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Spore the Most Pirated Game of 2008
TorrentFreak has posted some statistics on the most pirated games of the past year. Leading the list by a large margin is Spore, made infamous even before its release for the draconian DRM attached to the game. It was downloaded through BitTorrent roughly 1.7 million times, with The Sims 2 and Assassin's Creed following at just over a million each. (It's worth noting that Spore came out in September, so that figure is essentially for a mere three months.) GameSetWatch has posted a related piece discussing the countermeasures involved in dealing with piracy. It's the second article in a series about piracy; we discussed the first a couple days ago.
Maybe that is because of the DRM, even if you buy the game, you still have to pirate it to be able to play a clean version (clean meaning without DRM restrictions of course).
The solution is obvious. Add more DRM!!!
The creature creator used SecuROM (invasive copy protection) and 'phoned home'. I imagine a demo would do the same.
I, and a lot of other people, would avoid it as a matter of principle.
This should be from the I-told-you-so department. Does this really shock any of the /. crowd?
It sucks that something so popular with publishers and unpopular with consumers keeps making headline news (granted, /. headlines are a bit different), because we get to hear the same arguments again and again and again.
And I'd say these numbers are highly suspect to boot. Where does torrentfreak get the rough total number of downloads?
There was not a single case of a shipping of that game being stolen on the high seas.
Oh, you mean people shared the files? Well, here's a handy guide for you.
Arrrr!
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
Now, let's ponder for a moment. Was this game P2Ped so often despite the insane DRM mechanisms? Or was it maybe because of it?
How many read about what EA wants to do with their PCs to be allowed to play this piece of ... erhm ... software? Deep manipulation of your driver makeup, authorisation requirement to be allowed to use what you pay for, the sword of damocles hanging over you in the guise of limiting the times you may activate it, not to mention the question whether or not you'll be allowed to play it when EA decides that you shouldn't any longer because you're supposed to buy the successor...
How many of those copies are actually people who bought the game and for some reason had to activate it once too often, and instead of calling the very helpful, friendly and lightning fast user support people of EA who speak flawless English they decided for the faster venue of downloading the game to play it? Or, how many actually HAD to download it to play it at all because for some funky reason that DRM barfed on them and all EA said was "sorry, problem at your end"?
I'm actually willing to grant the DRM advocates that this time those copies are actually lost sales. But not despite, rather because of DRM. People wanted to play that game and they would have had no worries about the 50ish bucks it costs, but they just didn't want you to mess up their PCs.
Before someone asks, no, I didn't copy it. The money allotted for the purchase of Spore was redirected to Sins of a Solar Empire when I heard about Spore's DRM mechanism. Sins was a purchase of protest, only to turn out to be a pretty well made game. I then saw Spore at a friend's and realized it ain't even worth the bandwidth necessary to P2P it. So, I guess, I'm not in this statistic this time.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
To stop people comparing the demo and the game files to see where the protection was added.
At least, that's what I've seen claimed.
From what I hear, modern pirates tend to have heavy artillery on their shoulder rather than a parrot:
Maritime piracy still goes on, and is still a major problem in some parts of the world. Just because someone's smear tactic to conflate illegal copying with theft and murder has been successful doesn't mean we should stop resisting it.
Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face
Particularly in the case of Spore. That game was sold as just damn amazing. Well often when that's claimed it turns out not to be the case. Fable would be a good example. Had it been what it was originally claimed to be, it would likely be the defining RPG of this generation. Instead it was a fairly average action RPG.
Such is the case with Spore as well. Now I don't know, maybe the game gets awesome in later stages but to me, it seemed very shallow the little I tooled around with it on a friend's copy. The first two stages were really boring. I also had a look at his game on the Civilization stage. Well guess what? I've already seen that done better in a game called... Civilization. I likes me a good Civ simulator, in fact I own Civ 4 and it's two expansions. So if you aren't doing it better than that, and it isn't, well then I am not that interested.
