Why gamers have turned to pirating

[@Scarecr0wn]

Big publisher every single year: "We had record breaking year, we are swimming in money!" Big publisher every single year: "We need to increase game price, we need wider audience, we need to include more optional purchases because developers expensive" Big publisher every single year: fires hundreds devs Vote with your brain people.

[@lamegamertime]

@No-you-are-wrong-stop-LARPing bro is larping a guy with the username "no you are wrong stop larping" thats crazy But on a related note this video does not have to be 20 minutes for one tweet, that's like 10x as long as necessary since the point was clear in the first 2 😪

[@purplefanta7142]

Its astounding how many corporations shoot themselves in the foot daily.

[@Scarecr0wn]

@No-you-are-wrong-stop-LARPing Examples. Be as specific as possible.

[@TwiliPaladin]

​@No-you-are-wrong-stop-LARPing And those ones are called out as well. The difference is that they get an immediate effect because, for an indie dev, a 15-20% drop in revenue HURTS.

[@Amogersuser]

@No-you-are-wrong-stop-LARPing nice rage bait

[@theravensniffer]

The irony is, that I am much more inclined to pirate a AAA game. I'll eat a 10-15$ loss on 3 or 4 indy games that "weren't for me", but a 70$ AAA game in a beloved IP just isn't trustworthy anymore.

[@Roseles89]

This 100% I start to question if I really need a indy game when they creep into the 35 range.. I have one now I've been wanting to play and sitting on cause of the price tag.

[@Saviliana]

Haven't been buying anything pricier than 30bucks for quite a long time, there is nothing in AAA class looks even remotely entertaining for some time.

[@TwiliPaladin]

​@Roseles89 Only one that comes to mind is Factorio.

[@Roseles89]

@TwiliPaladin ive been watching fae farm but it's over 30 and I have been burned by so many fame games t.t

[@arverezzle]

this i live in 3rd word country where minimum wage is less than 400$/month i can spare 10-15 coz thats just 2 days of food, but 60-80$ is just a quarter of my paycheck, i need to think 2 or 3 time before buying it

[@Antonwalnuts]

the creators of hotline miami made a updated version of their game available to people who like to pirate. and when hotline miami 2 was banned in australia they told people to pirate it

[@peter_griffith522]

Hotline miami is amazing, bought it, and also pirated on my vita since the store is closed forever, never knew the devs were even more based then before hell yeah.

[@niceoftheprincess3197]

​@@peter_griffith522wdym closed? I have a vita and can still access the store no issues

[@HyperNova808]

I have begun chipping away at it and it's surprisingly tough and easy to mess up, atleast for my slow and strategic playstyle which is in heavy contrast to the fast paced games I tend to play, even though hotline Miami also encourages that, I'm keeping my first playthrough slow and steady Hell, if I like it enough, maybe I'll also pirate the sequel as I am Australian, though I've heard the story of the game devs releasing it so I won't be mad if it isn't as expected

[@Antonwalnuts]

@@HyperNova808 if you do decide to pirate it don't forget to do it safely and always check what you're downloading

[@AAS_OreO24]

@@Antonwalnuts should i be getting pirated games from steamunlocked? cuz i got halo 2 from there but the download speeds are so shit

[@Beefercow]

The original poster made that tweet as bait. They said further down that they bought the game. Still, what the dev said is absolutely based and I'm absolutely thrilled that theres still great devs out there.

[@sinner5452]

I was wondering why noone calling out that "i _love_ not to pay for indie dev work" guy. Probably thats why.

[@chipsalom]

The word that I think ppl are looking for in this discussion is "ethical". The question ppl should ask is, "Is this ethical". A label like "Indie" or "AAA" isn't what defines whether a game is ethical in their approach to their market. But you don't need those labels to substitute for the word "ethical" itself.

[@ElrondKaresh]

"they said they bought the game," as to not incriminate themselves for doing something illegal lol but sure let's trust some random dude on the Internet whole heartedly lol

[@edward3190]

bro, the dev has no choice. Saying anything otherwise would make a bad reputation. Saying nothing would have wasted a good opportunity to free marketing.

[@dogfromyoutube]

@No-you-are-wrong-stop-LARPing no need for discrimination bro, you dont need to do that just to prove a point.

[@electricindigoball1244]

As Gabe Newell said, "Piracy is a service problem". Either your game is too expensive, not available anymore/in a given market or requires you to jump through too many hoops to access. Also thanks for pointing out the demand issue that exists with physical copies. Too many people talk how things were so much better before digital distribution forgetting that during those times you could sometimes not be able to buy a game that released barely a year or a few years ago simply because it was not longer in stock anywhere.

[@Jim26D]

I've been gaming since the 80s and I can't think of too many occasions that a popular on disc or cartridge game was not available after release. Maybe I want playing those games though. There was limited stuff like ocarina of time gold cartridge, which I skipped school so I could be the first one at toys r us to make sure I got one. Maybe some import games were tough to find, stuff on the dreamcast was hard to find though even at its peak

[@electricindigoball1244]

@@Jim26D Key word here is "popular". A lot of physical games never got additional copies made because they didn't sell well enough at release. This happened to even some highly rated games such as Fire Emblem Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn which sold poorly (by FE standards) at release and have recently become more sought after leading to copies of Radiant Dawn selling for several times more than what a game like Mario Galaxy is selling for in large part due to the difference in the number of copies that were produced. With digital distribution it's entirely possible for a game to fly under the radar at launch only to have a big increase in sales later due to word of mouth. You also mentioned importing games, part of the reason why a lot of niche Japanese games weren't (originally) released outside Japan was because with the physical release model the cost and therefore risk of releasing these games in the West was much higher especially when a lot of publishers believed that tastes in the West were so drastically different that these games simply wouldn't sell there. While localization is still costly, it's not as costly as it used to be when you also had to produce physical copies of your game. Say what you will about what platforms like Steam charge to publish your game or how big of a cut they take, it's a fraction of the cost of producing physical discs and distributing them to stores. With digital distribution it's also possible to easily buy an entire game series while doing the same with physical copies can take a lot of time and money depending on how long the series in question is and how well its different entries sold.

[@Malam_NightYoru]

people also forget that countries like brazil had kids buying 1 game a YEAR because it was expensive as fuck. Even in PS2 era, I had around 2~3 original games a year, and the other 50 were pirated, bc original games were 200BRL, which was too expensive, and pirated ones were affordable at around 12BRL. Which is nuts.

[@alexandercatterson223]

Gabe hasn't followed his own morals for years now. What he said may have been true but it would be nice if people would stop quoting and acting like he's this great guy when he is constantly doing shady shit and going against his own words.

[@ma.2089]

If the game is too expensive, then the ppl buying simply shouldn’t be playing. Games are a luxury item, ppl aren’t entitled to obtaining them.

[@ilouze236]

I'm deeply convinced that it's not a money issue anymore but an ego one. Big studios executive's egos get hurt by piracies. They have way more money than they could know what to do of, so they spend it on legal fees to mend their egos.

[@smithynoir9980]

Correct. They genuinely feel entitled to the sales they project and assume they'll make based on manipulative marketing or the reputation of the actual good passionate people whose shoulders they now stand on and piss down.

[@Sparks95]

i wouldnt be surprised if that was true

[@raze2012_]

Kinda the opposte, they are out of touch but see "stealing games, that affects dollar go up!" and panic. So directors have to say "it's cool if we pay Dennuvo $100k no piracy" and the executives breath a sigh of relief. Not bothering to even measure if piracy is costsing them $100k to begin with. (note: idk the actual cost of denuvo, but I put in low ball figures based on Google).

[@thatoneguy9983]

What’s crazy is Nintendo intentionally killed their biggest weapon against piracy, the Eshop, literally if they just properly priced and maintained old games they wouldn’t be in the position they’re in now.

[@ahmedhasan4966]

I think that you are talking about Virtual console, right?

[@thatoneguy9983]

@@ahmedhasan4966 that and just the entire Wii U Eshop in general, they had basically everything from almost every previous Nintendo console.

[@Valcuda]

I remember when they did that, a dozen people changed their stance on console modding, since that was suddenly the only way to download games on the system!

[@jex-the-notebook-guy1002]

​@@thatoneguy9983you are forggeting the wii shop too

[@Marcara081]

Eventually people will realize that Nintendo operates precisely the same as Disney does.

[@CapitalTeeth]

"The video game market is shrinking" Translation: The COVID boom is over, and we're not making as much money but still want more

[@elijahford3696]

The market demands boundless growth on a finite world, with finite resources. When that's your model, things not growing is bad for business, and it can't grow forever.

[@XSilver_WaterX]

Two ultimate conclusions: either we all work until we literally fall dead, or we abandon a clearly toxic and undead market from the last world war and do actual STUDIES into making a new market. Survival is still an instinct!

[@kronos661]

@@elijahford3696 Chill out. We are living in mouse utopia, we are going to reduce our numbers back to 3 billions or less with our own hands very soon. Either way, if we take into consideration cycles of growth, technological advancement and size of a universe the universe will sooner END with a big crunch or through heat death than it's resources run out but both are a hard boarder either way so it doesn't matter how "sustainable" you were before it. The only thing that would matter at that point was having enough tech to either stop it or travel to another universe.

