outside of retail. A number of our [surveys] ask respondents to indicate which platforms they game on, and the results of those questions make it very clear that the PC remains very prevalent, if not dominant, in the total gaming picture."

The Link

 

[gibber]

because its impossible to pirate console games.

It's not obvious to some people that you are being sarcastic. So, I will let them know: folks, he was being sarcastic.

Whenever I hear people talk about gaming consoles at work I hear things like "I have ALL the games for my console [pirated]."

The game I play now (for the past couple years) is free. Last time I bought a game (Prey) it was such a total waste of money, I paid almost $50 and played it for a total of 15 minutes.

I wouldn't even consider buying a console until it's clear that it's reliably modable and safe (meaning that it can't be "detected" and then put on some kind of black list).

I will probably buy Team Fortress 2, but, I'm not sure, because I don't want Steam forced down my throat.

I like to buy games that are really good, I like to TRY games that are mediocre, but I certainly don't want to end up being screwed out of $50 for a crappy game because I was dumb enough to buy it from a store that doesn't allow you to return "opened" games.

Just sell games for $10 - $30 then there'll be less excuse and motivation to pirate them. Like hell would any sensible frugal person want to pay $60?!? for a game unless it's just f'ing amazing and retains it's value (remains fun to play) for more than a few days.

 

[gibber]

Wrong. Consoles are closed systems.

a) they require modification to allow playing pirated games
b) there is a large probability of having your console either: banned from the online service (Xbox Live), or having it bricked (Wii SMG update).

For this reason, console pirating will never become widespread.

It's BEEN widespread, it is widespread, see my prev. post...

My PS2 is modded, wouldn't have bought one if I couldn't have had it modded.

The only reason PC pirating is so big as it is, is that it's all done easily and anonymously through the internet. Commodore pirating was never very big was it?

Commodore pirating not as big? Heh The reason I bought an Apple II in the first place was so I could run hundreds of pirated games I had in a box - that was when I was young, didn't have a job, and couldn't have bought games in the first place, mind you. It's because of pirated software that I got interested in having a computer in the first place, and then, later bought thousands of $ worth of games. Commodore pirating was just as big as Apple II pirating. We would have parties to get together and trade all the latest programs. That wasn't anonymous, it was very social, and very fun.

I say f#@k Microsoft, I don't even want them in the gaming business. Soon as I find out where/how to have a PS3 modded (safely, so it can't get "bricked") I'll buy a PS3, and, I will also start to buy some PS3 software then, otherwise, I'm not buying any PS3 software (because I won't have a PS3).

If any company wants to prevent me from pirating their game there are two simple steps:

1) release a good demo, if I like it, I'll buy it, if not, too bad. (I'll buy it as soon as I can find it on sale for $39, sadly, that often means I have to wait a couple months to get it).
2) don't use pain in the ass "insert the CD to play" bullshit "copy protection", if I find that, the game is going straight back to the store for a refund, unless I can find an easy way to circumvent it.

Still though, you get the retards that try to disregard the value of intellectual property as opposed to something physical.

Even worse are the "retards" who don't see the difference and call copyright infringement "theft". Yes, IP has value, and yes, causing someone not to be able to earn a fair profit by illegaly distributing IP is bad, but that doesn't automagically make it theft.

 

[TerranUp16]

Just sell games for $10 - $30 then there'll be less excuse and motivation to pirate them. Like hell would any sensible frugal person want to pay $60?!? for a game unless it's just f'ing amazing and retains it's value (remains fun to play) for more than a few days.

Your subsequent post suggests that you do know you can pick-up $50-$60 games for half that price if you wait a few months...

 

[Neurofreeze]

You know what I don't understand?


I am the only person I know that has a relatively high-end PC. Everyone else I know wishes they had what I have, and my brother comes over and plays his games he bought for the PC (on MY PC), but he owns a 7 year-old Windows98 Laptop. He has a PS3 and an Xbox 360 but he visits a few times a week to play 10-15 hours of Star Wars Galaxies. He also complains about how slow his PC is. I always tell him to just spend the money and have me build him a PC, and he says its too expensive. Meanwhile he's buying a $60 console game on a weekly basis and doesn't understand that most PC games can be found for around $40 on release, AND he would have a faster all-around PC experience. Oh well.