Had I bought it, I would have felt rather ripped off. However I know you have to be careful on those extremely hyped games. You can't go by reviews either. Reviewers have already talked them selves in to how good the game will be, reviews are far too positively biased for Big Hits(tm).
I also think in Spore's case a non-trivial amount of it may have been due to DRM protest. Now you can argue if that's the way to go about it or not, but there were lots of people pissed about it. I've decided EA can basically get fucked. I'm not buying their games with this activation bullshit unless they are absolutely superb. I bought Mass Effect, that game is just that good, but I'm giving most others a miss.
For example I'm not going to get Red Alert 3. I'm a fan of the C&C series and have bought most of them. I quite liked C&C3 and Kane's Revenge. However though I like them, they aren't good enough for me to put up with the activation shit. So I'll get something else instead, Demigod probably.
Now while I'm not going to go nab a copy off Bittorrent, that may be what some people do, people who are put off by the DRM.
I'm reasonable when it comes to DRM. I'll accept that publishers are paranoid and need the "feel good" of having some DRM on the games, even though it seems it really doesn't help (see Sins of a Solar Empire for proof). However when it gets to be bullshit like "You can only install the game 3 times and then never again," well fuck you. Good games, I want to play and replay. I still fire up Baldur's Gate 2 from time to time. You'd better believe I've done more than 3 reinstalls since then. Hell I've gone through more than 3 complete system upgrades since that came out.
EA really seems to have crossed the stupid threshold. In particular the activation limits imply that it isn't so much about preventing illegal copying as it is about preventing a used game market and forcing you to buy new versions. I think the rampant copying will help show that no, this shit DOESN'T stop it.
Not really. PES is REAL popular in East Europe/Russia. In fact it takes a significant part of the market share in non-US markets. But unfortunately for them it is usually popular in places where pirating is also popular.
You're exactly right, i hate the fact that demos are suddenly out of fashion, it used to be the best way to get a good preview of the game. These days i pirate every game that doesn't have a demo and check them out, and buy them if i want to keep playing after the first 20 minutes or so, did that with Storm of Zehir last week, CoD World at War the week before that - IMO it's the only way to do these things.
Various reasons. One, as has been mentioned, to avoid crackers to look at demo and final and compare (which is, IMO, bollocks since when you use some sensible algorithms to crypt it you can't see jack, just use a boilerplate version of the DRM software that doesn't phone home and you're set. If your DRM vendor doesn't provide that, switch the DRM vendor if you really insist in having one).
Another reason, and more important if you ask me, as a gauge how many copies you might be able to sell. When a million people use your demo, it's likely that more people will buy it than when you see only about 100k using it. Downloads don't really count since they, too, could be redistributed or downloaded from pages that host your demo without your knowledge.
And of course to give people the train of thought: "Well, I got that crap on my PC already anyway, so buying and installing that game won't make it worse".
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
You've never been a teenager, have you? It's bragging rights. Remember kids, the more you download, the longer your penis is.
In my days it was the kind of clothes you wear, later it was having the biggest trading card deck, today it's the amount of ripped software you store. It's not like anyone really needs 20 TB of software (or movies), it's our good ol' hunter and gatherer impulse.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Spore is, if anything, a lesson. I think it should be used as an example in game design classes.
Spore is also a lesson to MMO makers, it really has a lot of qualities found in MMOs and it also shows why so many MMOs fail despite good outlook and design.
The first few chapters in Spore is a lot like leveling your character in MMOs. You play and grind, you build your character, you "level" (as in, gain DNA and "evolve"), you make your decisions where to improve your character, what parts to focus on and what you can do without, aiming for the "endgame".
Then you reach that endgame and realize a few things:
Your decisions are pointless. No matter what you "evolved" and no matter what your race is like, the game is the same.
The endgame itself stinks. Too much micromanagement, too little freedom in your decisions.