[@lemagicbaguette1917]

⁠@@kronos661 so, your excuse to be apathetic is the heat death of the universe? That's one I've yet to hear.

[@kronos661]

@@lemagicbaguette1917 No. It's a reason to overcome it and not the point of my post.

[@jonaut5705]

Another good example is Darkwood, which the devs literally uploaded to pirating platforms themselves so that people pirating it don't get viruses

[@LazyTophat]

wait fr? If it's real then that's such a power move from the devs lmao

[@wontonschannel]

like your pharmacist pulling up to your dealers house and dropping off a bag of drugs

[@warriorzpath]

that’s a bold move from the devs dang

[@jonaut5705]

@@wontonschannel literally just a safe injection center

[@TheSonicfanx1]

While Hakita did initially start Ultrakill as a solo dev, his team now includes more people than just himself. There is a credits level (not screen - a LEVEL) that you can check out that houses portraits of all the developers and people who have helped make the game

[@fronatomy6280]

Haven't played the game but that's just wholesome asf. Also kind of effective cause it's more interesting than a rolling credits screen.

[@squiddu]

I feel the museum level goes to show how much they respect their team and how much they've put into this game It's not just halls of portraits, its a highly detailed level with plushies of each of the main developers, with books explaining their purpose on the team and anything else they wanna say, and also tons of stupid little easter eggs, they're having so much fun with it and I love it

[@Jaykeduzthings]

@@squiddudon’t forget chess

[@clockwork1685]

@@Jaykeduzthings ULTRACHESS

[@axolotl_with_a_welrod]

i find it funny how the name of the museum is ''hall of shame''

[@MariusUrucu]

Growing up in Romania in the 2000s, my access to videogames was via piracy, for the simple fact a full priced new game was pretty much 1/3 of minimum wage. Not to mention, if you owned a decent gaming PC, let alone a game console like the Playstation, you were considered wealthy by default. Years later, with no expectations, I started my own KZbin channel, to share my passion for the games I enjoyed playing while growing up and later down the line, when I finally had a job and steady income, I bought all the games I pirated that I enjoyed to support the developers for making my childhood better, not to mention promoting those same games to my own audience. Seeing Hakita's tweet about "culture shouldn't exist for those who afford it" makes me respect him that much more.

[@TruxySSJ]

Woah! Unexpected to see you here, and I'm not even a sub!

[@beanieteamie7435]

Average Romanian activities

[@MariusUrucu]

@@beanieteamie7435 Sorry for not being born in the right country

[@beanieteamie7435]

@@MariusUrucu I'm sorry, I didn't mean it that way. I hope you have a good rest of your day today.

[@vadnegru]

In Ukraine, it was kinda hard to find legal games, most sellers in 2000s selled pirated copies.

[@3-valdiondreemur564]

A big thing that isn't talked about here is pirating movies. I know this isn't what the video is about, but it really shows something. Thing is, the moment you try to watch a movie on a streaming service and you're not on a "trusted device" the streaming quality goes to a bit crushed 720P. That includes any kind of computer. If you have a computer, you can't watch movies anymore because they don't trust you enough not to pirate it. So you pirate it to have better image quality. And since the studio isn't getting money either way from you watching their work and the streaming platform obviously doesn't want you there, you stop paying for it. Netflix, Disney +, (I don't watch streaming anymore), they all do it. If the best experience is earned from pirating, pirating becomes the new standard

[@MFAN1100]

As an anime fan, I'd like to add here: There's a lot of releases each season, and depending on which company gets the license for streaming each show in a different country the different fees start adding up, for example if you want to watch just 3 different shows and they're split up between different streaming platforms, you have to pay 3 different subscriptions, the alternative being a pirate site with all those shows on it. Another thing, as was mentioned, is the potential quality of the video itself, and of the server (for example, a lot of buffering) where some pirate sites that give the option to download episodes so you don't have to deal with buffering issues, of course you could always use torrents as well. Torrents bring me to another point, if you watch the shows with subtitles, there's often multiple groups that will subtitle the episode, giving you vareity (and often times higher quality) in the translations as well as the presentation of those translations (an example I'd like to give here is "Komi can't communicate" (personally I really like the show) where the female lead communicates through writing most of the time. The way the "official" subtitles are handled for that writing (believe the show is/was officially licensed by Netflix) is the same way when speaking, text at the bottom of the screen, which is perfectly servicable, however it just can't be compared to the subs I watched where the actual writing is substituted for the subs, like when she writes on a chalkboard and it actually looks like text written in chalk before she erases it and the subs get erased like they're actually there, it really adds to the experience and it also tends to be a lot easier to parse if there's a lot of text becauee they usually follow font and color changes as well). One last point I'll make about subs is localization, which I honestly feel is fine (for the most part) in dubbed shows, but really starts to grate if you've watched subbed shows for a long time, because you start picking ip on words or references and you know that the translations are incorrect or feel forced. The last big point I'd like to make is the catalogue of some of these sites, having shows that aired decades ago which you literally can't find legal copies of, either because no legal services have them, or because they never got translations in the first place, so fansubbed pirated copies were all there ever was that you could watch in different countries. Piracy in this case is a lot more about not wanting to jump through hoops than not wanting to pay for the product.

[@thegamingbean953]

Many people actually steal cars, they made a whole critically acclaimed super high selling massively hyped video game series about

[@AlexanderBogdanow]

@@thegamingbean953 Well nowadays not any pleb can steal a car bc of all the sec measures. More so you've to get it into another country and create an artifcial paper trail. On another note serious aren't even prosecuted anymoar if done sophisticated enough. Just check out western police statistics. They're a joke. European Cops in the 90s had way less tech & gear, crappy cars... But they got the somewhat done.

[@AlexanderBogdanow]

As if you can't just hook up a capture device on a 'trusted device'. Or you do via good ol' TeleSync. Anyway. That content gets a scene rls as soon as it's available.

[@SomeOne-ph1gw]

i always pirate movies.

[@morgboat744]

both the creator of Ultrakill and Robtop, creator of Geometry Dash, had pretty much the same response to this sort of thing. and that’s the type of behavior that makes me WANT to support them

[@dry4smash946]

Honestly I was thinking of pirating ultrakill until i saw hakita’s response

[@memesong21]

yeah iirc just shapes and beats has a video that plays if it detects that it's pirated that says something similar

[@fredk4745]

Ok ok but like how gonna pirate geometry dash 😭 you can buy that shit for 99 cents on the steam store on a good day.

[@caulfieldsimper]

​@@fredk4745Shit bro i pirated that shit while i was like 6

[@fredk4745]

@@caulfieldsimper lmao

[@thetriathigamer1544]

“Culture shouldn’t exist only for those who can afford it” is such a hard ass line fr

[@johnjackson9767]

The state of the world when culture is a video game.

[@thetriathigamer1544]

@@johnjackson9767 Videogames are part of culture the same way all art is part of culture.

[@galaxycamerata]

The state of the world when culture is a film. A song. A painting.A story. A dance. Its always the same state of the world: One that needs enrichment that isn't provided by something already there.

[@vreikezen8268]

@@johnjackson9767 Video games are one of the highest forms of art as it includes art, music and story

[@JotaroKujo-ip5wb]

@@johnjackson9767you really are intellectually incapable aren’t you?

[@sebastianzarek7056]

Pirating a game that's unreasonably expensive, unfinished, unpolished, lacks content, is filled with greedy tactics and microtransactions isn't a choice, it's a must. Not because I couldn't buy the game, but because the company doesn't deserve the money.

[@bedwarspro]

W fax

[@ameer13247]

I'm not defending big companies but if the game is unfinished, unpolished, lacks content, Why do you want to play it in the first place ?

[@MaybeShimo]

TRUE. Also don't forget about companies that just straight up spit on their fanbase. Looking at you Nintendo.

[@shsnwksybdeb]

Why pirate it then?

[@aperex]

@@shsnwksybdeb cause it's only worth it if it's free

[@xymaryai8283]

pirating from big corpo: YOU'RE DEGRADING THE VERY FOUNDATION OF OUR SOCIETY pirating from broke developer: hey, its totally okay if you can't justify it, all i ask is to tell your friends if you like it ♥

[@blackholeguy1529]

im going to make out with hakita sloppy style

[@Ovotun]

Lol

[@HungrySquid-z9j]

Lame joke aside you are horribly under estimating how much companies lose from piracy

[@Ovotun]

@@HungrySquid-z9j nice bait man

[@Guttertank_gaming]

@@HungrySquid-z9j good

[@ahabwolf7580]

I believe Nintendo was also caught using the pirated version of some of the game roms that were found on various websites at the time, when they released the classic versions of their consoles. Pretty big slap in the face, "Don't steal our stuff, but also, thanks for stealing our stuff."

[@Shizzmoney74]

Sony also used an open-source emulator (PSX ReArmed) on their classic console... this the same company that tried (and failed) to sue Bleem! back in the early 2000s. The irony.

[@polocatfan]

@@Shizzmoney74 not really a fair example, iirc they'd go on to hire the bleem guy for PS3?

