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[DodgyGeezerFella]

The problem here is that the decline in importance and sales of PC gaming aligns quite closely with the degree to which good off-the-shelf PCs stopped being unable to run new-ish games, a trend that really kicked in 3-4 years after the rise of cheap and easy CD burning. In 2000 you're still looking at many games shipping that don't require 3D accelerators. If new piracy technologies really had such a big impact, CD burning should have been strangling the PC market by 1998.

For me, this is the biggest reason why.

 

[Mael]

I'll post it here just to remind some of you

Back to 2006, Ritual Entertainment

http://www.shacknews.com/extras/2006/072606_ritual_piracy_1.x

edit: heh, they closed the shop in 2007. Somebody wanted an example of an independent dev being killed by piracy? Here you go.

was their game playable on off the shelf hardware without 3d accel cards?

 

[TheYanger]

edit that doesn't change the fact that charlequin has a better explanation why pc game sales suck than 'yaaar pirates'
When your customers have to change their hardware setups to 'run' the software you're selling, most won't go through the assle and won't buy your games :-/

How does that justify piracy still? It doesn't. If it doesn't run on your PC, don't buy it.

Here's a little theory for the 'ITS NOT PHYSICAL MEDIA SO YOURE NOT BUYING ANYTHING QUANTIFIABLE AND ITS NOT STEALING" crowd:

By that logic, assuming bandwidth is free (It's not, btw, but we'll pretend it is), if a game was SOLELY digitally distributed, everyone should be able to download every game for free and it's not really stealing because there's no physical product.

Now in this imaginary world where everyone plays by your twisted rules...who is making the games? Cause it sure as fuck isn't any actual development company since actually MAKING the assets for the game, does in fact cost something. Something that is amortized accross all copies of a game that sell. Thus, every copy of the game, physical or not, does in fact have a value. You are stealing the lost income of the developers.

 

[TheYanger]

was their game playable on off the shelf hardware without 3d accel cards?

How is that relevant? You can say nobody bought it because their computers couldn't run it (Which is horse shit, even terrible laptops with on-board intel graphics can run most games, Crysis != entire pc industry)?
I'm pretty sure those tech support calls from people that didn't buy the game were from pirates who do, in fact, have the necessary hardware to run the game.

If you lack the ability to play the game, you're not even part of the target audience, they're not retards, publishers are pretty aware at this point of the size of the market for different levels of system requirements.

To put it in perspective, this is like saying people pirate 360 games because they're exclusive and not on PS3, and if it were multiplat people would buy it.

No, the PS3 user is not part of the target market of your 360 exclusive, they don't enter into the equation. Same deal for your magical PC user that is somehow interested in games, yet is running Windows 95 on a 486. The market of people who can legitimately run the games is plenty big.

 

[Mael]

How does that justify piracy still? It doesn't. If it doesn't run on your PC, don't buy it.

Here's a little theory for the 'ITS NOT PHYSICAL MEDIA SO YOURE NOT BUYING ANYTHING QUANTIFIABLE AND ITS NOT STEALING" crowd:

By that logic, assuming bandwidth is free (It's not, btw, but we'll pretend it is), if a game was SOLELY digitally distributed, everyone should be able to download every game for free and it's not really stealing because there's no physical product.

Now in this imaginary world where everyone plays by your twisted rules...who is making the games? Cause it sure as fuck isn't any actual development company since actually MAKING the assets for the game, does in fact cost something. Something that is amortized accross all copies of a game that sell. Thus, every copy of the game, physical or not, does in fact have a value. You are stealing the lost income of the developers.

Do you only read what you want to read or do you occasionnally read the posts people make?
I mean where did I say that copyright infrigement is okay and we should all do it?
I'm saying that there's perfectly valid reasons why the pc market dwindled and that got nothing to do with piracy (which was there BEFORE people started making games on personnal computer btw).
Stop trying to hide how fucking incompetent most software makers are with that piracy smokescreen.
There never was a market big enough to support the constant flight toward the high end anyway or are we going to argue that somehow something magical happened and people suddenly decided to stop paying for their games unless they are called the Sims?

How is that relevant? You can say nobody bought it because their computers couldn't run it (Which is horse shit, even terrible laptops with on-board intel graphics can run most games, Crysis != entire pc industry)?
I'm pretty sure those tech support calls from people that didn't buy the game were from pirates who do, in fact, have the necessary hardware to run the game.

If you lack the ability to play the game, you're not even part of the target audience, they're not retards, publishers are pretty aware at this point of the size of the market for different levels of system requirements.

So you're saying that most developpers painted themselves in a corner by designing games for a market that couldn't support them, then?

 

[C4Lukins]

Wut. And even if they did struggle (they didnt) does the million sales mark magically mean success? I mean you think it might be possible to make a profit by selling less than a million?

Also Gears is PC centric my ass.

