The future of gaming: Will we let them continue to abuse us?

[Slava]

EDITED to add the following:

I have been a gamer for 22 years and own around 1000 (a thousand) games. I used to trust developers/publishers to *sell* me the product to keep and enjoy forever and ever, just like that Monopoly board game I have in my closet. But it was only recently that I found that these days End User Licensing Agreements are such that they don't provide for my ownership of even single-player games.

I do suspect that I am not the only one who is/was in the dark about everything that has changed. For this reason I posted the below. Sound off, let everyone know what you think.

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Electronic Arts (EA) has been on a trek for profits showing complete disregard for the clients (gamers). They have destroyed many creative developer studios only to cash in on their good names.

The most recent outrage is what happened to BioWare. As most of you, I have been a loyal and loving fan of BioWare and its games for decades (since Baldur's Gate series). But now this love affair has come to a bitter end.

Since EA took over BioWare they have destroyed the following games/franchises:
Dragon Age (2)
Star Wars: The Old Republic
Mass Effect (3)

Don't take my word for it. Do some searching on the web and skip positive 1-liner reviews. Instead read long and detailed negative reviews.

How did this happen? Why did this happen? Well, I pay close attention to the stock market and company earnings reports. Here's how and why it happened (just the most recent examples):

EA did not have a very good 2011, so in the last quarter of 2011 (on December 20) they decided to push to the market the broken and unfinished game of Star Wars: The Old Republic (SWTOR). It is essentially a single-payer game with barely usable or non-existent multiplayer components for which they want to charge monthly subscription fees. They did it, following aggressive advertising and hyped-up, misleading marketing, to improve sales numbers for the last quarter of 2011 and millions of gamers (myself included) were raped and robbed as the result.

Now, that the gaming community is on to them and SWTOR sales/subscriptions are not doing that great, they decided to push to the market the long-anticipated Mass Effect 3, even though it is a defective, buggy, unfinished game which does not deliver anything that was promised. Why? Because the end of the first quarter of 2012 is near and they need to show decent sales numbers.

(Search the web for GAMER reviews, not critic's reviews as all critics are on EA's payroll: How else would we explain why there is such a glaring discrepancy in critic and player ratings of the said games [not to mention that all critics' web sites, such as Gamespot have huge and colorful game ads on their front pages]? Conflict of interests anyone?)

So what we get lately is lousy games with Disk Locked Content for consoles/Downloadable Content for PC (DLC) for which you have to pay extra if you want the possibility of hope that you can enjoy the game(s). Gone are the days when you bought a disc for under $50.00 and actually owned the game you bought, free to play it forever, no matter how many times you upgraded/replaced your PC. The quality of games controlled by EA has been ever decreasing while prices and other charges have been ever increasing. But that's not all.

EA are not only destroying gaming as we know it, they are also infringing on our basic rights as consumers by making us accept their licensing agreements which boil down to the following (Don't take my word for it. READ the EULA for any EA game you have installed):

1. YOU have NO rights whatsoever;
2. THEY have NO liabilities or obligations to you whatsoever;
3. YOU own NOTHING. You should pray to EA asking them to allow you to pay for the license to touch their products;
4. THEY have the right to yank your privilege of touching their products and to yank support at their leisure and YOU have NO recourse if they do so (which results in your being unable to play the game anymore whenever they decide they don't want to support it anymore).
5. THEY will install spywares on your computer and collect your information and YOU cannot do anything about it; the Spyware known as SecuROM will continue to sit on your hard drive even if you uninstall all EA products and never install any new ones ever.
6. And if you install their games (and accept the License Agreement) you WAVE your right to sue them for any reason or be a part of any Class Action law suit against them.

Join me in my efforts to drive the gaming community to BOYCOTT ALL EA games regardless of the platform. Don't buy them no matter what. It is time gamers took a stand against abuse by this horrible company.

 

[casualcolors]

Let's play a Yes or No game and see which of my statements are inaccurate...

1. DRM does not prevent piracy but creates problems for legit users, also results in de-facto renting games, not owning them – Accurate?

2. EULAs deprive customers/gamers of all rights while absolving EA/BW of all responsibilities/liabilities – Accurate?

2.1. They will promise one thing, ship to you something else and refuse to take it back and refund your money …. because you accepted the EULA (see my post above re: SWTOR and ME3) – Accurate?

3. Most people are unaware of (2 and 2.1 above) since they think that the publishers can be trusted to do the right thing and these people should be made aware of the above. – Accurate?

4. DLC, supposedly only cosmetic, is often not. Two examples:

a) ME3 begins with a cinematic and a story-relevant dialogue which is based entirely on events from a ME2 DLC. One of the most recent user reviews on Amazon for ME3 PC describes this in detail. I quote:

"Another important detail related to the story, when the introduction begins you don't really understand what the characters are talking about because they are referring to a story that happened in a DLC of Mass Effect2... Bioware said it wasn't important but the beginning of the game starts with a huge reference to it. So in other words, we had to pay for downloadable content to get the whole story... I've never seen something like that, what were they thinking?"

So if you happened NOT to buy that DLC you sit there and wonder what the hell they are talking about; THIS is predatory.

b) The ME3 notorious 'Day 1 DLC' is lore/back story relevant, not simply cosmetic. Granted, ME3 fails to deliver on the much hyped up promise of making all your past actions/decisions have consequences, so presence or absence of the DLC Prothean is also largely inconsequential. However, this does not invalidate the statement that if you don't buy this DLC you will not learn some of the most important truths about the past history of ME universe. This handling of DLC content is, at the very least, unethical. – Accurate?

