let's debate piracy and the hypocrisy behind it

[DaOysterboy]

alternatives are no good for a future games tester and programmer.

-snip-

and not gaming will severely hurt my knowledge of games [that and the lack of yahtzee, the game overthinker and the news from the escapist which i think sums up the gaming community as a whole]

If you listened to Yahtzee at all you might hold a different opinion. From what I can tell Yahtzee is *against* every game seeming the same, so if you are playing games to get your ideas, you missed the boat. CREATIVITY is needed in game development more than the ability to "do what this other game did." If this is really the path you want to take, you'd be much better off learning to *actually program* or learning graphic design programs than "playing games."

i need alternatives for games.

You really are beginning to sound like you have an addiction. The rationalizing, justifying, self-pitying, and need for approval of your actions and affirmation of yourself has gone way beyond just the normal arguments of your typical "hey I'm a pirate, do you guys think it's bad?" thread.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

alternatives are no good for a future games tester and programmer.

-snip-

and not gaming will severely hurt my knowledge of games [that and the lack of yahtzee, the game overthinker and the news from the escapist which i think sums up the gaming community as a whole]

If you listened to Yahtzee at all you might hold a different opinion. From what I can tell Yahtzee is *against* every game seeming the same, so if you are playing games to get your ideas, you missed the boat. CREATIVITY is needed in game development more than the ability to "do what this other game did." If this is really the path you want to take, you'd be much better off learning to *actually program* or learning graphic design programs than "playing games."

i need alternatives for games.

You really are beginning to sound like you have an addiction. The rationalizing, justifying, self-pitying, and need for approval of your actions and affirmation of yourself has gone way beyond just the normal arguments of your typical "hey I'm a pirate, do you guys think it's bad?" thread.

What modern games can show the un average tester or game designer is what not to do and what with more polish can become golden.

 

[DaOysterboy]

alternatives are no good for a future games tester and programmer.

-snip-

and not gaming will severely hurt my knowledge of games [that and the lack of yahtzee, the game overthinker and the news from the escapist which i think sums up the gaming community as a whole]

If you listened to Yahtzee at all you might hold a different opinion. From what I can tell Yahtzee is *against* every game seeming the same, so if you are playing games to get your ideas, you missed the boat. CREATIVITY is needed in game development more than the ability to "do what this other game did." If this is really the path you want to take, you'd be much better off learning to *actually program* or learning graphic design programs than "playing games."

i need alternatives for games.

You really are beginning to sound like you have an addiction. The rationalizing, justifying, self-pitying, and need for approval of your actions and affirmation of yourself has gone way beyond just the normal arguments of your typical "hey I'm a pirate, do you guys think it's bad?" thread.

What modern games can show the un average tester or game designer is what not to do and what with more polish can become golden.

Really? What game served as the inspiration for World of Goo? Or Braid? Or Psychonauts? What game gave devs the ideas for the storyline behind Planescape: Torment? Surely you aren't suggesting that praise for The Sims or SimCity were based on how similar gameplay was to other games of the time? And of course we all know Mario 64 and Zelda: Ocarina of Time were staples of that console because they directly copied their predecessors /sarcasm. These games were successful (critically or commercially) because the experience they provided was *new*. Sure, each has characteristics that can be found in other games, and each is arguable in how good it is, but my point is that if you want to make something unique, you have to create from within your own mind, not rip off the last generic successful piece to hit the market. Your point is very poorly made. You won't become a good engineer by learning how to not be a bad engineer. You won't learn to be a good soldier by learning "how not to get shot." You teach people the fundamentals and how to do things well, and they'll see exactly why the pitfalls are pitfalls. Plus, you just need experience working in your medium and feedback from your audience. Playing games really won't give you the needed dose of either. If you want to program games for a living, do less playing of games and more programming, creating, learning, and testing. Applying to a programming or graphic design position at Infinity Ward will require more than a resume that shows you got all the achievements in their last game and can get a 25 kill streak 80% of the time.

 

[JonnWood]

Ah for the lulz, no wonder you are incorrect so much.

I also said I was still making actual points. I'm just doing so in a sardonic manner. At least I'm not saying everyone who disagrees with me is mentally retarded [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_retardation#IQ_below_70].

People can't grow up and realize piracy is more gray than black and white. 7 times out of ten its due from lack of service and or qaulity from the copy right owner, the other 3 times its due to people making an illicit profit.

Once again, ad hominem. Once again, shifting blame. Once again, presenting claims without evidence.

 

[Morderkaine]

This is the information age. People are connected, all across the world. The different things, and the knowledge, we have access to has increased incredibly over the past several years. We have become used to hearing about something, going on the internet, and having instant access to information about it via google, wikipedia, youtube, etc.
Now people are finding out there are things out there they never had access to before. Often it is a computer game that is not sold in their country, or a movie not released there. There seems like there is something wrong about telling someone 'You can't have this because of where you live', when they know it exists, and have a way to have it even if its a round-about method.

This is a specific example, and probably not the most common pirate, but this is for the black-and-white viewpoint people. If there is a person who wants to buy something, but cannot get it legally, no matter how willing he is, it seems discrimitory to punish him for getting it the only way he can. If there is a game/movie I want, and I try to buy it but cannot, then I will not feel bad downloading it.

