piracy

[jiggy]

This is probably a daft question but should you pay for something if you realy like it and you can get it for free. I buy all my games legit but not my music unless its very good.
CRYTEC the makers of crysis are in trouble and are blameing piracy
http://www.tomshardware.com/crytek-crysis-piracy,video-276.html

[biffo1]

to b honest mate its a buzz gettin ur games , music, movies and what ever else u get for free , just imo lol

[Seedy_r0m]

I've got to agree with some of the comments, the game is too graphically intensive for the majority of PC users.
By the time they've spec'd their boxes high enough to run it, they can't afford the game :)

I'm not as much of a gamer as I used to be, I usually end up buying them rather than downloading them.

UT3 will be my next purchase as soon as I can put enough oomph in my machine to take it.

Can't remember the last album I bought, have downloaded 100's.

I do buy DVD's regularly though.

The last movie I downloaded was Doomsday...that's 1hr 45minutes of my life that I won't get back. What a pile of cack!

I only download stuff as I don't have the space for all those CD & DVD cases, & I'm doing my bit to save the planet by storing all my stuff electronically.

[Raven]

Depending on what forums you go on you will get people frowning on piracy and etc etc....but IMO everyone does it, it's just not everyone openly admits it for obvious reasons.

The thing to remember is that for every copy downloaded ilegally they have lost one potential buyer, possibly, but the thing to remember is that they are still pulling down 40 quid per person who is buying the game legit. Thing is the companies can say what they want about piracy but where games are concerned it is not a black and white scenario anymore, and the games companies are as much to blame.

Think of it this way, if the game is awesome and well worth the money - go buy it. End of story. It's true that an original game beats a copy anyday for durability and packaging. But the problem is how do we know the game won't be the most overhyped pile of crap ever ? like Halo 3. How do we know if we will like or enjoy the game or not ? we don't until we play them. And stores get increasingly tight about returning PC games, trust me. Even though statutory law says otherwise.

Then there's the problem of companies putting out shitty games with a brand name title, just to make money at the expense of customers. Or what about the companies putting online key checks in their games, thereby screwing nobody but the ones who paid for their game at the store ?

Basically yeah, game devs are as much to blame nowadays for pulling a fast one, and bleeding heart store employees are not helping, the thing to remember is that these games are selling for 40 quid a piece, the game devs will be minted if the game is good in most cases end of story, but piracy is a big problem for them, but for us it's a necessary evil for a number of reasons, but end of the day if you like the game and play it alot then yes you should buy it, since you know you won't take it back and you also know the devs deserve your money because you know you enjoy the game and that it's worth 40 quid.

Some companies like Bethesda, makers of Elder Scrolls Oblivion, have the right idea...no online activations or checks, no license keys, just a well crafted game and an extra incentive or two for buying the game legit. Little things you can only get with an original.

[Jaffa]

In this house we have hundreds of box sets and any major film which is good we buy, my daughters buy albums if they are good but always download it 1st to see if it is worth buying. Myself...I buy nothing as I dont play games really except psp now and again and I download the games for that.

The majority of things I download is TV series from the US as they get them before us.

[dc_uk]

The reason their sales are so poor is that game will not run stably unless you're running the very latest and most expensive hardware. An average consumer isn't going to pay 500 quid for a graphics card, so perhaps instead of trying to push the performance of their engine, they should have worked on making it run decent on lesser hardware. Literally the only people I know who have played that game have pirated it, just to see how their hardware perform.

[C64]

Rather shamefully, these days I pay for nothing.

Haven't done since about 1997, I do feel some slight guilt if I'm playing a game and I'm really enjoying it, but never enough to make me go out and buy it.

The only original game that I own is a copy of a PC adventure called 'Scratches', the only reason I've got that is because I was a beta tester and was given the game for free from the authors!

[DirtyAce]

I pay for my DVDs and Games thats about it.

Considering punting my DVDs though seeing as ive got a new terra drive.

[mini-moog]

i buy ps3 games for obvious reasons!

[C64]

Aye, a 1 terrabyte drive full of ~~~~ and Rangers clips.

