Is there still no solution to PC game piracy?

[Flucky]

I know nothing about the ins and outs of games but is there no way of destroying the experience of a pirated game? I can't remember what game it was but (I think it was Monkey)
posted a video of how a game spawned this huge indestructible scorpion if it was pirated - couldn't they just completely block the game if it was pirated if they are able to spawn
giant scorpions?

If there was more money to be made in PC games then companies would strive to experiment with graphics and ideas. As they only focus on consoles nowadays the evolution of graphics
is going to be severely stunted. There's never going to be another Crysis is there? Where the boundaries were pushed so hard it still looks gorgeous half a decade later...

 

[DeadEyeDuk]

I think what you remember is the giant indestructible scorpion that Serious Sam 3 spawned IF someone was cheating...which hunted them repeatedly, never sleeping, never stopping

That said I am sure someone posted in that thread that REAL cheaters/hackers got around that in double quick time.

I for one am with you though Fluck, and abhor game/film/music piracy. Mainly for the illegality of it, but quite a large part because of smug bleeps that do it and boast about it as if they are proply nails

 

[sted]

I don't think there's a solid solution, no. Effective measures are often taken to prevent it and often people find some way around it.

PSP games, how they were made is rather effective in stopping this, I'm not sure, but I've never heard of a pirated version of any game on this.

Blu-ray was another good effective step to prevent film piracy, though I'd imagine there are some ways around this one.

It's like with consoles, every time a new one comes out, the nerds of hacking/modifying technology often find ways of chipping consoles to recognise and allow the use of illegal copies. Each generation of consoles gets more complex to be chipped, of course, but it never outright stops it, not up to this gen atleast. take PS3 for example, the first form of chip to be utilised to allow illegal copies eventually broke the playstation and effectively voided the warranty, some people I hear were silly enough to risk that and shame on them, they cost themselves more by trying to make buying games cheaper and effectively doubling the cost of the console by having to replace it with a whole new one, if they were that bad in the long run.

Eventually, going by just rumours And hearsay, mind, they apparently found a way to chip PS3's without damaging the system at all, even in the future, this didn't stop the warranty from being voided though, as no one outside of the manufacturer should be opening the console up and messing with anything in side it, including the removable HDD, which is the case with just about any device to some level.

But there's another rumour too. Stating that a way has been found to externally trick the system to run false copies of games by attaching an external device, a USB drive or something similar, possibly. This however would not void the warranty as the company would have no indication of tampering due to the method used.

With newer games as I'm sure you know, on the PC have something on the disk that is read to confirm it is an authentic copy from an actual retailer and by simply copying the disk onto another, this stamp of authenticity is not simply transferred in the process. I don't doubt there are ways around this, but I've not heard of any instances where people can get around it to this point. So as I see it, there is no way to guarantee that people will ever not be able to commit piracy ever but only ways to prevent it and as technology goes up in the world, so does the complexity of getting around preventions in making illegal copies, of course. The best course of action would simply make different ways of preventing illegal copying and make it harder in the process for them to recognise ways to get around the whole thing by using different methods that already attempt this, such as the authentification of Ames on the PC.

If it is something they're not used to seeing and finding a way around it, they effectively take longer to get around it and possibly by that time a new prevention is created and then they have to go through the trouble of it all again, with the possibility of giving up because I wouldn't find all that work worth my time to make a little bit of money as opposed to what genuine individual copies make.

When I was young, not even in my adolescence stage even, I never understood why things like this mattered, but now I see how badly it affects a lot of things. Not to mention that PC games have been sorely lacking in variety for a long time, due to the amount of people that take on console gaming, despite a computers many superior qualities and so the console gets a lot more love than PC games at the moment, being left in the dark so to speak.

I'm considering getting someone to take away my access of PCS a while until I can resolve my major problem of long posts. :/

 

[Bsrz]

my concept for stoping pc game piracy is quite simple, It wont work for all types of games but I would release the game to the general public for free, and then add an in game shop or a pay yearly subscription, of the price of the normal game in game, thus there is nothing to pirate since the game is free, and the developers still make money from the in game shops,subscription.

 

[Wozza63]

I rarely pirate, but if you dont want people to pirate your content, release some decent content, I ain't paying for something thats crap.

Also most people who pirate stuff wouldn't pay for it anyway, the things I have pirated, I would have just gone without, and I've spoken to a few people who have said the same thing

 

[rosgor]

I don't think there's a solid solution, no. Effective measures are often taken to prevent it and often people find some way around it.

PSP games, how they were made is rather effective in stopping this, I'm not sure, but I've never heard of a pirated version of any game on this.

PSP Games are very easy to pirate. Just need a custom frimware, which now days is not hard to obtain and bam you can download ISOs from anywhere and put them onto your psp.

 

[Kalisnoir]

I'd like to see games pirated if they were only playable via OnLive (or anything similar).

*ADD*
I can also vouch for how incredibly easy it is to get pirated games for the PSP, I put CFW on mine so I could get an emulator on it to play Pokemon but there was plenty of pirated games I could of got had I wished to do so.

 

[sted]

As you can see rosgor, I'm a little behind with some of my information and no doubt showing I don't get out much!

 

[Wolvo7]

Blu-ray was another good effective step to prevent film piracy, though I'd imagine there are some ways around this one

It's just as easy to find BD-Rip (Blu-Ray rips) as it is to find DVD-rips

 

[sted]

Well, thanks to everyone who decided to rain on my parade.