[@neoqwerty]

@@polocatfan If you can't beat them, hire them!

[@MxSlfDstrct]

oh, they first started doing that with the Wii Virtual Console lmao

[@Biskkyz]

Yeah It was a copy of Pokemon yellow for the Gameboy.

[@voidwalker3508]

Great video, honestly you summed up my precise thoughts on this matter right as I was reading Hakita's tweet for the first time. HOWEVER. That long hallway behind your set slowly getting darker as it extended made me super anxious and as I watched I was just waiting for some monster to slowly lurk out from behind you and sneak up on you XD

[@geovanedepaula8110]

As someone from Brazil, just another point: The minimum montly wage in Brazil is R$1.412,00. Which means that while the average montly salary is R$3.222,00 most of the young adults are not able to afford to pay R$300 to R$400 on a game.

[@Amogersuser]

robux

[@Spectacular_Insanity]

Blame your government. The tariffs are absurd and companies are not going to eat that cost.

[@cyberfalcon2872]

​@@Spectacular_Insanity We do

[@PotatoTheProgrammer]

⁠​⁠@@Spectacular_Insanityokay... so what should you do next? complaining about the government wont just summon money to your bank account

[@maxxoft]

​@@PotatoTheProgrammer Have you ever participated in revolution? No? Then stfu

[@TinyGremolin]

Helldiver's being banned in over 90 countries is why my review is still negative. Not sure why Sony hates money so much.

[@kampfer91]

And that was just the beginning , future sony game will all required PSN , may be even Single player game , even though Sony game work just fine before without the PSN crap .

[@dh8203]

Also why I'm not buying that game or any other with psn required.

[@verskarton]

@@kampfer91soon you have to pay for Playstation Plus just to play Sony published games on PC

[@NikolaiMihailov1]

The worst part is Snoy successfully memory holed the fact that HD2 had a PSN *may* be required on the store page. If it was for Crossplay/Cross Progression whatever I wouldn't care because can just not use that and not have to use PSN. It doesn't help that the CM team is actively harming the game and community and a big part of why I'm dropping off.

[@Andyisgodcky]

@@kampfer91 Then thats great incentive to not partner with Sony to make a game.

[@JanoschNr1]

To the point of "piracy is illegal and also wrong" *If a law is unjust a man is not only right to disobey it, he is obligated to do so. - Thomas Jefferson.*

[@reetusbeetus]

Damn he really said that?

[@Objectified]

Fucking please. We're talking about video games, not the kinda of things Jefferson was addressing. And, no, disobeying laws tou don't like is not a way to get them changed, or rational.

[@Objectified]

​@reetusbeetus He said many things that only made sense in the specific time and context in which he said them. Disobeying laws is stupid and counter productive. It's not how you get things changed for the better.

[@bubbleman2002]

@@Objectified I agree. For instance, if there was a standing army, just use the legal system that they have specifically tailored to protect them from prosecution to prosecute them... You're not too bright, are you?

[@bubbleman2002]

@@Objectified Obeying the law won't change things either. Try it and see.

[@HANNIBAL30ro]

when an online only game becomes unplayable due to server shutdown or other self inflicted company decisions, that game should be eligible for refund. that would teach them.

[@squiddu]

bless the few games that allow people to make their own servers on those games, however small. valve's pretty good with this.

[@YayaFeiLong]

you should check out Stop Killing Games then, it's a campaign make that sort of thing outright illegal

[@DemiCape]

yeah any of those games should still be playable offline.

[@ninja_nadir]

​@@squidduyea like tf2 players hosted better servers with more anticheat and was more fun I actually agree 👍

[@londonrials]

Depends. If you bought a 10-year-old online game then a year later the servers shut down because the company doesn't wish to support it anymore, that's okay. But it's different if you bought a recent online game and the company's decisions (i.e. being greedy) cause them to shut down servers. That should cause people to get refunds. For example: GTA: Online - No refunds are good when the servers shut down in the future. It's been going for longer than some of the younger players have been alive. Marvel's Avengers - Official support ceased to exist and if I'm not mistaken (not sure as I don't play anymore) the servers were shut down last May. I bought the game at full price a week after release. Game issues aside, only having an online game exist for a year before ceasing server operations without any form of award or refund shouldn't be allowed.

[@TryHardGamerYT]

I pirated Ultrakill because 1. I don't usually play fps games so i wanted to try it out first 2. Wanted to check if my doodoo computer could run it I absolutely loved the game so I bought it, and subsequently recommended it to all my friends, 2 of which I've confirmed have bought the game themselves. Word of mouth works!

[@Amanda-ss2ub]

There is a free demo of the game on itch

[@chromosomedcollector]

I pirated ultrakill because i dont like giving people my money

[@TXA-TXAT]

@@chromosomedcollectoryour pirated copy will ultrakill you now

[@chromosomedcollector]

@@TXA-TXAT :(

[@MidnightChilly]

​@@chromosomedcollector So basically you're stealing in that case

[@jademonass2954]

im gonna be honest, when steam decided to increase the conversion rate for R$ (reais) from "$1 for R$2" to "$1 for R$3", many games have gone on to cost absurd amounts i dont blame the indie game devs necessarily, because they probably not know about the PPP, but still! R$90 for a lot of indie games is crazy considering i paid R$15 for stardew valley (700h+ at this point, oops) not even 4 years ago R$399 for sonic frontiers (equivalent to USD$250+ in PPP) is just insane

[@vanTersec]

Money is tight...ly held in the hands a few assholes

[@shoopoop21]

We are literally in this financial situation because of covid money. Either this is all orange man's fault, or wealth inequality is a meme. You cannot have both. Stop being cringe.

[@victoralexandervinkenes9193]

True

[@nono-yw3tv]

That's not as true as you think it is. And in fact. Money exchanges hands at an exponential amount depending on the size of the business. And the "few assholes" spend money just by breathing. They have other people literally spending their money for them

[@daboss4318]

@@nono-yw3tv Yet they still have yacths, huge ass manisons, overpriced cars, they are not spenders, they are hoarders. And even if some boby kotick spends his hundreds of millions, he will not spend it on anything good. You can exchange your money, with many ways, and they are not equal

[@arthasmenethil2201]

Print more amirite?

[@andersongrillo5902]

Brazil mentioned. Yeah we're fucked out here. Buying a game is more expensive than fixing my house.

[@Spectacular_Insanity]

I don’t understand why Brazil’s tariffs are so high compared to any other country. They’re so high it hurts the locals instead of helping them like tariffs are supposed to.

[@Gabr1elSL]

​@@Spectacular_Insanity Corruption

[@dev4159]

@@Spectacular_Insanity Corruption

[@Polengue]

This is what happens when people "Do the L"

[@Gabr1elSL]

@@Polengue L is for Loser after all

[@TechflashYT]

As a 15 (only soon to be 16) year old who plays games, but is also a software developer and modder, I entirely agree with this. I get money approximately 2 times per year, typically $100 or less each time. At this point, it's just not possible to pay for games anymore. Just trying to get some hardware for modding and developing software (which I plan to get a career in) takes up pretty much all of my budget, leaving absolutely nothing for games, so piracy is indeed to only option.

[@MrTickleTrunk]

It's nice to hear a little more nuance on the topic for once.

[@dragonandavatarfan8865]

Lextorias also made a really good video on this.

[@barbos1507]

I prefer term "Corsair". Even got the letter from government to pirate unavailable products.

[@Awakened2001]

I like that.

[@635574]

In this case unavailable is really unavailable, try pirating a much smaller indie off steam when nobody cracked it. You can't.

[@barbos1507]

@@635574 Most Indies are available, unlike many triple a games, especially the Sony ones. Mofuckers even forced a refund of a Tsushima preorder, without my consent.

[@ORLY911]

great hardware company too, love their headsets lol

[@aquamarinerose5405]

Honestly. I kinda wish that "Corsair Piracy / Privateering" was actually a possibility. I'd love to be able to take PT to the government and request a permit to legally preserve and distribute copies of the program.

[@Haszry]

In my country, the minimum wage is around 300$. So just imagine how can they buy games when the average price are 70$.

[@localmegamanfan]

for my country, minimum wage is sadly 100$

[@spiralspark8523]

Its not that piracy is okay, its that piracy shouldn't need to be okay

[@vontootsmclovin]

Highly agreed man

[@farmervillager1376]

what the fuck is wrong with you?

[@JohnYourMama]

bro cooked

[@godlyvex5543]

piracy is okay though

[@farmervillager1376]

@@spiralspark8523 piracy should be ok

[@qu1253]

If buying isn't owning, then pirating isn't stealing. It really disgusts me how the games industry isn't just indifferent towards preservation - they're actively against it and go out of their way to shut down preservation efforts by the community. We're already in a situation where loads of games from the early 2000s can't be played on modern hardware because they were never updated to run properly on modern PCs, or they came bundled with some dog water DRM that renders the game unplayable without a crack (a crack that may not even exist if it's an obscure game).

[@Roxor128]

Paying, not buying. Buying is paying to own. If you don't own it, you didn't buy it.