What would help this, would be game companies using internet sales more often. If it became standard that ALL new games are sold online from the developers, at a lower cost than the store copies (reduced production cost because of no materials being used, no shipping costs, no retail markup, etc) the companies that make the game can make the same profit per sale as store bought games, and increase their market share by reaching countries that wont sell physical copies (or only have overpriced physical copies) and consumers would pay less per game. People who buy it in the store get a physical copy, manual, extras, and people who buy online get a lower price but only a digital copy and a cd-key.
Game developers need to adapt better to the world. Some of the copy protection used now is instead angering the users, not the pirates, instead of trying to meet a mutually beneficial compromise.

 

[Morderkaine]

*deleted* quote didnt work....

 

[Morderkaine]

If I don't have money for the bus... I don't try to get on the bus... I fucking walk.

Imagine a world where you have the money for the bus, but no busses exist. And you and your countrymen hear about busses, and decide to build your own, but the bus company says 'Sorry, we own the right to busses, and decided not to build any in your area at this time.' and its illegal for your city to build its own busses because of the copyright on busses.
And now you have to walk every day, even though you know an alternative exists but is not allowed to you. Is it fair that because the bus company decides not to build busses in your area, that your city can never have them? Even if building them is no cost to the bus company?

This is not a defense of all piracy, only that where the pirate is willing and trying to pay for the item, but literally cannot due to restrictions based on geography or similar. Whether 1 or 100,000 pirate a game when they could not buy it even when trying, it wont make a penny's difference to the makers of the game.

 

[Grand_Arcana]

While I don't pirate myself I'm wondering: what about cases when you can't buy the game in your country legally? By legally I mean that I could look inside the bargain bin and hope that it's there without resorting to wishful thinking. I understand about losing potential sales, but if a developer in a foreign country doesn't expect me, of even want me to buy their game, what's the harm? I am not one of their intended consumers, even of i did go through the trouble of importing the game. It seems to me that whether I pirate or not is none of their immediate concerns.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

Ah for the lulz, no wonder you are incorrect so much.

I also said I was still making actual points. I'm just doing so in a sardonic manner. At least I'm not saying everyone who disagrees with me is mentally retarded [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_retardation#IQ_below_70].

People can't grow up and realize piracy is more gray than black and white. 7 times out of ten its due from lack of service and or qaulity from the copy right owner, the other 3 times its due to people making an illicit profit.

Once again, ad hominem. Once again, shifting blame. Once again, presenting claims without evidence.

Well you can't get past the 1:1 ratio myth so you IQ has to be called into question.
What is a fallacy about loosing potential sales to the real world problem of not gaining the public's interest not because of of magical one legged bandit but because the seller of the product can not gain and maintain the public's interest.

Law is about marginalizing what we can functionally control, there is no way one can functionally control distribution and copies in this age of information and no amount of draconian or antiquated law will keep the public from it. Now if you marginalize it and control the profit aspects of it you allow enough balance and control to enforce it across a diverse planet.


There is no evidence, No one has hard evidence either way as its a blame game to steal rights and freedoms from the public and ensure the rent a license scheme is unquestioned......

alternatives are no good for a future games tester and programmer.

-snip-

and not gaming will severely hurt my knowledge of games [that and the lack of yahtzee, the game overthinker and the news from the escapist which i think sums up the gaming community as a whole]

If you listened to Yahtzee at all you might hold a different opinion. From what I can tell Yahtzee is *against* every game seeming the same, so if you are playing games to get your ideas, you missed the boat. CREATIVITY is needed in game development more than the ability to "do what this other game did." If this is really the path you want to take, you'd be much better off learning to *actually program* or learning graphic design programs than "playing games."

i need alternatives for games.

You really are beginning to sound like you have an addiction. The rationalizing, justifying, self-pitying, and need for approval of your actions and affirmation of yourself has gone way beyond just the normal arguments of your typical "hey I'm a pirate, do you guys think it's bad?" thread.

What modern games can show the un average tester or game designer is what not to do and what with more polish can become golden.

--snip--

World of goo you can see bits of lemmings and other puzzle games(one on the PSP I forget the name of and a SNES one I forget the name of). Braid is a mix of classic 2D adventure platfomers like Cadash,Popfulmail and Mario wolrd but with a more puzzle theme.
Psychonauts is a adventure/action platformer at heart whats unique about it or beyond good and evil is the story and the style in which you go about playing the game.

Planescape: Torment? a bit of D&D and dark or otherwise fantasy novels and comics for inspiration of the setting I assume and the gamepaly is derived from RPGs before it.

The creation process goes beyond copy catting X or Y as you play and absorb games you see bits and pieces of mechanics that at times you so badly want to tweak because they are just off a bit or just horribly implemented(at least I do and I so rag about it at times).

One can not develop a new experience just by going over your single minded mechanic or game ideal(look at damnation or even dantes inferno its a perfect example of a game developed in a vacuum ) one has to experience what has been done then add their own to it. And that is difficult these days as creativity is something companies put aside to do a 9 to 5 gig.

Oh and lets look at the sim city is based off of other city or world building games or ideas I forget if ti or populauos was first, but the like the RTS its just a genre starter the mainstream may or may not focus on.

Now with that said absorbing games is only one part of of becoming a developer so you can see mechanics and weave them together and make a refined game ideal, thats easy I do it all the time. The hard part is stream lining the ideal so the fat is cut from it, making it coherent and then bringing it to life. All I can do is imagine and think I am working on my coding skills but they suck, same for my artistic/drawing skills I have no money for collage all I got is a dream and a break brain(learning disabilities) that makes it very hard to communicate and read physical books. But I am trying, call it a vain pitiful try all you want but nothing will get done if all I do is dream..