A million is not a magic marker. But if a company is going to invest tens of millions into a game then it does need to reach those numbers to be successful. If you are going to be at the top of the whole gaming evolution as far as graphics and technology it takes that sort of money to compete.

And I just mentioned several games that their combined sales are less then a Halo, actually probably more in line with a Halo spinoff, or a small percentage of what a Call of Duty or GTA does on consoles alone. And you are right about Gears, it plays better on consoles, works better with a common console controller, and was just a horrible example on my part.

The PC was the area of the megabudget games back in the day that utilized and pushed the technology of that period. Wing Commander 3 is the first example I can really recall, and then you had Wing Commander 4 which had some sort of ridiculous movie like budget. Outside of subscription based games, or proven mainstays like Civilization, Blizzard games, and the Sims, just having the biggest and best does not seem to work in the PC world as it once did.

 

[Zizbuka]

You mean one guying being the president of Epic? Or one guy meaning you or the other individuals that just talk right out their asses with not a lick of knowledge or data. None. Zilch.

I missed Cliffys data, could you please share it with me. I know he wouldn't make things up, he is after all a developer.

 

[Mael]

A million is not a magic marker. But if a company is going to invest tens of millions into a game then it does need to reach those numbers to be successful. If you are going to be at the top of the whole gaming evolution as far as graphics and technology it takes that sort of money to compete.

And I just mentioned several games that their combined sales are less then a Halo, actually probably more in line with a Halo spinoff, or a small percentage of what a Call of Duty or GTA does on consoles alone. And you are right about Gears, it plays better on consoles, works better with a common console controller, and was just a horrible example on my part.

And what is the point of making a top of the line game that requires a stupenduous hardware to even hope to be playable (or even more than a cpu bought without any 'frills')?
I mean it sure as hell isn't about reaching a huge market, so why be surprised when the sales are not in line with a profitability that is unreachable anyway?
Let's not pretend to be surprised that something like Quake is a bigger success than whatever needs a high end range to even be playable.
Again I don't see the makers of civilisation or europa universalis having any problem with piracy AT ALL (and seeing how dependant they are on networking, I'd say they must be hit by that too)

 

[neorej]

How does that justify piracy still? It doesn't. If it doesn't run on your PC, don't buy it.

Here's a little theory for the 'ITS NOT PHYSICAL MEDIA SO YOURE NOT BUYING ANYTHING QUANTIFIABLE AND ITS NOT STEALING" crowd:

By that logic, assuming bandwidth is free (It's not, btw, but we'll pretend it is), if a game was SOLELY digitally distributed, everyone should be able to download every game for free and it's not really stealing because there's no physical product.

Now in this imaginary world where everyone plays by your twisted rules...who is making the games? Cause it sure as fuck isn't any actual development company since actually MAKING the assets for the game, does in fact cost something. Something that is amortized accross all copies of a game that sell. Thus, every copy of the game, physical or not, does in fact have a value. You are stealing the lost income of the developers.

Great analogy, expect for the part where stealing bandwidth physically removes the ability for others (others being paying customers) to use that portion of the bandwidth, whereas pirating a game does not impair the ability of paying customers to play that particular game.

...


Owh wait, that took away the entire validity of your post, didn't it?

 

[TheYanger]

Do you only read what you want to read or do you occasionnally read the posts people make?
I mean where did I say that copyright infrigement is okay and we should all do it?
I'm saying that there's perfectly valid reasons why the pc market dwindled and that got nothing to do with piracy (which was there BEFORE people started making games on personnal computer btw).
Stop trying to hide how fucking incompetent most software makers are with that piracy smokescreen.
There never was a market big enough to support the constant flight toward the high end anyway or are we going to argue that somehow something magical happened and people suddenly decided to stop paying for their games unless they are called the Sims?




So you're saying that most developpers painted themselves in a corner by designing games for a market that couldn't support them, then?

The market clearly DID exist though, you act like PC games didn't sell fabulously, even high end ones, before piracy became so widespread.

Do you honestly posit that the quality of games on PC are somehow worse than those of consoles? That these devs clearly are just retarded while the console developers are jesus-like in their magnificence at making compelling games?

Let me connect the dots for you:
PC games sell well. Even 'high end' enthusiast titles. This has been true from the beginning of the modern PC market in the late 70s and early 80s. Piracy is possible for most of these, but overly cumbersome and difficult, so it's not a HUGE factor. This continues along until sometime in the very late 90s early 2000s, after not only the internet is widespread, but HIGH SPEED CONNECTIONS, and File Sharing systems, torrents, etc, are all common. Piracy is now exceedingly accessible. Note, that piracy is just as possible on the Xbox 360, the PS2, heck, almost anything. The ease of access however, is still significantly different. By definition almost any PC user is savvy enough to find a torrent, download it, and play. Whereas the required knowledge goes above and beyond pirating a PC game if you do it for a home console, even including hardware modification being necessary, while the audience is LESS pc savvy by necessity. So Piracy is not as widespread. Suddenly, the PC market shrinks in the blink of an eye, and the console market doesn't suffer.

