An Industry In Crysis

Opinion from Matt - Tuesday, 15 February 2011 @ 11:59am

A recent article by Jim Sterling on Destructoid caught my attention yesterday. This is about piracy - PC piracy to be specific. It essentially proclaims the death of PC gaming due entirely or mostly to piracy, in the light of the recent leaking of Crysis 2 to torrent sites ahead of its launch. In the time since this article came out (a mere 10 or so hours after) Killzone 3 for the PS3 has also hit torrent sites.

There are a lot of things I agree with in the article. But there are a lot I don't.

Mostly I don't agree with the tone. Ranting and raging is not helpful, calling pirates names isn't a solution. But hey, it's an opinion article, and that's the place for ranting. I do it all the time. And that's not to say he doesn't have a point, but I certainly don't agree with it entirely.

For example:

Actually that's not true anymore. Box office takings are not a majority of movie profits anymore - DVD sales are, and DVD sales are most directly impacted by piracy.

But the point he's making is still a valid one. With multiple revenue sources movie and music can weather the storm, and TV, already broadcast free and funded by advertising, is largely unaffected. Gaming doesn't have the same flexibility. "Second bites at the cherry" from re-releases, discount versions, platinum editions, etc, are minimal revenue. 80% of a game's sales are generally in the first day or two, and that's about all you get.

But there's other stuff that's more significant that I disagree with.

This is where we come to the crux of my disagreement. You see, to me, it's not theft. It may be just a matter of terminology but I think it matters. The whole "you wouldn't steal a car" concept is bullshit. You would so steal a car if you could take a friend's car and make an exact duplicate of it with no cost whatsoever, and don't tell me you wouldn't.

Stealing property and "stealing" software are NOT equivalent, however cavalierly you demand they be called so. Especially when your article is titled "Pirates, admit you're fucking thieves." The logical response from pirates is "no". Because they don't think they are. And I don't think they are either.

Piracy isn't equivalent to property theft because no one loses their property. That's not to say it's morally or legally right, but that it's not the same. It just isn't. That isn't to say we should tolerate or accept it, or that there shouldn't be laws against it. But those laws shouldn't equate things that just aren't the same. It's not like stealing diamonds, it's like sneaking into a second movie when you paid for one.

If theft was murder, piracy would be, at best, manslaughter. NOT the same.

This distinction matters. Because just as you can't presecute someone for manslaughter on the same grounds as murder you can't and shouldn't treat pirates the same as theives. It's a different situation and it needs to be treated accordingly.

Of course, at this point I'm conflicted. I have to finish this up and I have to take a stand. It seems pretty obvious that I'm siding with the pirates on this one, but the fact is I'm not. Our industry is based on the hard work and vast investments of people who need revenue to make bigger and better titles. Must as I often consider the EAs and Activisions of this industry an evil I consider them a necessesary evil, and without them the AAA standard would be much lower than it is now.

The leaking of Crysis 2 is a terrible thing for EA, and for Crytek. This is an event that should result in criminal or civil procedings against the individuals who breached commercial confidence and released it to the public. Whether it should result in criminal or civil cases against downloaders I'm less certain. I'm kind of inclined towards no. I think they should be punished in some way, but I think multinational corporations destroying the lives of private citizens through legal action is the most dispicable and disgraceful course for these companies. It amounts to bullying, and is destructive and unacceptable.

There are a lot of justifications people use for downloading Crysis 2 off a torrent. Some of them are even valid. Some are enthusiastic fans who would download it now for funzies and then buy it at release anyway.

But there are a lot who are simply downloading it because it's there. They wouldn't have ever paid for it. They just wouldn't have, no matter what. These people often have justifications that Jim spoke about - that games are too expensive. That they can't afford it. There is a split here. In part they have a point. Games ARE very expensive, especially in Australia, and Australian publishers will walk across fire before they explain to you why Aussies get the shaft on prices that we do. So some of this is a factor in piracy. It's not an excuse, but it IS a factor. But the vast majority is simply this: entitlement. Many pirates equate being able to get something with earning it. That if you can get it you can have it, and that their whim should be catered to. They wouldn't buy it at any price. World of Goo was mentioned in the Destructoid article, and another good example is the Humble Indy Bundle. Pay any price you like, and the proceeds can all go to charity. And people still pirated it in huge numbers.

Fucking cunts.

You heard me. Selfish, self-entitled assholes.

The fact is, these people don't actually matter. They wouldn't have bought the game anyway. Whether they couldn't afford it or just weren't the market. They're not customers, they're scavengers, parasites on the body of the gaming industry. Of course, it's easy to dismiss them. But for everyone who downloaded Crysis 2 but would never have bought it, what games would they have bought? I'm not saying that makes it OK, what I'm saying is that people who pirate don't necessarily exclusively pirate. That they often buy some (or even most) games, and just pirate the ones they wouldn't have bothered buying. Dismissing them as some sort of scum because they only paid for 9/10 games seems oddly dismissive.

But there's a third group of people who do really matter. People who would have bought Crysis 2, but now they won't have to bother.

This is the problem. This is the only people who actually do matter. Gaming piracy figures tend to take into account groups one and two because they make for bigger numbers, but people who DO buy the game anyway and people who were never going to are irrelevant. What really matters is actual lost sales.

Releases like this (and the recent announcement of Killzone 3 as a similar leak) spell legitimate cost to the publishers. Big titles leaked prior to release, not days afterwards. They amount to an actual reduction in peak sales. Not so much KZ3, because the PS3 hack is hardly common, but PC torrenting is everywhere. How much does that amount to? Hundreds of thousands of dollars? Millions? We'll really never know.

There's not much more I can say on this without becoming an unfocused rant. You know... more... I won't take the same tone as Ranty Jim, but I do have a sort of similar view. Not being able to afford something doesn't give you the right to have it anyway. But I want it. And it's right there. And it's so easy...