bigmit3737
Member
Fragamemnon said:
Well if Stardock keeps doing what they are doing, they may eventually have this option. =)
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Stardock on Piracy and PC Gaming (It's positive)
- Thread starter bigmit3737
- Start date
Well if Stardock keeps doing what they are doing, they may eventually have this option. =)
The Faceless Master
Member
holy shit, that's a shot across the bow of many pc game developers!
HarryHengst
Member
Finally a developer with a realistic sense of how it all works. Its all so easy: make a good game that a lot of people can play and you get sales. Its no rocket science, sjeez. :lol
The Faceless Master
Member
usually stuff with adware or nag screens...methane47 said:
I bought Gal Civ and unfortunately could not get into it. I tried Gal Civ 2, but also just could not get into into it. This is the main reason I have not even considered SotSE.
But after reading this article, this guy makes so much sense that I want to support their endeavors. I will purchase Gal Civ 2 and give it more of a chance. I know there is a deep game that I would love in there, I just need to give it more of an upfront time commitment to learn it than I have in the past. I love Civ 4 and Masters of Orion is one of my all time favorite classic 4X games, I have to love Gal Civ 2 don't I?
But after reading this article, this guy makes so much sense that I want to support their endeavors. I will purchase Gal Civ 2 and give it more of a chance. I know there is a deep game that I would love in there, I just need to give it more of an upfront time commitment to learn it than I have in the past. I love Civ 4 and Masters of Orion is one of my all time favorite classic 4X games, I have to love Gal Civ 2 don't I?
Metal Gear?!
Member
Or a glance at the StarForce official forums...Kabouter said:
Amusingly it might actually have been good for sales :lol
TaeOH said:
I love Civ and Moo, I don't like GC2 at all. Supposedly the newest expansion changes the game considerably, but I still don't know enough details to buy it outright.
Sins, on the other hand, is from Ironclad, not Stardock, and it is very excellent. Unfortunately, it lacks multiplayer automatching, and it seems the majority of the thousands who bought it just play private games online if they play at all, or play offline against the horrible CPU. Not so good for me, since I prefer multi in my rts games (it's not a 4x, despite their claims, it's more Kohan in space than slowtime MoO). I checked on a monday evening and found 4 games online (1 open), checked just now and saw 2 (one of which closed immediately). Not good
Fragamemnon
Member
TaeOH said:
Start here if you are a GalCiv 2 newbie:
http://forums.galciv2.com/?aid=104908
Anyone with Civ4/MoO experience should be right at home with GalCiv once you "get" the differences in the way that GalCiv economy works, which I found to be the biggest hurdle to overcome.
You have to understand, PC publishing is a lot different than console publishing.
Mainly, because on the PC, you're not paying MS or Sony royalties on every copy nor are you paying the ridiculously high fee to go through certification. Every penny you make is yours.
So, given that, the profit of 400,000 copies sold could almost be seen as the same profit 1.2-1.6 million console titles sold makes.
Mainly, because on the PC, you're not paying MS or Sony royalties on every copy nor are you paying the ridiculously high fee to go through certification. Every penny you make is yours.
So, given that, the profit of 400,000 copies sold could almost be seen as the same profit 1.2-1.6 million console titles sold makes.
Victrix said:I love Civ and Moo, I don't like GC2 at all. Supposedly the newest expansion changes the game considerably, but I still don't know enough details to buy it outright.
Sins, on the other hand, is from Ironclad, not Stardock, and it is very excellent. Unfortunately, it lacks multiplayer automatching, and it seems the majority of the thousands who bought it just play private games online if they play at all, or play offline against the horrible CPU. Not so good for me, since I prefer multi in my rts games (it's not a 4x, despite their claims, it's more Kohan in space than slowtime MoO). I checked on a monday evening and found 4 games online (1 open), checked just now and saw 2 (one of which closed immediately). Not good
Not being a big fan of the RTS genre is another stumbling block for me and SotSE. Company of Heroes is literally the only RTS I have ever enjoyed. Otherwise I have stuck to TBS games.
Fragamemnon said:
Thanks!
I am pretty sure that is the same place I started last time. I think I got through the tutorial, was overwhelmed and had not had any fun yet. I think that is when I dropped it and went back to play a game of Civ 4. That is what I mean when I said I don't think I gave it enough time. It has a fairly steep learning curve. When I was younger with less responsibility games like that were more tolerable. Nowadays with my game time so limited as it is, I rarely gives games like this enough time to start having fun. I spend a lot of time in Civ, but I already know how to play it, so all of that time is fun.
The Burning Crusade released 16-18 months after it was revealed at Blizzcon 2005. Starcraft 2 was revealed last summer and won't ship until fall or later.SRG01 said:
Blizzard had a long presentation at GDC this year about the 6-10 projects they have completely cancelled due to quality concerns (not even including Starcraft: Ghost). I don't think other developers have the ability to cancel that many projects and stay afloat.
No_Style said:
Valve and Blizzard are doing pretty dang good job at both of those. It really is key. Releasing a game like Crysis or UT3 limits your target market immensely. Just don't see how PC devs ignore this. They believe even though a very limited number of people can run the game at release that a lot of people will upgrade because of it. That is simply not the case.
Jibber Hack
Member
I'm no PC market expert so I'm reticent to speak on the subject. This article was definitely a nice read, but I fear that it's no solace to Crytek or Epic. It seems that the market, in it's current form, will not support the kind of games that they want to make. They're not out to make strategy games. They're into cinematic experiences that push technology forward. Can they create a successful business model today? Does that mean that they should just not try to push that segment of the market?