Maybe that was a bit too hard to grasp, but the gist of the argument is this: You claim that there are other reasons PC games don't sell well, there very well may be, but it's a snowball effect, as people game less on their pc, they think of their pc less as a gaming platform. People game less on their PC as pc gaming titles become less available and the games they want are increasingly on consoles. These PC games move to consoles because their bottom line on PCs is being harmed greatly by piracy. So you go backwards in time to that point, PC development slows, sales dwindle, as a direct result of piracy, people stop seeing their PCs as a primary gaming machine, thus costing EVEN MORE pc gaming sales.

Yes, it's 'harder to use' and stuff too, but it's been 'harder to use' for the entirety of the existence of consoles, so frankly I don't buy that as the determining factor. The ONLY thing that has changed about the relative ease of use, power of the systems, development skill, etc, over the past 30 years has been the introduction of high speed accessible piracy downloads online. Coinciding neatly with the near collapse (Relatively speaking) of the PC gaming market.

Please refute. I'd love to read this.

 

[TheYanger]

Great analogy, expect for the part where stealing bandwidth physically removes the ability for others (others being paying customers) to use that portion of the bandwidth, whereas pirating a game does not impair the ability of paying customers to play that particular game.

...


Owh wait, that took away the entire validity of your post, didn't it?

No, not really. Just the part you quoted, and really only in the broadest terms. (The bandwidth you're using to download your pirated game and depriving the paying customers of doesn't count? Your argument in that regard makes no sense since you admit that they are stealing that....but really the entire post seems to have just gone over your head, since bandwidth was not a major portion of the argument).

 

[kamspy]

How many developers get paid based on the residual sales of their game?

Is it a common form of compensation in the industry? I remember reading that most get their little $X0K a year salary and having a big selling title was just good resume fluff to get a better job or a raise.

 

[gillty]

Epic Blames Pirates for Terrible Sales of Terrible Games.

nuff said.

 

[Mael]

The market clearly DID exist though, you act like PC games didn't sell fabulously, even high end ones, before piracy became so widespread.

Do you honestly posit that the quality of games on PC are somehow worse than those of consoles? That these devs clearly are just retarded while the console developers are jesus-like in their magnificence at making compelling games?

actually on consoles, software makers are even more incompetent but that's another debate alltogether.
All I'm saying is that most games reduced their appeal all by themselves, the whole installation process that doesn't make sure that you can play you're legally owned copy (irnically requiring one to become a 'pirate' to play his game), the whole requiring a new 3d card to even be able to play the games BECAUSE the devs don't support legacy hardware.
It's safe to say that it's less of a hassle to play a game on a console than on a pc, most people would be driven to the consoles as the consoles are having more games that could only be found on pc before (the whole trend of fps games and other mutliplayer heavy games)

Let me connect the dots for you:
PC games sell well. Even 'high end' enthusiast titles. This has been true from the beginning of the modern PC market in the late 70s and early 80s. Piracy is possible for most of these, but overly cumbersome and difficult, so it's not a HUGE factor.

BS, it never was very hard to pirate a game inthe 80/90, you didn't need a key generator or all the software now needed to make the craks run.

This continues along until sometime in the very late 90s early 2000s, after not only the internet is widespread, but HIGH SPEED CONNECTIONS, and File Sharing systems, torrents, etc, are all common. Piracy is now exceedingly accessible. Note, that piracy is just as possible on the Xbox 360, the PS2, heck, almost anything. The ease of access however, is still significantly different. By definition almost any PC user is savvy enough to find a torrent, download it, and play. Whereas the required knowledge goes above and beyond pirating a PC game if you do it for a home console, even including hardware modification being necessary, while the audience is LESS pc savvy by necessity. So Piracy is not as widespread. Suddenly, the PC market shrinks in the blink of an eye, and the console market doesn't suffer.

Again BS, have you seen the ps1? That thing was pirate heaven, and it was in the midst of the rise of cd burner even, that's even why people bought instead of the competition in such huge number! you got to a shop to get ship and then you're good to go and can play any game burned on a disc, you cannot make any less hassle free.

Maybe that was a bit too hard to grasp, but the gist of the argument is this: You claim that there are other reasons PC games don't sell well, there very well may be, but it's a snowball effect, as people game less on their pc, they think of their pc less as a gaming platform. People game less on their PC as pc gaming titles become less available and the games they want are increasingly on consoles. These PC games move to consoles because their bottom line on PCs is being harmed greatly by piracy. So you go backwards in time to that point, PC development slows, sales dwindle, as a direct result of piracy, people stop seeing their PCs as a primary gaming machine, thus costing EVEN MORE pc gaming sales./

Nope they move away from pc to console because Sony and Msft gave them a window of opportunity to make their games very easily(especially MSFT) without much additional cost, as such it's more money that are leading them away from pc than something scaring them from doing pc games.
The finit number of resources used to make pc games had some diverted to make console games.

