Huh, didn't know it was so bad there...
I usually torrent movies and shows that A) don't air here B) are bad and/or I don't like the creator (mainly Hollywood)
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If something is that bad why waste time on pirating it?
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That same I can say about people that you hate. If you don't like Justin Biber, Nicki Minaj, Pewdiepie, and other stupid people then why are you watching their videos, uploading pictures/meme of them or even telling your friends about them? You only make them more well-known and what that mean more rich.
I'm not saying that you do that but most people are like that. When Biber released his first video all my my friends were talking about it (not very positive but still...) and at that same time they were giving him more and more views on youtube. Even if i didn't wanted to know why they don't like him they still wanted to show me his video....
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That's why I pirate, they get 0 money and 0 publicity....
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Not really, I'm a big fan of sci-fi and fantasy, but not Marvel. So I pirate most of their movies, because I want to see the cool stuff, that doesn't mean I like the movies(or think they are good) or the company.
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That's an excuse. Not for somebody else, but for yourself - so you don't feel bad about it. Mental gymnastics.
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As Gabe Newell said: Piracy is usually a problem of service and more often than not, the best way to fight piracy is to give users a service that is much more convenient than piracy (such as Steam)
Im not going to lie: I do pirate, a lot actually, albeit what comes about games I basically stopped downloading pc games, except for a few odd ones that its impossible to get legally anywhere.
I dont consider piracy as like the big evil RIAAA and all the other copyright organisation make it out to be. Simply put: if somebody wants to pirate your content, they will, and no amount of barrier put in place will stop them from doing that
Another occasions (mostly for consoles) its a matter of price. Im sorry Sony but Im NOT paying more than 40 miserable bucks for games like Persona 3 Portable it when it costs half of it on Amazon, Im also not going to pay more than 20 dollars for a PSN classic when I can get any of these ps1 games from thrift shops for a spare change and convert the cd file into an EBOOT myself.
And do you know whats the best part is? in the hungarian PSN store for the PSP (when it used to be live that is), the avalaible games amount compared to lets say the french PSN store was probably the fraction of it(!). Basically beside the popular ones, there were no PSP minis, and many others, and the ones we had were obscenely overpriced. And yet they wonder why sales arent doing good for the Vita, when everything costs you a small fortune to buy.....
Android games: I occasionally tend to buy a few ones that deserve my cash , even though I sometimes tend to run into the unspeakable garbage they are trying to sell there for cash (Painkiller Purgatory, Modern Combat 5, Im looking at you.....), The fact that SE games cost almost as much as some of the FF games on Steam.....lets just say that it doesnt motivate me to buy those, in the slightest. Im willing to support android game devs, but theres a limit of how much Im wiling to spend on a mobile game ...
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I don't see Steam as a good service provider,i mean the russians have their own price region while,other Eastern countries have to buy games at the almost same price in USA...that's not fair.
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...and therefore you and people like you are more likely to pirate things rather than purchase on steam.
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Do you know what it means to live with 250 euros a month? If you don't please stop complain.
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I don't think he was complaining, I think he was just pointing out that that's what Gaben said...
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Langauge barrier, again.
I was just elaborating on what was Zetikla mentioned, According to Gabe Newell's thoughts on piracy, the the driving force is often the service or quality just as much as the price. You then said that you don't see Steam as a good service provider due to pricing issues, so I reiterated what the previous post had said. For instance, if Steam offered a proportional price in your home currency, you would be far more tempted to buy the games rather than pirate.
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My bad i misinterpreted,and yes what you said it's true.
