BulletStorm didn't sell well because of piracy

[Craig234]

I think EA whining about the poor sales of their mediocre game speaks for itself. There is a much larger trend of companies feeling entitled to the money in their customer's pockets that goes beyond just game companies. BoA is just one that comes to mind.

I'm not excusing piracy, I'm not saying it wasn't a factor here, but companies complaining about not making big money on a mediocre product get little sympathy from me. Not to mention there are other factors like the economy, customers waiting for inevitable price drops, and better products for customers to spend their money and time on being out there. Even in a perfect world decent products can get hit by these and other factors.

Are their any numbers on how much this game did make vs. what EA was projecting?

If by 'feeling entitled to the money in your pocket', you simply mean putting out poor quality products, OK, but I disagree that's an accurate phrase to describe it.

You are perfectly able to keep the money in your pocket and not buy them, they have no other access to your pocket.

I agree with you, the industry is training customers to wait for price drops, hurting revenue. As for figures, I haven't checked, the link says 'good but less than expected'.

 

[Craig234]

There is in a sense. Play on a private server and there are no fees to play. Instead of giving money to Blizzard, you are downloading the client for free and playing for free with the private server rules.

Thats a form of hacking to me because you are playing a game designed by the blizzard team but depriving them of their money.

I agree, I didn't know it's actually happening.

 

[Craig234]

Umm, this company seems to expect it, they admit to poorly porting an already poor game and then proceed straight to blaming piracy for it as if there is no other reason their poorly ported mediocre fps didn't sell well.

First, even 'not so good games' deserve people who choose to play them to pay for them.

McDonalds is not that good of food, but you owe them the dollar or two for an item.

Second, an 82% gamerankings is a good rating - most games are 'worse'.

You are just demonstrating exactly what I said in my post about gamers being ideological and posting a story they want, ignoring the facts.

 

[ImpulsE69]

Gonad, please explain to me the companies, with some evidence, who expect you to buy their game despite bad quality? I'm not familiar with those companies. DRM, yes.

Are their companies who put out not so good games for sale? Of course - but you can not buy them, there's no indication they 'think they're entitled to your money' for them.

I'd understand more if you were talking about a market with less competition, with some more compulsary element, though it's hard to come up with many examples in the US.

All of the game companies apparently. Because you never hear "well..we got shitty reviews, and the overall the playerbase told us our game sucked, and we didn't sell many copies, I guess we should try harder next time". Instead, they just say....

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

If by 'feeling entitled to the money in your pocket', you simply mean putting out poor quality products, OK, but I disagree that's an accurate phrase to describe it.

You are perfectly able to keep the money in your pocket and not buy them, they have no other access to your pocket.

And these companies are apparently expecting customers to shell out the cash anyway and are quick to whine and make excuses when they don't.

I agree with you, the industry is training customers to wait for price drops, hurting revenue. As for figures, I haven't checked, the link says 'good but less than expected'.

I don't think this is the industry's doing as much as it is a reflection of customers being more selective with their purchases. There are really only two categories of games now, buy full at price on release day or wait for it to hit the bargain bin. Well, three if you count the don't bother at any price category. BulletStorm is a bargain bin game.

 

[Craig234]

The game isn't very good (that's my opinion, and it seems to be shared by quite a few others here), that is the reason why it didn't sell well. Your 82% figure is from "official" reviewers who get paid to advertise the very same games they're supposed to be critical of.

I don't buy your attack on the reviewers for a minute.

If nothing else, the many, many gamerankings below 82% show otherwise.

Piracy definitely does happen with every title that gets released. It happens on consoles, it happens on PC. The issue is in assuming that each and every torrent download = a lost sale, when that is not the case at all.

Pirates are pathetic, as are publishers/developers who can't man up and admit they did a poor job. They deserve one another.

Where to start. First, piracy on consoles and PC can't be compared - PC dwarfs console.

Second, that's a straw man - no one said 'every pirated copy is a lost sale'. Could The Witcher 2 have lost half its sales, 75 of its sales, if 'way more than 5 million copies' were pirated for 1 million sold? Yes, that'd be an easy ratio of lost sales. Studies find over 90% piracy for some games. It is a major factor, you are denying it wrongly.

Finally, this publisher DID admit it had problem with the port quality despite the 82% rating - show me many other non game products who admit that! You made a false attack.

Another post proving the point I made about the posting of a story out of ideology.

 

[Craig234]

And these companies are apparently expecting customers to shell out the cash anyway and are quick to whine and make excuses when they don't.

Plenty of people don't buy McDonalds because it's 'crap'. Others do. Does that mean they fit your attack too, if you feel they 'think they're entitled to your money for crap'?