Yes, it's 'harder to use' and stuff too, but it's been 'harder to use' for the entirety of the existence of consoles, so frankly I don't buy that as the determining factor. The ONLY thing that has changed about the relative ease of use, power of the systems, development skill, etc, over the past 30 years has been the introduction of high speed accessible piracy downloads online. Coinciding neatly with the near collapse (Relatively speaking) of the PC gaming market.

Please refute. I'd love to read this.

It's harder to use than consoles and now consoles have the very same games, which will the consumer choose?
Nope it's the massive influx of a competition against which the pc gaming didn't compete

 

[neorej]

No, not really. Just the part you quoted, and really only in the broadest terms. (The bandwidth you're using to download your pirated game and depriving the paying customers of doesn't count? Your argument in that regard makes no sense since you admit that they are stealing that....but really the entire post seems to have just gone over your head, since bandwidth was not a major portion of the argument).

OK, I misinterpreted your post (it's early here and I'm still on my first coffee).

Let me retry:

I think you misinterpret the whole concept of 'it's not stealing if you're not taking a physical product'. Let me try to explain.
The claim that most, if not all, developers and producers make is that every illegal download counts for one lost sale, while quite the opposite is true. There is no way of telling whether an illegal download would've been a sale. Just as there's no way of telling how much people actually go out and buy the product after they illegally obtained it. Here's another fun-fact: more often than not, the pirated copy of the game works better or smoother than the retail-product, which again is not taken into the equation of amount of downloads vs amount of sales.

You seem to be under the false impression that pirates claim that as long as it's not physical, you should just copy it. That's not the point of the above quote. The point is that if you download something illegally, you are not impairing someone else to buy that product. If someone went into a recordstore and physically stole a videogame, THEN he/she is impairing someone from buying that particular product and it definatly counts as a lost sale. Because while the thief may not have bought the product, someone else might have.

Returning to the twisted world you created, you seem to assume that piracy equals the downfall of the industry. Believe it or not, but that same industry has been claiming it would go under for years, if not decades. If piracy really IS the big problem the industry and some forummember make it out to be, the only way to play videogames in this day and age would be on the unpirated PlayStation 3. PC gaming would've died eons ago, the Xbox 360 would've never existed because of the high popularity of the Xbox amongst pirates and the Wii would not have the massive library it has today.
For an industry that claims it's dying, they're spending a shitload on development, marketing and advertisements. Let me ask you: where the hell is that money coming from, because it sure as hell isn't coming from the pirates.

 

[TheYanger]

BS, it never was very hard to pirate a game inthe 80/90, you didn't need a key generator or all the software now needed to make the craks run.

Where did you get the pirated games? You had to know someone that had it and install it, hopefully it didn't need the disc because burners weren't very widespread if it was a CD based game, and even still you had to copy the physical copy protection schemes they had. It wasn't 'hard' but it was certainly prohibitive.

Again BS, have you seen the ps1? That thing was pirate heaven, and it was in the midst of the rise of cd burner even, that's even why people bought instead of the competition in such huge number! you got to a shop to get ship and then you're good to go and can play any game burned on a disc, you cannot make any less hassle free.

First off: Downloading a PS1 game in the mid 90s took forever and a day. The internet was still not widely spread like it is now, burners were not as commonplace, you had to either pay someone or physically modify your system yourself...You wanna know how you make it less hassle free? You do it on a PC today, here's how you pirate a PC game now:
1)go to a torrent site.
2)Download torrent, usually it's already cracked.
3)Play game.
You can't seriously compare any of those home console piracy methods in ease of use or the impulse ability to do it.

Nope they move away from pc to console because Sony and Msft gave them a window of opportunity to make their games very easily(especially MSFT) without much additional cost, as such it's more money that are leading them away from pc than something scaring them from doing pc games.
The finit number of resources used to make pc games had some diverted to make console games.

Again, are you honestly trying to say that the console suddenly existed and that took away from PC games? Her'es news for you son, consoles have existed just as long as PCs. Sony and Microsoft are actually NEW to the console business, as strange and foreign as that may seem to you.

It's harder to use than consoles and now consoles have the very same games, which will the consumer choose?
Nope it's the massive influx of a competition against which the pc gaming didn't compete

We're not even talking about 'the very same games'. They have the same games NOW because making PC exclusives doesn't make sense, because of piracy. There were SHITLOADS of PC exclusives when piracy began to run amok, chicken and egg here - There are less PC exclusives because of piracy, not the other way around. Look at TitanQuest, trotted out many times already because it's obvious, but you can NOT play it on a console. That didn't stop it from getting pirated at a rate of probably 5:1 with legitimate purchases.