The replay value, which could have been stunning considering the ways you could create your race, is near zero. Most of all, you do not want to replay, knowing that what is in for you in the end is the most tedious, boring part of the game.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
People who know anything about that DRM wouldn't let SecureROM on their system, it has no business doing what it does to a system just to play a game.
It's 100% certain they'd have had my money the day the game hit the streets if they didn't have DRM in it. As it is, no. Not ever. Not unless I can run it in a VM where it can't pillage my system, and AFAIK it doesn't run in a VM.
And anyone who wants the game can easily get it in a clean pirated version.
Counting just BitTorrent is undercounting too; usenet is a safer place to get stuff (not as trackable).
Well, when you saw Spore, I think you'll agree that any kind of demo would have hurt the sales, not helped them. What would you have demo'ed? The "eat and grow" treadmill in the beginning that I have seen done better in various flash games? Doubt that would have convinced anyone to actually buy the game.
But if it tells me something it is to stay away from games that don't dare to offer a free sample of their gameplay. When they're not confident that the 20ish minutes I can usually play such a demo before I hit the "buy the full version to play on" wall will make me want more, the game is usually good for less than those 20 minutes.
And, bluntly, 50 bucks for 20 minutes ... dunno, how much are hookers these days?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Thanks for killing the games industry, you filthy thief.
Yes, I second that !
We need more suckers... huh, no... "customers" to fall for the brainwash... hu, sorry... for the marketing overhyping our product, and who will blindingly throw their money at whatever product we manage to persuade them will be the best-game-ever-even-better-than-blowjob-and-beacon-sammich !
Our economy is dying because of all the filthy thieves who selfishly want to see what a game is worth before buying !
--
though, seriously, I actually found the game kind of cool.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Standard excuses for not paying for this or any other game (pick any that apply):
1) I will pirate it first and then pay only if I like it (a la when I go into a restaurant and only pay when I liked the food, or go to the theater to see a film and pay only if it didn't suck). If the game is not PERFECT, I don't pay.
2) My pirating is good for the software developer (more people playing, even without paying is good, it gives them lots of free publicity). Piracy increases sales! I am doing them a HUGE favor.
3) I am a cheap ass.
4) There is no such thing as copyright (or shouldn't be). Other people should create art, music, games, films, and entertainment for me as a favor and fund it out of their own pocket.
5) Piracy is a fact in the gaming world. Get used to it. It's the developer's own fault because they should have taken it into account in their business case (besides, they should have been working on this full time as an open source program for free anyway).
6) $50 for this game is too much. Come to think of it, $25 is too. And if it is only $10, then pirating it shouldn't be that much of a burden to the developer.
7) I do not want to try the demo because the only meaningful way to try out a game is to try out the ENTIRE game.
8) Who cares if there is 99.9% piracy, all the developers need is to make just enough money to fund developing another game. They don't need to get rich (after all, I'm not).
9) "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need."
10) Because I have never had to create, develop and market a game and I don't have a clue as to what it takes to run a business.
11) Because DRM is such a great excuse.
A company that makes Spore wants to earn a living. And to do that they put on DRM.
And it just can't work.
The premise of DRM is to make more difficult for people to casually copy the game.
That means managing to put restriction for every last game player out there. Everyone has to be subjected to that shit in the hopes that the copying will be limited.
But then, all it takes is 1 single unique copy. 1 single unique time when the DRM has been circumvented, for that copy to be made available to millions via the internet.
Who in his right mind could guarantee that, out of the several millions of sold copies (2 million after 3 weeks according to EA as reported on Wikipedia*), the DRM will stand un-defeated, not even 1 single time.
That requires failure rates lower than 1 in several dozen of millions. That are failure rates that even space exploration - with all its engineering brilliance - can't guarantee. And your expecting shitty manufacturer of crappy DRM systems, which can't even stay stable on a machine without crashing it, to be able to guarantee that ?