I'm a strategy fan, and I will be picking up Gal Civ or Sins in the near future, but I would hate to see the big names go, because the business is not profitable for them. I'm not worried about the business as a hole, since that's where all of my $'s are going (WoW, EQ2, RPGs, strategy games). But, I can see where some may be struggling to adapt.
I'm a strategy fan, and I will be picking up Gal Civ or Sins in the near future, but I would hate to see the big names go, because the business is not profitable for them. I'm not worried about the business as a hole, since that's where all of my $'s are going (WoW, EQ2, RPGs, strategy games). But, I can see where some may be struggling to adapt.
mambadragon
Banned
TaeOH said:
I think someone above posts how the game is barely 4X and more RTS, but I really feel differently. It's probably not as deep as more recent 4X games (the last I played was Civ1), but really the offense of the game is just build up fleets of different units and move that fleet around the map. Once that fleet enocunters an enemy, for the most part the fight is out of your hands (I've yet to micro at all, the only decision you have is to retreat or not). Because of the slow pace of the game you don't have to do anything reactionary in combat (like it's too slow to continually resupply a fleet).
Frogboy said:
I wish every company would see this. I am a pretty savvy PC user, but I only know "how" to pirate a game because I don't want to be required to have a disc in my drive that is only there because of DRM. So I learned about "CD fixes". The only way to learn that is too understand how to pirate a game.
I am not a pirate. I paid for and played Bioshock with the disc in the drive. But once they finally came out with a No Cd fix that did not bypass the online registration, I downloaded it immediately. GameCopyWorld is a favorite site of mine for no other reason than to be able to play Civ 4 the same way I played Civ 2. With everything installed so I did not need the disc and could put it away. It just irks me that things have changed so much that even though 10gb installed are common I still need a fricken disc in my drive to play it, even though the game only checks it on startup. Civ 2 coders made it possible to move the movies to a HDD if you had enough space so you did NOT need the CD.
I have started buying games on Steam because I don't need the disc to play, yet I still wish I had a hard copy.
bigmit3737
Member
methane47 said:
:lol That made me laugh for some odd reason.
bigmit3737
Member
Jibber Hack said:
Yep, I agree with you. Crytek and Epic should make the 360 their first option...honestly FPS games are selling like crazy on the 360 and it's doing pretty well on the PS3 as well.
The consoles are hot for FPS at the moment.
Who knows what's going to happen with the FPS genre on consoles in the future, but for now, I would make the consoles a priority if I was them.
PC gaming will never disappear...games like Sins, Disciples, Fantasy Wars, will always do well enough in their niche market.
I am also glad for Independent Rpgs...the quality is getting better and better it seems.
njp142 said:
I have heard this too. The game is on my radar and I would play a demo of it, but I don't believe they have one.
I downloaded the full version of Gal Civ 2 with full intention of purchasing it if I enjoyed it, I only did that to get around it having no demo at its release. I deleted once I realized I was not going to buy it. I don't want to be a PC Pirate statistic these days so I will wait for a proper demo of SotSE.
monkspider
Member
I love the guys at Stardock. This was one of the most reasonable and realistic posts I have ever read about addressing the issues facing PC gaming. I love Galciv II and Political Machine and will continue to support their products.
I don't know about Epic, with the whole Rein saying Cliffy B is an idiot and all the other self-contradictory crap they've been talking, but really, it's kinda their fault for releasing a game that no one paticularly wanted, after pretty much every other game of note, in one the more crowded seasons of the past couple years. As for Crytek, they've said multiple times that they were quite happy with how well it sold, and a sequel has already been warranted. I don't know why people obsess over the 1st NPD numbers, but always ignore the platinum anouncement. And how about iD? They're the ones who perfected the idea of games as glorified tech demo, and though they've made some tenitive aproaches toward consoles, none of their ports was really worthwhile, leaving their games effectively only being worth it on PCsJibber Hack said:
platypotamus
Member
I am so ready to reload Space Rangers 2. I've been thinking about buying it from Stardock just to reinstall it without the Starforce that's on my disc, and now I'll be able to get extra content too? Hells yes.
Yeah, but part of Stardock's sales are due to their DRM policy. Basically there's no copy protection per se on GalCivII, but if you download a patch for the game, it has to be activated over the internet. And like most PC games it was shipped rather buggy, so you need the patches.
Furthermore, this also makes it impossible to sell a used copy, since the new buyer cannot activate it (and it's impossible to de-activate a serial number). Which comes into play in a big way because the expansion packs are not sold in stores, but only bundled with the original game. So a lot of people ended up buying the game twice (and possibly three times when the 2nd EP comes out).
(Yes, you can buy it via download, or have them send you it on disc, but the latter is actually more expensive than buying the bundle in stores once you factor in shipping)
Remember the rumors that Sony was going to do the same thing with PS3 games (have them require some sort of activation to prevent re-sale)? There was a huge uproar. But when a small PC gaming company does the same thing, people slobber over them. It's baffling.
Furthermore, this also makes it impossible to sell a used copy, since the new buyer cannot activate it (and it's impossible to de-activate a serial number). Which comes into play in a big way because the expansion packs are not sold in stores, but only bundled with the original game. So a lot of people ended up buying the game twice (and possibly three times when the 2nd EP comes out).
(Yes, you can buy it via download, or have them send you it on disc, but the latter is actually more expensive than buying the bundle in stores once you factor in shipping)
Remember the rumors that Sony was going to do the same thing with PS3 games (have them require some sort of activation to prevent re-sale)? There was a huge uproar. But when a small PC gaming company does the same thing, people slobber over them. It's baffling.
AdventureRacing
Member
Fragamemnon said:
They didn't start with that budget. It had to come from somewhere. Plus even though a lot of devs aren't capable of doing what blizz does there are others who could but odn't