 

[fushi]

I'll post it here just to remind some of you

Back to 2006, Ritual Entertainment

http://www.shacknews.com/extras/2006/072606_ritual_piracy_1.x

edit: heh, they closed the shop in 2007. Somebody wanted an example of an independent dev being killed by piracy? Here you go.

To be fair, the first Episode was not very good. And I should know, being a pretty big SiN nut back in the day.

 

[Mael]

Where did you get the pirated games? You had to know someone that had it and install it, hopefully it didn't need the disc because burners weren't very widespread if it was a CD based game, and even still you had to copy the physical copy protection schemes they had. It wasn't 'hard' but it was certainly prohibitive.

Copy protection scheme? They were laughably weak, Metal Gear Solid lasted 2 days, and I don't mean 2 days to find the crack of the web, I mean 2 days for a friend to advertise that his copy worked :lol
Let's not even talk about something like the DC....

First off: Downloading a PS1 game in the mid 90s took forever and a day. The internet was still not widely spread like it is now, burners were not as commonplace, you had to either pay someone or physically modify your system yourself...You wanna know how you make it less hassle free? You do it on a PC today, here's how you pirate a PC game now:
1)go to a torrent site.
2)Download torrent, usually it's already cracked.
3)Play game.
You can't seriously compare any of those home console piracy methods in ease of use or the impulse ability to do it.

You didn't even need to dl the bloody game! you rent it or now someone who have it, dump on the comp, and burn. People were downloading songs off Napster at the time, not games.

Again, are you honestly trying to say that the console suddenly existed and that took away from PC games? Her'es news for you son, consoles have existed just as long as PCs. Sony and Microsoft are actually NEW to the console business, as strange and foreign as that may seem to you.

And before they entered the console market, the pc devs were not dealing with console games.
Heck they was barely a massive influx in console dev in Europe when the ps1 hit (mostly due to Sony's less strict distribution model)

We're not even talking about 'the very same games'. They have the same games NOW because making PC exclusives doesn't make sense, because of piracy. There were SHITLOADS of PC exclusives when piracy began to run amok, chicken and egg here - There are less PC exclusives because of piracy, not the other way around. Look at TitanQuest, trotted out many times already because it's obvious, but you can NOT play it on a console. That didn't stop it from getting pirated at a rate of probably 5:1 with legitimate purchases.

That doesn't mean it would have sold significantly more if there wasn't piracy at all!
It just means there's that much people interested in playing it but not interested enough to pay for the game. You're basically saying that 1dl = 1 lost sale,
well try something :
try to sell places to the cinema then offer it for free, I tell you there's people that have no interest in even watching the films that will show up when you'll give free tickets.
Heck I'd probably go watch Portal if it was free!

I'd like to add that regardless of ease of use, when I'm talking about piracy in the ps1 days I'm not speaking of the savvy people that know where to seek stuff and all,
it was more like the DS where even a child of 10 with no computer knowledge was actually not paying for his games.
And again on pc the publishers made sure that people were trained to go to the crackers site anyway. compare Spore with the Sims3 for example, guess which one got pirated more and which one sold the most?

 

[bigswords]

I dunno, as long as I see Valve and Blizzard able to sell tons .... I don't see pirates as the "main" problem.

 

[neorej]

To be fair, the first Episode was not very good. And I should know, being a pretty big SiN nut back in the day.

As several posters pointed out: the quality of the product has nothing to do with the downfall of a company. It's all the pirates' fault!

Spoiler

</sarcasm>

 

[CecilRousso]

Om still curious about which sources people are referring to when they say that pc games doesnt sell anymore.

 

[I <3 Memes]

Om still curious about which sources people are referring to when they say that pc games doesnt sell anymore.

Why NPD of course. PC games arent selling well at gamestop so of course PC gaming is dying .... Again this is Epic trolling PC gaming and hoping that just saying it will cause it to happen pulling even more customers into the console market to buy their games

It would be nice if PC gamers would pull together on this. Easiest way to put a stop to this BS from console devs would be to stop buying hardware from any company that supplies hardware/technology to console manufacturers. Intel/AMD and especially Nvidia/ATI would drop support for console manufacturers in a heartbeat if PC gamers did that. Those companies couldn't survive a boycott of more than a month or two.

Without the technology from those companies the console business would be finished. Their entire business strategy depends on outdated and cheap PC components to keep the costs of consoles down.

I also find it ironic that a company that makes such boring and bland games is named Epic.

 

[Sho_Nuff82]

Great analogy, expect for the part where stealing bandwidth physically removes the ability for others (others being paying customers) to use that portion of the bandwidth, whereas pirating a game does not impair the ability of paying customers to play that particular game.

...


Owh wait, that took away the entire validity of your post, didn't it?

This is fucking retarded.