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I feel your pain my friend, here in Hungary we are basically getting jacked up with ludacris prices due to the exchance rate
the region price, while being unfair and a PITA due to region lock, its necessary to at least minimalise the absurd rates of piracy in those countries as otherwise they would likely end up being at a zero-sum situation or heck, they would end up in a loss
dont get me wrong, I dont like this price gauging either, but yeah, not much we can do about it >< at very least during sales, its still a cheaper solution for me than buying retail
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It's a shame, because whenever sites offer proportional regoinal pricing then everybody sweeps in to try abuse it for cheap copies, which quickly causes services to jump through all the region-locking measures. You guys just can't win. :s
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I pirate largely because of money issues. Living in eastern europe you can't really expect to pay for some entertainment that you can get for 'free' with a torrent. I do buy a lot of stuff when they go on sale, like the current winter sale, when i can spend 100$ once and load up the entire year with great games. Games, especially AAA ones, aren't priced for developing markets like the one i live in. If you honestly expect someone who makes 300-400$ per month to drop 50-60$(which is sometimes double what you pay for your water, electricity and internet bills combined) on a single game(which probably lacks content anyway, because DLC) you're out of your mind. That combined with next to no demos, I actually prefer FTP or even free-to-pay games since they let you experience the game before you decide to sink your money into it.
And steam is great, not only for the great sales, but also for the way they give people who don't really have a lot of money to get games. The bulk of my library was acquired by trading TF2 items, buying low and selling high, watching the market, buying keys with the metal profit i made and trading said keys for games.
As far as other entertainment goes, iTunes i use a lot since I've always been the like-a-song-not-an-entire-album kind of guy, so paying a small sum for a song is convenient and preferable. I don't like going to movies because of the people there(those who constantly use their phones during a movie, those who bring their brat kids, those who cant shut the fuck up etc etc.). Though I'm not much of a movie buff anyway. TV series I pirate because I like to binge watch and services like netflix(or PPV for that matter) arent available here yet without some serious VPN or other hoops most people dont bother with.
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Pretty much this,at least in my country a lot,and a lot of people pirate because you can't buy something when you earn less than 300$ a month,i usually pirate movies and animes becuase i can't afford to buy them or go to the cinema in the nearest city,but i do buy some games that i really appreciate. What knoxx said it's very true,you can pay your electricity and internet bills,or buy an AAA.
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I disagree that the main reason for piracy is lack of good services. I think a lot of people just like free stuff, which is perfectly understandable. Equally, some people pirate so much stuff there's no way they could afford it even they wanted to buy it all.
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are you telling me that udon'tplay help piracy over udon'tplay services ?? so they actually can play their game
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I think they were talking about UPlay, but strangled themselves trying to make a dumb taunt out of it. \:3/
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I still don't understand where all the hate against Uplay is coming from, I have zero problems with their services.
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Same here. I've being playing AC: Rogue for a couple of hours now and have no idea why Uplay has such a bad rep.
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Same here, got AC Rogue this sale and it runs great.
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I've never had any problems with their service either, but I think it's more a run-off anger towards Ubisoft for how they handled certain games. If I recall, a lot of people were unable to play the games they ordered due to Uplay issues, though I don't remember any specifics, it left a lot of people bitter due to the wait just to use what they already paid for, y'know?
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I dunno...
I don't pirate games. I simply can't imagine myself enjoying that. Having a steam account, waiting for sales, reading reviews and downloading demos, debating for hours on end what to buy - that's half the fun for me. Sometimes I buy games that I know I'm not going to play until months in the future simply because I like the idea of owning them. At any rate, with my horrible internet connection, downloading the games is often a far bigger hassle than buying them anyway, so piracy's not that big of a helper. And plus, I know I'll feel guilty about playing a game that I don't own - I can't even fully enjoy demos! Pirated games would be far worse.
So I don't pirate games not really from a moral standpoint, but only because I think the price is definitely worth the enhanced experience. You might say it's artificial, but what about games isn't?
Music is more a murky area. I get 90% of my music needs from youtube anyway. No need to either buy OR pirate. The only times I buy music is when I really like the artist and want to support them - So, only Taylor Swift and Sleater-Kinney. But being such a fan of Taylor Swift, she's really opened my eyes to the dangers of music piracy. People are taking music for granted(including me). But it's not. A lot of people work very hard to bring us it, and if we're not prepared to pay for it, we WILL lose it, if not now then in the future. For the benefit of all those who enjoy either making or listening to music(so pretty much everyone ever), something must be done. But how or what, I have no idea. Music isn't really my field, so I'll let whoever's there handle it and hope they can make it.