5. There isn't a major Activision/Blizzard game which was hyped up to be a Rolls Royce but turned out to be a pile of stinking garbage. EA/BW have done this with at least two major games: SWTOR and ME3 – Accurate?

6. Your statement regarding how Activision is preying on WoW population is laughable. You are comparing apples and oranges. If WoW players want to buy vanity pets for cash – it is totally fine. What EA/BW does with DLC is completely different. They are not trying to sell you a vanity pet or a pretty dress which you can easily do without. In the case of Mass Effect they sell you story-relevant and consequential content; and as described in (4) above this sort of thing forces you to buy the DLC. It is not purely optional as WoW's vanity non-combat pets you refer to in one of your replies in this thread. - Accurate?


7. Every time EA takes over a developer studio it pushes its unfinished/broken products to the market to meet sales goals following massive and misleading hype and advertising campaigns (it is easy to find proof/examples. See my post above about SWTOR and ME3 and Check the fate of Spore to start) – Accurate?

8. "Official critics'" reviews give stellar scores to EA/BW games while gamers give the same games abysmal scores; "Official critics" display colorful ads on their sites for the games to which they give stellar reviews/scores. Conflict of interests. – Accurate?

Do you honestly believe these things do not justify boycotting EA?

Your last question serves as proof that you're still vastly out of your depth in this topic. None of these complaints that you have are EA exclusive, most weren't pioneered by EA or any of their development studios, half are subjective (at best) and you've officially adopted the stance of ipso-facto supporting Activision as to remain diametrically opposed to me. If you don't think that last position will get you laughed off of any forum discussion on any gaming forum anywhere, including activision's own forums, you're sorely mistaken.

But to address a couple of your points directly:

1. Accurate-DRM does not prevent piracy. Worth noting, digital DRM was pioneered by Valve with Steam and all of your DRM woes and lack of physical ownership start there.

2.Inaccurate-Almost every country has laws completely subverting EULA's that are rewritten after the date of purchase in all games without month-by-month fees as the date of purchase marks the beginning and end of financial obligation for both parties. In effect, the ever-changing EULA's are about as legally binding as an unwitnessed handshake, if you really want to spend the time fighting the wording in one. Screaming about EULA's has always come directly from those who are least informed, and the least intelligent.
-2.1: we both know that you're referring to your specific and personal complaints with a finished product (ie Mass Effect 3) however it's not the EULA which protects the integrity of this software. It's the fact that despite your temper-tantrum, there are still millions of people who love the game. This compromises the traction of your complaint, regardless of validity.

3. Almost everyone is aware of the implications of both DRM and shifting EULAs. You're attempting to project your own naivety on everyone around you.

4. Mass Effect's DLC is pretty crucial to the story, but me and antizig both touched on what DLC's should consist of and we both agree that this form of DLC is morally wrong. However the game was built from the ground up by Bioware with day 1 DLC for a crucial part of the story. Your complaint lies with them as much as anyone.

5.EVERY*** Blizzard-Activision product has been overly hyped and had very little yield by comparison. Do you even know what the collective marketing budget of Blizzard-Activision looks like? lol

6. You're projecting character qualities onto the WoW-community that they don't have. This topic is largely subjective but if you want to discuss it privately feel free to shoot me a message in proper english.

7.It's the Developer's goal to get the game out the door as much as it is EA's. It's a business, and they are both out to take your money with the least investment possible to do so successfully. Welcome to the reality of business.

8.Too subjective to argue. You're falling into the trap of "the big guys vs. the little guys" which is how it always wants to be portrayed by the little guy. It gives him the air of validity when more often than not, all he wants to be is the big guy. All video game reviews are subjective. A perfect example to counter your example with ME3, is Duke Nukem Forever. Every major reviewer said that the game was awful, while a lot of the lesser-known reviewers tried to give the game a more even-keeled review. At the end of the day I tried the game, and it was one of the worst games I have ever played. Regardless of what you want to say about IGN or Gamespot, their reviews of the game were more accurate as per my taste. So there is nothing universal in this argument and it changes game-by-game, and person-by-person.

At the end of the day, none of these things specifically justify boycotting EA in particular. Moreso they signal that maybe it's time for you personally to step out of the mainstream game market and start looking at indie developers that will satisfy your sense of fiscal morality (not that they don't want your money just as badly, or with any more effort).

I really don't think that you have any of the required background, or even the longevity of interest to debate this. Antizig takes up your stance in a much more responsible way, and makes much sounder points. I don't doubt your claim of "22 years of gaming experience" or whatever, but I also get the sneaking suspicion that at most, 2 years of those 22 consist of any awareness of the gaming industry's practice as a whole. You just seem incredibly naive and incredibly misinformed and misguided. Sorry.

 

[Slava]

You can boycott EA for whatever and no reason all day. But they definitively are only an expression of the core problem.

Personally, I'm curious how Activision will handle future titles, including Diablo III. There's some fishy *** going on, too. Like the RMAH stuff with in-game currency only viable within Activision games, etc. ...

All this stuff makes me more and more going F2P and generally way more patient with purchasing new games.

My recent experiences profoundly convinced me: I will not trust ANY new game from ANY publisher and I will not buy anything DRMed or otherwise convoluted (like you describe above).