 

[CecilRousso]

So we can agree on that we dont know if pc games are selling bad? Doesnt that kill the whole discussion? :lol

 

[daycru]

It would be nice if PC gamers would pull together on this. Easiest way to put a stop to this BS from console devs would be to stop buying hardware from any company that supplies hardware/technology to console manufacturers. Intel/AMD and especially Nvidia/ATI would drop support for console manufacturers in a heartbeat if PC gamers did that. Those companies couldn't survive a boycott of more than a month or two.

LOL

They've shot themselves in the foot now! Next you'll be telling us about PC culture (you're an expert).

 

[Joseph Merrick]

To be fair, the first Episode was not very good. And I should know, being a pretty big SiN nut back in the day.

nevermind that, ritual dying had nothing to do with piracy. they sold the company to mumbojumbo and had a huge falling out across the whole company resulting in many key people leaving, like steve nix and tom mustaine. not necessarily in that order

that shack interview is referring to a blog post russell the qa guy made about support requests from people that seemingly didn't know they were running pirated versions of the game and he was annoyed about doing minuswork

 

[M°°nblade]

You didn't even need to dl the bloody game! you rent it or now someone who have it, dump on the comp, and burn.

He's right about the ease of acces though. Most people didn't mod their PSX. They paid someone who had the expertise to mod a PS1 (soldering the chip).
Most people didn't copy the PS1 games themselves. CD burners were quite expensive at that time. They paid someone for copied games.
It was all organized crime and definitely less accesible than dlen a PC game on a torrent site.

 

[freddy]

Originally Posted by charlequin:

The problem here is that the decline in importance and sales of PC gaming aligns quite closely with the degree to which good off-the-shelf PCs stopped being unable to run new-ish games, a trend that really kicked in 3-4 years after the rise of cheap and easy CD burning. In 2000 you're still looking at many games shipping that don't require 3D accelerators. If new piracy technologies really had such a big impact, CD burning should have been strangling the PC market by 1998.

Well said

 

[GeekyDad]

I blame Epic for grey saturation in my games.

 

[Silly.Mikey]

nuff said.

I dont agree with that. The last Unreal Tournament game was great, lots of support, fun to play and im positive PC people hated on it because their major focus was now Gears (a console game). I have it on steam and i loved that game. People hate on them because they've shifted their focus to console gaming for now, not because UT3 was a bad game, cause it isn't.

 

[Teknopathetic]

"nevermind that, ritual dying had nothing to do with piracy. they sold the company to mumbojumbo and had a huge falling out across the whole company resulting in many key people leaving, like steve nix and tom mustaine. not necessarily in that order"

Precisely. This is what happens when people google for something and quickly c/p the first thing that matches instead of researching the topic first.


"I dont agree with that. The last Unreal Tournament game was great, lots of support, fun to play and im positive PC people hated on it because their major focus was now Gears (a console game). I have it on steam and i loved that game. People hate on them because they've shifted their focus to console gaming for now, not because UT3 was a bad game, cause it isn't."

PC gamers hate on the game because it was released in a pretty sorry state. It was lacking a ton of features that were in its predecessors and had a server browser that was poorer than the original UT that was released almost 10 years prior. Also the demo was released without a dedicated server client initially and the first impressions of the netcode for a lot of people was pure piss.

 

[Mael]

He's right about the ease of acces though. Most people didn't mod their PSX. They paid someone who had the expertise to mod a PS1 (soldering the chip).
Most people didn't copy the PS1 games themselves. CD burners were quite expensive at that time. They paid someone for copied games.
It was all organized crime and definitely less accesible than dlen a PC game on a torrent site.

The thing is while it is indeed easier for some savvy to bypass the hoops, the thing is the people that used the organised crime type piracy were actually way more casuals than the hardcore gamers downloading toorent off the web (which was my point, and that certainly didn't kill Sony's business).
So yeah copied games have become cheaper from 1buck to 0 :-/
seriously blank cd were dirt cheap back then to boot.
Seriously if widespread piracy didn't kill the whole market before it certainly couldn't do that now.

I stand by my assertioin that publisher blaming piracy as their sole problem have bigger problems they should deal with.

"nevermind that, ritual dying had nothing to do with piracy. they sold the company to mumbojumbo and had a huge falling out across the whole company resulting in many key people leaving, like steve nix and tom mustaine. not necessarily in that order"

Precisely. This is what happens when people google for something and quickly c/p the first thing that matches instead of researching the topic first.

:lol

 

[I <3 Memes]

LOL

They've shot themselves in the foot now! Next you'll be telling us about PC culture (you're an expert).

Hey I'm just trying to save gaming as a whole. If Mike Capps is convinced that all but casual PC gaming is going to die then he must think that the free R&D on hardware that console manufacturers need is going to die too. I'm just trying to help Epic out here by trying to find a way to keep big budget PC gaming alive, and by virtue, keep the PC hardware market alive that his company depends on.