Movies I could care less about. I think the movie industry in contrast with the games and music industries is underworked and overpaid. I don't even enjoy movies that much, but when I feel like watching one I'll either see it at the cinema or pirate it. No buying movies from me. Nu-uh.
I don't think book piracy is really a thing. I mean, you can find free version of most books online but most people seem to ignore that - and that's awesome and for the good :)
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I find it curious that Taylor Swift has opened your eyes to the dangers of music piracy. That women is the highest earning musician in the world. She's made hundreds of millions of dollars.
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Just like Metallica, the most well paid artists are always the ones who are openly against pirating
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Also required would be a time machine. I suspect that even if they never earned another cent, they would live out the rest of their days without even having to consider buying Homebrand baked beans...
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I know that. But she also fights for the rights of musicians. I'm not afraid for her, but she brought the danger to my attention.
Just read this, you'll understand. Or maybe this.
This is not about me. Thankfully I am on my fifth album and can support myself, my band, crew, and entire management team by playing live shows. This is about the new artist or band that has just released their first single and will not be paid for its success. This is about the young songwriter who just got his or her first cut and thought that the royalties from that would get them out of debt. This is about the producer who works tirelessly to innovate and create, just like the innovators and creators at Apple are pioneering in their field…but will not get paid for a quarter of a year’s worth of plays on his or her songs.
Sure, a lot of people said that she doesn't actually care and she only did that for her own benefit. Regardless of whether that's true or not: Does it matter? She's right. Regardless of the reasons behind her message, the message itself is very eye-opening.
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Actually, I believe that piracy can be a good thing for musicians. If people can get music for free, they are faster tempted to try that music. I wouldn't spend money on a band that I don't know wheter I'll like it or not. And if people then like the band, they'll likely buy stuff from that band. I'm not sure how it is in the other music styles, but at least in the metal a lot of people buy the music, buy shirts and other merchs etc (I also read that metalheads are the most "loyal" fans (so buy the most stuff form the bands they like) compared to other genres).
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The trouble with piracy is that it isn't always a net gain. Exposure is a great thing, but while it speeds up people hearing of the name, it can also really sting new artists and diminish income / sales statistics for them.
Imagine being a content creator is a tabletop boardgame. "Piracy" would be a card that has a 25% chance of halving your income for 8 turns, a 25% chance of doubling your fanbase permanently, and a 50% chance of doing both. Now imagine that on the very first turn of the game, the piracy card gets dealt against you. To a new artist, that loss of traction can be a killer just as much as it can be a great boost. People might try saying "It's okay, because if they're any good then they'll survive it", but that's not always the case. I used to pirate games ages ago, and went by the self-assigned code of buying it if I liked it. However once you complete a game it turns into an equation of "Do I want to pay for a game I've completed?", and it's no longer a matter of whether the company deserves the purchase, but whether you feel the game is so great that you would buy it after having finished it. I quickly learned to buy the game before I got to about 50% through, haha. ;P
Piracy is neither a totally good or a totally bad thing. It can really help new faces and spread the word of any sleeper hit, but it can also really punch any creator in the butt. Piracy really is a coin-toss factor.
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Totally agree. I'm not pro piracy, but I also don't see it as a very bad thing. It really is a grey area. On some areas it might be worse then on others, but as you said, it also has the potential of someone buying a game (or music or whatever) they normally wouldn't, because they try it and it turns out to be way more fun.
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I dont get it, the movie industry brings way less money than the game industry
Not to mention its the game industry that decided to bring their products to the public when their only half done
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The reason the game industry brings out half-done products is also the reason why it's only fair they get paid more: It is far, far harder to make a game than it is to make a movie. You need to be very good at both science AND art, which is very rare and very respectable. Yet most movie stars make far more money than most developers - publishers and managers get most of the money in gaming.
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Errr ...