I agree with you that the problem is larger than just EA. But most of my favorite games are older BW games and I feel especially sour because of what EA/BW merger resulted in.

 

[casualcolors]

My recent experiences profoundly convinced me: I will not trust ANY new game from ANY publisher and I will not buy anything DRMed or otherwise convoluted (like you describe above).

I agree with you that the problem is larger than just EA. But most of my favorite games are older BW games and I feel especially sour because of what EA/BW merger resulted in.

Well feeling sour is absolutely justified. Not just about Bioware changing their business model but about the game industry as a whole. And I'm not sure if it's a matter of trust per se, since the DRM's are pretty well exposed to modest research, but it can certainly be a responsible choice. Obviously when it comes to retail, you have the ability to vote yes or no on anything with your dollar. The best thing gamers could do collectively would be to unanimously vote no to things like DRM, day 1 DLC and so on, but unfortunately every pretty new title makes us weak in the knees! haha

 

[Jprobes]

As if there's no piracy for console games ...

You are pointing out semantics. The statement you make, while factually true (if taken as sarcasm), isn't useful as an argument.

Murder exists but that doesn't mean detouring society from engaging in it is not useful or putting in place laws (DRM) to stem the urge.

Piracy on consoles is inevitable. You cannot completely prevent it on any system that uses physical media. Eventually the cat will get outta the bag and run amok.

The PS3, until recently, about 1 year, was completely free of piracy. The Xbox has become very difficult to mod for piracy. Unlike the first generation of Xbox 360's, Microsoft have taken numerous steps to reduce and prevent piracy with AP25 and console redesigns.

My life has been personally effected by piracy. I see it as something completely different then what most people perceive it to be. Until you have become victim to it, you tend to not see it from the side of the game companies.

Take my situation for example. I am a structural engineer. I have a licensed stamp that essentially is what produces income for me and my employees. I do sub contracting work and recently, within the past 3 years, have done projects for a contractor.

Instead of coming back to me and negotiating new contracts for work outside the original scope of work on some of these projects they decided just to digitally rasterize my stamp and use it on whatever they saw fit without compensating me because they felt the amount that I would charge would be unfair because of how expensive the existing contracts were.

In the end they ended up paying me a hell of a lot more then they would of originally due to their illegal practices and in turn it effected them far beyond a monetary value due to other contractors finding out about there egregious errors in moral judgement.

Now to prevent this from happening in the future I have several options. Either take it for granted that it was a one time deal and proceed as business as usual or make changes to how I apply my stamp and require that it is to be done by hand, pushing the extra costs off into my contracts and forcing other contractors to deal with the inconvenience of only being released by hand stamped and signed documents, which in today's day and age, doesn't meld well.

So what do I do? I have the same problem as most game companies.

Push the inconvenience onto the customers because of past experiences. I cannot monitor the location of every document I stamped to ensure nothing shady is being done under its guise.

I have to take a duel action approach based on what i feel is best suited towards my interests. On large projects with lots of RFI's CO's and other modifications done in the field I require that my stamp be wet & hand dated to ensure that it does not get used on anything I am not being paid for.

Other projects that are small and less time consuming I am more then willing to expedite services and provide an electronic stamp.

Just because my stamp can be pirated doesn't mean that it will, in turn just because my stamp has been pirated doesn't mean that it will be.

I have to protect myself and my lively-hood as best as I see fit.

As much business that I might lose from my stringent demands, it doesn't matter at the end of the day as long as the clients are happy and my work is accurate. That is what drives my business.

Same goes for the customers of game developer. If the games are good then the DRM is irrelevant.

If the games are ***, then well, every that can be an issue will be an issue. Just to solidify opinions one way or another.

As for myself, I thoroughly enjoyed ME 1 & 2 and have yet to play 3.

Finals week for the wife so I spend most of that time working.

keep this discussion lively, its interesting alternative to the mass amounts of "SKYRIM DOESN'T WORK HELP!!!" threads. =o)

 

[casualcolors]

Good points all around, I just wanted to quote this little piece to ask you to elaborate. When you say production values were already down when they were making mass effect, do you mean ME3 or ME1?

Frankly I cannot recall right now what came out first ME1 or DAO, I believe DAO, but I'm leaning to believe that bioware was working on both games in approximately the same time frame and both games were absolutely fantastic.

I don't have a grasp on how good their production values were back in the period from Baldurs gate 2, through NWN and up to DAO/ME1 (whichever came first), as majority of those games I got acquainted with through retro gaming (didn't have a pc to game on, so only started digging for bioware titles after I've played jade empire). Baldurs Gate 2 I remember the original hype about because even though I was a kid I heard about it from my friends who had good computers at the time and could enjoy them.

I'm sorry I completely lost this post in the huge but very fun quagmire that this thread has started to turn into (I love it!). But to answer your question, I meant by the time Mass Effect 1 was being developed. Bioware had a lot of products predating the ME series that I thought were the height of their company artistically, but that could just be me. Mass Effect kind of felt like Bioware was a Vegas stripper who just heard about a whale in the crowd, and decides to run around shaking her ass extra hard hoping to cash in.

For reference ME1 was developed before DA:O. DA:O predates ME2. I just didn't think DA:O has everything as an rpg that their prior fantasy rpg's had.

Side note: Jprobes, your post was a really interesting read.

 

[Slava]

Same goes for the customers of game developer. If the games are good then the DRM is irrelevant.