[@gaylussac6156]

This is legally true as well. Piracy is not classified as theft but legally charged as copyright infringement because nothing was taken from the original holder, just copied code.

[@kleefirestar]

Nintendo when you emulate a 40 year old gameboy game: 😢

[@docileyoke]

It literally is stealing man, if I buy a game, I own it now, who else owns it if I don't? The Greek gods? It's stupid to get mad at all the big companies out there scamming you and then you turn around and steal from them. You stoop down to their level.

[@CatsOverdrive]

Got a slav-hacked MechWarrior3Pirate'sMoon, a Turkish "fan compedium" of Captain Claw, NoOneLivesForever2 from a Kiwi NOLF fan site, another slav-hacked standalone Kane's Wrath, Vietcong running on a custom DX9 DLL from a Romanian fan forum, and a working classic XIII, thanks to a Czech fan patch. Also, classic Battlezone 2 from an unofficial patch...created by that game's lead programmer. It's kinda awe-inspiring for me to discover that some of the old games i played still have this kind of odd, niche, fans that does so much to keep their personally beloved games alive.

[@HoldmyApplejuice]

my brother showed me ultrakill, one christamas eve, I don't celebrate Christmas as me and my family are Muslim, but I remember it was on that day, 2022, but I remember watching him stream it to me and showing me how to play, on our computer he handed down, I was an fps nut and had played games like doom, halo and quake during quarantine and I was like 'this is so much like quake!' he had a pirated copy and I loved the game so much, I brought it twice, one for me and the other for my brother, he loved it a lot. also one of the artists who make some songs for ultrakill, keygen church, literally has a piracy reference in their name, a keygen would typically help you generate a key for a pirated program and came with some pretty cool tracker music!

[@Dr._Nicolas]

"We want to expand gaming to a broad audience" *Increases the prices* "You should get use to no owning your games" *Lashes out at piracy* "We are making this for your own safety" *Add an antipiracy measure to a single player game that doesn't have multiplayer elements*

[@EdyAlbertoMSGT3]

- An antipiracy measure that gets complete and total access to your PC

[@YTDani75]

​@@EdyAlbertoMSGT3 And still gets cracked anyway but ruins performance for lower-end users

[@GregorianMG]

​@@YTDani75And then the crack is unironically better that the legit version...

[@YTDani75]

@@GregorianMG Deadass

[@nxx99]

​You're the deadass @@YTDani75

[@_GhostMiner]

*FUN FACT: Minecraft got so popular thanks to being easy to acquire for free*

[@ORLY911]

also the console editions demo was based as hell. Demos are a rare breed outside of indies

[@thecupofno]

​@@ORLY911 Especially the LEGO game demos were so much fun.

[@memesong21]

​@@ORLY911and to this day they still have a java demo

[@CommissarChaotic]

It's been a few years since I finally bought Minecraft, and many since I first played the demo and subsequently got a crack version in late 2013. It was still kind of a hassle to buy the game, but unless you were living in a more developed area back then, it was kinda hard to get the game, and for a kid that I was there was no chance really. I learned about the game because my cousin played the demo, and I followed suit.

[@ricedanan]

There's also a Tweet from Notch himself back in 2012 telling some guy to just pirate it and to buy it when the guy could afford it in the future.

[@Vibing_Wave]

mad respect for hakita the developer of ultrakill for such words

[@daveinthemicrowave]

Cool thing about actually buying ultrakill is when it is released it is planned to have steam workshop support for so you can easily play custom levels.

[@GregorianMG]

Also mods can be easily installed in that case too.

[@Johnheartbreaking]

I bought civilization 6 despite having it on epic games for free for the steam workshop integration

[@johnjackson9767]

This is a good way to provide a service that your paid customers get to enjoy.

[@cantinadudes]

The steam workshop is honestly one of the best things in modern gaming. I wish more developers would use it somehow

[@4ndr00med4]

There are services to download content from the Steam workshop directly even if you don't own the game.

[@13erzerker33]

Exactly the reason why I pirated Metal Gear Rising. Konami refuse to make it available in South East Asia and other regions for some reason. They are losing free money right there.

[@Lampoluke]

Konami pretty much hates their gaming section, they have been sabotaging it since 2010 or something. They make all their income with Yu-gi-oh and pachinko, which are easier to mantain.

[@plugshirt1762]

I live in America but it doesn't help that their version of the game on steam is so atrocious you literally can't put it in full screen

[@V1-ultrakill-u6b]

Goated game, absolutely justified to pirate it.

[@SadGhost123]

Pirate Software localizes his game, so for example it was R$19.99 in Brazil which was $3.58 USD. As a result no one in brazil pirated his game and Brazil made up 20-25% of his studios income.

[@shaicat]

Most of the time I pirate, I'm doing it to find out if I'm being sold a scam before I buy the game. It's happened far, far too many times. And not just in the indie space.

[@SparkyTM]

same

[@emi-ber]

A perfect example of players selling more than marketing is pvz GW2. the player base reached record highs years after popcap stopped updating the game. even now it has a sizable player base. It even has the EA style grind of needing hundreds of hours of gameplay to unlock characters but no one cares about it because the game is fun. companies need to learn that making the game fun to play will make the game last.

[@Nictheidoit]

I love that game

[@antonionegrea3554]

Agree, the game still gets full lobbies often both on pc and xbox from wgat ive seen myself

[@xristaka8199]

PVZ is just a big brand in general that's why it was soo successful besides being good. Now imagine if EA actually invested in PR and Marketing.

[@JeanRosa-qc3mb]

i live in Brazil, i'm not rich in any way, and games on steam are so cheap now (specially on sales) that i don't see a reason to go out of my way to pirate anything, i literally have more games and DLC's that i could possibly find time to play 20% of them. i love playing my games inside steam with multiplayer with my friends who also bought the game, my progress is saved no matter if i uninstall the game, my achievements, my profile page, my total time played on my games, my screenshot gallery, guides, badges, inventory, community hub. and i can share the majority of my games with my brother through the family feature. personaly i wouldn't pirate anymore. it just doesn't make any sense, not only because i would feel bad playing a pirated copy but also because all the features i would be missing.

[@ZirconiaGacha]

I pirated Slay the Princess, a visual novel of many genres (it's marked as psychological horror on Steam, but it's more than that) by Black Tabby Games. My dad had already bought a copy, but any time I was in the mood to play, either he was playing a different game or I didn't have access to his computer. When they made a post saying "if you can't buy it, pirate it and buy it later", I felt so much relief: I could find a safe place to download it for free on my own personal device, knowing that I had the graces of the devs to do so. While I would never pirate an indie game without the dev of that game giving some sort of go-ahead, I'm glad that indie devs are acknowledging that not everyone can afford to buy their games and are telling them to just tell others about it if they love the game.

[@ereneksi7029]

is that a real game?

[@voidartist7575]

@@ereneksi7029 yup

[@ereneksi7029]

@@voidartist7575 lol thats a pretty weird but funny name

[@questionmark.4444]

@@ereneksi7029 it's about slaying a princess surprisingly

[@jimijenkins2548]

@@ereneksi7029 Well, there is a princess to slay.

[@barvin9271]

To be honest, the anti-piracy measures only embolden and justify the piracy measures because all of the DRM that they put into play only exonerates the people who crack the games for both paid and nonpaid users alike, because who wants bloatware if they buy a game?

[@ultimatehamsandwich734]

DRM punishes people who bought the game legit more than the pirates

[@horizoner2361]

@@ultimatehamsandwich734 for real, denuvo litterally makes games run slower.

[@smithynoir9980]

Yep, anti-piracy measures only harm those that actually buy the game. Pirates' will just work on a crack or wait until one is available. More people would buy the game if not for DRM and anti-piracy measures.

[@V1-ultrakill-u6b]

Never heard of the word 'exonerate'. Thanks for the free vocabulary expansion. Plus, you're absolutely right.

[@DatBoiOrly]

4:14 One thing I hate about gaming these days is i'm paying more than the rest of the world like us Brits pay £70 for a game which is $89 i'm paying more for the same experience it's honestly infuriating that the one they do adjust for we end up paying extra it's so frustrating that I only buy games on sale

[@kitestar]

To regurgitate what lord GabeN once said: “piracy isn’t about price, it’s almost always a service problem”

[@axel3689]

His statement is irrelevant now. Piracy is now a pricing + product issue(shit games, high price)

[@kitestar]

@@axel3689 well…alright then

[@blackholeguy1529]

don't trust someone who can't be bothered to maintain his own games

[@kitestar]

@@blackholeguy1529 yeah…I guess I’ll trust in him once he finally puts out an effort to maintain his product

[@YayaFeiLong]

@@axel3689 That's still mainly a product/service issue though. I didn't see anyone complaining about Shadow of the Erdtree costing almost as much as the base game proper, since it's gigantic and very good.

[@valleyard8674]

3:02 Nah bro There are people in Brazil that have that price as basically half their salary Since the minimun is mostly between 1500 R$ and 1700 R$ So yeah "You could buy your groceries, pay your bills, store the rest of that money for situations where you'll end up needing a back up... OR, here, buy this game that is half of your monthly income What do you mean buggy or full of micro transactions? Y'all are saying some weird stuff, ngl... NOW BUY OUR SLOP, OUR PROFITS NEEEEEED IT!