I also have a friend that wishes he could afford a better GPU, and he owns all three Consoles released in the past 2 years.

I just don't understand why people buy consoles and tons of games in these situations.

Generally PC games are at best $10 cheaper than the console counterparts, brand new. Your comparison is flawed. If you can get a title for $40 new, you will most likely be able to get console version at the same price. For instance CoD4 for the PS3 was $40 at Gamestop during an after Christmas sale. Timeshit was $30 for the 360 during that same time. Assassin's Creed has been popping up all over the place for $40 for the two consoles (especially at Target). I paid $42 for UT3 for the PS3 one week after release. $45 for Halo 3 one month after release. Then you have used games.

If he's buying games at $60 a pop every week, then he's just really bad at spending money and would not save a single cent by going purely PC gaming. He is the type of person who would also spend $50 a pop on PC games every time. If he's that bad at saving money, think how much he'll waste on buying a new computer. I wouldn't be surprised if he went with Alienware.

 

[MrGuvernment]

, if hardware modification becomes widespread, the mod providers will be easily found and jailed/fined. The risk of providing hardware mods on a large scale is much higher than the risk of simply sharing ISOs online. For this reason, console pirating will never become widespread.

Thats funny, mod providers can already be found and it is already widely spread considering..., the problem is they CANT be jailed because they run from countries the U.S cant touch and places laws dont make what they do illegal , modding will always happen, if it becomes more wide spread it goes more underground but you will always have that friend who says "pssst, hey, i can get that modded for you"

as you say making an ISO availible is easy online, fine, more bootCD by-passing will occur, download the ISO, burn, place into console, TADDA, now boot burnt game and it works, no modding occuring, what about USB devices, plug in and go, no soldering needed, any joe blow can do it.

if man made it, man will break it.

 

[maleficarus]

You know, I realize I'm going to get flamed to all hell for this, but here goes:

I consider the video game industry a lot like the movie, and music industrys.

They demand profits that far exceed the value of their product. When a game is priced at 50 bucks or so no wonder people say to hell with that, it should be 5. I view this as a fault of the publishers, not the developers..

The video game industry is a racket. Lets create one copy of intellectual property, and sell rights to use copy's of that original copy, regardless of the fact that it cost us practically nothing to produce more copy's...That system is FUBAR! It looks attractive when you're the one making the profit, but the profit isn't justified. The fact is, until reasonable prices for games are charged (and by reasonable, I'd say 2-3 bucks for the cardboard and media, and then perhaps another 2-3 bucks for the game/software/intellectual property.) piracy will continue to occur - and it should.

The belief that its alright to MASSIVELY overcharge the end user of intellectual property, be it games, movies, or music - is flat out wrong. The only reason its still done today is because publishers have gotten away with it in the past.

Treat your customer fair, and they will treat you fair, by actually paying you for the product.

I think we should all pay for PC games. If we all end up using bogus versions we found off the net at some point in time all these game makers will suddendly stop making PC games. It is cause and effect...

There is so many great PC games out there that need to be supported. For example I downloaded off steam a game called Red Orchestra. I think it cost me something like $14.95. Turns out to be a great game and one I play the most. Support the gaming industry guys seriously.

 

[TerranUp16]

Red Orchestra is awesome- it offers perhaps the best representation of the Eastern Front that has made it onto store "shelves" (I got my copy before I started using Steam) in the US (can't speak for other countries), and it does so through multiplayer, which makes it all the more impressive. Of course, it is also another mod-turned-game, but it was only $20 at launch I think and definitely worth every dollar I payed (the support is very good- a few months ago they even released a patch w/graphical updates, which is not something very many games do, certainly something no console game does Plus, with mods like this in the works, its longevity continues to grow).

 

[Manny Calavera]

could that leave the owner of the valid cd with a ban? Im pretty sure a cd key generator could generate a cd key that exist .

Of course,but many,and I'd venture to say we have a lot of those people on here,DONT GIVE A GOOD GOD DAMN about others,so of course they'd have no problem at all with stealing software off the net,rather then do the right thing and PAY for it.

Paying 3 or 4 or 500 for a fast video card,or 1500 or 2k for a system,and or having a fast net connection seems to give many a sense of entitlement,with music,games,movies.

Most know they'll likely never get caught by the authorities so they grab whatever they can with no regard as to how it might effect the hard work of others and thier families.