Interesting story you told. Yet, I would ask you to elaborate on "If the games are good then the DRM is irrelevant."

The way it is now prevents customers from owning their copy of (a) game. Decommission the DRM server and the customer can't play the game, good, bad or indifferent. It seems the issue of DRM is relevant regardless…

The funny thing is that arguments for and against DRM may be compared to those for and against gun control – criminals will always obtain guns, and gun control laws only really apply to and affect law-abiding citizens by denying them the opportunity to protect themselves. Correct me if I am wrong, but as far as I recall the state which enjoys the lowest gun-related crime rate is Vermont while Vermont has zero restrictions of firearms. You live there? Got a valid address/driver's license? You have everything you need to buy any firearm – no waiting periods, nothing.

 

[AntiZig]

I would like to disagree with casualcolors statement that they had a choice in the matter, the console business has piracy just as PC business does, so turning to console development wasn't a solution to the problem. The solution to the problem had to be DRM, which is why it emerged. Plus, just turning around and go from PC dev to console dev isn't as easy as you make it sound (it might be easier today, but not 10 years ago)

Regardless of why the DRM began its existence, the outcry against DRM today is due to the fact that some companies chose to take it too far in attempt to finally beat the pirates.

Another issue with loss of revenue, both of you are correct. It's true that piracy results in direct loss for the publisher, the dev too, but not so much (afaik devs get a teeny bit from sales, but that's not the point). However, there's absolutely no way they can give you a correct dollar amount on how much they've lost to piracy.

If somebody wishes to argue that, let me explain, of all the multitude of torrent websites that are out there (mind you torrents isn't the only way to get a cracked game, alas it's the most convenient), there's no way they can count them all, plus, even if it was downloaded they got no proof the software was ever installed (some of you may argue then what was the point to download surely to install it!) No, not always the case, in third world countries such as where I grew up there was no EA, no Ubi and no any other kind. There was an electronics store and there was the market with little booths that sold various CDs. Both sold the same things for rather cheap (~$1-3 basically the cost of the cd + box) Typically, those games were pirated versions of english games, some of them were translated by legit companies into localization, some of them weren't. I'm sure those that were translated via legit channels (very few) kicked the royalties back to publisher (aka EA), but often times the localization was done by some cracking group. So, long story short, there's no way in hell the publisher can estimate how many of such copies of the game were burned to a CD and sold. I'm sure they would love to imagine that those numbers are in millions of copies, on which they would claim billions $$ in damages, but truth of the story, there's no way they can count that for sure.

So, those figures are completely bogus, based of whatever the monkey wanted to estimate the average piracy rate for their titles. The fact that it's direct loss of revenue for the publisher because the sales are truly being stolen from them is indeed a salty fact for them and the PC gamers that are causing it.

With all mentioned above, I would like again to point out, there's plenty of piracy on consoles too, the reason why it's not being hyped up as much as PC piracy is because corporate headquaters are located in the USA and thus they seemingly choose to ignore the situation in the EU and all other continents (which is where console piracy is almost effortless). [Don't make me tell a story how one of my console gaming friends went out of his way to get an EU console just so he could bypass securom protection on some console games he DLed from internet.]

 

[casualcolors]

Interesting story you told. Yet, I would ask you to elaborate on "If the games are good then the DRM is irrelevant."

The way it is now prevents customers from owning their copy of (a) game. Decommission the DRM server and the customer can't play the game, good, bad or indifferent. It seems the issue of DRM is relevant regardless…

The funny thing is that arguments for and against DRM may be compared to those for and against gun control – criminals will always obtain guns, and gun control laws only really apply to and affect law-abiding citizens by denying them the opportunity to protect themselves. Correct me if I am wrong, but as far as I recall the state which enjoys the lowest gun-related crime rate is Vermont while Vermont has zero restrictions of firearms. You live there? Got a valid address/driver's license? You have everything you need to buy any firearm – no waiting periods, nothing.

If the game is good no amount of DRM will stop pirates, and no amount of DRM will stop people from purchasing. DRM becomes doubly ineffective in both the positive and negative alternatives. But the thing that me and Antizig were discussing a bit earlier about DRM, and alternatives, is that DRM now is basically exploratory. Publishers are looking for the means by which to stem piracy. They already know their current forms of DRM don't work, which is why they try new methods all of the time. While it may serve as a good platform to complain about, it's basically them trying to keep the door to the PC platform open. It's not like publishers want to lose potential PC sales, but they don't want to lose revenue either, nor do they want to incur potential loss on a platform vice development time.

Your gun analogy was sort of proven to be irrelevant either way by Ubi's market probes. With or without DRM, their AAA titles were widely pirated. They actually spent years using varied forms and degrees of DRM to see if it had any impact on the pirating community, to essentially test the theory that piracy is a reaction to invasive DRM. At the end of the day, it appeared that piracy is more the result of people wanting stuff without paying for it. Which anyone could naturally infer.

 

[whatsthatnoise]

It was mainly sarcasm, but it was also pointed at the "pc gaming will die and the solution is console gaming" comment.


For your engineering work, there are patents you can register, which is not really possible with intellectual property.

You can trademark a name. But not an idea or type of game or an artwork in the same way. Sure intellectual property is protected by the law. But it can easily be adapted and renamed and becomes something new, without being different at core. Just take all the clones of popular games as an example. A company like Blizzard or whatever can't do something about it, but live up to being the first and innovate further (if possible).