 

[JonnWood]

Well you can't get past the 1:1 ratio myth so you IQ has to be called into question.
What is a fallacy about loosing potential sales to the real world problem of not gaining the public's interest not because of of magical one legged bandit but because the seller of the product can not gain and maintain the public's interest.

Law is about marginalizing what we can functionally control, there is no way one can functionally control distribution and copies in this age of information and no amount of draconian or antiquated law will keep the public from it. Now if you marginalize it and control the profit aspects of it you allow enough balance and control to enforce it across a diverse planet.

There is no evidence, No one has hard evidence either way as its a blame game to steal rights and freedoms from the public and ensure the rent a license scheme is unquestioned......

I say this with all sincerity, but even making allowance for the fact that English is obviously your second language, you sound like a crazy subway conspiracy hobo.

World of goo you can see bits of lemmings and other puzzle games(one on the PSP I forget the name of and a SNES one I forget the name of). Braid is a mix of classic 2D adventure platfomers like Cadash,Popfulmail and Mario wolrd but with a more puzzle theme.
Psychonauts is a adventure/action platformer at heart whats unique about it or beyond good and evil is the story and the style in which you go about playing the game.

Planescape: Torment? a bit of D&D and dark or otherwise fantasy novels and comics for inspiration of the setting I assume and the gamepaly is derived from RPGs before it.

You're missing the point. While they were based on other games, they all did something to innovate. Shoulders of giants.

The creation process goes beyond copy catting X or Y as you play and absorb games you see bits and pieces of mechanics that at times you so badly want to tweak because they are just off a bit or just horribly implemented(at least I do and I so rag about it at times).

That's similar to what he said; one needs to understand games, not just play them, and to do that you need to know how they're made.

One can not develop a new experience just by going over your single minded mechanic or game ideal

But...he didn't...are you receiving some sort of alternate universe version of this thread? Because you seem to be responding to points no one is making.

Now with that said absorbing games is only one part of of becoming a developer so you can see mechanics and weave them together and make a refined game ideal, thats easy I do it all the time. The hard part is stream lining the ideal so the fat is cut from it, making it coherent and then bringing it to life. All I can do is imagine and think I am working on my coding skills but they suck, same for my artistic/drawing skills I have no money for collage all I got is a dream and a break brain(learning disabilities) that makes it very hard to communicate and read physical books. But I am trying, call it a vain pitiful try all you want but nothing will get done if all I do is dream..

As Stewie Griffin once said," And we come to the center of the shrubbery maze."

 

[JonnWood]

Imagine a world where you have the money for the bus, but no busses exist. And you and your countrymen hear about busses, and decide to build your own, but the bus company says 'Sorry, we own the right to busses, and decided not to build any in your area at this time.' and its illegal for your city to build its own busses because of the copyright on busses.
And now you have to walk every day, even though you know an alternative exists but is not allowed to you. Is it fair that because the bus company decides not to build busses in your area, that your city can never have them? Even if building them is no cost to the bus company?

Oh, I'm imagining, all right. I'm imagining an absurd analogy.

This is not a defense of all piracy, only that where the pirate is willing and trying to pay for the item, but literally cannot due to restrictions based on geography or similar. Whether 1 or 100,000 pirate a game when they could not buy it even when trying, it wont make a penny's difference to the makers of the game.

In either case, someone is taking something they have not paid for. There are times when intent matters, but this isn't one of them.

This is the information age. People are connected, all across the world. The different things, and the knowledge, we have access to has increased incredibly over the past several years. We have become used to hearing about something, going on the internet, and having instant access to information about it via google, wikipedia, youtube, etc.
Now people are finding out there are things out there they never had access to before. Often it is a computer game that is not sold in their country, or a movie not released there. There seems like there is something wrong about telling someone 'You can't have this because of where you live', when they know it exists, and have a way to have it even if its a round-about method.

I'm tempted to just respond with "BAWWW!", but I'll just point out, once again, that games are a luxury, not a right.

This is a specific example, and probably not the most common pirate, but this is for the black-and-white viewpoint people. If there is a person who wants to buy something, but cannot get it legally, no matter how willing he is, it seems discrimitory to punish him for getting it the only way he can.

If the "something" in question was, say, a Ferrari, that sentence would look ridiculous. If it were medicine for one's sick kid, it would be somewhat reasonable. Games, being a luxury, fall somewhere on the "Ferrari" end of the spectrum.

If there is a game/movie I want, and I try to buy it but cannot, then I will not feel bad downloading it.

So we should feel bad about "discriminating" against pirates, while you shouldn't about getting games in an illegal fashion?

What would help this, would be game companies using internet sales more often. If it became standard that ALL new games are sold online from the developers, at a lower cost than the store copies (reduced production cost because of no materials being used, no shipping costs, no retail markup, etc)

Not very familiar with economics, are ya?

the companies that make the game can make the same profit per sale as store bought games, and increase their market share by reaching countries that wont sell physical copies (or only have overpriced physical copies) and consumers would pay less per game.

Many games launch with digital distribution today, but they only make up the minority of sales for most of them. Also, most pirates are what you call "black"; they don't care about the price, they just want the game for free. No matter how cheap it is, they'll still pirate.

Game developers need to adapt better to the world.

