I don't think so, i guess it's a alternate distribution method. The developers themselves put it there.
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Pirates react to their games being pirated in Game Dev Tycoon
- Thread starter usea
- Start date
I don't think so, i guess it's a alternate distribution method. The developers themselves put it there.
Aquamarine
Member
The "cracked version" is a satirical parody intended to make pirates aware of the irony of their actions.
Wow. I feel like this should be in the OP.
I'm just so, SO glad the 3DS + Wii U + Vita haven't succumbed to piracy yet.
Figures like this shock the ever-living daylights out of me. Those poor developers...
Greenlight it like me and others have done!
Basileus777
Member
This is a clever way to gain publicity.
Alexios
Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
They're gonna pick it up because they always make something out of nothing for hits, otherwise it's not at all uncommon, plus other games do this kind of thing technically better by having it as part of the DRM so until discovered and properly cracked every illegally distributed version has it rather than only a separate special version of the game uploaded by themselves that technically isn't even pirating since they basically just released a free altered (and bad) version of their game.
axisofweevils
Holy crap! Today's real megaton is that more than two people can have the same first name.
Absolute genius!
This is amazing. I'd love to see more devs troll the pirates. Make it so a glitch only happens to pirated copies. Then when people complain about running into said glitch, they get outed as a pirate.
They'll probably fully crack the game in time but the day one pirates will end up looking foolish.
They'll probably fully crack the game in time but the day one pirates will end up looking foolish.
It existed before Nintendo too. FADE in Operation Flashpoint.
Revolutionary
Member
Pretty brilliant. I really love how oblivious the pirates are. "Why are there so many that pirate? It ruins me!"
Aquamarine
Member
I'd like a system where you get nearly to the very end of the game, then you get a "YOU HAVE BEEN PIRATED!" splash with a fanciful waltz on your screen, as the game wipes all of your saved data.
In general these schemes often cause a lot of negative word-of-mouth about your game. People assume the game just sucks and they tell people so.
It really is too bad that they already revealed this.
SE also had some creative anti piracy measures. For example, in Dragon Quest V you couldn't get off a boat at the beginning of the game and in Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates a thank you message would pop up and the game would freeze.
SE also had some creative anti piracy measures. For example, in Dragon Quest V you couldn't get off a boat at the beginning of the game and in Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates a thank you message would pop up and the game would freeze.
But if the devs release a version of the game for free, would you actually be pirating the game if you download it?
If the definition of piracy is copyright infringement, but the copy of the game that is being distributed was created by the copyright HOLDER, and distributed by them, the people receiving the game would not be guilty of copyright infringement.
It's not the delivery method that makes a game pirated, it's the fact that the copy is unauthorized.
So the funny thing is that people playing this version of the game, made and distributed by the developers of Game Dev Tycoon, are NOT pirates.
If the definition of piracy is copyright infringement, but the copy of the game that is being distributed was created by the copyright HOLDER, and distributed by them, the people receiving the game would not be guilty of copyright infringement.
It's not the delivery method that makes a game pirated, it's the fact that the copy is unauthorized.
So the funny thing is that people playing this version of the game, made and distributed by the developers of Game Dev Tycoon, are NOT pirates.
This has been deleted now.
Macho Madness
Member
Tried the demo. It's pretty much Game Dev Story.
You know, it really does...
LOL. An even better approach would be to include an unbeatable boss. Get the player frustrated as hell. That would be hilarious.
Ah you're right. This is true too.
bigbaldwolf86
Banned
That is a brilliant troll to the pirates.
I hope this publicity gets them a few more sales because I quite like their games
I hope this publicity gets them a few more sales because I quite like their games
Fudgepuppy
Banned
This makes me want to buy the game.
Been craving a good Tycoon-game.
Been craving a good Tycoon-game.