I don't think the DRM becomes irrelevant if the game is good. It's still an inconvenience to the customer and a good game might just make it easier to endure, but not irrelevant. I still *cough* at steam all the time I start up Dirt3 and it does make me start it up way less than I would without it being bound to steam. Which could translate into not buying more of that product or type of protected product in the future. 😉

However, like I said before, I do understand that companies want to protect their products. And yes it's hard to find a good way to do it, probably not possible without compromises on both sides.

So maybe you are correct after all that a good product might lead to a happy customer most of the time. But it still doesn't feel like it and will not be the case, to/for me.

 

[Jprobes]

In addition,

Studies have been done about the extensive piracy of music and movies in foreign countries (Africa/Asia Mostly)

The leading factor into why piracy was rampant in certain parts of the world boiled down the asking price for said products.

Consumers didn't feel that the publishers asking price was consistent with the value, in turn, it becomes morally ignorable to pirate based on those assumptions.

You can see the results with ebooks and the recent DOJ investigation with price fixing by publishers around the time the Ipad came out.

Book published conspired to fix the pricing of books and take away the ability for distributors like Apple, Amazon, B&N to adjust the pricing of books as they see fit.

That is why most digital version of books cost more then a physical version. because the publishers see their products as more valuable then the consumer does.

Movies for what they are worth are overpriced. Same can be said for music beyond what people sale privately on their own web stores.

Gaming, it is the same on the retail end. Games tend to retain their MSRP far longer then what is acceptable with the consumer.

When you have game revisions that come out every year, IE Madden, that cost 60 dollars for little improvement, you are abusing the consumer.

In turn when you install systems that work well like Steam. You will see people more then willing to pony up money for games when they feel the value is worth the costs.

You can either sale 1 million copies of a game and risk 3 million being pirated. or you can sale 4 million at 1/3rd the assumed original cost and have 1.5 million pirated.

People pirate for different reasons. Most due it because the cost isn't worth the value. Some do it regardless of the cost of the game and an even larger segment that gets ignored by both sides are the lost sales to consumers who don't pirate yet don't feel the cost is worth the value,

The reason for the whole used game market for consoles.

When something exists despite all reason, you can't use reason to disprove it.

Edit:

The long and short of it is this. I don't feel as if DRM has any bearing for piracy whatsoever.

It doesn't detour it nor does it propagate it.

If developers/publishers were really interested in mitigating the effects of piracy they would adjust their pricing based on the consumer base to try and find the sweet spot between sale price and revenue.

As for the DRM servers being taken offline, that is a red herring scare tactic, D2 servers are still up, 10 years later.

By the time they take DRM servers down they will either patch the game to not require it or the amount of people playing the game will decrease to levels not significant to cause a public relations nightmare.

That being said, I would chose to think Developers would provide a way to circumvent the DRM servers when they are no longer required to protect revenue.

But then again we are talking about developers and publishers... :lol:

 

[casualcolors]

I would like to disagree with casualcolors statement that they had a choice in the matter, the console business has piracy just as PC business does, so turning to console development wasn't a solution to the problem. The solution to the problem had to be DRM, which is why it emerged. Plus, just turning around and go from PC dev to console dev isn't as easy as you make it sound (it might be easier today, but not 10 years ago)

Regardless of why the DRM began its existence, the outcry against DRM today is due to the fact that some companies chose to take it too far in attempt to finally beat the pirates.

Another issue with loss of revenue, both of you are correct. It's true that piracy results in direct loss for the publisher, the dev too, but not so much (afaik devs get a teeny bit from sales, but that's not the point). However, there's absolutely no way they can give you a correct dollar amount on how much they've lost to piracy.

To the first paragraph, I know what you're saying and I remember how wide the delta between PC and console was 10 years ago (and 15-16 years ago at that even), but also in those days PC-to-console theft via emulation, daemon tools, ios burning etc truly pales in comparison to PC-to-PC torrent theft today.

To the issue of revenue I don't think anyone has ever said, "We've lost 25.5 million dollars to pirates this quarter" for instance, because obviously that would be a fictionalized number. You're right there is no exact metric by which to attach a dollar value to the topic. However, what you can say is that sales are down 250% on a AAA title, on a platform with a 10% smaller consumer base vice another. This is hyperbole but obviously you see how those numbers get drafted. People build their entire careers on such analysis.

 

[casualcolors]

In addition,

Studies have been done about the extensive piracy of music and movies in foreign countries (Africa/Asia Mostly)

The leading factor into why piracy was rampant in certain parts of the world boiled down the asking price for said products.

Consumers didn't feel that the publishers asking price was consistent with the value, in turn, it becomes morally ignorable to pirate based on those assumptions.

You can see the results with ebooks and the recent DOJ investigation with price fixing by publishers around the time the Ipad came out.

Book published conspired to fix the pricing of books and take away the ability for distributors like Apple, Amazon, B&N to adjust the pricing of books as they see fit.

That is why most digital version of books cost more then a physical version. because the publishers see their products as more valuable then the consumer does.

Movies for what they are worth are overpriced. Same can be said for music beyond what people sale privately on their own web stores.

Gaming, it is the same on the retail end. Games tend to retain their MSRP far longer then what is acceptable with the consumer.

When you have game revisions that come out every year, IE Madden, that cost 60 dollars for little improvement, you are abusing the consumer.

In turn when you install systems that work well like Steam. You will see people more then willing to pony up money for games when they feel the value is worth the costs.