Even without entering in the stupidity of the DRM's cryptographic details, or the complete out-of-reality of the pay-per-copy failed business model, just the sheer numbers involved tell you that DRM just doesn't stand a snowball in hell's chance to be even remotely reach something that could be interpreted as success.
DRM just can't be the answer to the piracy problem :
to succeed it must stop absolutely everyone from copying.
to fail 1 single leak is all it takes.
That's impossible.
--
*: EA reports 2 million copies sold after 3 weeks.
TorrentFreaks reports ~2 million download after 3 months of BitTorrent.
That's an incredibly high... SELLING RATE. Articles on /. have mentioned that 90% piracy is rather the norm in the gaming industries.Whereas, it seems that Spore has sold more copies than it got pirated.
That's some damn fucking sign of tremendous success. And given this success, given all the money Spore has managed to earn, why does anybody need to give a fuck if some punks have downloaded copies of the intertube ?
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
A few people have mentioned DRM as shareholder appeasement. It would seem the company would enact more sensible policies if their shareholders were themselves gamers. Either that or people from this group who understand that DRM can always be circumvented.
It would be interesting if a major benefit of holding shares in a company was a discount on the company's products. It's a very old fashioned view of the stock market, but I think you should buy shares because you believe in what a company is doing and want to help them succeed. Of course, their success = your success as far as your ownership goes, so it's not an altruistic act to purchase shares. Currently, many companies are run by people who have no interest in the products being good or even finished are a bad thing as well. Maximizing shareholder value doesn't always give you long term success or a good product - just look at Circuit City. They were held up as an exemplar in Good to Great of increasing shareholder value. Even during that time where they were doing a great job, their customer service (which I guess is one of their main products) was widely panned.
I'm no economist so maybe this idea is hugely naive. I welcome being shown as naive.
When the axe came to the forest, the trees said, "Look out - the handle was once one of us."
Steam isn't better than any other DRM, and worse than most. It's just very convenient, being able to download a game to any computer.
Effectively, however, your Steam "purchases" are rentals. Internet connection down? Games are inaccessible. Account gets banned? Games are lost. Valve goes out of business? Games are lost. Valve gets bought up? Pray the new owners don't change the terms of use to something draconian.
I wouldn't spend a dime on Steam. I like to own my stuff.
Don't whistle while you're pissing.
I recently bought the native OS X version of Call of Duty 4. (I had the PS3 version for a little while, but I can't get used to playing a 1st. person shooter with the console controller....)
I only got to play online a few times before I was greeting with a "CD key already in use" message and kicked offline. Apparently, quite a few people are suffering from the same issue. Tech. support suggests that improperly exiting the game can cause the main server to hold onto your login info for a while, and to "wait a little while and try again". They also suggest that an "overloaded master server" could temporarily cause it.
Well, that may be true in *some* situations, but the more obvious problem is that pirates have created key-generator programs that make valid keys that wind up matching ones paid for by customers like me. Will they issue me a new key though? No way! Forget it! I've barely been able to play in the last few weeks..... If I finally get online with my key, I guess I need to leave my Mac connected all the time? Ridiculous!
My best friend had the exact same issue with Quake 4 a while ago - which prompted him to stop buying any more 1st. person shooters requiring keys for online play. Activision refused to help him with his problem -- so he was essentially better off just pirating.
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DRM isn't there to stop someone experienced in illegally obtaining software. It is there to stop the average person from doing so. Most people don't know how to download software, run key generators, replace binaries and that sort of thing. They want to click on something and have it run. It is just like a lock on a house doesn't do anything to stop a professional thief, but it will stop the guy going door to door just trying doorknobs until he's found one that is unlocked. The people screaming "DRM is useless", are like the professional thieves saying "locks are useless" all the time justifying that they only break into houses because people put locks on them.
If you are not allowed to question your government then the government has answered your question.
"It seems that the current generation thinks that charging for software is a bad thing."