Same with any product industry - automobiles, tv shows, whatever.

I don't think this is the industry's doing as much as it is a reflection of customers being more selective with their purchases. There are really only two categories of games now, buy full at price on release day or wait for it to hit the bargain bin. Well, three if you count the don't bother at any price category. BulletStorm is a bargain bin game.

I think it's largely the industry's doing, because there's an arms race on discounting more and faster - don't discount you lose out to competitors, do and you lose revenue.

I'd like to find figures but I suspect it's slashing the revenue per copy.

When I say it's the industry's doing, it's not so much blaming them - no one publisher can do a lot about it - it's just a problem in a 'free market'.

Who makes better burgers - that gourmet independent, or McDonalds, and who sells more?

 

[ImpulsE69]

Plenty of people don't buy McDonalds because it's 'crap'. Others do. Does that mean they fit your attack too, if you feel they 'think they're entitled to your money for crap'?

Same with any product industry - automobiles, tv shows, whatever.

This analogy is fail. You OWN those products once you pay for them and you have a tangible product. If they suck you can return them and get your money back. You can sell them used. All the same arguments people have made for years. People have more access now than ever to TONS of media and entertainment. They have more choices of ways to spend their money and time. They are more selective. Many companies (especially with the growth of casual app games) have tried to make a cash grab.

Quit trying to side with the software companies. They are WRONG. The numbers are BS. Pirates are a problem, not a be all end all solution to their failing business practices. It's been proven time and again a good game will sell and it doesn't need a bajillion dollar budget.

 

[Craig234]

All of the game companies apparently. Because you never hear "well..we got shitty reviews, and the overall the playerbase told us our game sucked, and we didn't sell many copies, I guess we should try harder next time". Instead, they just say....

First, what industry regularly has CEO's say 'our product sucked, we should try harder'?

I can think of one case, and it was pretty clearly driven as a marketing campaign, not any real desire to say that, Domino's Pizza 're-designing' their pizza.

So how much sense does it make for you to demand that?

Second:

http://www.1up.com/news/elemental-early-adopters-sequel-free?cmpid=rss-allugo

As an apology to fans, Stardock President Brad Wardell stated at GDC today that early adopters of Elemental: War of Magic will be entitled to receive a free copy of its sequel.
The original Elemental (pictured above) started out with a rough launch. It was incredibly buggy when it first came out, and even after an early patch, there were problems aplenty. To make up for it, anyone who purchased the game prior to October 31, 2010 will be given a free copy of Elemental: Fallen Enchantress.

"We're going to spend a couple of million dollars and give the sequel away to show our fans we've learned from our mistakes," Wardell said. "We released Elemental two days early because we were so excited for people see it. We wanted our fans to see the masterpiece we'd put out."

It's an extremely commendable move after already offering two free expansions last year. Even if those early adopters aren't interested in the sequel, this is a lot more than many developers would be willing to do for its fans. Hats off to you, Stardock.

 

[LurkerPrime]

Publishers have to expect a certain amount of piracy. Just like retail stores expect a certain amount of theft from thier stores.

However unlike a retail store, when someone downloads a game, you didn't really lose anything.

I also never understood why companies dont just seed a crapload of corrupted versions of thier game. Have one crash at load, have one with the first objective isn't completable, etc... If a pirate has to wade through all that crap to find a real pirated copy, it wont be worth it to them anymore. Sure you aren't going to convert a pirated copy to a sale, but thats rarely going to happen anyway.

 

[CPA]

I liked Bulletstorm. One of my son's loves it. I only paid $5 for it AND ONLY because I had listened to the "public" that the game "sucked". I would have paid close to full price for it, if I would have known otherwise.

 

[PowerYoga]

4.5 million downloads doesn't equal 4.5 million lost sales. Most of these people who download the game wouldn't have bought it in the first place. Now there ARE a lot of people who do go out and download their favorite games instead of buying it (students mostly as they're tight with money), but to say "I lost 50 million dollars because there are 10 million pirated downloads" is silly.

Recettear actually got a big sales boost thanks to piracy. People downloaded the game, liked it, bought the real deal. I know this is not the case for everyone, but if you make a quality game, people WILL buy it.

Bulletstorm? Not so much. I wouldn't even waste my bandwidth downloading that sucker.

 

[Craig234]

Publishers have to expect a certain amount of piracy. Just like retail stores expect a certain amount of theft from thier stores.

However unlike a retail store, when someone downloads a game, you didn't really lose anything.

Yes, you did.

YOU INVESTED the costs in making the game, with a business model for it to be bought.