You can either sale 1 million copies of a game and risk 3 million being pirated. or you can sale 4 million at 1/3rd the assumed original cost and have 1.5 million pirated.

People pirate for different reasons. Most due it because the cost isn't worth the value. Some do it regardless of the cost of the game and an even larger segment that gets ignored by both sides are the lost sales to consumers who don't pirate yet don't feel the cost is worth the value,

The reason for the whole used game market for consoles.

When something exists despite all reason, you can't use reason to disprove it.

Absolutely agree with your reasoning behind piracy. I'm sure it goes without saying though that none of this can be used as justification for the act itself, as it's still theft. If the product's price doesn't meet with your interpretation of its value, your only recourse within the bounds of the law is to simply not purchase it. Opting to steal it instead is what lands us in such a long debate as this 15 years down the road =P.

 

[Slava]

<...>Your gun analogy was sort of proven to be irrelevant either way by Ubi's market probes. With or without DRM, their AAA titles were widely pirated<...>

You conveniently avoid the main point I make about DRM and that point is that DRM prevents you from owning your copy of the game. As such DRM punishes you, not the pirate who DOES own his copy of the pirated game. So the gun control analogy is completely valid whereas criminals possess firearms while good citizens are denied the right to protect themselves.

By the way, I did acknowledge that I found out about DRM and what it really does fairly recently; yet you stoop to the level of a third-grader when you imply that I lack intelligence. Kudos to you for that, it was refreshing. I guess there's the first time for everything. I may be idealistic (and, as such, naïve), fine. In any event, you will forgive me if I do not acknowledge any of your posts in this thread going forward.

 

[casualcolors]

You conveniently avoid the main point I make about DRM and that point is that DRM prevents you from owning your copy of the game. As such DRM punishes you, not the pirate who DOES own his copy of the pirated game. So the gun control analogy is completely valid whereas criminals possess firearms while good citizens are denied the right to protect themselves.

By the way, I did acknowledge that I found out about DRM and what it really does fairly recently; yet you stoop to the level of a third-grader when you imply that I lack intelligence. Kudos to you for that, it was refreshing. I guess there's the first time for everything. I may be idealistic (and, as such, naïve), fine. In any event, you will forgive me if I do not acknowledge any of your posts in this thread going forward.

So far you haven't acknowledged anything that has been posted in this thread, at least not to any extent that would imply a firm grasp of the content. I don't see why you would start now.

And you seem to be using things like DRM, DLC, and Digitalization almost interchangeably at this point. I'm not sure if it's a result of frustration or what have you, but DRM isn't what prevents you from owning a copy of your game. The digitalization of the entire medium is what prevents that. And that was a change that PC gamers supported because it brought lower prices.

As for the argument that your games can be taken away from you at any time when the authentication servers go down, surely true. Of everyone. Steam, Origin, Amazon, GOG, GF and so on. But the fact that there hasn't been a AAA title in the post-DRM age yet to actually suffer this fate, you have to understand that the argument is hard to take seriously. That is why people continue to buy these digital copies at a reduced cost.

I'm aware that you've only just recently discovered some of the realities of the digital media age, but that doesn't excuse (or even begin to explain) why you think it's fair to proselytize on the subject when by your own admission, you're not in a position to do so. You've met every post that dissents from your view of the subject with a forcefully obtuse response, or zero recognition at all. lol That is the sign of someone out of their depth. Essentially every fact or view that is inconvenient to your reactionary approach gets met with a resounding, "nuh-uh!"

 

[whatsthatnoise]

What I don't like about things like Steam, MS Games for Windows and whatever else alike there is out there is security. Since there is no such thing as online security (everything can be hacked).

Personal Data, especially paying info (credit cards woohoo) aren't safe ... just take "Sony 2 times in a row" as an example ... and the more this market is going to be purely digital, the less people who want to buy a copy of a game in a shop and take it home to play it will have no choice, but to stop playing all together. That's what will reduce the number of customers, too.

That's why I think the "Microsoft One Time Activation" thing is okay, you don't have to register personal information, you can choose how and where to pay for it. You own a copy of it.


I agree that a huge part of the issue is piracy itself, that lead to the current situation.

 

[Jprobes]

That is the *** thing about life.

The only things you will ever own in this life are the things no one else wants.

Mistakes and Kids.

Everything else is up for grabs once you die or lose your ability to secure it.

 

[whatsthatnoise]

That is the *** thing about life.

The only things you will ever own in this life are the things no one else wants.

Mistakes and Kids.

Everything else is up for grabs once you die or lose your ability to secure it.

Hehe, guess it all comes down to that! :lol: 😉

 

[Jprobes]

And lastly, don't even get me started on corporate software piracy.

The *** I have to jump through to use some of the programs I use make gaming DRM look like blowjobs and lollypops.

Just sayin'

 

[Slava]

So far you haven't acknowledged anything that has been posted in this thread, at least not to any extent that would imply a firm grasp of the content. I don't see why you would start now.

And you seem to be using things like DRM, DLC, and Digitalization almost interchangeably at this point. I'm not sure if it's a result of frustration or what have you, but DRM isn't what prevents you from owning a copy of your game. The digitalization of the entire medium is what prevents that. And that was a change that PC gamers supported because it brought lower prices.

As for the argument that your games can be taken away from you at any time when the authentication servers go down, surely true. Of everyone. Steam, Origin, Amazon, GOG, GF and so on. But the fact that there hasn't been a AAA title in the post-DRM age yet to actually suffer this fate, you have to understand that the argument is hard to take seriously. That is why people continue to buy these digital copies at a reduced cost.