Well, aren't you a selfish, entitled little child.

Some of the copy protection used now is instead angering the users, not the pirates, instead of trying to meet a mutually beneficial compromise.

There isn't one. Pirates will pirate, regardless of the price of the game, availability, or whether the developers offer a coupon for sexual favors in each box.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

Well you can't get past the 1:1 ratio myth so you IQ has to be called into question.
What is a fallacy about loosing potential sales to the real world problem of not gaining the public's interest not because of of magical one legged bandit but because the seller of the product can not gain and maintain the public's interest.

Law is about marginalizing what we can functionally control, there is no way one can functionally control distribution and copies in this age of information and no amount of draconian or antiquated law will keep the public from it. Now if you marginalize it and control the profit aspects of it you allow enough balance and control to enforce it across a diverse planet.

There is no evidence, No one has hard evidence either way as its a blame game to steal rights and freedoms from the public and ensure the rent a license scheme is unquestioned......

I say this with all sincerity, but even making allowance for the fact that English is obviously your second language, you sound like a crazy subway conspiracy hobo.

World of goo you can see bits of lemmings and other puzzle games(one on the PSP I forget the name of and a SNES one I forget the name of). Braid is a mix of classic 2D adventure platfomers like Cadash,Popfulmail and Mario wolrd but with a more puzzle theme.
Psychonauts is a adventure/action platformer at heart whats unique about it or beyond good and evil is the story and the style in which you go about playing the game.

Planescape: Torment? a bit of D&D and dark or otherwise fantasy novels and comics for inspiration of the setting I assume and the gamepaly is derived from RPGs before it.

You're missing the point. While they were based on other games, they all did something to innovate. Shoulders of giants.

The creation process goes beyond copy catting X or Y as you play and absorb games you see bits and pieces of mechanics that at times you so badly want to tweak because they are just off a bit or just horribly implemented(at least I do and I so rag about it at times).

That's similar to what he said; one needs to understand games, not just play them, and to do that you need to know how they're made.

One can not develop a new experience just by going over your single minded mechanic or game ideal

But...he didn't...are you receiving some sort of alternate universe version of this thread? Because you seem to be responding to points no one is making.

Now with that said absorbing games is only one part of of becoming a developer so you can see mechanics and weave them together and make a refined game ideal, thats easy I do it all the time. The hard part is stream lining the ideal so the fat is cut from it, making it coherent and then bringing it to life. All I can do is imagine and think I am working on my coding skills but they suck, same for my artistic/drawing skills I have no money for collage all I got is a dream and a break brain(learning disabilities) that makes it very hard to communicate and read physical books. But I am trying, call it a vain pitiful try all you want but nothing will get done if all I do is dream..

As Stewie Griffin once said," And we come to the center of the shrubbery maze."

And your post is for the lulz not even trying to use logic and reason you simply dismiss it as a fallacy because you are incapable of dealing with the discussion....

Oh and I believe DaOysterboy was talking bout creating a game based on a new idea(which is more likely a conglomerated one since there is nothing really new anymore) that has not been seen i gaming before.

I am learning disabled and have issues with grammar not with logic and reason tho ^_~

 

[Eponet]

In fact, it might be too much to ask depending on your definition of "affordable". GTA had a budget of $100,000,000. That's a lot of cash that the company needs to make up in sales to keep afloat. Products sell where marginal revenue equals marginal costs. Increasing price from this point reduces total income, Lowering price from this point also reduces total income. The fact is that these "greedy developers" who do what every good businessman does (read: maximize profit) are not interested in reducing their income.

There is so much wrong with this...

If we assume what you say to be true, then games should sell incredibly cheaply. Their marginal cost is miniscule. I could probably produce an additional unit of the product for under a dollar, and I'm sure game companies can do even better.

The marginal cost equals marginal revenue is the point at which they should stop lowering the price, not what they should set the price at. If they just left it there they'd simply suffer their fixed costs as a loss as their revenue only covers the cost of producing and distributing the games themselves.

 

[DaOysterboy]

If I don't have money for the bus... I don't try to get on the bus... I fucking walk.

Imagine a world where you have the money for the bus, but no busses exist. And you and your countrymen hear about busses, and decide to build your own, but the bus company says 'Sorry, we own the right to busses, and decided not to build any in your area at this time.' and its illegal for your city to build its own busses because of the copyright on busses.
And now you have to walk every day, even though you know an alternative exists but is not allowed to you. Is it fair that because the bus company decides not to build busses in your area, that your city can never have them? Even if building them is no cost to the bus company?

This is not a defense of all piracy, only that where the pirate is willing and trying to pay for the item, but literally cannot due to restrictions based on geography or similar. Whether 1 or 100,000 pirate a game when they could not buy it even when trying, it wont make a penny's difference to the makers of the game.

Someone already mentioned that making the analogy your argument is problematic. It can help explain when people don't understand but when it *becomes* the argument, it is inherently flawed. Saying "you can't make a bus" translates to "you can't make a game". Go ahead and design a game! If it's good I might buy it! I could take your bus analogy and say there are "busses", but they cost $50 just to go downtown, only come by twice a year, and smell kinda funny, and my analogy would be just as good as your "no busses allowed" analogy. If you're going to talk about the piracy issue, put it in terms of piracy. There is no need to say "it's kinda like this" because everyone understands what it is in reality. So let's put your analogy back in terms of the games. "So now you have to not play games or play less interesting games even though you know an alternative exists." Basically, yeah that's it. I've already stated, game devs are not required to make products, reduce their income, or cater to any regional market. If they don't want to sell you their *intellectual property* (another big reason your bus analogy just doesn't hold up) they don't have to.