Movies stars aren't the only people involved in making a movie. There are dozens (if not hundreds) of other "little people" involved in making every movie. They don't get paid more than anyone else doing the same type of work, and often are just as underpaid as developers. I've known several carpenters (I'm one myself) who have worked on movie sets, and they were paid no more than any other carpenter.
Also, special FX experts aren't good at science? Makeup artists and set designers aren't artists? CGI experts aren't artists? Writers aren't artists? Etc, etc.
You're neglecting every other person involved in making a movie and focusing only on the stars themselves.
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Sadly, almost nobody sits down and patiently watches the ending credit. Behind-the-scene people are non-existent to most audience.
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Yep, and the same goes for music, too. Everyone sees how much the "star" is making and decides they don't want to buy music because the artist makes "too much money already" -- and they forget about all the other people who went into making an album or concert performance.
I work part time nights as security for our local sports/concert arena. Our security staff alone is 75+ people for any concert, and that doesn't count vendors, lighting, sound, video, the band's entourage, promoters, marketing, etc. There can easily be 250+ people involved in just one concert -- and those are just the ones I know about. :X
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But concert profit are separated from CDs sales profit, I think. Often a singer will contract an event organizer to hold her concert, and the event organizer get a percentage of the ticket sales as payment. That's how most singers in Asia roll.
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Same principle applies, though. There are a lot more people involved in movies and music than people realize, and it's usually the little people that get screwed over. :P
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I love Leslie Nielsen movie credits, quite often they had jokes there (like "Lottery Numbers" or food recipes).
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Most of the time I sit till the end of the credit for hidden surprises. And I have developed a hobby to hunt for Vietnamese name in the credit roll. So far I have spot a lot of them. In the new Star War there were more than 7 Vietnamese working in various position :3
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I dont think you realize how many people work to make a movie, or how much it costs to make, or even the pressure for a director to work for years without even knowing if the movie will see the light of day or even make money on box office
Their not that different from eachother, a Movie like Avatar has a crew of nearly 3000 people and costed 237 million, one of the most expensive games like COD usually costs $200 million.
Also, yes movie stars make a lot of money, but how many stars do you see in one movie, some make more than cinematographers, art directors, but they are in contrast to the huge percentage of good actors that dont make much money at all.
in both cases the studio or publisher gets bigger cut of the revenue
EDIT:
You need to be very good at both science AND art
Not really, thats why there are Video game directors, game art designers and composers aswell
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Here in Spain, the media calls piracy to all, but the only ilegal thing is download non legal software, you can freely download movies/music ; said this i think its mostly from the money point of view, here in spain before euro arrives, go to a watch a movie cost like 300-400 pesetas (1 euro = 166 pesetas +- ) Now if you want to go to watch a movie its like 7 euros... Same with DvD movies or music, if you want it legit it cost way too much.
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Well lets go product by product:
Games : I used to pirate them with just buying maybe 2 or 3 games retail before I found Steam(2012) since then I spent quite a lot of money during sales or preorderds/dayone purchase(yet to regret any of the latter) . Then found and the bundles which as usual made my library too big to be able to filter it perfectly.And with bundles I found about DRM-free products which atm is key selling point for me(hence why atm I'm more eager to spend money on GOG than Steam) . I still pirate games but that is for 1-2 hours of playtesting before purchase or because the game isnt available anywhere for purchase.
Music : Well, its kinda pretty much like games but instead of Steam, Groupees supplied 95% of my current playlist with the other 5% being OST or stuff from Google Music( well bandcamp, do you plan soon to accept direct card payments?) . Which luckily introduced to much more interesting music than what I listened before which was mainly big bands. Forgot to note that the albums came with DRM-free backup
Comics/Books : I never pirated those but reintroduction of Comixology in EU let me to start buying comics on them, mainly the one that provide DRM-free backup copies.
Software : Now this is something I usually pirate because 1. I was too lazy to search for decent open source/free software 2. Gonna be using it only once ,
Movies/TV Series : Pirating those too, but its mainly older cartoons. Sadly so far seems big movie companies dont want to adapt DRM-free or I just cant find a good place to buy from but if they decide to start selling DRM-free I will gladly pay for those.