I'm aware that you've only just recently discovered some of the realities of the digital media age, but that doesn't excuse (or even begin to explain) why you think it's fair to proselytize on the subject when by your own admission, you're not in a position to do so. You've met every post that dissents from your view of the subject with a forcefully obtuse response, or zero recognition at all. lol That is the sign of someone out of their depth. Essentially every fact or view that is inconvenient to your reactionary approach gets met with a resounding, "nuh-uh!"

Since you publicly insult me again, I have no choice but to make one last attempt at communication with you.

You write:
"And you seem to be using things like DRM, DLC, and Digitalization almost interchangeably at this point."

A quote of this please? Before you accuse me of making inaccurate or false statements, take a look at yourself.

People may know less than you or be in error and it is up to those who know more to enlighten and convince them. That's why they call them "discussion forums". If you are not up to the job you should not post here. It is obvious that you dislike me for being less informed on the issues being discussed but bashing me is unlikely to earn you any points with anyone.

As for my acknowledging what has been posted in this thread and demonstrating "a firm grasp of the content" what did you expect? Quoting everyone whose points I find valid and saying so? You are one funny individual. You may want to re-read my posts and you will find that I do acknowledge quite a few things posted by others but not so much by you since you and I are talking about different things.

Frustration you say? Well, I guess I am a bit frustrated. It seems you don't understand what I write and, somehow, you are so wrapped up in your own thoughts that you fail to even see that I talk about one thing while in your replies you address something entirely different. Reading comprehension issues?

Here's to help you out:

1. I did acknowledge that the issue is not limited to EA and that I singled it out because of my long 'love affair' with BioWare that went sour.

2. What I say about DLC is that it is often an unethical practice supplying an incomplete product then milking customers for more money with DLC.

3. In the context of (2) above your statement that

"The digitalization of the entire medium is what prevents that. And that was a change that PC gamers supported because it brought lower prices." is completely false:

Gamers have never paid more for games than in recent years. Mass Effect 2 (basic edition, not some 'deluxe') alone cost me nearly $100 with all the DLCs some of which are required for ME3. When was the last time you saw any game priced below $60 at launch? Or do you mean older titles that at some point go on sale on Steam and elsewhere?

4. Your statement "You've met every post that dissents from your view of the subject with a forcefully obtuse response, or zero recognition at all" is also false. I have reviewed the entire thread and whenever I did produce a "forcefully obtuse response" it was to (some) of your largely condescending posts

5. Understanding the long and colorful history of DRM vs. pirating is entertaining but it does not invalidate my concerns regarding the non-working (DRM) solutions which hurt me and everyone else as customers. So you can reiterate again and again that I do not understand how DRM came about and why. This will certainly contribute to the discussion.

6. I certainly hope that you are right about EULAs being overridden by legislation.


Jprobes understands. He edited his earlier post, addressing my questions/comments precisely:

"As for the DRM servers being taken offline, that is a red herring scare tactic, D2 servers are still up, 10 years later. By the time they take DRM servers down they will either patch the game to not require it or the amount of people playing the game will decrease to levels not significant to cause a public relations nightmare. That being said, I would chose to think Developers would provide a way to circumvent the DRM servers when they are no longer required to protect revenue."

I certainly hope Jprobes is right.

Whatsthatnoise also understands my DRM-related concerns:

"...people who want to buy a copy of a game in a shop and take it home to play it will have no choice, but to stop playing all together."

 

[casualcolors]

People may know less than you or be in error and it is up to those who know more to enlighten and convince them. That's why they call them "discussion forums". If you are not up to the job you should not post here.


Gamers have never paid more for games than in recent years. Mass Effect 2 (basic edition, not some 'deluxe') alone cost me nearly $100 with all the DLCs some of which are required for ME3. When was the last time you saw any game priced below $60 at launch? Or do you mean older titles that at some point go on sale on Steam and elsewhere?

I'll address these 2 parts specifically and be done with this thread. Firstly, the entire thread has been more people than myself trying to give you some perspective into a topic that you didn't fully understand. But you didn't seem to garner much from any of it and pretty much have devolved from a singularly defensible position into one where you've pretty much adopted the "see-huh!" response to anyone who partial agrees with you (and in their cases, with several caveats that you seem to overlook).

Secondly the reason gamers have paid more for games in recent years than in the past, is largely due to the reason that you pay more for a loaf of bread now than in the past. It's inflation.

To be honest I feel like I've exhausted my position on this topic. You've bounced around from not understanding what DLC was, to accusing programs of being spyware when they aren't, to actually supporting Activision as some sort of morally opposing force in the argument about EA (which is actually mind-boggling given how EA came to be in the first place but we'll let that be), to supplying anecdotal evidence in support of the piracy that ironically has led to the exact position that you're in today with digitalized media, restrictive licensing, and DRM.

And I understood (and continue to understand) your concern as much as Jprobes does. I've tried to supply you with equally convincing factual reasoning to belay most of your concerns. You haven't actually acknowledged any of them beyond saying "I hope this is true" and the like. You're more or less looking to bicker at this point, in lieu of having done any actual research for yourself. It's lazy debate really.