[@Maquinoide-001]

Not only that but you need a console or a good computer in the first place...... even for medium class can be kind of a hustle

[@valleyard8674]

@@Maquinoide-001 exactly Not only you'll need like... Half of a lower income monthly salary to buy one of those games You'll need like, 4 months of salary to play Minecraft Or most likely a year to play some of those AAA games with at least 30fps

[@johnjackson9767]

>entertainment option too expensive as a justification for theft of labor >never change, Brazil

[@Maquinoide-001]

@@johnjackson9767 you forgot to call us monkeys

[@spankyjeffro5320]

Yes, it's called having priorities. If you have to choose between groceries or gaming, choose the fucking groceries. It's not a hard concept to grasp. Brazil needs to fix it's own economy. In fact, it needs to fix a lot of things. Gaming is at the bottom of the list. Criminals run the main prison and it's still illegal to be an Atheist. The list goes on.

[@V1-ultrakill-u6b]

Hakita is one of the best game devs and you can't convince me otherwise. He's an excellent role model, too- He had a dream for a great game (ULTRAKILL) and made it a reality. Originally, he was the sole dev working on it with only some help. Now he has a team, but he still does 60% of development, including the music. Which are AMAZING, by the way. He makes bangers constantly, and the community loves them. He's reworking how levels look in ULTRAKILL, he started making Encore levels, he makes incredible music, the list goes on. He and Eminem are my personal heroes, because both started out with basically nothing and became incredible artists, who are very skilled in their respective crafts.

[@byeetch]

Clearly we both have VERY obvious biases here lmfao but I'd argue John Carmack and his id team back in the 90s are unmatched in terms of giving to the community AND pushing the industry forward. An indie team having the most advanced tech, having the game be shareware, made the game open source and singlehandedly carrying the PC gaming industry for years is something that would be impossible today

[@marybdrake1472]

These CEOs don't even understand what a modern audience is. They're really out of touch.

[@HaveYouTriedGuillotines]

They know what their shareholders want, though, and that's what you're going to get. Welcome to capitalism.

[@xyketh0n]

Their customers are investors, and gamers are the bad guys standing between them and line going up.

[@neoqwerty]

@@xyketh0n Gamers are their bank account to withdraw funds from, more like. We're not even people to them, just the things that swipe and authorize credit cards.

[@tumultoustortellini]

@@HaveYouTriedGuillotines fitting name. "Capitalism is bad lol" isn't a criticism, or even a statement worth anything. If you can point out the problems with the current system, then creating solutions shouldn't follow far behind. But because you blame capitalism as a whole, you remove your own agency, and create meaningless doomerisms instead of policy. Shareholders as a problem, exist because of the fact that their control over companies is legally binding, meaning that they essentially hold more power over a company than any person within that company. A simple fix, give workers and people within the company iteslf the ability to sue stockholders for their short-term decision making under the idea that, "their control and short term decision making is internally destructive to our corporation". They could do it, they just don't think of it as an option, or think they'd die if they did, which may be true, but if these companies are shedding hundreds of millions each year anyways, then this is a solution they could potentially take. Look into how much policy you can create by saying, "how can we fix it" instead of ending the conversation at, "here's the problem".

[@johnjackson9767]

Anti-Capitalists stealing labor from independent devs is peak champagne socialist liberalism.

[@spicytortilla2308]

I have a communications class which the teacher gave us free reign for what we can give a presentation on, and your video actually got me inspired to do my speech about video game piracy. Now to be fair I'm trying my hardest not rip off your video for my speech as I am looking for sources on various sites that would back up my claims, but your video gave me a really good outline on what I can use to back up my overall thesis which is: "Piracy is a Service Problem" I get that that is a direct quote, that's why I'm also looking for who exactly says it, but your video gave me multiple points I could focus on during my speech. Thanks for an awesome video!

[@johnjackson9767]

The irony of not wanting to rip off his speech for your own is too much.

[@spicytortilla2308]

@@johnjackson9767 Well, I'm not, like I said. I'm actively finding my own sources for things; I'm just using this video as a sort of guiding post as to what I can talk about.

[@skeletonmob318]

Gabe Newell is the source of that quote... That, or I done lost me brain. (Edit: accidentally typed Gabe as Gaben... My bad.

[@Emarella]

@@skeletonmob318 He will always be Gaben to us, we understand.

[@Salador64]

"Culture shouldn't exist for those who can afford it" ✍🔥

[@raze2012_]

we live in a land with a lot of shoulds. Sadly people like that can't just change the laws that be

[@tuba3000]

He politely called him a broke boy

[@BARDI77]

as a broke boy I cannot be offended by the true

[@RealDanishShuffle]

I mean sheet, i would rather take that, than the ''dOnT yOu gUyS hAvE pHonEs? ?'' approach

[@ovencake523]

even better - it's an insult if he isn't a broke boy, and an affirmation if he is

[@Karthik-pn2yj]

I or my family isn't broke bit the issue is. I would need my parents to buy games but they don't trust steam or whatever else nor want to buy games in these cases one can't play video games without pirating them

[@Malphorus]

@@RealDanishShuffle What you guys don't have money?

[@NoBeats_]

That dev is based af.

[@squiddu]

play ultrakill, my beloved hakita

[@alejandromarte9852]

Hakita, having made the crackhead game where blood is fuel, is also somehow - An amazing composer/music artist - A recovering nihilist, providing him with better insight than 80% of people without being depressed - A poet/writer And on top of all that, we can find it completely in character of him to just put Japanese dating sims and just… Crash Bandicoot into the game. I don’t think we could’ve gotten a better dev.

[@johnjackson9767]

Good to know I can just grab all his stuff for free

[@Yesnt15]

Combine it with new blood and we get perfection.​@@alejandromarte9852

[@yaboikindabored9831]

​@@johnjackson9767 Good, now you should play ULTRAKILL, NOW ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

[@TheRoCkHaRdOrDiE]

im not sure if they still do but i remember when i had nintendo switch online with its "classic game collection" but the only way you could access it was being constantly connected to the internet... on a portable device. ive had ppl argue with me before saying they dont do that anymore but ill never know because im never getting switch online again. all of the games in the classic collection were games i played back when i didnt have internet. i just imagine what it would be like if my game boy color asked me to connect to the internet every time i wanted to play pokemon red, i wouldve never gotten a game boy color if that was the case

[@Totallykermit1]

Best part about that Hakita wasn't angry he wasn't upset he understood the Ultrakill devs are one kind group and I personally respect them for that, God bless.

[@Nanashi-YT1]

Hakita is Based

[@Thee_Phantom]

Unfathomably so

[@doubletaptap]

Ridiculously based. He even announces updates with shitposts. I’m not joking, check his channel

[@daboss4318]

He never fails to deliver and exceed the expectations. Ive never seen a dev who can do that consistently, only ocassionaly or mostly (larian)

[@Futo_no_mononobe]

Very breadable too

[@Nanashi-YT1]

@@Futo_no_mononobe WTF

[@iEscapedVim]

I earn a $125 in a month.. . I'm not buying games, because I'll have to give up food if I do...

[@Dcyaboi33]

Yo it's been a few months. Are you still holding tight? Just wanted to check in 🫤

[@ekcman]

I bought every game I played as soon as I received my first paycheck. But frankly, I wouldn't be a gamer if it wasn't because of the easy-access version in my early life.

[@ali4games10]

Mate, in some countries pirating games is actually punished by jail time

[@qu1253]

My brother-in-law first played Call of Duty 4 on a pirated copy on the PC. Later on, he bought a legit copy on the Xbox 360 so he could play with his friends. Game companies view piracy as pirated copy = lost sale, but I've seen tons of anecdotes of people who played a game through a pirated copy and liked it so much they bought it legit just to support the developers.

[@whysoserious4274]

@@qu1253this is why demos need to come back. This is what they were meant for

[@guska5523]

@@whysoserious4274 exactly why I will play an... uhhh... evaluation copy... of pretty much any $30+ game these days. Although it does seem like indy devs are starting to put out demos again, which is really nice. (Even if it does then bring in waves of people crying about limited time, and locked tech trees etc)

[@NuniaBiznaz]

@@ali4games10 Which is absolutely fucking ridiculous and should not be the case...And is also not as easy to enforce as you might believe.

[@kekson1a]

0:12 - But Hakita isn't the solo developer of ULTRAKILL...

[@Stonecold300]

He was when he started on the project, but he has gathered a team over the years

[@reinbew62]

He still does a lot of the work. But yeah, the credits museum shows the amount of people who worked on this project.

[@Beefybeef5]

But he is a developer

[@Ph0b1calz]

yeah he has a team now but he still has done about 60% of the entire game

[@rhymontic]

The price of one game ($60) is enough to feed me for a month.

[@londonrials]

Are you in the United States if so what do you eat brother? For two people, we spend about $300 a month, personally, I literally eat once a day.