So yeah , Piracy exist either because of bad service or price issue . It's incorrect to say that pirated copy is a lost sell since most pirates either cant afford it or just wont buy it.
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This is mostly me, with some changes. The main one in my case is :
Software : Super paranoid after Macromedia slapped my ISP with a threat years ago, because I torrented an old, unsupported version of Flash. They shut off my internet and wanted £50 from me as a 'fee' to re-enable my internet. I'd change my ISP but I live somewhere in the UK where we have a municipal phone system and one company has a total monopoly on it, and are the only landbased broadband providers (and screw mobile data tariffs, hnngh).
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I had a weird experience the other day. I was at a store and saw the newest Iron Maiden album for like 40 bucks. I entertained the thought of buying it, but decided it'd be easier to get the music online so I can put it on my cellphone. Then I noticed one of the cds didn't have that magnetic tag they usually have to prevent thievery, and I thought about stealing it. I felt so bad I imagined myself taking it, walking half a block and then coming back to return it. But that didn't stop me from going home and downloading the cd illegally anyway. I think it's just that we aren't used to digital goods yet. If I had stolen that CD, I could have gotten in actual trouble for shoplifting. There are no negative repercussions to downloading a music cd, at least here in Brazil.
I agree with what someone above said, though. Why pirate some games if steam is probably going to have a good sale on them eventually? I almost never pirate games anymore because it's just easier to get them on steam. I only do it for stuff you can't find, like old SNES and stuff. And music, well, a couple of my friends released songs on bandcamp and I bought their albums to support them, mostly as a symbolic gesture. Some of the stuff I'm into is really hard to find or very expensive to import, so I just pirate it. Whenever the bands I'm into come around town, I make an effort to go see them live and support them that way.
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Well for music it totally depends on the artist wheter I pirate it or not. For Iron Maiden I'll never pirate it (it's my favourite band). But usually I tend to pirate some albums from a band to see wheter they are good or not. Then, if I like them, I usually end up buying it anyway.
And I agree that it is easier just to get a game on steam for cheap then downloading it for free. I haven't downloaded anything in about 5 months, then I tried pirating Fallout 4, but I actually couldn't enjoy it, knowing it was pirated.
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Yeah it's weird, I had pirated Civilization V but never really ended up playing it until I bought it on steam. Maybe because the version I got on steam had the Gods and Kings expansion which improves the game greatly, but I tend to play more my steam games than anything else.
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For music, I just use digital streaming.
For movies, I'll buy it if I can actually use it, but for some reason region locking is still a thing.
For games, I pirate them (or play the demo if possible) for an hour to test them and see if it's worth it, if it is, I buy it, If it isn't, I delete it.
Personally I think it's morally wrong to pirate something just because you're low on funds, but I won't call you an asshole for it, just cheeky, because piracy isn't theft, no matter how you look at it.
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I agree on that. In my opinion, if you don't have a lot of money, you shouldn't waste your time on gaming in the first place (of course I don't know the personal situation of others).
I used to pirate as a sort of "demo," but as most games that I'm interested in are usually huge, it is way easier just to buy them (and I can afford to make some mistakes) and download them through steam.
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I think music should follow Korean trend now: Publish songs online for free, but still sell CDs with photobooks, special MVs, or signatures as collectors' items. All friends I know download free music from their idols online, but pay loads to buy CDs "just to keep it". It's the same for comics: people read them online, and buy printed version for collection.
For movies, I pirate them because the cinema versions are always cut for a f**king reason of "violent and adult theme". Do you believe that in the final scene of Kingsman, where the people heads explode, all blood splashes are replaced with f**king FIREWORKS?
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I'm pretty sure that was not a censored/cut scene but I think in the movie they actually made it so that the "blood splashes" were fireworks, I could be wrong though.