That could only be true if the RATE of piracy is higher than in the past. And what you'd need to do is to study what is being pirated and how it compares to 5 or 10 years ago. You could do lots of interesting research in this area provided you have the data.
What we're lacking is facts, and the people providing them have a vested interest in doing research only as long as the outcome they're paying for.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you
Not sure about the method, but its the only way. Really, as a general rule, even for things that are part of the criminal code and even felony, only socially unacceptable things aren't done on a daily basis. Kiddy rape -> socially unacceptable. Illegal immigration (also a felony) -> socially ACCEPTABLE. Piracy -> Socially VERY acceptable. Working under the table -> 50/50, depends who you hang out with.
And so on and so on. If something is legal or not often has very little effects on if people care or not (and I guess it makes sense... laws are probably supposed to some extent to represent what people think, on top of protecting minitories and other edge cases)
I have a Steam account, I got HL2 bundled with a graphics card a while back. You're talking about offline mode. You have to authenticate online at least once before being able to enter offline mode. Also, each game must be activated online, you can't install games to an offline Steam client.
As with any online activation based DRM, even store-bought steam games get reduced to coasters once the authentication servers are gone.
Have a look at the Steam subscriber agreement. It pretty much says that games are tied to accounts, and that Valve can terminate any account at any time for no particular reason, without any recompense.
No, really, I wouldn't spend my money there.
Don't whistle while you're pissing.
Uh.. plenty of Steam games can be bought in a brick-and-mortar-store, on a physical medium. Everything HL2 related, for instance.
You don't think it sucks that you have to have a) ask for permission online to play a (legally bought) single-player game, and b) Valve can render the (physical-medium-attached) game nonfunctional by canceling your online account? Inacceptable in both regards, I think.
As I wrote above, I like to own my stuff, and with Steam it just doesn't feel like it.
Don't whistle while you're pissing.
Manages to stay alive and keep making hit games with no DRM.....Morrowind, Oblivion, and Fallout 3 are all bona fide hits, surely making the company a big pile of money, and yet none contain DRM. Hmmm.....I wonder how that works....Maybe it has something to do with the fact that these games are great, and can yield years of entertainment. Morrowind is one of my most played and replayed games of all times, with it's open ended nature (in terms of game play and modability), and both Oblivion and Fallout 3 follow this trend. If you make quality stuff, you don't need DRM, apparently.
Actually, the chance of finding a proper key that is suitable for online play is non-trivial, here is how key generation usually goes:
1) programmer of company develops an algorithm to generate keys
2) company runs said algorithm 100,000 times to generate 100,000 valid keys, covering only a tiny fraction of the complete keyspace
3) company records those keys and adds them to their master server to allow online play
4) those keys are distributed with the games
What happens once the game is released is this
5) cracker figures out the algorithm
6) cracker tries to generate a "valid" key for online play, but fails because the keyspace is a couple orders of magnitude larger than the small number of keys actually distributed.
Chance of valid duplicate keys: close to nil. Chance of generating a valid key for online play: also close to nil.
Of course it happens, I just don't believe it happens that often.
My girlfriend has bought all 8 original Sims game, and all 9 Sims 2 games.
That equals between $750 and $1000 spent on one single videogame franchise.
And despite her being against software piracy, she is now unlikely ever going to buy another EA game again.
You hear that EA?? You've lost one of your most loyal customers because of your ridiculous policies and DRM.
The last game (Apartment Life) she installed was done via their online service.
I spent Two weeks fixing her computer and trying to get the game working. With zero help from EA, I ended up finding answers on cracking sites (even then, all the security measures made it tough to implement the user-made fixes). After a few days I downloaded the pirated expansion pack onto my computer and let her play on my computer until I got hers figured out.
The next Sims game she plays will likely be pirated. After seeing how easy it was to just download the pirated game and what the DRM encrusted game could do to her computer she very quickly changed her mind on the morality of downloading software.