Ah for the lulz, no wonder you are incorrect so much.

I also said I was still making actual points. I'm just doing so in a sardonic manner. At least I'm not saying everyone who disagrees with me is mentally retarded [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_retardation#IQ_below_70].

People can't grow up and realize piracy is more gray than black and white. 7 times out of ten its due from lack of service and or qaulity from the copy right owner, the other 3 times its due to people making an illicit profit.

Once again, ad hominem. Once again, shifting blame. Once again, presenting claims without evidence.

Well you can't get past the 1:1 ratio myth so you IQ has to be called into question.
What is a fallacy about loosing potential sales to the real world problem of not gaining the public's interest not because of of magical one legged bandit but because the seller of the product can not gain and maintain the public's interest.

Law is about marginalizing what we can functionally control, there is no way one can functionally control distribution and copies in this age of information and no amount of draconian or antiquated law will keep the public from it. Now if you marginalize it and control the profit aspects of it you allow enough balance and control to enforce it across a diverse planet.


There is no evidence, No one has hard evidence either way as its a blame game to steal rights and freedoms from the public and ensure the rent a license scheme is unquestioned......

The public is interested because the game is getting pirated. If nobody were interested in the product it wouldn't be pirated. Also, take a civics class or two and stop with the anarcho-communist arguments. Law is not just about keeping you rascals quiet after quiet hours have started. Law is society's way of functioning in a way that minimizes the abuse of its people. Disagree if you will. Game companies actually are composed of people, with lives, and expenses trying to make a paycheck from their hard work. Go ahead and say "nobody is harmed if I take what I haven't earned." Jack's government is saying that about his tax dollars, so I guess what goes around comes around.

alternatives are no good for a future games tester and programmer.

-snip-

and not gaming will severely hurt my knowledge of games [that and the lack of yahtzee, the game overthinker and the news from the escapist which i think sums up the gaming community as a whole]

If you listened to Yahtzee at all you might hold a different opinion. From what I can tell Yahtzee is *against* every game seeming the same, so if you are playing games to get your ideas, you missed the boat. CREATIVITY is needed in game development more than the ability to "do what this other game did." If this is really the path you want to take, you'd be much better off learning to *actually program* or learning graphic design programs than "playing games."

i need alternatives for games.

You really are beginning to sound like you have an addiction. The rationalizing, justifying, self-pitying, and need for approval of your actions and affirmation of yourself has gone way beyond just the normal arguments of your typical "hey I'm a pirate, do you guys think it's bad?" thread.

What modern games can show the un average tester or game designer is what not to do and what with more polish can become golden.

--snip--

World of goo you can see bits of lemmings and other puzzle games(one on the PSP I forget the name of and a SNES one I forget the name of). Braid is a mix of classic 2D adventure platfomers like Cadash,Popfulmail and Mario wolrd but with a more puzzle theme.
Psychonauts is a adventure/action platformer at heart whats unique about it or beyond good and evil is the story and the style in which you go about playing the game.

Somewhere in that snip I'm sure I said that each game has elements that have been used before and since, but this is missing the point. My point is if you boil down game development to regurgitating older games, a good chunk your base will get bored and leave. Sure you can use old elements (that's why there are game genres) but it has to be presented attractively or nobody will care (unless it's the next big title in a series and people buy it out of habit.)

Planescape: Torment? a bit of D&D and dark or otherwise fantasy novels and comics for inspiration of the setting I assume and the gamepaly is derived from RPGs before it.

Don't underestimate the importance of the storyline. Sure the setting is borrowed from an existing fiction, but the story is unique to anything I've seen before or since. It changed the way I view games as a medium and the very concepts of life and death. But now I'm just gushing... so moving on.

The creation process goes beyond copy catting X or Y as you play and absorb games you see bits and pieces of mechanics that at times you so badly want to tweak because they are just off a bit or just horribly implemented(at least I do and I so rag about it at times).

Off topic, but if all you do is tweak mechanics you haven't created anything. Watch Yahtzee's recent videos that get the "Like God of War but..." tag. You need to make a contribution to the genre, even if it is just being a better story teller, or the game is forgotten and sent to the bottom of the bargain bin. Whatever you do by "tweaking" is going to just be marred by the everpresent notion of "so what? X did it first."

One can not develop a new experience just by going over your single minded mechanic or game ideal(look at damnation or even dantes inferno its a perfect example of a game developed in a vacuum ) one has to experience what has been done then add their own to it. And that is difficult these days as creativity is something companies put aside to do a 9 to 5 gig.

I never claimed adherence to a single game ideal could create a new experience. Quite the opposite. The games I listed were vastly different in scope, mechanics, and even purpose. I consider these games standouts in the field though because what they offered at the time they came out I had not found in other games. Any game now though that starts out "an immortal amnesiac wakes up in the morgue" seems like a tired joke. And I agree, creativity is largely ignored in favor of a tried and true formula: usually "ruggedly handsome space marine shoots aliens for fun and profit." My words have been taken out of context and my point was that you won't create something good by knowing "what not to do." You must have an idea of what TO do.

