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Independent Dev Reports Over 80% Piracy Rate On DRM-Free Game
An anonymous reader writes "Developer 2D Boy has written that they are seeing an 82% piracy rate for everyone's favorite DRM-free physics puzzler, World of Goo . Surprisingly, this rate is in-line with what they were expecting. The article also features a fascinating comparison with the piracy rate of another game that was shipped complete with DRM, at 92%. There seemed to be no major difference in the outcomes of the rate regardless of whether DRM was used or not ... well, no difference other than the cost to implement such nonsense."
it's just an estimate though... there are factors that we couldn't account for that would make the actual piracy rate lower than our estimate:
* some people install the game on more than one machine
* most people have dynamic IP addresses that change from time to time
there are also factors that would make the actual piracy rate higher than our estimate:
* more than one installation behind the same router/firewall (would be common in an office environment)
* not everyone opts to have their scores submitted
for simplicity's sake, we just assumed those would balance out. so take take the 90% as a rough estimate.
I think they make it pretty clear that their math is flawed and based on shaky assumptions. If you scroll down further in the article there is an update, too, with much more detailed math and the final conclusion of an 82% piracy rate.