 

[rickne]

You'll never stop it. The people that do the work are extremely talented at what they do and some so much so that the company's that try to stop them on occasions end up hiring them. *cough* Sony *Cough* Dark Alex.
You know that all this aggressive DLC harms the people that legit buy the games and does nothing to stop pirates. Publishers have got it all so so wrong now it hurts. As long as files are stored on your harddrive those files can be exploited. The only solution would be streaming games using services such as Gaikai but that is no where near good enough yet.

 

[steaky360]

Personally I don't think there is any way to stop it. However the amount of people who download pirated copies of games (music/media etc.) might be diminished if (for example) titles were not as expensive upon release. I realise this is not something that can simply 'happen' as the giant corporations need to make their excellent bonus's somehow (cynic) but there must be some other way to make money. It would not stop the pirate's who create the pirate copies of things though, I'd like to say many of them do it for the challenge (at least with games, as movies and music I guess are far easier to copy).

The only way I can think of to make pirating less worthwhile would be forced DRM and subscription services etc. I imagine you can get copies of Diablo 3 for example and World of Warcraft but I would guess its more difficult to pirate games such as these because of the 'always online' aspect. Obviously this isn't the answer just yet but it could be once we (as a nation) have sorted out the broadband issues existing in rural areas.

Still it would prove to be an unpopular step, maybe there is some middle ground?

 

[rickne]

Personally I don't think there is any way to stop it. However the amount of people who download pirated copies of games (music/media etc.) might be diminished if (for example) titles were not as expensive upon release. I realise this is not something that can simply 'happen' as the giant corporations need to make their excellent bonus's somehow (cynic) but there must be some other way to make money. It would not stop the pirate's who create the pirate copies of things though, I'd like to say many of them do it for the challenge (at least with games, as movies and music I guess are far easier to copy).

The only way I can think of to make pirating less worthwhile would be forced DRM and subscription services etc. I imagine you can get copies of Diablo 3 for example and World of Warcraft but I would guess its more difficult to pirate games such as these because of the 'always online' aspect. Obviously this isn't the answer just yet but it could be once we (as a nation) have sorted out the broadband issues existing in rural areas.

Still it would prove to be an unpopular step, maybe there is some middle ground?

Thats what private servers are for.

 

[steaky360]

Thats what private servers are for.

True, although I'd imagine there are not as many people on the private servers and I'd guess there will be more cheaters (etc.). I wouldn't expect it to stop piracy at all, but it might make it more irritating for most people to bother getting pirated copies of games as opposed to buying them

 

[DeadEyeDuk]

As with most things. a firing squad for lets say 10 random media pirates would rather dissuade the vast majority from carrying on

 

[SmokeDarKnight]

PSP games, how they were made is rather effective in stopping this, I'm not sure, but I've never heard of a pirated version of any game on this.
:/

PSP's the earler ones are hacked using a device called PANDORA'S BATTERY!!! OOOOOOO! =D My friend uses a lot of copyed games on his psp but once you have your PSP unlocked it turns it into a drive for your PC to copy games. His excuse is he likes games that arent released over here. However this then stops him playing and PSN dependant games.

My first borderlands 2 experience was online and someone had changed the rules so that orange guns always came out of the vending machines and the box opened all the time. In disgust i left... after taking a orange gun =D

I like the idea of consoles going download only and think they should just get rid of any usb or data ports to stop hackers. There's just no need.

I dont agree with download prices though and it would put me off buying a download only console. Im sure they say piracy keeps the game prices up which im sure is true along with there want to make a larger profit.

 

[Grimezy]

Price won't solve it, you can pick up music albums for less than a fiver and people still choose to torrent them. My mate hasn't bought a DVD or an album for about 5 years now which I don't really agree with.

At the end of the day it's down to conscience. I appreciate something more that I've paid for, especially things like albums because if I download it for free I don't feel the need to listen to it, if I spend £7 on it I force myself to like it. I watched the One Show (mmmm Alex Jones) the other day and they were doing a feature on people shoplifting from Charity Shops. You're never going to stop those people, the Charity Shops had even started installing CCTV, etc but at the end of the day if somebody wants to steal something, they're going to find a way to do it.

We just have to hope that it won't have too much effect on our experience as a paying customer. I disagree with what somebody said earlier regarding a free to play model with either a monthly/annual subscription or an in-game cash shop. Unless your hack shield is top notch, you're just going to get hackers makings tons of free accounts and ruining the game for everybody.

 

[rickne]

Mortal Kombat 2 on the Super Nintendo was £55+ on release. £44 on the Mega drive. Ahhh cartridges.

 

[kruppsy]

File sharing has spawned copied/pirated media into an unstoppable force....its too easy to download a pirated game/album...if it was a pain in the rear end, people wouldn't bother.

 

[Narcotics]

AnyDvD is a Blu-ray ripping software that's been out for a long time. I mean what other use than piracy does this have.

Features Blu-Ray
Same features as regular AnyDVD
Removes restrictions from Blu-ray media.
Makes Blu-ray media playable with every player software.
Removes region codes from Blu-ray media.
Watch movies over digital display connection, without HDCP-compliant graphics card and without HDCP-compliant display.
Removes annoyances.
Can disable BD-Live to protect your privacy.
Allows playback of discs requiring a 3D monitor on 2D displays.
The "must have" utility for the serious home theater enthusiast using a media center / home theater PC.
Provides its own Universal Disk Format (UDF) reader, no need to install 3rd party filesystem. Discs which cannot be read by Windows can be backed up when using AnyDVD HD.