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Oh, if that's the case, then what about THE WHOLE FIGHTING SCENE IN THE CHURCH WAS CUT OFF because of brutality? D:
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i don't pirate games. mostly some software. watching movies/tv series online, can't tell if it counts as pirating.
most people look at piracy wrong. if you want to watch movies/series now, you have to pirate. for example, it's almost impossible to use series services like netflix in my country. movies usually comes out on dvds eventually, but haven't seen any dvds with series on sale in my country, so for series piracy is the only option, as most of tv series i'm watching are aired at night here + i don't even have that channel to begin with.
otherwise developers doesn't really loose too much cause most pirates if there were no piracy wouldn't buy that product in the first place. secondly, there are pirates who pirate to try out games/software. if there's no demo, i actually would like to try out software before i pay $100 for it - it can not run on my pc or wouldn't provide tools for my needs - it's easier to pirate and buy when tested and good with result.
for music, i do pirate a lot of music. but there's no way to get most of music anywhere else. spotify or similar services ain't a solution as there aren't a lot of artists i like or that it requires constant internet connection, or i need to listen to ads. i know there is paid version to it, but that's not a solution. and it's impossible to buy less known music online, or most music in my country costs too much.
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The only DVDs sold in my country are pirated ones, so even if you buy DVDs, you are still pirating *____*
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in that respect a lot of older games in the us were pirated without consumer knowledge; some us publishers were infamous for not paying royalties.
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I used to pirate games, I had no idea that steam existed and I bought very few pc games. Now I have steam and I buy a lot of stuff, the only time I pirate games these days is to make sure that I can play it on my computer etc, or to check it out to buy later. Now I just pirate animes and tv shows, and occasionally movies for the family. I'm not really a big movie person, or even tv person I just sort of skim through most stuff.
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I buy, just look at my steam profile which is only part of what I have; however I believe DRM is usually viruses and malware and should not be allowed. I feel that products that have been poisoned with DRM should be put into the public domain, all rights removed. and that anyone in the DRM chain from the people that make it to the people that distribute it should face the same penalties any other cyber attack criminals face.
DRM can damage competitors products so they won't run, damage hardware, weaken security, steal info, mine bitcoins, damage files, interfere with product compatibility, interfere with the preservation of software for when copyright runs out, create bot nets, adware, loggers, or do anything else other malware does, it's just not legally treated as malware because of current legal loopholes.
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There's no limitations for me in my area, so I don't feel the need to pirate. I'm quite picky of what they I play, so I don't spend much. A few walkthroughs/gameplay videos will suffice, perhaps look at reviews, and if possible watch a review from TotalBiscuit or AngryJoe.
I understand the reason for your pirating, OP. An entire city does not provide any videogames is absurd, but the whole debit restriction is just adding more assault to injury. You literally -literally- have to get out of the country to have more opportunities to buy games and such.
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It's extremely annoying, the "president" has been in office since 1979, him and his cabinet drive keep the people miserable, I do buy physical games around once a year when I go to a neighboring country, but there are tight restrictions on how many or even what games you can bring.
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+1 plus piracy because most publisher doesn't deliver what users want.
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I'm okay with pirating things if you're going to buy them at a later date, as a demo, to see if you like it or not.
There is one game series, however, that I'm 100% okay with you pirating, regardless if your going to buy it or not.
And that's obviously The Sims. Screw you EA and your $200+ DLC collections.
In fact, I'm fine with you pirating any games from such unethical and horrible developers, we shouldn't support them.
Having said all this though, do I pirate? Yes. Do I always follow this rule? Nope. I should, and I try, but what can I say?
I'm not a great human being. :p The only thing I pirate though is TV Shows. (The ones that aren't on Prime or TV rn).
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Actually, if you were perfect, you wouldn't be a good human being. Every single human on this planet (no exception) does stuff that isn't according to rules (either set by yourself, the government or just social conventions).
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And the worst part is they keep selling us the same expansions over and over again.
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Games : No need thanks to Steam and GOG, etc. I already have long enough backlog. Though I still have a few pirated copies of old games no longer available legally anywhere.
Software : Buying Windows, Office Programs. Using good Freewares.