 

[Silly.Mikey]

"nevermind that, ritual dying had nothing to do with piracy. they sold the company to mumbojumbo and had a huge falling out across the whole company resulting in many key people leaving, like steve nix and tom mustaine. not necessarily in that order"

Precisely. This is what happens when people google for something and quickly c/p the first thing that matches instead of researching the topic first.


"I dont agree with that. The last Unreal Tournament game was great, lots of support, fun to play and im positive PC people hated on it because their major focus was now Gears (a console game). I have it on steam and i loved that game. People hate on them because they've shifted their focus to console gaming for now, not because UT3 was a bad game, cause it isn't."

PC gamers hate on the game because it was released in a pretty sorry state. It was lacking a ton of features that were in its predecessors and had a server browser that was poorer than the original UT that was released almost 10 years prior. Also the demo was released without a dedicated server client initially and the first impressions of the netcode for a lot of people was pure piss.

Are u joking? a PC game in sorry state when it launches? Its been like that for ages! I remember BF2 needing patches for patches they released. They would release a patch, then another one a day later to patch the patch. PC gaming has always been like that.

 

[Future PhaZe]

If games have to be of a remarkable quality to be bought on PC then piracy isn't even the issue. Reading some comments here you'd imagine that most PC gamers are Roger Ebert. The point is that a lot of shitty products sell in the world, and regardless of the quality they are priced and placed on a platform where the business can be successful. If PC isn't the space for that then you can't blame developers for trying to get money from a source that will be more prone to impulse purchases.

 

[Teknopathetic]

"Are u joking? a PC game in sorry state when it launches? Its been like that for ages! I remember BF2 needing patches for patches they released. They would release a patch, then another one a day later to patch the patch. PC gaming has always been like that."


No, actually, it hasn't. Buggy launch PC games have lessened over the past decade. BF2 is a pretty poor example as it is an exception when compared to most of the "big" titles released in the past 5 years.

 

[eznark]

Are u joking? a PC game in sorry state when it launches? Its been like that for ages! I remember BF2 needing patches for patches they released. They would release a patch, then another one a day later to patch the patch. PC gaming has always been like that.

You must not have bought a PC game in ages. Back 10 years ago Tribes 2 chased me away from PC gaming for a long time it was the final straw in a string of shitty releases, however in the past three years I can count on one hand the number of games that haven't immediately worked perfectly out of the box...damn you Demigod!!!!

Know which game had a day one patch this week? Red Dead Revolver. Yeah, only pc games get patched, right?

 

[Kade]

Are u joking? a PC game in sorry state when it launches? Its been like that for ages! I remember BF2 needing patches for patches they released. They would release a patch, then another one a day later to patch the patch. PC gaming has always been like that.

BF2 had all the content of it's predecessors and more at launch. UT3 was barebones as fuck. I think that's what he's arguing.

 

[BobsRevenge]

"Are u joking? a PC game in sorry state when it launches? Its been like that for ages! I remember BF2 needing patches for patches they released. They would release a patch, then another one a day later to patch the patch. PC gaming has always been like that."


No, actually, it hasn't. Buggy launch PC games have lessened over the past. BF2 is a pretty poor example as it is an exception when compared to most of the "big" titles released in the past 5 years.

BF2 was also a shit load more fun, regardless of bugs.

UT3's demo didn't feel like a PC game, the GUI so absolutely horrid and offensive. The gameplay didn't feel as good as UT2K4, the graphics weren't appealing and had shitty post-processing effects, and the maps weren't fantastic. It also didn't run that well for me at the time. I had a 7600gt, I believe.

 

[BobsRevenge]

If games have to be of a remarkable quality to be bought on PC then piracy isn't even the issue. Reading some comments here you'd imagine that most PC gamers are Roger Ebert. The point is that a lot of shitty products sell in the world, and regardless of the quality they are priced and placed on a platform where the business can be successful. If PC isn't the space for that then you can't blame developers for trying to get money from a source that will be more prone to impulse purchases.

Honestly, PC gamers aren't any more demanding of quality. There are just different tastes. Gears of War isn't technically a bad game, I just think it sucks because it is so... plebian

Spoiler

:-D

. Mount and Blade is far more janky than a typical console gamer could tolerate, but, like, almost every PC gamer I know has it.

PC gamers have more tolerance for jankiness. Console gamers have more tolerance for shallowness. Somehow it all works out.

 

[Facism]

The real issue here is the difference in consumer found buying pc games and console games. PC gamers tend to be more intelligent about their purchases, where as the console gamer can get anally reemed and still claim to enjoy it. It's better for epic that the pc consumer dies away. It means they can make lower quality games for a lower quality consumer. Their games can be full of bugs and unfinished and still sell millions.