[doobiest]

i buy origonal films and albums but only after getting them off newsgroups and deeming them worthy of taking up my shelf space!

never paid for a pc game although i do buy 360 games to go live with.

[Raven]

That's the best way to do it if you are on the fence as it were. Generally I dl most of my stuff and in the past I would only buy if I couldn't find. You know what I mean lol. But now I am pretty much only buying what I know is good at a reasonable price, especially now with store policies being as tight as the can possibly be, IE no refunds you buy it you're stuck with it....so I have to be very careful that what I pay for is worth the money. That's the beauty of newsgroups. Glorified renting lol.

[davidharvey75]

It's all a big can of worms imho!
If you recorded a tv show from the tele onto vhs years ago then gave it to a friend or family member to watch, thats copyright!
If you recorded a song from the radio onto cassette and gave it to someone thats Copyright!
But strangely all the big companies, still sold vhs recorders, the same way as they sell dvd recorders now, and if they didn't want you to watch or download movies from the web then surely they wouldn't put divx/xvid playback on their dvd players!
I'm not much of a gamer. Ps3 and pro evo thats about it. And oh yes it plays divx and vobs and mp3's. Funny that. We can't all take that many family videos that need to be compressed down to a downloadable size!

But thats just me.

[Raven]

Yeah it won't change anything, there's alot of game dev mergers and takeovers going on at the minute, despite this the gaming industry is in a boom period. Seems some companies, EA, want a piece of another companies success, Rockstar Games with GTA IV.

Anyhow back to piracy, the industry is in a boom period so business and popularity is as high as it's ever been, other companies are obviously using piracy to fuel their own business but any such company has nothing to do with the source material. They see it as piracy is just there so we will exploit it to make money for ourselves, and that's the thing at the end of the day, everybody is out for themselves...games developers are minted and look like sustaining it because of the boom period, other areas of business are making money themselves from piracy indirectly, and we basically dl for free and try to avoid a sting in the wallet by trying before we buy, but alot just dl and keep. So we are all happy in a sense that nobody has nothing, the only people losing out are the game devs but they are richer than you or me anyway.

And some game devs are far too greedy, and I am looking at EA. If I bought every single game that I own in future I would still dl particular EA games because frankly I don't like EA as a company and I wouldn't give them my money.

[six2]

i D/L albums for 1 reason, when you go out and buy this album what you have seen on TV that they make look good and sound great only to play it and like 3 tracks out of 15.
as for films i D/L 99% of them, most of the time they dont even make it to dvd, watch them on pc then get rid, if its a film that i really like i will go buy it when asda have it in there bargin bin ?4.99.
i buy all my games for the 360/wii, as for pc its 50/50 dl first then buy if i like. all the games cost a bomb, so why not try before you buy lol

[jimbo69jones]

the only reason I've got that is because I was a beta tester and was given the game for free from the authors!

That just narrowed the search down by 70 million people ;)

[spog000]

folks have coped stuff for years vinal to tape cd to cd-r dvd to dvd-r. downloding stuff of the net just makes it easy

[johnfox1]

do it quet and fast, dont get busted after the first warning!

[cerocool007]

I pay for my DVDs and Games thats about it.

[antos88]

Rather shamefully, these days I pay for nothing.

Haven't done since about 1997, I do feel some slight guilt if I'm playing a game and I'm really enjoying it, but never enough to make me go out and buy it.

The only original game that I own is a copy of a PC adventure called 'Scratches', the only reason I've got that is because I was a beta tester and was given the game for free from the authors!

How did you go about getting into 'beta testing'

[andy211081]

i download tv shows from the US but is that really piracy? when they are shown on Uk tv channels a week or so later than the US and then if you sky+ is that classed as piracy?

The thing is with piracy...they sell you the tools but say not to use them illegally...probs 70% of people with a cd or dvd burner will have used to burn a disc that contains downloaded or pirated material.

[rayf]

can you help, i am trying to download movies but dont know what the best site to use is, what converter to use to put them onto disc...... all help appreciated