Music : Buying legal CD of my favorite artists and OST. Listening at YouTube if they don't sell in my country or just so-so artists. I often rip MP3 from CD for the convenience and devices I own.
Movie : Going to cinema once in a while. Buying Blu-Ray or DVD of my favorite series. Sometimes I collect pirated one of my legal copy for the convenience.
Anime : My big pirated ones. Though I'm trying to buy legal copies of my favorite series when they sell in my country, they are not always available. Japanese versions are too expensive and have language issues(I can read English, Japanese fast enough, but uncomfortable).
Books : I need more space for them... My parents always said 'Don't buy more books!' When I move, service worker guys complain. I began to collect e-book, though I like the paper ones more. >.< When there is no legal copy I can buy, I search torrent, but that doesn't often happen.
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its related to both price and service, thankfully it has become so much easier to collect
Anime
For me, my interest comes in waves, when i want to watch anime i usually sign up at Crunchyroll for only a month
Music
I spend alot of time on youtube and once and awhile i buy albums of my favorite artists
Movies
From my favorite directors, i usually buy the blu rays or go watch them at the big screen, sometimes both, for every other movie i watch them on tv or netflix, i do pay for netflix but use Vpn, not sure if thats a grey area or not.
Series
Thats a bit more complicated, i usually start at netflix, than get attached to the characters and story and instead of waiting, i end up torrenting the newer episodes
Books and Manga
I usually pay for those, since i dont like to read, all my books are tied to games or movies, i really dont waste to much money on them
Games
No pirating, but i havent bought a game at full price ever since GTA V on PS3
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Accessibility, quality of content, value for money.
Its worth noting that these days most industries no longer produce "goods".
In the past, a car manufacturer would produce quality cars - they prided themselves on the products they created.
In construction they would build buildings with the intention for them to last the ages.
There was an overall focus on quality and people prided themselves in being able to deliver a certain quality.
These days, its all about the numbers. Often times, a product that is bought "new" just hasn't broken yet.
Everything comes with an expiration date. Nothing is intended to last, because they want you to buy again.
Software, music, movies - they're all the same.
Expend a minimum amount of effort for a maximum amount of return.
And that means focusing on the largest common denominators.
Which inevitably results in a drop in quality aswell as actual quantity of content as long as people are willing to settle for less.
It also results in the income disparity, not just internationally but even locally where one group can easily afford something while the other deems the price too high.
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So what IS value for money?
A lot of people will use the cinema comparison. You pay $1020 for a 23 hour movie.
So when you get equivalent or better value from a game then its "worth it".
Similar ideals apply, as long as you get X hours per dollar spent its good enough. Regardless of what that time is spent doing.
And inevitably this leads to games that focus on multiplayer. Since a single large dungeon in Skyrim could take about the same amount of time to create as your average Call of Duty map. But where people spend dozens if not hundreds of hours on the latter, the former only occupies most players for up to a dozen hours on average.
Add to that the fact that statistics indicate most players do not actually FINISH campaigns. And they ask themselves the obvious question: "Why are we creating content that half our audience never plays?"
Ofcourse not everyone is into generic multiplayer content. So the ones of us that are not see a drastic decrease in value of content.
While the ones that thrive in fragging their opponents will sink hundreds if not thousands of hours into a single game.
Interestingly enough, both are bad for the industry. Since the former will be more likely to wait for a sale or outright pirate.
The latter simply does not have the time or desire to play other games, they will play a single game for a year or more then hop to the next.
Same applies to music, movies, TV series.
Most of us love us some Game of Thrones, but is that one series worth paying the full HBO package for 4 months?
Assuming they even offer it in your region in the first place. You could wait on the DVD box, but when is that gonna release - IF its gonna release in your area (international releases are still quite rare...)
The list goes on and on and on.
And the reason is simple. There is a conflict of interest in what is being created versus what is being demanded.
Because there is a vast disparity in income, interests and regional currencies.
You can't make a single generic product to cater to the entire world, and yet that is the very thing that is being attempted.