PedroPanache
Member
It's hardly a story "out of nothing", and with the irony of the games content and some of the priceless comments from the pirates, it's an interesting commentary on the nature of piracy. Technically, it still is pirating. They're not paying for the game, it's just that the developers took a pro-active stance and put up a torrent ahead of people putting up the torrent of the DRM free version without the patch.
I remember something similarly amusing in rFactor; if you had a pirated copy, the game would cause a random car failure on the last couple of laps sometimes. Just about to win a long, hard fought race? How about a front-right brake failure which sends you spinning at high speed into a wall. Or how about your engine spectacularly spews out smoke and you roll to a halt, metres from the finish line.
But this though, is even more genius. Awesome game too, I played the demo from the Windows 8 app store (not that I use that thing regularly, I just found it when exploring W8 on my new laptop), and plan to buy the full game when it hits Steam.
But this though, is even more genius. Awesome game too, I played the demo from the Windows 8 app store (not that I use that thing regularly, I just found it when exploring W8 on my new laptop), and plan to buy the full game when it hits Steam.
That's just a technicality though. The players playing on the modified copies are intending to play the pirated version. In other words if the "official cracked" version wasn't there they would have downloaded another cracked version anyway. So it's still an accurate count of piracy stats, which they're looking for.
Yeah, it's a little too on the nose. Especially the line about the new engine. I may just be cynical but it seems like viral marketing to me.
Acquiescence
Member
Pirates complaining about piracy. I'd like to laugh, but it's just sad more than anything.
Wolves Evolve
Member
I feel weird about this because the game is sorta close to KS's Game Dev Story in turn.....
Didn't Earthbound on SNES do something like that? Well not a splash on the screen, but it wiped the saves just before the last boss or something if it detected that it was a pirated copy.
Considering they basically did a bit of theft themselves (of the game design/idea/NAME), it wouldn't surprise me.
Earthbound got nasty if you were playing a pirated copy. First you got a warning screen. If you got past that check, enemies would span in significantly greater quantities to make the game absurdly difficult. If you got past THAT check, the game would delete your saves when trying to fight the final boss.
More info on it: http://starmen.net/mother2/gameinfo/antipiracy/
It's cool to have similar games. I haven't played this game, so maybe it's terrible. But I think in general it's a great thing to have similar games. There's room for everybody, even borderline clones. I'm also very strongly against all the people who are trying to get laws passed against game cloning. Just my opinion.
Linkstrikesback
Member
Isn't that basically what happened in earthbound? You get to the final boss, then the games graphics and music (generally) go crazy for a moment, followed by the game freezing, forcing you to reset, then once you get back to the file screen, everythings wiped.
alexandros
Banned
It will be interesting to see how these numbers will be affected if/when the game makes through Steam Greenlight. Odds are the number of sales will increase significantly.
Screaming Meat
Unconfirmed Member
I do love a clever anti-pirate feature, but a fourth-wall breaking one that puts pirates in the shoes of the Devs? Freakin' priceless.
It's not really a technicality. It's the heart of what piracy is: downloading and/or distributing a copy of a title that was not authorized by the owner of the copyright.
If you download a copy made for you by the people with the right to make copies, you're not pirating.
This is kind of what happens when a "pirated" version is released within minutes of the store's opening.
Good job cannibalizing your own sales to make a point about piracy, guys. Really, stellar work.
~90% not unique or surprising.
Wow. I feel like this should be in the OP.
200 sales seems pretty awful, though. That's about $2000. It pays for maybe two man-weeks worth of work. If that.
Damn that's rough haha.
Reminds me a little of TMNT3 on NES that had an anti-piracy thing that checked if the Konami logo was missing from the title screen, which would usually be the case with a pirate copy. If it was missing, the enemies took many more hits to kill and dealt more damage. And Shredder was unbeatable.
That's actually what I suspected which was why I posted that link to the Steam thread to get GAF detectives working. The Steam user that posted the thread is "corporalhicks" and I thought he was going to turn out to be a shell account but it's entirely possible that he really did pirate it because his account has been active since 2009 and his library is filled with cheap games and games from bundles.