Its a free for all.In fact its been that way for years.

 

[Manny Calavera]

Your propogating piracy, and by doing so your not just affecting the particular game developer and/or publisher, your affecting an entire industry just a little bit. Multiply that by several million people, and you get huge monetary loss. If you use a P2P software program to download it, your usually making it easier for someone else to download it that might have actually purchased the game by giving the host a reason to continue serving up the file, and/or uploading it yourself via the P2P program your using. If you cannot afford the game, but still wanted the game, you might be able to actually save a few dollars and buy it in the future. If you had no intention of purchasing it in the first place, you either (1) can't afford it and want it, refer to previous reason, or (2) don't really want the game in the first place, you may be propogating it by downloading it through P2P (or a website, or other, etc. etc.), and why the fuck are you downloading it in the first place?

That a good enough explanation?

How about the fact that people pirating PC games in the first place is why they are so goddamn expensive, and why so many great game developers have slowly gone out of business or switched to consoles or making horrid games for cell phones?

Quite Frankly, your reasoning sounds like a child who can't seem to see beyond himself.

QFT

QFT !!!!!!!!

But there are a lot of idiot children on the net,and right here on [H],that live in a moral abyss,and will never wake up.And they'll try,unsuccessfully,to play all the semantics games they can to get away from the truth.

 

[TerranUp16]

No Copy Protection = Better Sales?

Stardock seems to think so.

I remember hearing at a conference that when an executive at a big publisher heard that Galactic Civilizations II shipped with no CD copy protection that they quipped “I hope bankruptcy treats them well.”

Millions of dollars in sales later as one of the top selling PC strategy games at retail (according to NPD) over the past couple of years let’s me say “Ha!” in response. And this is on a game that made most of its money on digital sales.

I don’t like piracy. I don’t like people using stuff my friends and I worked very hard on for years without compensating us. But I also can make the distinction between piracy and lost sales. That’s a distinction that most DRM and copy protection schemes ignore.

Recall that the NPD does not presently measure digital sales.

 

[Frosteh]

Theres several good examples of games using certain copy protection like Starforce had the fans rebel and boycott the game before release which actually pushed developers towards using a less brutal copy protection system. Theres also accounts of the opposite happening where decent games with shoddy copy protection doing very well, just look at CoD4 which has now out sold Halo3, they messed up the copy protection system and still outsold Halo3.

What it comes down to is making a quality game, developers are all too fast to blame lack of sales on piracy when in fact they've made a pretty mediocre game in an age where we have hundreds of decent games to pick from.

The market is getting saturated and now more than ever the competiton is getting tight, you can't make a medicore profit from a mediocre game anymore, you have to produce something which can compete, and not everyone can do that.

Developers should stop wasiting money on crap copy protection systems that don't work and rather invest that money into the development of the game, extend the play testing a few weeks or hire another coder to fix the bugs etc.

 

[pxc]

and or having a fast net connection seems to give many a sense of entitlement,with music,games,movies.

That hits the nail squarely on the head.

So sad and so true.

 

[KingPariah777]

I think that the more games are made to be online only, the easier it will be to enforce copyrights.

Developers need to imbed their copyright protection all over the source code.

edit: That was the laziest, stupidest response I have ever made in the Hardforums. It doesn't even make sense. I apologize.

 

[TerranUp16]

Btw, you guys might want to check out the latest Games for Windows: The Official Magazine (aka CGW- same mag, just a different name and cover plus a 5-7 page GFW advertisement somewhere in the middle; still has the best PC reviews around imo) for its cover story- Battlefield Heroes. Basically, BFH is going to be free to the end user (there will be some microtransactions, but DICE claims 95% of users will never pay a dime; additionally, those seem more orientated towards aesthetic character customization and paying money instead of time- for example, you'll be able to pay for an ability that will let you earn XP faster; ultimately, DICE is not basing BFH's financial success on its ability to generate microtransactions- they seem to be more of a fallback, imo) and will rely on ads (amazingly, not in-game). How? Same as Qtrax more or less, but for games- the more people you can attract to downloading and playing your game, the more hits you can get on your site, therefore the more you can charge for ads...

 

[Ocellaris]

Developers should stop wasiting money on crap copy protection systems that don't work and rather invest that money into the development of the game, extend the play testing a few weeks or hire another coder to fix the bugs etc.