[@rhymontic]

​@@londonrials I'm from Kenya, and I typically eat once a day. I spend Ksh 6,300 per month on food, which breaks down to Ksh 210 per day. This amount covers a large meal, usually a bowl of beans, peppers, kales, and six chapatis (a type of flatbread-feel free to look it up, it's my favorite and I don't mind eating it daily). I sometimes mix up the cereals by choosing peas, beans, or green grams instead. That works out to about $49 a month, or roughly $1.63 per day. I'm not much of a foodie and don’t crave things like pizza, chicken, or meat. Occasionally, I buy spirulina, which costs around $5 for 100 grams, and mix it into my food. So in total, my monthly food expenses come to $54 ($49 for meals and $5 for spirulina).

[@rhymontic]

also note: I don't mix the whole 100g spirulina in food, just half a tablespoon in my bowl. I like the taste it brings to food and I read somewhere it has good nutrients which help supplement my monotonous meal.

[@Ponial]

I bought doom eternal back in day. Haven't played it. Power outages and then intrnet outages began in Ukraine. Instaled Doom, internet out, time to finaly play the game I bought, what I see? I gigantic - "FUCK YOU", internet connection required. Hi-fi rush - same Mad max - same Star Craft remaster - SAME Fuck sake, why should I even bother buying games now if all I see is this Fuck you? Now I have to sail the high seas. Reality is no, back to early 2000 for me, when there were NO licensed copies.

[@arkgaharandan5881]

i bought gta v for the singleplayer, when my internet was down i said "whatever i will play the singleplayer until its back up" I couldnt because i wasnt connected to the internet. I would be able to play it singleplayer if i pirate it.

[@Ghalion666]

Isn't it amazing how the climate activists seem to have no concern about the monumental waste of energy it is to make everyone be online all the darn time for these things, but god forbid us little people get plastic bags from grocery stores even though everyone re-used them as garbage bags anyway?

[@neoqwerty]

@@Ghalion666 let's be fair, they're still barely catching on to the fact crypto burns small countries' worth of energy to operate, you think they're thinking about all the other stupid shit like "AI" wastes of time like LLMs and image generators and voice mimicry and deepfake BS and smart appliances (why tf are people's fridges and LIGHT SWITCHES online, anyway?) and online DRM are also burning energy? The only people who actually are aware of this are tech-savvy climate activists who weren't born to think this kind of overconsumption is OK and normal and everywhere, you're demanding why the tiniest of niches isn't louder than it already is, basically.

[@uis246]

After fucking Putin we have to fuck DMCA.

[@plugshirt1762]

@@Ghalion666 I mean most competent climate activists realize that on an individual level you make practically no impact compared to the government and corporations and that they spread that message themselves to lessen the blame on them. Though its definitely true to say more people are those gullible idiots who fell for it hook line and sinker and act like someone using a piece of plastic is singlehandedly ruining the climate not to mention those clowns who keep destroying art and monuments

[@4nowknU]

Funny thing about Helldivers 2 is that the countries that have it blocked you can just buy a key from a 3rd party store, although you can't review it you can still play it with no issues.

[@dillonrameraz7082]

And what if that key is unavailable or cost more than the marketing price?

[@4nowknU]

@@dillonrameraz7082 well then there's nothing you can do to my knowledge, in my case it was even cheaper than it would've been on steam

[@shadowyyCFH]

People hate on helldivers 2 for that when they should hate on Sony rather than arrowhead’s project

[@raze2012_]

@@dillonrameraz7082 then you buy it or don't? Like any other prodct.

[@H.E.C.U_BR]

In Brazil, the price for games ranges from 60 reais and upwards. Here things are quite expensive, even indie games.

[@MrOssyan]

Sad fact that some measures against piracy are the ones that push ppl into piracy , like drm denouvo or the always online single player stuff .

[@uppishcub1617]

Steam dropping support for XP is what got me to stop buying games. One day, my whole library which I had bought and paid for, was no longer playable on machine. Now I just download 20 year old isos to play my games, andthose will work forever.

[@logan_wolf]

@@uppishcub1617 Lost my internet one day and wanted to play games still, tried to set Steam to Offline mode, but it wouldn't let me, saying I needed internet access in order to do so, which begs the question: what's the point? 😑 All DRM is bad, even the socially acceptable DRM known as Steam.

[@twist3d537]

@@uppishcub1617 brother xp is 20 years old

[@uppishcub1617]

@@twist3d537 so are all my games

[@lesslighter]

@@twist3d537 does it matter when people still run DOS machines to this day?

[@victoriacecilia3926]

also, good to know: R$700 (in brazil) is more than half of the mininum wage. The average AAA game here costs R$250 - R$300, which is fucking expensive too. That's why piracy is so big here

[@MadelynnTurner-nx8vt]

The thing with online-only games is that it is harder to save them or archive them for future when maybe possibly that game would no longer be accessible

[@RespiroOfficial]

As a pirate who's sailed the Dark Seas of the internet for the longest time, one rule I have is to NEVER pirate indie games, and NEVER pirate recent games (my PC cannot handle them lol)

[@krisztiannemeth6875]

I sometimes pirate games to try them out. There is a refund policy sure, but transactions cost money.

[@RespiroOfficial]

@@krisztiannemeth6875 just play the demo lol.

[@namenotfound2456]

As the Dev of Ultrakill said "if you do not have the money to spare, you can help via word of mouth". I think you see piracy more like a "fuck you" to a company, than an alternative way to circumvent bogus prices or endless hoops and accounts.

[@RespiroOfficial]

@@namenotfound2456 Piracy is indeed a great way to say "fuck you" to the company. But, picture this: it's easy to visualise them as cabal of greedy executives ready to milk as much cash from you as possible. Can you pirate a game, however, and face the reality of seeing countless programmers, musician, marketing employees, sound designers, and other such guys and gals who work around the clock in order to meet an impossible deadline fired due to "lower than expected" sales figures, indirectly caused by piracy? It's better to not buy THAT game, and instead invest in something from the company that you DO like. Or, just play indies.

[@FJSAGS]

I do pirate indie games, if I am unsure if I'll enjoy it

[@x149te]

I can't buy most games in Russia anymore. But I like games.

[@spriteman1925]

You could buy steam keys online tho

[@UnclePeccos]

@@spriteman1925 you can, but it will be 50+% increased price. Since 2022 you cannot use Russian credit card to buy online anything outside of Russia. There are workarounds, there are people who resell keys within Russia too, but as I mentioned, 50+% and more overpriced.

[@defaulted9485]

@@spriteman1925 Not yet, still be highly careful of online vendors that are not Lord GabeN, Humble Bundle, or GOG. We want to buy it, but not at another G2A stolen Credit Card and Chargeback Extortion incident.

[@Сталкер-ь2х]

​@@spriteman1925grey market it is its both legaly questionable (you really think money paid for those keys will ever get to devs?) and its just more expensive than buying directly from steam

[@spriteman1925]

@@Сталкер-ь2х bro the main point of buying keys is to make it cheaper do research before commenting

[@poob_ian4448]

I honestly never pirate indie games because unlike AAA companies they need the support the most because they're just a small team unlike industry giants

[@thegameranch5935]

I pirate indie games and then buy them if I enjoy it

[@LonderwOo0]

i think ive heard Geometry Dash's dev(RobTop) say that its fine if you pirate the game,but IF you can,then buy it on steam or the app store ive had probably over 200-300 hours on GD and as soon as i could,i bought it on steam for 2 dollars to support him and because i felt guilty for owning it for free (also it was 2 dollars on a discount,wtf Rob why even have a discount for an already underpriced game) also this was around the time update 2.2 released so i also thought Rob deserves the reward of me legally purchasing the game (and since he is now consistently updating the game) and im buying ULTRAKILL soon to support Hakita cause he deserves it gotta love indie developers💯💯💯

[@johnjackson9767]

Wow. You're amazing.

[@localmegamanfan]

i had the game pirated and then bought it, he deserves the money

[@that_guy1211]

i am brazilian, and i just gotta say, any and all games are expensive af ,., i used to pirate all of them, until i managed to buy minecraft. now i pirate less cause like, viruses and stuff, but i still pirate stuff inside of VMs ain't no way i'm paying 100 dollars in BRL (which is 548 bucks) on WINDOWS of all things!

[@tacticalmattress]

Or VPN?

[@that_guy1211]

@@tacticalmattress what?

[@TheOofaloofa]

ULTRAKILL is one of the few games on Steam that I haven’t bought on sale or have “found” it elsewhere. It’s genuinely such an amazing masterpiece that MUST be played. I also bought the soundtracks to Infinite Hyperdeath and Imperfect Hatred on Hakita’s Bandcamp. It’s genuinely so, so good…

[@EmeraldFatalis]

I'll pirate a AAA title any day and support the small indie game every chance I get. Just purchased Slay the Princess and love it!

[@purplefanta7142]

Speaking of your point on high speed internet. I was remoting into some computers to set up in the Philippines today, their power actually went out and I have to wait until Monday to finish my job now. Not everyone has it as good as we do.

[@WhatWeHaveThere]

The ironic thing is that i live in Russia, and most of games are blocked. Why i should do 1000 steps to buy an game and even overpay for it. For me it's just better to pirate it, cuz i don't want to support who blocks game in my country because of the war.