I can't really explain anything to you without you immediately taking offense to it, because despite your lack of experience on the topic (by your own admission) you've adopted the position that you are somehow by default, right. It's kind of funny but at the same time it's getting pretty wearisome. Best of luck boycotting EA, while continuing to get bent over by every other entity in a gaming industry that is rapidly evolving into a model that predicates outright disregard for the consumer on the back of the notion that the consumer has the same disregard for the publisher.

 

[mahatmacoat]

Interesting to see this thread. I buy fewer games today than I have ever done.

Personally, if a game has to have an internet connection when it is not needed for gameplay it does not get purchased in the first place. Simple as that. If I buy software I decide when I use it and for how long, not at the behest of , and being allowed by others.

If a game is basically online, a multiplayer set up, then different perhaps...I had 600+ plus hours on Red Orchestra, and all for a tenner, so not so bad at all.

Basically developers are shooting themselves in the foot....all this hysteria about piracy is overboard. Back in the days of the Amiga, it was not uncommon for people to have literally thousands of games ..would they have bought those games? No mates, never in as million years....The fact is, me like many, in spite of having boxes full of disks actually went out and bought the games we really wanted....Elite, F15 Eagle, Stuntcar racer, etc, etc. The games on those boxes of disks were not lost revenue, they would never have been purchased in the first place.

I for one, remain cautious, as said I rarely buy, I refuse to hand over good cash to be treated like a pariah , and dictated to by those I am daft enough to give business to.

 

[Slava]

Interesting to see this thread. I buy fewer games today than I have ever done.

Personally, if a game has to have an internet connection when it is not needed for gameplay it does not get purchased in the first place. Simple as that. If I buy software I decide when I use it and for how long, not at the behest of , and being allowed by others.

If a game is basically online, a multiplayer set up, then different perhaps...I had 600+ plus hours on Red Orchestra, and all for a tenner, so not so bad at all.

Basically developers are shooting themselves in the foot....all this hysteria about piracy is overboard. Back in the days of the Amiga, it was not uncommon for people to have literally thousands of games ..would they have bought those games? No mates, never in as million years....The fact is, me like many, in spite of having boxes full of disks actually went out and bought the games we really wanted....Elite, F15 Eagle, Stuntcar racer, etc, etc. The games on those boxes of disks were not lost revenue, they would never have been purchased in the first place.

I for one, remain cautious, as said I rarely buy, I refuse to hand over good cash to be treated like a pariah , and dictated to by those I am daft enough to give business to.

I can't agree more, Mahatmacoat. I have not spent $50 million on games, but I estimated how much I spent on games over the last 22 years. It is over $50 thousand. A drop in the ocean, naturally, but take a thousand lost customers like me and it does amount to $50 million.

With all the garbage that is happening in gaming (regardless of the reasons why it is happening) I scarcely see myself buying any games any time soon, though giving up my gaming addiction will be hard. I literally used to buy 20-30 or more games a year several years ago. In the last couple of years I have bought on average 3-5 games…

Thankfully, there are a few publishers/developers who don't abuse you with DRMs and DLCs and such.. but I fear they might be swallowed by the EAs of the gaming industry.

 

[pleasenoname]

The first outrage from EA, for me was with spore.
EA actually made it mandatory to download Adobe Air, a commercial spyware program(that reports to third party advertisers) onto the computer to play spore.
Also the DRM gave me messages onscreen, just from trying out different monitors to play on. DRM seems to interfere with FRAPS and cause crashes too.

Then I saw Mass effect 1 on sale on EA's website for $9.95 (before the advent of their "Origen" service). I downloaded it, to see if it would run on my old computer.
It did not. I told EA that I wanted my money back since I was unable to play the game and had no desire to infect another computer with the DRM.
EA refused and ever since I have had no desire for any of their products.

Some Australians did research on EA's Origen and discovered that it was implementing SecuRom DRM. Origen is just a shell. Steam can install Securom, depending on the game publisher's preference.

I have bought "Sins of a solar Empire" it didn't have DRM. It was money well spent, supporting free enterprise. I am glad and hopeful upon hearing the news that "CDprojekt" has made a statement concerning curtailing DRM.

 

[penguin_guy]

It is not just EA man. Look at Ubisoft and Activison/Blizzard. Look at how they ruined SC2 with removing of LAN play. Look at how they made a single-player game (Diablo-III) online only to play single-player. Look Ubisoft going like crazy for DRM and always-online bullshit.

How can they do this? They can do easily cause sorry but most of the gamers are stupid retards and none of them gives a ***. Those kind of people will even agree to eat the *** of the CEO of the publisher companies just to buy from them. They will buy anything on every condition don't worry. You can not do any boycotting with "gamers".

I am surprised your post here not closed. When i try to raise my voice even in DRM-Free games selling sites they mock and give negative rating to your post to hide it.

 

[casualcolors]

It is not just EA man. Look at Ubisoft and Activison/Blizzard. Look at how they ruined SC2 with removing of LAN play. Look at how they made a single-player game (Diablo-III) online only to play single-player. Look Ubisoft going like crazy for DRM and always-online bullshit.

How can they do this? They can do easily cause sorry but most of the gamers are stupid retards and none of them gives a ***. Those kind of people will even agree to eat the *** of the CEO of the publisher companies just to buy from them. They will buy anything on every condition don't worry. You can not do any boycotting with "gamers".

Pretty much all of this is completely accurate. I imagine it has to be funny to approach this conflict from the corporate side where your opponent is literally a spineless mass of people who will A. buy anything or B. don't begin to understand when they're being screwed and when they aren't.