Aeshi said:
1. So the pirates can crack the DRM that makes the game playable but not the DRM that makes sure the multiplayer is legit?
Multi-player requires a unique serial to register the game to your account in 99% of all cases. Even CD-key generators can't generate a serial that is valid (unless they get lucky). So yes, in most cases pirates ARE compelled to play the single player only. Some games attempt to get around this by emulating the server structure of the real game (so-called 'pirated servers'), but the experience is most often buggy, dumbed down, laggy and often doesn't work at all.
As for the rest.
Aeshi said:
2. You yourself seem to admit that at best companies can only near-equal pirates for this one, also you know what's even cheaper than a "cheap" game? a "free" game.
3. If they're willing to spend ages waiting for a torrent to download something tells me most won't mind waiting a few more days.
4. Not exactly sure what you're trying to say here, but I doubt a pirated copy is going to be less convenient to carry around than a regular copy.
5. I don't think "Customer Loyalty" counts for much given how the average gamer seems to either believe that game companies have infinite money and just charge customers for games out of spite or defines "loyalty" as "I won't pirate from this company until I can think of an excuse for doing so."
...your mistake here is that you take each individual point out of context, and not only do you fail to apply any factual logic to them individually (your logic is quite simply awful), they don't matter individually, they matter in unison. Every single point combined with the others add up to be more than the sum of it's parts. Yes, a free game is cheaper than a cheap game on it's own, but if points 3-5 outweight that, then in many cases people WILL buy instead of pirate.
In fact, if by your logic no person in the world would EVER buy a game (except the really hardcore 'Piracy is 100% wrong' people, and those aren't that numerous).
But to take your points apart one by one:
2) Cheap games is often enough. Valve have shown data to prove that the steam sales are working, dramatically. Decreasing a games cost by 75% during a sale, would typically lead to 3500% the amount of purchases. I'm sure you can do the basic math from there that this adds up to more $$$$$$$$.
3) If people were truly didn't mind waiting, then noone would ever pre-order a game until they read the reviews.
People in general can't wait. Period. That's how we work. We want stuff, we want it NOW and even being delayed one day can sometimes pain people. The "torrent wait" doesn't apply, because that's a waiting time you can't get around in any case (pirate or digital buy).
4) Pirated copies ARE less convenient carrying around than steam copies. I know this, not because i pirate, but because i have backup-games from all my old CD's (which are essentially equivalent to pirated games, except they're bought legally). It IS more convenient to just ask Steam to download something and then go play (or do) something else while waiting.
Then there is the issue of online-piracy being a hassle. It's not much of a hassle, but you still have to search through torrents, figure out of a torrent is real or a fake (of if the bundled crack is working). With the exception of Ubisoft-games, legal purchases typically just WORK.
5) Customer loyalty matters a lot more than you think. People who love a game from a company typically buys from them again if they got treated will in the process. Blizzard and Valve are both companies that can testify to that. In fact, i can't wait to see the piracy numbers on the Single Player games EA is planning on releasing on Origin Only (like Mass Effect 3) to prove my point.
Your logic has no grasp in reality at all. If it had, then like i said, almost no person would EVER buy a game, even the cheap games. People have a lot of reasons for pirating and a lot for buying games, but in the end they can be attributed down to the five points i made. And yes they matter. You typically can't beat piracy on point 2, but for most consumers, you can beat them on every other point, and if you do that, you have a recipe for a game that will sell well and be pirated less (it will still be pirated, you can never get rid of piracy or the most extreme pirates, but less).
