Game Developer Asks To Hear From Pirates

cliffski writes "Indie game developer Cliff Harris has long waged war against games piracy, but has issued a call to pirates to tell him why he is wrong. Assuming that developers are missing out on potential sales from disgruntled pirates, Cliff wants to hear specifically from people who have pirated his games. Not to criticize or lecture them, but to answer a simple question. Why? The reasons people give for copyright infringement/piracy are many and varied, but much of the debate has centred around music and movies, with big 'Triple-A' games an occasional consideration. With specific application to the world of small budget 'indie' games like those Cliff makes, he wants to know the thought processes behind people pirating the games. What puts people off buying? Is it quality, cost, DRM, ease of access? Is there anything that can be done to convert those people to buyers? While many pirates often make good general points about the reasons for the widespread pirating of PC games, it's unusual to get a chance to address specific developers with specific reasons. If you knew 100% that the developer would read your email explaining why you pirated their game, what would you say?"

Comments

Re:I think I speak for a lot of people when I say

[FlyingSquidStudios]

If someone else subsidizes it, I get it for free. That's how 'free' works.

Here's some good ideas.

[scorp1us]

The only game I ever bought was Quake (1). Yet I've played many more. Lately, I've not been playing much at all. Here's how you can get me buying games again:

1) I'm [still] waiting for the Orange box to go on sale. Fun games are always fun. This is game play over technology. There's not a lot to do about this one.

2) The last demo I downloaded was Bioshock. It was good but I had issues with my video card. (I think my hardware was at fault, but I'm not ready to replace it.)
a) Why not allow in-game downloads, to convert the demo to the full version as you play?
b) If we have incremental level loading, why not just have us play for as far as we get. Let's face it, I suck at a lot of games. I don't finish most of them. Why should I pay full price? Charge me per level, first level is free, with a price cap.
c) With incremental levels, there is no media to protect. Given multiple paths (plot choices), no one can have a full copy of the game until the game is completely beaten. The downloads can also be coded per computer so they can't be copied. Also, this puts pressure on some really fantastic levels. This way the game doesn't open strong, then fall apart after level 3. When you're paying per level, we'll get our value or stop p[l]aying.

d) While levels are nice, I really only ever play at LAN parties. Making network-only versions (pricing and lack of levels). I've dabbled with some single player for a few games, mostly to just get good at multiplayer. Having cheap or free multiplayer play is a great way to get us interested.

Finally, this isn't about piracy, but please for the love f god, have a common key-binding system between games. I've been playing FPS for over 10 years and I've always used the same key bindings whenever possible. It would help if it would take my common key bindings automatically so I can jump right into game play.

Why?

[DaveV1.0]

Because pirates are cheap, lazy, selfish scumbags.

There is the answer to "Why".