Not sure what you think we're going to do here. We don't like people pirating the game, but if they do buy it afterwards we aren't going to do anything about it, since they're a paying customer either way--that's always been the case. Anyone who pirates the game without buying it though is generally going to get banned the moment we find out.

Pirated copies do have a cost, even if the pirate never would have bought it--

- Pirates still try to get support, wasting our time and making delays for legitimate users. With the large number of people getting the game, this is a very real issue.

- If cracks are needed, pirates may experience issues that legitimate users do not, due to sloppy cracks. Again, wasting developer time with bogus bug reports.

- Pirates waste forum bandwidth, even if they only lurk for strategies and such.

- Even if it costs nothing to replicate, the fact is you're still gaining from our work without giving any compensation. Games are a luxury item. If you *can't* get them legitimately, then find a way to make it happen legitimately or learn to do without.

to whiteskull86 : Amen to that brother

The comment was not meant to be taken at face value. It was meant as a metaphorical statement. The fact you guys do nothing about such statements and even get involved such threads or for that matter permit such discussions is sufficient evidence of tolerance and support for your customers - all of them.

The situation far different on other official forums. For example on many forums if the word "pirate" pop-up in a thread the thread is locked or removed. If people make a link to any torrent site that person gets booted. If people bitch about DRM they get warnings. If a person admits to first being exposed to the title as a pirate then they get suspended for sometime or even banned.

There is more but I'm sure I made my point. None of these happen within this community. So if all things are equal one could get the idea that there is a sort of amnesty program here.

Extremetech just published an article entitled "Piracy, Copy Protection, and the Evolution of PC Gaming" on the topic at hand as well. You can read it
here.
It should be noted that SD/IC is prominently featured in the article.
Although the closing remark seems a little illogical to me in a sort of discounted way. I would love to see Frogboy hop in the comment thread and speak his mind on the topic.

People asking for support for a game they didn't pay (or anything else for that matter) should get shot on sight

I've been a long SD fan myself but let be honest Brad is insane. He kind of like the "Alexander the Great" of game developer. While most of his follower thought Alex was being brave he was really just crazy thinking he was invincible.

Even I had fears on how well this game would sell with no copy protection as we all know people will pirate this game no matter how good Brad has been to his consumers. (This game runs with no patch better than some PC games with patches) I want games like this to really sell for the future of PC gaming.

@Smidlee - Brad is not crazy. Like me, he seems to believe that people are basically honest, reasonable and fair. If you treat them with respect, offer them value and support them as a person and more importantly as a merchant, then you remove all the general excuses/reasons people use to exploit or take advantage of you. This is of course unless they are simply corrupt and there is no point in trying to change those people. So dont waste time and resources trying to struggling with them at the expense of your real focus; the decent people.

Absolutely disagree. There is no difference between walking into a store and shoplifting and item and downloading software/music/video without paying for it.

Zero difference.

Stealing is stealing. There is zero justification for it.

The difference is a store will have a guard, a camera, the threat of the police, and the fact that society doesn't look kindly on stealing to deter a shoplifter.

For whatever reason, some people think that stealing intellectual property is just fine. Nobody is watching you, the "police" don't do anything about it, it's easy to get away with.

But theft is theft.

Some people want to say that there are unlimited copies of digital media or downloads but you're still stealing. There doesn't have to be a physical item for it to be theft. You are taking something that someone else owns without their consent. That's being a thief.

For anyone who thinks pirating software is just fine, ask yourself this. Do you have a job? Do you expect to get paid for your time, or do you just do 8 hours a day of volunteer work? Why should you expect people to create games/movies/music for free for you to steal? Don't those people deserve to get paid just like everyone else?

"I laugh everytime someone uses this as an argument. If someone invented an 100% full proof way of making pirating impossible then all pirates would stop playing games with that logic. RIGHT. They would find a way to save up money and start buying games. You would see a increase in all game sales."

And i laugh every time you think the avrage pirate does not buy games.

been stated many times in this thread that they pirate to try and then buy whats good.

Now if people could return games they didnt like then there would be elss need to pirate and try, or allow demos to be full version of the games but with like a 72hour timer hours only go down while they play.


"There is no difference between walking into a store and shoplifting and item and downloading software/music/video without paying for it."

both are theft but they are both diffrent they are NOT the same people, its common sense to figure that out.

"For whatever reason, some people think that stealing intellectual property is just fine."

because the goverment makes and enforces the law, and not once have they arrested anyone for downloading a game yet they do arrest and stick people in jail for theft in sotres car theft etc..

And yes ONLY the goverment gets to decide whats illegal in the end, your morals dont mean shit to them and your morals do not mean its law right or wrong.

Just a disclaimer before I begin, I am in no way condoning pirateing your entertainment, as my parents taught me, two wrongs do not make a right.

Game\music\movie industrys and their supporters are always out condemning people as pirates and theifs, pot calling the kettle black IMO. These industrys are some of the biggest thiefs on the planet, they have been stealing from the general public for decades and nobody bats an eye. Maybe thats why the police are pretty lax in defending their copy rights. The fundamental of price indexing is 'supply and demand' but in these industrys there is unlimited supply, so in theory the prices of these products should be extremely low, but they are not, why? Becuase of collusion between companys to set a false price point far above what economics would justify, as far as I know that is highly illegal, I don't see the justice system jumping all over them. Of course its because they lobby(bribe) the people in power to look the other way. Just like they lobby the same folks to make laws that make copyright infringement more of a crime then rape or child molestation, WTF, pirating is bad but IMO it is far lower in scale then what the industry has been doing to the public for decades.

Lets take the music industry, they have been around the longest and are therfore further down the trail of utter failier. The cost of purchasing a music CD is way overpriced to the point of the industry showing ultimate greed. When CD's first hit the market, the price point was justified, becuase they had a huge infrastructure to build. But once that infrastructure was paid for the prices should have, under economics dropped big time. Why, can you tell me is a CD more expensive to purchase then a casset tape, when a casset tape costs more to produce? I will tell you it is because the industry got together and through collusion set a false price point and they could all make profits beyond thier dreams. The public although generally stupid, isnt completely retarded and when an alternative came around they jumped all over it. The industry instead of realizing they could no longer work under the kind of monoploy system they had in the past and therefore dropping their prices to resonable rates, instead have gone in another direction and are trying in their last death throws to keep their monoploistic greed system alive. If the movie and games industry do not learn the lesson here they will also be on the same path as the music industry. There is no competition in these industrys only collusion, so you can understand if I do not give a flying shit about their problems, IMO they and pirates are of the same breed, birds of a feather folk together.

Greed, IMO the most destructive thing in our society, almost all crime when traced to its source will point to greed.

"You really believe that the majority of people who pirate a game go out and buy it if they like it? If 5% of pirates do that I would be shocked."

I would be shocked if atlest 50% of the pirates did not buy some of the games they enjoy, just to play MP.


Ya if a game is like bio shock with SP limted replay etc.. i doubt very many went out and bought it, no reason to( i rented it for my 360) even more so cause of the limted installs and not being allowed to resell when they where done because of the limted installs.

Prima Giedi is 100% right price fixing atlest in the US is illegal yet they all do it, not just cd movies and games but even gas companys, and they get away with cause of bribes in the form of contrubtions(SP?)

I mean ffs i still remember when i used to pay less then a $ for gass, now its 3$ on avg and the gas corps are posting there biggest profits ever.

So how about the fact that rape has a lighter sentence than downloading a copy of "Enter Sandman"?