Poll: Pollage: Your the CEO

[viranimus]

Ok, The two hotbutton topics we keep hearing from the industry seems to be that they are sick of Piracy, and sick of the resell/rental markets. So, trying to face these two topics that keep coming up, I wanted to do so with a twist.

So if YOU were the CEO who is looking at everyone who is playing your product but your not getting a piece of their enjoyment, and a coder comes along and offers you a proposition that they can eliminate either Piracy or resell/rental, and by choosing one, the other is made virtually impossible to stop. The question is, as a CEO, Corp figurehead/mouthpiece which should you be more worried about, Piracy or resell/rental

 

[Blackadder51]

Piracy by far.

 

[Imper1um]

Rental causes issues in the industry. While Piracy is an issue, the re-sale market is such a higher profit cut in the market. In the Xbox360 and PS3 Market, the Piracy issue is even lessened due to how the X360 and PS3 work with games.

Rental: It's almost like legal piracy.

 

[Vrach]

Piracy.

Resell = people buy the game = $$$

Rental = store pays for the rights = $$$

Piracy = one person pays for the game (if any)

You do realise that all that $$$ goes to the stores/rentals and not to the developer right? That's why it's an 'issue'.

I'd go with nuking resells/rentals if I have to go with your options. Piracy is often used as a (very convenient and free) testing tool. If you get a resold game, there's not a chance in hell you'll buy a new one. If you get a pirated version of the game, play it, enjoy it, you can easily decide to go buy the real thing. Particularly the case for games that have strong multiplayer value.

What I'd personally do is go for fixing the issue on the global sale. Nuke BOTH piracy and rentals. But rather than being a greedy ************ (assuming everyone that was on the job making the game got paid a fair sum) and keeping all the profits from those two actions, I'd put about 90-95% of the gained profits to reduce the cost of games on the whole. Of course the actual economic plan would have to be somewhat more intricate than that, but you get my drift.

 

[cerapa]

If you buy used games then you are actually willing to spend money. The developer sees none of that money if not bought straight.
A lot of pirates arent willing to spend money and no money is lost.

So, in my opinion used games are worse.

 

[octafish]

Resale and Rental, there is money exchanging hands and I'm not getting any of it. Plus I still have the law on my side against piracy and I will ruthlessly pursue and bankrupt individuals to keep my shareholders happy.

 

[cerapa]

The retail stores that sell used copies? Someone had to buy it first to trade it in, no?

Learn your facts.

Someone had to buy a game to crack them and put them up for piracy too.

 

[viranimus]

Wow.. I purposely put that fourth choice in to try to keep people from choosing it. I think I understand why I like it here... People are just as twisted as I am /joy

I think it comes down to motivation.

People who resell/rent werent likely to buy the game at full price anyway. If there is no market for R&R then it only hurts sales as the R&Rer is more likely to either wait till the price drops to their acceptable range, or it might lead them to piracy.

People who pirate werent likely to buy the game at all. If piracy isnt available they would just turn to the more legal means of R&R, which still isnt putting a profit into publishers hands.

I am really starting to think that all this clamor about how much money they are loosing is shooting publishers in the foot as people are increasingly seeing the publishers as money grubbing, which if they push that far enough might well cause people to swear off their products all together. Perhaps its time for the publishers to go a different route.

 

[WelshDanny]

You're the CEO, You're! Improper use of grammar makes this CEO sad.

 

[Tharwen]

You're the CEO, You're! Improper use of grammar makes this CEO sad.

Hang on... but apparently you're the Demo! So who's the CEO?