Looking at half the shit that gets sold as downloadable content proves how stupid the average console consumer is. If the console consumer ever knew what it was like to get mods and maps free on pc he would never part with his cash for a piece of avatar clothing. Epic and every other games developer want people to forget those days, because then expectation are far lower and shoddy products becomes more acceptable.

 

[TxdoHawk]

This really does sound like Epic being butthurt over the steaming pile of crap that was UT3. PC gaming is far from dead.

 

[Silly.Mikey]

You must not have bought a PC game in ages. Back 10 years ago Tribes 2 chased me away from PC gaming for a long time it was the final straw in a string of shitty releases, however in the past three years I can count on one hand the number of games that haven't immediately worked perfectly out of the box...damn you Demigod!!!!

Know which game had a day one patch this week? Red Dead Revolver. Yeah, only pc games get patched, right?

I didn't say only PC games get patched moron, i said thats they way its always been. They've always had a launch now, fix later mentality. But all of a sudden, everyone hates Epic cause they decided to focus more on console gaming where its easier to make money and where theres less piracy. Can u blame them? U think they make games just for ur happiness?

 

[Mael]

I didn't say only PC games get patched moron, i said thats they way its always been. They've always had a launch now, fix later mentality. But all of a sudden, everyone hates Epic cause they decided to focus more on console gaming where its easier to make money and where theres less piracy. Can u blame them? U think they make games just for ur happiness?

Yeah they totally made GoW because there was less piracy on the 360 not at all to show what Unreal Engine was capable of on console.

 

[Silly.Mikey]

Yeah they totally made GoW because there was less piracy on the 360 not at all to show what Unreal Engine was capable of on console.

Yes, cause they wanna make money and right now, consoles are easier to make money on than PC is. Plain and simple. If u guys wanna hate them for that, then u should hate the whole gaming industry cause ive got a news flash for you, their all in it to make money. Crazy i know.

 

[Mael]

Yes, cause they wanna make money and right now, consoles are easier to make money on than PC is. Plain and simple. If u guys wanna hate them for that, then u should hate the whole gaming industry cause ive got a news flash for you, their all in it to make money. Crazy i know.

And that have to do with piracy how?
I mean how providing middleware for a new lucrative market has to do with piracy?
Unless you're one of the cucko singing 'Illuminati llizardmen did this to me' that believes every stupid thing of the web, there's nothing to link that move to anything to do with piracy AT ALL

 

[Silly.Mikey]

And that have to do with piracy how?
I mean how providing middleware for a new lucrative market has to do with piracy?
Unless you're one of the cucko singing 'Illuminati llizardmen did this to me' that believes every stupid thing of the web, there's nothing to link that move to anything to do with piracy AT ALL

Well its simple: When u buy a console, for the most part u have to modify something on it in order to play pirated games on it and thus, is more complex to do. regular Joe cant just buy a console, plug it in and start pirating. On a PC, u turn it on and u can basically hack anything u want without having to change anything. Basically, they wanna make it more difficult for everyone to hack and pirate their games and on consoles, with a closed monitored on line infrastructure like Live for example, they get just that. Before they didn't have a choice cause for one, consoles were powerful enough to make the games they wanted to make and the online sucked. Now they can and are monitored cause of stuff like MS and their Live so the game plan has changed. Thats whats happening. Less piracy on consoles + more money = more support.

 

[I <3 Memes]

But all of a sudden, everyone hates Epic cause they decided to focus more on console gaming where its easier to make money and where theres less piracy. Can u blame them? U think they make games just for ur happiness?

No, everyone hates Epic because they wont keep their cock gobblers shut about how PC gaming is somehow doomed.

 

[Silly.Mikey]

No, everyone hates Epic because they wont keep their cock gobblers shut about how PC gaming is somehow doomed.

They never said it was doomed. They just think that they way the PC is now doesn't work anymore for them, and they're right. Right now consoles are a more sure thing for make $$ and has less piracy.

 

[Mael]

Well its simple: When u buy a console, for the most part u have to modify something on it in order to play pirated games on it and thus, is more complex to do. regular Joe cant just buy a console, plug it in and start pirating. On a PC, u turn it on and u can basically hack anything u want without having to change anything. Basically, they wanna make it more difficult for everyone to hack and pirate their games and on consoles, with a closed monitored on line infrastructure like Live for example, they get just that. Before they didn't have a choice cause for one, consoles were powerful enough to make the games they wanted to make and the online sucked. Now they can and are monitored cause of stuff like MS and their Live so the game plan has changed. Thats whats happening. Less piracy on consoles + more money = more support.

Let me get this straight, you really believe that Epic making Unreal Engine 3 for the xbox 360 has all to do with piracy and NOTHING to do with :
- partnership with MSFT?
- getting a middleware for the then 'nextgen' consoles where multiple times concerns over whether a working middleware was essential or not for game making?
- making the middleware that could be used for nearly all console games like renderware was used the gen before?

I mean are you for real?