[@suenisilva4921]

as a Brazilian, my favourite hobby has seriously become impossible to actually legally do.

[@nxx99]

Even us americans are starting to lash out on companies such as Ubisoft and EA. Fuck you, CEOs.

[@mogaming163]

Dope dev but not a solo dev, their is a whole museum ingame for credits

[@aaz.2007]

started as one

[@NamelessDjinn]

@@aaz.2007 started as none

[@raze2012_]

@@NamelessDjinn started as sperm in their dad.

[@JamesRichardsPlays]

I am glad you brought up Nintendo over this. I was a kid and bought their games with my hard earned allowance. I then bought them again on the "eshops" just to have the eshops shut down and lost those purchases. Then they expect me to buy them again with their "minis" and they don't even have half the games I want again. I am 42 and I still want to play old games. at this point, piracy has become the only way I can keep my purchases. I buy the game then make sure I have a copy saved somewhere. I am tired of paying for things to have them taken away form me without a hint of discount on future purchases or refunds from the loss.

[@Dresdenstl]

The worst risk of pirating games is a great indie dev's game not selling and they can't make anymore games. Obvious, but it's worth mentioning.

[@VJArt_]

This isn't exactly true. There are multiple reasons for this. No.1 If the person wanted to pirate, that means they didn't wanna pay to begin with. Nothing was lost if there was no gain to begin with. No.2 I have known others and even myself who pirated games, only to buy them after some time due to us enjoying. So not only is piracy not losing any money, it is generating extra money, because you get sales from people who initially didn't wanna spend the money on it

[@RiskOfBaer]

A pirated game =/= a lost sale, stop buying into that propaganda. A vast majority of people who pirate for money reasons don't do it to save money, they pirate because they CANNOT AFFORD IT in the first place.

[@neoqwerty]

@@VJArt_ AFAIK most "get me my bottle o'rum" people actually treat pirating games as a demo. Most oldschool shareware era devs understood that and most devs who grew up with shareware and demo discs ALSO know that. There's even some devs who put out their own games up as torrents for free extra publicity instead of as bait for lawsuits, they just add a "if you liked it you can support us by buying the game!" extra message for pirates. And even game devs who aren't as pro-piracy, like the Spyro the Dragon PS1 devs, admit that there's a relatively small window for piracy to actually cause sales damage and it's the first two months of release. That's why antipiracy used to be about forcefully turning a cracked version into a demo or making the experience turn increasingly unpleasant or unplayable.

[@VJArt_]

@@neoqwerty yep, exatcly

[@johnjackson9767]

​@@VJArt_Everyone should just pirate because the "word of mouth marketing" is such a vital component of commercial success.

[@vivekkparashar]

Yup ,the 130 dollars edition is around 10k rupees Indian... That's a month of groceries for a family of three , and the cost a middle range 5g android smart phone from Motorola. Tbh i have almost always bought ubisoft games on heavy discounts but even after that , their games are gonna be costly af

[@amanjanko3950]

4 in many places

[@vivekkparashar]

@@amanjanko3950 Keep in mind i was talking about ultimate edition which is 130 dollars

[@vivekkparashar]

@@amanjanko3950 I was talking about ultimate edition, which is 9100 Rupees

[@dougman1067]

why is everything so dirt cheap in third world countries

[@flop69419]

@@dougman1067 cus usd has a higher value than currency from third world countries

[@Sairiui]

Companies: The industry is shrinking and we're not making enough money to keep making games! Gamers: Then do this thing we've been asking you to do for years and would pay for. Companies: Ew no. Why would we do that?

[@darkmtbg]

I would as a person in a developed country be okay with $70 AAA tiltles if the following things were true, No macrotrasactions/microtransactions, Offline mode without no extra authorization, better treatment of the ones that actually make the games and assets, Distribution on the main platforms on PC (if you go any type of exclusive to a platform it got to be your own IP not a timed one), Like Fortnite is Exclusive on Epic and TF2 is exclusive on Steam. No refresh version of the game every so often with the same price, for the example Fifa (current year) But i highly doubt that companies are willing to do that once they are a publicly traded companies, the people who are swimming in money will keep swimming in money while the rest are gonna do what is effectively slave work.

[@darkmtbg]

I do not remember last time i bought a AAA title for its full price either. I'm okay with buying a game for its full price if its an indie.

[@DakumunDahBat]

@@darkmtbg To be fair, Monster Hunter games are triple a, and they're still on a price cut of 29.99 for the full game and dlc for Monster Hunter Rise and Monster Hunter World. They have mtx shops, but is purely cosmetics. The rest of the updates the games get are free title updates that added new monsters, quests, and other fun goodies. They're great triple a games that are currently priced like some indies, and have a shit ton of awesome, engaging content. Or, well, at the very least, I love Monster Hunter. (even before the price cut in anticipation of wilds, Rise and it's dlc would constantly go on sale for 40 bucks...and that was for the deluxe version that came with a ton of free cosmetics.) And now some of that is just...in the game for free.

[@sicklysweetdenouement]

@@DakumunDahBat This isnt just a Monster Hunter thing, I've found that Capcom has a very good habit of respecting both it's IPs and it's fans. Usually, they've been really good about it all.

[@DakumunDahBat]

@@sicklysweetdenouement Yeah, fair

[@bubbleman2002]

You're not the customer, the shareholders are, you just eat the slop.

[@jordick8427]

I'd love to play Battle for Middle-Earth 1 & 2, but the only way to play them is by pirating them. Same goes for the original Warcraft 3. With the release of WC3 Refunded...I mean Reforged, Blizzard removed the OG game and now you have to download the Refunded version whether you like it or not. You can just use the 'classic' textures on it if you want, but every WC3 veteran knows that it's not the same thing anymore.

[@shoopoop21]

Hands that don't have the muscle memory for control groups typed this post.

[@lukasz88888888]

Also new Polish translation for WC3 is inferior to old and classic. Somehow they decided to translate EVERY character name in most literal way. It sound terrible!

[@cav89-]

I still have the CD’s from back then, both for RoC and TFT, manuals and everything. I’m not a vintage media collector in any way shape or form: I just managed to keep them relatively safe in a known spot, throughout life, so far. 😅 Last time I installed them was about 6 ou 7 years ago.

[@greyed]

9:00 - Another place where publishers are shooting themselves in the foot. Not enabling anti-cheat for Linux. With the Steam Deck and the Linux market being millions of players.

[@homegrowngamer3411]

4:34 Regional pricing isn't a thing unless it allows people to INCRESE. their pricing. Take a look at the people who made ratropolis, They didn't touch their prices except to release a mobile game they could charge per charecters on Untill they randomly made an announcement saying "hey guys, just saw that regional pricing lets us charge more in America, and say that it's fair, sooo. Now we're charging more! Isn't that cool?!" But when it comes to changing the pricing so their product is.. oh, I dunno. Cheaper? Nope, never, Only more. Only ever more. A lot more.

[@homegrowngamer3411]

@throwthrow-c7e entirely, it's wholly rediculous. Especially when you see that the price of games in America has increased 10 dollars for more or less all tripple a devs.. What I will say, is it's mostly the tripple a devs who are loosing vast amounts of buisness. Indie devs are making massive bank, and charging a fraction of the cost... weird that, almost as if maaaaybe giving access to your game to a large majority of people, with particularly consistant sales, is more important than being in catagory of games that people who aren't rich get approximately one or two of during a few month piriod. Like, just from an objective standpoint. I'm not buying a 60 or 70 dollar game, unless it REALLY impresses me, but a 10 dollar game? 15? Or occasionally 5 dollar game? Easily, buy em like popcorn. And those games get immensely popular and beloved, cause they find their fanbases really quickly, since anyone who is remotely interested can play it, and not spend a lot to do it, and become loyal customers of those devs. Then you got the other people, tripple a devs, who seem much more interested in squeezing every penny they can get per sale, with no regard for the health of their following, fanbase, future products, future buisness, or anything else. From an objective standpoint, they have the buisness skills of a fricken potato. "Ah, regional price increse! Charge more! " Numptys.

[@raze2012_]

That's just how it is. Because if you make it cheap enought, people will just VPN and buy it in that currency. It's a huge issue and balance to keep. But until then, they generally price it in a way to maek sure the most popular countries can't use this exploit.

[@MareSerenitis]

If someone makes a single-player game that I want to play, that I can just buy, keep a copy and play - I will buy it. If they also make it always online, and/or stack a mountain of DLC on it, don't offer a download/archive package, ask for too high a price, require running a client or other middleman software or lock/restrict it any way, I will pirate. Because fuck all that nonsense.

[@logan_wolf]

Based.