Copy protection schemes rarely cost enough so that they could be traded for "weeks" of additional playtesting. Also its usually the publishers investing $ in the copy protection as well, and this has no affect on how funding is made available to the devs to make the game.

 

[Frosteh]

Copy protection schemes rarely cost enough so that they could be traded for "weeks" of additional playtesting. Also its usually the publishers investing $ in the copy protection as well, and this has no affect on how funding is made available to the devs to make the game.

I hear the top level protection of starforce is very expensive actually, and fundamentally it still doesn't work. I'll see if I can find some figures for it. (not to mention additional support required to serve the countless thousands that run into trouble with it, see Bioshock)

 

[TerranUp16]

Steam Grows to 15 Million Users

Valve's PC digital distribution platform Steam now has over 15 million user accounts, with the company reporting a 158% growth in holiday sales over those of the last season.

Gabe Newell-

PC gaming is thriving, and has evolved into an era of constant connectivity. That connectivity gives us the ability to have a much better relationship with customers, not just for delivering our games, but across all aspects of our business--including the design, development, and support of our games.

15 million users... that tops (or nears, at least) XBL's, no? Not to mention that should give a modest indication of the potential market Steam has for digital distribution. And the NPD doesn't count any Steam sales... Not to mention that it doesn't count any other digital distribution sales (for example, I got Sins of a Solar Empire from Stardock directly- speaking of Sins... awesome game =).

 

[Big D.]

Yeah, PC gaming isn't dying anytime soon, that's for sure.

We're simply moving everything online. We play online games and we buy them online too. I'll say it again:

Merely a few years ago there were only Valve games and mods on STEAM. Now we have some of the top publishers and developers in the world selling their games through it. Some games are already announced to be released simultaneousely in stores and on STEAM. That should give you an idea of how huge of a maket this is. And keep in mind this is just the beginning for the online distribution of games.

People simply underestimate PC games and assume that every game needs to sell 5+ million copies to make a profit when in fact most don't even need to sell 100k.

 

[TerranUp16]

Not to mention that PC games that people expect to sell 5 million copies definitely have the potential to do so- just not immediately.

 

[Big D.]

Not to mention that PC games that people expect to sell 5 million copies definitely have the potential to do so- just not immediately.

Exactly. Some of the most known PC franchises like Quake, Doom, Unreal, CS, etc. took years to sell millions, so that's perfectly normal.

I think if PC game makes (or publishers) would all spend 5-10 million dollars in advertising, PC games would sell much better on day one too, but most simply don't need to sell that many copies to begin with and they don't all have that much extra money to spend. PC games, apart from WoW, are rarely advertised on TV, for example, where as console games are on TV all the time. Obviousely when you have 20 million people a day watching your commercial, your product will sell better, regardless of its quality.

 

[TerranUp16]

From www.sinsofasolarempire.com (official website of SoaSE)-

And what about sales?
#2 at Amazon.com, #3 at EBGames.com / Gamestop (And it sold out, they've replenished). Sales at other retailers who have it in stock say it's "selling very well" (but no rankings yet).
Why is this significant?
Because the reviews haven't hit yet. People are buying this game sight unseen despite relatively little coverage, PC gamers so much want a real time strategy game that has 4X depth that they are going out, en masse to find out more about this game and buying it.
You are making your voices heard. People who buy PC games may have consoles but they don't necessarily want their PC games to simply be ported console games or console-like games.
We thank you for your support! We hope we are living up to your expectations.

Article Link

 

[Big D.]

Very nice. I hope it does well, just to promote these "different" games.

 

[TerranUp16]

Very nice. I hope it does well, just to promote these "different" games.

That and the fact that Sins is undoubtedly one of the best RTS games ever, up there w/StarCraft and Company of Heroes.

 

[Canadian in Berlin]

Don't forget the completely DRM free-ness of it. The only thing you lose from pirating is the inability to download patches (until they appear on bit torrent ) and such. That said, anyone who pirates these games with no intention to purchase, is a truly sick person.

These are kinds of policies, beliefs and QUALITY OF GAMES are what will hopefully be the future of PC gaming.

If we have fewer Epics putting out buggy, unoptimised piece of shit brainless console clones, so much the better.

 

[TerranUp16]

8 Reasons Why PC Gaming Isn't Dead