Now with that said absorbing games is only one part of of becoming a developer so you can see mechanics and weave them together and make a refined game ideal, thats easy I do it all the time. The hard part is stream lining the ideal so the fat is cut from it, making it coherent and then bringing it to life. All I can do is imagine and think I am working on my coding skills but they suck, same for my artistic/drawing skills I have no money for collage all I got is a dream and a break brain(learning disabilities) that makes it very hard to communicate and read physical books. But I am trying, call it a vain pitiful try all you want but nothing will get done if all I do is dream..

I'm not ragging on anyone's dreams or the difficulties they may have in reaching them. All I said is that if making games is your goal, having games to play needs to be secondary to learning how to make games. I spend an inordinate time playing games (mostly older games) and have absolutely no idea how to make one. My time playing games has not in the least prepped me for a life of programming, debugging, and making shipping deadlines.

Oh and I believe DaOysterboy was talking bout creating a game based on a new idea

Well done! We're almost getting somewhere!

(which is more likely a conglomerated one since there is nothing really new anymore) that has not been seen i gaming before.

*sigh* ...nevermind I guess. I really don't understand why anyone would want to work in an industry where you NEVER DO ANYTHING NEW! Of course there are ideas that haven't been explored! There's a game out soon (if not already) called The Misadventures of P.B Winterbottom... it's apparently about a silent movie villain who can manipulate time in order to steal pies. After watching the trailer I thought "That is fucking genius right there. PIES FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!!!" Sure, time manipulation to obtain an object=Braid, but I defy you to find a setting or character to approximate what the game is offering. Now I haven't played it and the game may or may not completely suck, but I'm grateful somebody is at least trying. To say "everything creative has been done" is extremely cynical (and I'd be careful with that viewpoint if you ever are hired onto a creative development team) and I simply don't buy it. Someday, someone will make a game where you play a dragon chef with his own cooking show detailing how to make tasty concoctions from virgin-princesses-chained-to-rocks and you have to secure your lair against the knightly vermin who keep trying to steal your ingredients and the contents of your horde pile, and it will be funny, and sarcastic, with awesome graphics and sound, and the story will somehow seamlessly incorporate a race of talking cats bent on taking over the world, without any irony or disconnect from other plotlines, and so help me God I will buy it!!!

 

[DaOysterboy]

In fact, it might be too much to ask depending on your definition of "affordable". GTA had a budget of $100,000,000. That's a lot of cash that the company needs to make up in sales to keep afloat. Products sell where marginal revenue equals marginal costs. Increasing price from this point reduces total income, Lowering price from this point also reduces total income. The fact is that these "greedy developers" who do what every good businessman does (read: maximize profit) are not interested in reducing their income.

There is so much wrong with this...

If we assume what you say to be true, then games should sell incredibly cheaply. Their marginal cost is miniscule. I could probably produce an additional unit of the product for under a dollar, and I'm sure game companies can do even better.

Really? You could copy a game to a disk, produce the disk art on said disk, print out the professional quality manual, purchase the case box, print out the box art, and (here's a fun one) ship it from California to Romania covering all tariffs and other import costs for less than a dollar? Kudos. Really. Jack doesn't have a credit card remember so please don't come back and say "no I'd use digital distribution." You need a way to give Jack the game and to receive from Jack $1.01 plus whatever expense it costs you to accept his payment (yeah, there's money involved there too: you know every time you use a credit card at a grocery store the grocery store has to pay the credit card company?) to make it worth your while. Pick any game you have, give it a shot, and document the process please. I'd be very interested to find out how it goes.

Apart from this you have assumed that "marginal cost to the company" is the same as "marginal cost to someone who just did it for the hell of doing it." Marginal cost is not a static quantity. Marginal cost initially decreases with increasing quantity (I can make and ship a truckload at a lower average cost than I can make and ship one single product), but begins increasing at higher quantities (I need to have more people working on it, I have to increase supply purchases, I need more truck drivers, etc.)

The marginal cost equals marginal revenue is the point at which they should stop lowering the price, not what they should set the price at. If they just left it there they'd simply suffer their fixed costs as a loss as their revenue only covers the cost of producing and distributing the games themselves.

No. You just described where total revenue equals total cost. In a perfectly competitive market, the price is ALWAYS set where marginal revenue equals marginal cost. If your marginal revenue exceeds marginal cost your *total* profit will increase. If your marginal cost exceeds marginal revenue your *total* profit will decrease. You ALWAYS maximize your total profit by setting the price where marginal revenue equals marginal cost (where your profits stop increasing).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Profit_maximization#Marginal_cost-marginal_revenue_method

 

[Eponet]

In fact, it might be too much to ask depending on your definition of "affordable". GTA had a budget of $100,000,000. That's a lot of cash that the company needs to make up in sales to keep afloat. Products sell where marginal revenue equals marginal costs. Increasing price from this point reduces total income, Lowering price from this point also reduces total income. The fact is that these "greedy developers" who do what every good businessman does (read: maximize profit) are not interested in reducing their income.

There is so much wrong with this...

If we assume what you say to be true, then games should sell incredibly cheaply. Their marginal cost is miniscule. I could probably produce an additional unit of the product for under a dollar, and I'm sure game companies can do even better.