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Value for money should not be metered as hours per dollar spent. I bought csgo when it was -80% 2 years ago, I have more than 1100 hours but my psychology and happiness made a skydive. this game is evillllllllllll
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For older titles and specifically the ones with lots of replay value (whether its multiplayer or sandbox / procedurally generated) it is a harder measure.
But many will still hold onto this metric.
Pay $60 for a game, get 12 hours of gameplay out of the campaign? Thats $5 per hour paid.
Its also applied to boardgames - apparently a lot of people believe that Pandemic Legacy (for example) is worth the initial investment for much the same reasoning. While it has no true replay potential after going through it due to how you have to tear up cards and open up boxes etc. They then reason that getting 12 to 24 sessions out of it is worth the $50 to 70 price.
Meanwhile others will reason that the mere fact you can not share the experience with others without having to buy the game a second time.
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So while I could reasonably say that paying less than a dollar per hour of entertainment seems fair.
At the same time there is no way anyone will convince me to rebuy the same product after sinking 60~ hours into it so I can have a second playthrough.
Its hard to measure value and determine what is or is not worth it.
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I used to download all my games, but since i have a steam account i play only using steam and keep buying thigs because it is easier then downloading and supports the developers. for movies and tv shows i would like to use netflix but netflix is outdatet and it cant keep up with the illegal things. Downloading a season at once is a lot easier then using netflix and you never know when netflix removes a thing. It will remove the walking dead soon so that is another thing that people will download. If netflix wants to keep up they should have everything and have it as soon as it launches. There are some series though i would like to own on dvd :)
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piracy is wrong since you are not allowed to do it (wow, wonder who made those laws, eh?) but...
since hollywood, disc labels, big game developers and publishers are doing so well (like, x999,999,999 times better than everyone else with a normal job!) do they really need to start a witch hunt because they need more money?
besides, the amount of funds they invest in fighting piracy is just stupid... from lawers to drm tools.
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Thats the interesting part. The more they invest in fighting piracy, the more money is removed from making the product better.
Decrease in quality will convince more people to either pirate or wait on a sale. But as development budgets go up they need more and more sales.
They've set themselves up to fail as there is no such thing as infinite growth.
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I used to pirate since I had no money and my parents would not allow me, to game. Now days, the only reason I pirate is to test out if the game will run on my computer since these days, most AAA games don't come with demos. and out of the last 3-4 games I have pirated, I bought 3 of them in the end, so go figure.
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Also, my current torrents are Terry Pratchett Discworld in English, which is almost unavailable here (though I've read his books in my native language) and pretty much all the seasons of Digimon in Japanese (which is almost non-existant)
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I used to torrent a lot of tv shows/movies, but with netflix i dont really anymore. Never really pirated any games.
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I used to pirate a lot for some time, but with Steam, Youtube, Netflix, Spotify, and others, I pretty much don't do anymore... The only thing that kept me in the ''pirate business'' is some TV Shows that aren't available in my region
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There have been some topics about this already, but mostly focused on games. I'm curious about where people stand in all media piracy. I'll start:
I believe the root of piracy isn't price, even though it's a factor, but mostly the quality of the service and product.
I used to pirate PC games because there was no way to buy them, in my country the only place that sells PC games is the capital, my city sells ZERO PC games, and even in the capital they cost (at the time) around $100~120. Then about 2 years ago my country started using debit cards and I found Steam, since then I've been getting my games digitally, but since then the country has blocked all cards because of a problem with currency.
But what about movies, music, shows, etc.? For these unfortunately, I engage in the practice, but because there are no places that sell DVDs or Blu-rays of movies or shows, and the only CDs for sale in the stores are of local artists, and services like Netflix, iTunes, etc. aren't available here. If you got the only cinema in the city you find movies that are 6-8 months old, and only a very small fraction of movies make it there.
Pirating something means that the creator if the product won't get the money he deserves from that sale, but if it's impossible to buy it then that sale doesn't really exist. Should you be denied the product because there is no way to make the purchase? Is it still wrong?
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