Justifying Pirating

[SteveDave]

I have never been for pirating of games but I have experienced a situation where I think I would be justified in pirating a game off the internet.

I recently bough Empire Total War (disc, not through Steam) on the fourth of March and ever since then I have not been able to install the game because there is something wrong with Steam (I don't want to get into details because that would make this post way too long).

So I have owned this game for almost nine days and I haven't played a single second of my game. Creative Assembly has been unresponsive to the issue and lets just say fuck Steam, Steam can go to hell. So now I am considering, for the first time in my life, pirating the game. I feel I am not really stealing since I bought the game and this way I can play it whenever I want without the permission of CA or Steam. That is what I am most frustrated about. CA is using Steam as some sort of DRM but Steam is soo intrusive that I feel like I don't even own the game. It is like I bought a glorified rental.

Anyway I'd like to get some thoughts and opinions on this. Also I would like to say fuck Steam or have I said that already?

 

[Avatar Roku]

I've never used Steam, but I've heard only good things until now. But everyone has their fans and haters, so whatever.

I personally would not condemn you for piracy in any case, but even in the eyes of the antipirate diehards you're in the clear. You must be. You got shafted, and it's time to correct that.

Agreed. I'm very strongly anti-pirate, but it feels justified in this case. After all, if you buy the game, it doesn't work, and tech support is unresponsive, it really is the only option left if you want to play the game you payed for rightfully.

 

[Kodlak]

I'm pretty sure there are exceptions if you have the game, as it is legal to download a game iso for ps1 or whatever, but thats ok if you already own it.

 

[NeverAiling]

The way I look at it, you don't sign a EULA before you BUY a game. So, once you buy it, it's yours, because you payed for it. You don't have to sign, or view the EULA. You don't have to agree to anything.

Open the game files and modify it so say: I agree to these terms: poonanny.

The take a stroll down to gamecopy world and grab the no cd crack. If the problem is the game not running?

If it's not installing, yeah, you'd probably have to download the entire game. The sad part is that this could take days.

 

[ZeroMachine]

Really? Usually Steam works so well... My suggestion is that if you don't have a ton of games on Steam you uninstall it, install your new game, and then reinstall Steam. If that don't work, power to ya, but it'll at least give you one more chance to get the game with no risk of viruses.

EDIT: I also figured I'd say that I've never had an issue with Steam, but I've only ever downloaded Valve games with it, save the Bioshock demo.

 

[Jamash]

Steam's made me feel like that too, over Dawn of War 2.

I was quite annoyed that I couldn't play it as soon as I got the game, I had to wait for Steam to decide I was allowed to play my game, but that's more due to international release dates and not really a big problem anymore.

What really 'gets my goat' is the few times when I've been unable to start the game because Steam is having problems with their servers. On a few occasions when I've tried to play my game, I've got the message saying "All our servers are busy. Please try again in a few minutes".

It's annoying because I didn't buy the game through Steam, I own the physical disk, yet I'm prevented from using 'my' property.

It harshly drives home the point that I don't actually own any of my games, I'm just renting them or renting the licenses to use the copy or the game.

I know this has actually been the case for most games for years, according to their ELUA's, but incidents like this really make it apparent, destroying the illusion that you own your game and can use it whenever you want.

Piracy sometimes does seem like an attractive alternative to these glorified rentals, and if I knew how to, I probably would crack my games to allow me to play them at all times, and not be dependant on an internet connection or Steam.

 

[Thurston]

After nine days, and an honest effort to work with tech support, you have no progress, then that really sucks. I don't condone pirating, but you've got a good reason here. You paid your money, and have not received satisfactory performance or support.

You could try to return the game, or try a total reinstall, as mentioned above.

I'll also add the usual tech support stuff, which you've probably already tried:
1) Virus check
2) defrag
3) scandisk (or whatever Vista calls it)
4) Windows update
5) latest drivers

 

[SteveDave]

Steam's made me feel like that too, over Dawn of War 2.

I was quite annoyed that I couldn't play it as soon as I got the game, I had to wait for Steam to decide I was allowed to play my game, but that's more due to international release dates and not really a big problem anymore.

What really 'gets my goat' is the few times when I've been unable to start the game because Steam is having problems with their servers. On a few occasions when I've tried to play my game, I've got the message saying "All our servers are busy. Please try again in a few minutes".

It's annoying because I didn't buy the game through Steam, I own the physical disk, yet I'm prevented from using 'my' property.

It harshly drives home the point that I don't actually own any of my games, I'm just renting them or renting the licenses to use the copy or the game.

I know this has actually been the case for most games for years, according to their ELUA's, but incidents like this really make it apparent, destroying the illusion that you own your game and can use it whenever you want.

Piracy sometimes does seem like an attractive alternative to these glorified rentals, and if I knew how to, I probably would crack my games to allow me to play them at all times, and not be dependant on an internet connection or Steam.

I basically have the same feeling of animosity as you.

 

[Cairo]

Beware the Ides of March. And "yarrr!"

 

[Erana]

The thing that bothers me is that, legally, you could get in trouble for that.
In a situation like this, the rules themselves restrict the justice that they are meant to enforce.

 

[Citrus]

If you pirate the game then you won't be able to go online or receive any updates for it.

Did you get your CD key from when you bought it?

 

[linchowlewy]

The thing that bothers me is that, legally, you could get in trouble for that.
In a situation like this, the rules themselves restrict the justice that they are meant to enforce.

Yes. I know entirely what you mean. I have broken the disc for republic commando and don't want to buy a new copy, so i should pirate it. BUT, the stupid law prevents me and if somehow i do get caught my excuse won't hold up in court.

 

[AndyFromMonday]

You payed for the game. It's perfectly normal to pirate it off the internet if it won't let you play it. I mean seriously you waste your money on games that you can't even play but pirating it off the internet is still bad?

 

[Captain Blackout]

Pirate it. In a heartbeat. Then again, I'm biased.

 

[Abedeus]

And you would get caught...why?

If you're not hosting a file sharing server than you have nothing to worry about, most torrent clients nowadays encrypt your connection and even if they didn't, your ISP is entitled to protect your data. I don't even know if they make the distinction.

On that note, piracy is never justified. In the eyes of law that is.

I've been a pirate all my life because I have a system on testing games first before buying them, and sincerely most games which I pirate don't deserve to be bought. And yes, these include good mainstream games. I just have my standards too high.

I also bought Empire Total War and had absolutely no problems with it.

Actually, in Poland you can pirate the game if you have bought it. Example:


I have no rights to pirate Starcraft. But I have every right in the world to pirate Diablo 2, since I already own 2 keysets of Diablo 2 + LoD.

As long as I use my CD-Keys, it's nice and legal. Same as I can download Neverwinter Nights 2 in English version to enjoy the original voice actors.

 

[AndyFromMonday]

If you pirate the game then you won't be able to go online or receive any updates for it.

Did you get your CD key from when you bought it?

Actually you will be able to install updates, problem is you'll need to re-crack the game.