Really? You could copy a game to a disk, produce the disk art on said disk, print out the professional quality manual, purchase the case box, print out the box art, and (here's a fun one) ship it from California to Romania covering all tariffs and other import costs for less than a dollar? Kudos. Really. Jack doesn't have a credit card remember so please don't come back and say "no I'd use digital distribution." You need a way to give Jack the game and to receive from Jack $1.01 plus whatever expense it costs you to accept his payment (yeah, there's money involved there too: you know every time you use a credit card at a grocery store the grocery store has to pay the credit card company?) to make it worth your while. Pick any game you have, give it a shot, and document the process please. I'd be very interested to find out how it goes.

Apart from this you have assumed that "marginal cost to the company" is the same as "marginal cost to someone who just did it for the hell of doing it." Marginal cost is not a static quantity. Marginal cost initially decreases with increasing quantity (I can make and ship a truckload at a lower average cost than I can make and ship one single product), but begins increasing at higher quantities (I need to have more people working on it, I have to increase supply purchases, I need more truck drivers, etc.)

The marginal cost equals marginal revenue is the point at which they should stop lowering the price, not what they should set the price at. If they just left it there they'd simply suffer their fixed costs as a loss as their revenue only covers the cost of producing and distributing the games themselves.

No. You just described where total revenue equals total cost. In a perfectly competitive market, the price is ALWAYS set where marginal revenue equals marginal cost. If your marginal revenue exceeds marginal cost your *total* profit will increase. If your marginal cost exceeds marginal revenue your *total* profit will decrease. You ALWAYS maximize your total profit by setting the price where marginal revenue equals marginal cost (where your profits stop increasing).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Profit_maximization#Marginal_cost-marginal_revenue_method

Since when did average cost and marginal cost become the same thing? Also, since when did companies begin lowering prices for each person based on what they were willing to pay?

Common sense dictates that you keep your prices relatively stable, otherwise consumers won't buy because they will expect a future price drop. The marginal cost = marginal revenue is the point at which you should sell the very last unit if you constantly lowered prices based on what people are willing to pay for it. Sticking it up at marginal cost will net you a profit per unit sold of 0.

In fact, I even stated that the fixed costs (ie: Developing the game) are seperate.
"If they just left it there they'd simply suffer their fixed costs as a loss as their revenue only covers the cost of producing and distributing the games themselves."

Actually, you're somewhat right, I did make an error. All those fixed costs for development are part of the marginal cost of that very first unit produced. So it should be sold at around $10000000 or so. After that first unit, the cost of producing additional units falls and rises as more administration fees become necessary. Despite all this, and assuming that you somehow manage to sell that first unit to someone, you'll be breaking even.

I might not be a genius, but I'm fairly certain that when all the costs of every single unit are equal to the revenue gained from every single unit, you're breaking even with a net profit of 0.

You need to sell at more than it costs you to make something if you want to make any profit, that model only works to decide when to stop lowering the price for people who aren't willing to pay much for the good. It also assumes a different price for each individual.

In the real world, human behaviour (or as the wikipedia article calls it "Game Theory") destroys the possibility of anyone actually doing that.

 

[Seneschal]

why are people so hateful on people like jack? :-/

Because he seems to think that it is perfectly ok to steal stuff because he doesn't have the money to buy it, maybe? Has he tried to get a job? Probably not. Well, I can't afford to live on my own, drive a nice car, or have the insurance for a nice car. Using Jack's logic that means it is perfectly ok for me to go steal a nice car and have a nice house without paying for any of it...

already discussed the job part

fourthly: the economic state in jack's country is in a full turmoil, adults are so desperate for a job that they are willing to work extra hours for no money at freaking mcdonalds as a toilet washer or stuff like that so jack has no way of getting a job [not including the extreme work-load a school from jack's country necessitates.]

You never said if he ever tried to get a job. Plus, school is no excuse. If he has time to play pirated games and go around to all these sites on the internet all the time, then he has time for a job...

Yeah, there's loads of jobs out there in under developed countries for high school graders.

If Jack and his country are so destitute, then he really doesn't have the time or the money to spend on games does he? Games are a luxury item and it sucks that there are haves and have-nots but at what point did not having enough money for something mean that you got it for free?

No one said it's the right thing to do. Jack buys original games from time to time when he can afford them. On the other hand, I can bet my ass that all of you would pirate the hell out of the world if you lived in the same conditions.

I don't even have to ask you if you have an mp3 folder on your computer. Or if you watch copyrighted videos on youtube. That's also piracy, as far as I know.

In the underdeveloped countries, piracy does more good than DRM ever will. Jacks play pirated games and buy them once they can afford them. If it weren't for piracy, Jacks would never play or buy any games at all. Not to mention, there would be no Jacks on this forum and the whole gaming community would be a lot smaller.

Piracy isn't right. None of us say it is. It's just that we have no other choice, except not playing games at all. I know, you'll tell Jack to stop playing games, and I know you wouldn't stop either.

AND FOR THE Nth DARN TIME TO EVERYONE OUT THERE: IN THIRD WORLD COUNTRIES FOOD, COMPUTERS AND INTERNET ARE CHEAPER AND THE WAGES ARE LOWER THAN IN THE US, BUT THE PRICES OF GAMES REMAIN THE SAME SO STOP ASKING HOW CAN JACK AFFORD A COMPUTER AND FOOD AND CANNOT AFFORD GAMES.

But anyway, this whole argument is retarded since we all just go in circles.

I just saw on the Extra Punctuation comments that you're Croatian. You comment now makes much more sense. Being one myself, I agree and understand Jack's views.