[@denisvarga2794]

i live in russia, country that is like... second or first place in amount of people pirating games in the world, China maybe first place... and i was ALWAYS for buying games, EVERY SINGLE person who i knew were laughing at me. There was actually no reason to pirate games ever, because russia was the country with the cheapest games (full tripple a game was 10 dollars, and even when prices went up, it became 25 dollars) And ever since.... 2010 i think or 2009, when i could afford games i always buy them. But now, gaming companies decided that gamers like me, who just chilling and playing games, responsible for stuff that happening in the world right now because of russia, and blocked every single payment method for russians, and region lock games on steam (about 70% of games on steam is blocked if you have russian steam now). Obviously not being able to buy Slime Rancher or Persona on steam, is strategically important for protecting the world from evil russians... So yea that was the point when i was "yea they dont want my money", and even if they EVER decide to go back and allow russians to buy games, i wont. There is ways to even get denuvo games here in russia without laying out 70 dollars. Obviously im not pirating everything, i found ways to buy games, but if before, i tried to buy everything i wanna play, now its ether PS5 exclusives, or VERY good games that are like.... Masterpieces.

[@MartyrPandaGaming]

The only games I pirate anymore are Indie titles that do not have a demo available, to see if I want to buy it. I don't bother with the AAA games anymore, because they aren't making anything that's even worth pirating, even just as a demo.

[@L1vv4n]

There are some games I would buy as soon as they remove useless launchers, online and denuvos from them. Anno 1800, RDR2, Hitman trilogy, etc. But, until (if ever) they are available, I have a lot of other games to play. Also, it too returned to 'demoing' games for myself, because I end up buying more indie games this way.

[@PomuLeafEveryday]

Is the Steam refund window not good enough for you?

[@MartyrPandaGaming]

@@PomuLeafEveryday No. It isn't. It isn't a Demo of a game. That anyone thinks that is a suitable substitute for a Demo is eye opening and astonishing.

[@RichardPhillips1066]

​@@PomuLeafEverydayI was told the other day by steam I had done a lot refunds and I wasn't supposed to use it to try games , but haven't really done that many maybe 5 , so it's no use to demo games

[@johnjackson9767]

​@@MartyrPandaGamingObviously you need to play the full game to determine if you want to buy it first.

[@Darlf_Sevil]

warframe: we treat everyone equally, no matter if you have fast or slow internet, our system will make sure that everyone downloads updates the same way... slowly by checking every 5 nano seconds to see if there is anything updated in the files, and more often if you have better internet.

[@anthonywuellner969]

@@qu1253 prime warframes aren't required to reach endgame, mods are.

[@qu1253]

@@anthonywuellner969 You can just buy those, too.

[@arxfang3274]

​​@@anthonywuellner969 And those you aren't buying for real money, but farm in-game (quite easy too)

[@whysoserious4274]

@@anthonywuellner969idk what group of people started saying that Cuz I can easily boss the game with regular warframes lol. primes are mostly for fashion And helminth system is a choice not a mandatory thing in warframe. The only place where it matters is when we talk about prime weapons cuz the stats are significantly better/different than their normal counterpart. A good example of this is pyrana/pyrana prime

[@Lord_Maraptor]

@@whysoserious4274 yup, mostly for fashion and depending on what warframes, are easier to grind than the original warframe.

[@goliath0967]

This video should honestly be made viral. I feel the good that can be done if gaming companies were to listen would be insurmountable. As we move into newer and newer generations of kids and people, more and more games are going to be wanted to play, whether thats a new game or an older game that isnt on hand to just buy anymore. Its only going to get bigger. If these big gaming companies want to just sit and listen to their consumers they'd fix problems for everyone involved. Companies get more games actually sold, and the consumers get to play more games without having to resort to pirating. I wish the big heads at any game company could sit and watch this, maybe then theyd realize what the real problem is and the bigger picture of it all. If it keeps going like this gaming may die in some places, thats not something anyone wants to see. I loved your video man, im glad you could get the words out that other people couldn't. Keep up the amazing work.

[@snakebird9048]

Demo ultrakill background footage is crazy

[@shmerg8369]

ive never pirated a game however i do agree at this point they are close to making games cost 100, everyone might as well pirate when that happens as paying 100 for just a game let alone 60 or 70 is insane. i hope companies such as Ubisoft grow a brain and realize how much they loss by not doing the smart thing. its kinda sad to see big companies be dumber than every other person as you would think it takes smart people to be successful in the first place. of course they were but now they are just greed in a nutshell.

[@shoopoop21]

Mario 64 in todays money would cost well over 100$, and that is the system that zoomies and fakers pretend to opine for. There is obviously more to it than that, but I can tell when someone is just blowing air out. _ive never pirated a game_ Then you never will, and all of that bloviating is just for your own amusement, and self-aggrandizement. You _want_ to be the power user who is not taken advantage of, but you never will be. You will always cough up the dough first, and be one of many suckers fueling the system, even while espousing a lack of faith in the system. Maybe if users _actually_ moved to empower themselves, and didn't constantly worry about other people's approval, we'd be in a better place, but that's neither here, nor there.

[@arkgaharandan5881]

have you tried replaying any ubisoft games since far cry 3 that they made every game the same? They dont have any replay value, just play old games instead, id rather play morrowind than any modern open world game.

[@latt.qcd9221]

NES games in the 1990's cost around $50 in 1990's money. Adjusting for inflation, they would be around $120, today.

[@BotFisherman]

Unfortunately, most of these companies already have a brain and it's sole purpose is making sure they meet the demands of shareholders while also ticking off every box that they think applies to what they think is the modern audience. What the game company ceo/directors need is a heart, passion for the projects they're creating with their team. They think they can just hit some arbitrary out-of-touch requirements they think connects with their playerbase or expand to a wider audience and they'll suddenly have a money printer

[@spankyjeffro5320]

Games are not expensive. You are cheap. That's a you problem.

[@Justgooning]

3:00. Brazilian here, I have moved out of Brazil a few years ago but just now realised how much games costed and how I only could get them from resellers and the small games that no one knew about ( play knack 2 it’s goated)

[@a1goldenrunner]

Digital Devil Saga is one of my favorite rpgs of all time and even though I don't have my ps3 to play my digital copies anymore, i will do whatever I have to so i can continue to play it. I will even pre order a remaster if one is ever made Until then, im not going to just forget about its existence because its not easily available

[@chrisgundry5480]

I actually think the Ultrakill developer is misinterpreting the pirate’s tweet. The tone of the tweet to me implies that the pirate could absolutely afford the game, but won’t because he can just get it anyways for free.

[@Zks.s]

It really isn't that, since some posts later he said he bought it

[@locurset]

Context is the person said in the comments that they were joking around, and that they were transferring their bought version to their school computer.

[@chrisgundry5480]

Did the original poster clarify before or after the dev responded

[@kaliicappy]

@@chrisgundry5480 way way way before man, i said it like at MOST 3 hours after i posted it, ive had it bought for over a year and ive put many many hours into it

[@raze2012_]

@@chrisgundry5480 after

[@InfernalNull]

"why gamers have turned to piracy" my absolute lack of money:

[@maciej2c]

The only time i buy aaa game is when it is 85 / 90% discount on steam, and i treat is as an cloud storage fee and fast download service fee

[@Sheoji]

As a diehard pirate I bought 4 copies of the game I loved. I would not have done that if I hadn't played it first, because it was badly presented. Just food for thought.

[@johnjackson9767]

​@peefromtmvUltraKill has a generous demo, and it's still pirated. Maybe pirates should just own up to wanting free stuff and stop lying about it.

[@paisleepunk]

@@johnjackson9767i wonder what constitutes a "generous demo" in this case

[@johnjackson9767]

@@paisleepunk I figured someone would be pedantic enough to split hairs. How about this - Songs of Syx, developed by a single guy, has a demo that's the FULL GAME but only three updates behind the paid version. The game is still pirated.

[@Viisuri]

@@johnjackson9767 sometimes people are just low on money and buy the game when they are able to actually afford it. or maybe they just don't like the game and plan on never playing it again, so they feel no obligation to purchase it. there will always be a subset of people who just pirate and nothing else, but the vast majority tend to buy if they actually feel like it is a game worth buying

[@SyRose901]

​​@@johnjackson9767Yeah, I usually just want free stuff, at least at first. Demos are extremely rare, sadly, so I naturally think to pirate a game to try it out if I find it on KZbin or something and nobody tells me that it has a good demo. What is a legitimate reason to pirate a game even if it has a good demo? Distributing to someone with extremely limited internet. My friend's internet used to be too bad to download huge games, and we were too far away from each other to meet often, so we exchanged hard drives with pirated video games in it through couriers. I mean, he never needed online multiplayer stuff, since his internet was only sufficient for texting for a good while. Or, it could be just that the pirated version of the game is plain better. There are instances where one would buy a game, and then pirate it anyways to get the better experience. Maybe some kind of shitty DRM that the pirates remove. Maybe it's about easily installing modded versions of games(Romhacks in particular. A lot of cool shit, pain to install unless someone lets you pirate a pre-installed version, maybe.).

[@MatadoresXD]

Thaks for usin Brazil as a example, here a 5 dollar game is almost R$30. We want to support indie devs, but the majority of us are too poor (I used 30% of my salary to buy Tekken 8 fuck AAA without regional pricing)

[@magnuserror9305]

I pirated a lot as a kid because I couldn't afford games. But I do believe once you get a job and can afford games, you should spend the money. Especially for indie games. Nowadays I still pirate games. But its always triple A games and its a as a test. If I like the game I buy it afterwards.