I made the same point four other times, but no one ever deigns to respond. It's just getting ridiculous. You cannot apply the same logic to a fat lazy cheap American and a poor Russian gamer. It would be much simpler, but it is fundamentally wrong.

With an average American wage of $2600 per month, a typical $50 game costs you 2% of your monthly income. In Eastern Europe (and I'm talking affluent parts), the average wage is $800 and the equivalent game is $100, which is 12.5% of the monthly income. So, we pay as much as you for games that cost twice as much to get SIX TIMES less content. If Jack is from Romania or Albania, double or triple this difference. This means that with the effort to buy the 5-6 original games Jack has, he could have bought 50-90 games if he was American. He wouldn't feel the need to pirate, he would have already bought everything he wants. I bet half of you don't even own that many games.

 

[PhiMed]

And that's fine. They offer a price (or pittance, if you will) to the person who bought it originally. The owner of the game is free to turn this offer down and seek a higher price on Amazon, Ebay, or other vendors and sell it direct instead of through a middle man. If accepted, though, the store acquires the game from the owner, then sells it again. One repurchase = one resale.

While it may be a back-door counter to the "potential sales" argument, the practice of used game sales and game piracy are not even remotely similar in terms of the human interactions involved.

One is the sale of game which was originally purchased but the owner no longer needed, resulting in maybe 4 or 5 different users over the course of a couple of years, with no more than one owner at a time, and the other is the production of hundreds or thousands of copies from one purchase. Also, the person who cracked the retail copy never actually relinquishes ownership. Comparable effect on sales =/= same thing

Except this happens far more frequently than piracy. You're assuming the amount of legitamate customers = the amount of pirates.

I didn't make that assumption, and I'm not sure where you're getting that.

No offense, but your wording was pretty unclear in that comment. I'm not sure what "this" is that you're saying happens far more frequently than piracy.

 

[TPiddy]

If I don't have money for the bus... I don't try to get on the bus... I fucking walk.

Imagine a world where you have the money for the bus, but no busses exist. And you and your countrymen hear about busses, and decide to build your own, but the bus company says 'Sorry, we own the right to busses, and decided not to build any in your area at this time.' and its illegal for your city to build its own busses because of the copyright on busses.
And now you have to walk every day, even though you know an alternative exists but is not allowed to you. Is it fair that because the bus company decides not to build busses in your area, that your city can never have them? Even if building them is no cost to the bus company?

This is not a defense of all piracy, only that where the pirate is willing and trying to pay for the item, but literally cannot due to restrictions based on geography or similar. Whether 1 or 100,000 pirate a game when they could not buy it even when trying, it wont make a penny's difference to the makers of the game.

This is also NOT the OP's situation. The OP will not pay for them even though he makes about $30 a month, and they ARE available in his country. And you know, if you don't like something that's going on in your country? Move out of that country? You know how many people immigrate every year to get out from under the oppression of their homelands?

The OP is at least in a country where he can have computers, high-speed internet and high school. They have colleges. He's not as poor as he claims to be and there are ways to fix his problem. He just wants us to agree that his pirating is ok.

 

[PhiMed]

I just saw on the Extra Punctuation comments that you're Croatian. You comment now makes much more sense. Being one myself, I agree and understand Jack's views.

I made the same point four other times, but no one ever deigns to respond. It's just getting ridiculous. You cannot apply the same logic to a fat lazy cheap American and a poor Russian gamer. It would be much simpler, but it is fundamentally wrong.

With an average American wage of $2600 per month, a typical $50 game costs you 2% of your monthly income. In Eastern Europe (and I'm talking affluent parts), the average wage is $800 and the equivalent game is $100, which is 12.5% of the monthly income.

That's fair. But the costs of living quarters and food are MUCH more greater here, so a smaller PERCENTAGE of income will be left for stupid stuff like video games. I know that equals more CURRENCY, but it's still a smaller percentage. Someone with an income of $30,000/year isn't going to have much left to spend on games after rent, electricity, water, transportation, and food.

Also, games cost $60, not $50. I know it's only $10, but that's a 20% error.

Additionally, while $30,000 may be the MEAN income, the MEDIAN income is closer to $20,000. This means that half the people in America make less than $20,000. Considering the cost of living is higher here than it is there, should poor people here pirate?

Also, and I know this is picking nits, but pirating games probably isn't helping the price of games in your region, and you're still not entitled to them.

So, we pay as much as you for games that cost twice as much to get SIX TIMES less content.

You get less content? They edit your games? Do you mean it's 6 times as much of a percentage of your income? That's not the same thing. You're paying twice as much (not really, but let's take your numbers at face value) for the same games.

If Jack is from Romania or Albania, double or triple this difference. This means that with the effort to buy the 5-6 original games Jack has, he could have bought 50-90 games if he was American. He wouldn't feel the need to pirate, he would have already bought everything he wants. I bet half of you don't even own that many games.

Okay, I'm very sorry you live in an impoverished area. Your logic is flawed, though, because you're assuming that both of your examples are spending 100% of their income on games. If they're doing that, they're doing it wrong.

I've heard a somewhat similar justification for Somali pirates. They're engaging in violence in order to get food for their families. You're engaging in theft of intellectual property in order to get a stupid computer game. Why do I think you're the bigger douchebag?

Might I engage in the same behavior if I were in your position? Perhaps. But at least I would have the self-awareness to realize that I was doing something wrong, and I wouldn't waste a single second trying to tell people that I was in the right.