It's no different whether you spent $100 for development costs, or inventory.

Either way, the revenue you legitimately expect to cover those costs is being denied to you leaving you with the costs and someone consuming your product without paying.

The development costs are real money, just like the products in a store.

But look, that's not the only issue. Take music. The Beatles made millions selling records that wasn't mainly about the physical album.

Would they have done so if over 90% of their sales had been pirated? Other music groups?

So, they made millions for something that 'didn't cost them anything for people to steal'.

So even when that IS the case, and it's not for games, it doesn't justify piracy.

Again, not only the injustice to the producer, you are threatening the creation and budgets and quality of these products when you threaten the revenue.

Take away that revenue and what happens? Try shopping by browsing books at your local independent bookstore (90% closed) or Borders. Or at one of the closed Best Buy's.

I also never understood why companies dont just seed a crapload of corrupted versions of thier game. Have one crash at load, have one with the first objective isn't completable, etc... If a pirate has to wade through all that crap to find a real pirated copy, it wont be worth it to them anymore. Sure you aren't going to convert a pirated copy to a sale, but thats rarely going to happen anyway.

Since pirates generally pirate a bought copy, you want customers who buy the game to get that crap? Not making sense. Or are you suggesting you can flood the pirates?

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

Plenty of people don't buy McDonalds because it's 'crap'. Others do. Does that mean they fit your attack too, if you feel they 'think they're entitled to your money for crap'?

Same with any product industry - automobiles, tv shows, whatever.



I think it's largely the industry's doing, because there's an arms race on discounting more and faster - don't discount you lose out to competitors, do and you lose revenue.

I'd like to find figures but I suspect it's slashing the revenue per copy.

When I say it's the industry's doing, it's not so much blaming them - no one publisher can do a lot about it - it's just a problem in a 'free market'.

Who makes better burgers - that gourmet independent, or McDonalds, and who sells more?

Look, I'm not attacking anyone, but the fact is Bulletstorm was (barely) a b-grade game and if it sold OK, but not great, then that's right where it should be, regardless of any piracy.

 

[DaveSimmons]

I don't pirate, and I can afford to buy as many games as I want.

I didn't buy Bulletstorm because it didn't appeal to me. Did they lose my sale to piracy? No, they lost it to not making a game that I wanted.

Instead I've pre-ordered Wasteland 2 and Borderlands 2, am playing SWTOR and Star Trek Online, etc. etc. and etc. Make a game I want and I'll say "shut up and take my money!"

 

[Craig234]

Look, I'm not attacking anyone, but the fact is Bulletstorm was (barely) a b-grade game and if it sold OK, but not great, then that's right where it should be, regardless of any piracy.

For the third time, the fact you think it's not good quality is not justification for piracy, any more than it's ok to steal McDonalds or bad music or any other product. Don't use it.

That's the point - but you are also not getting it right for this product. An 82% rating to repeat this again is a good rating. Not everyone likes any game.

You had several people in just this thread say they really liked it. But it's not the point.

Quebert wants to buy a sequel. He can't. Piracy was enough to kill the sequel.

It doesn't make piracy the ONLY issue - why, if they just made an AMAZING game that sold better, that would have fixed the problem! So the hell what?

It's like saying 'ya, George Bush got enough fraudulent voted to change the election in his favor, but if his opponent had been better, that would have solved the problem'. SO WHAT?

The piracy is wrongly denies, and it's harming both the fairness of compensation for game makers as well as the creation of games. Period. Stop blaming the victim stolen from.

Post after post after post is showing my point about how ideology is the cause of the views being posted, not facts.

 

[GrumpyMan]

I can't believe review sites, because they get punished by the publishers if they give a bad review, so they refrain and give them a mediocre rating even if the game sucks.

 

[thespyder]

...snip...

In the first place, piracy is wrong. I can think of zero reason to justify it. It's stealing plain and simple. And if you can't/don't earn it, you shouldn't have it. period.

As for the statistics you present, they are wholly depressing if true. Since I have none to back up either for or against them, I will take them as 100%. Sux.

However..... You are right in that any DRM strategy has a practical shelf life of days. This is not a disputed fact. Yet still companies continue to use invasive DRM that impacts legal consumers far more than pirates. This is wrong in my book. Not wrong enough to justify switching to piracy, but still wrong.

When describing game companies that have taken a stance and gone DRM free, I personally suspect that they have come to the same conclusion. that DRM only impacts (to any significant degree) legitimate consumers. And so they figure "if it is going to be hacked and broken within days, why not just eliminate the middle man and stop impacting our paying customers. Which makes sense to me. it doesn't solve the problem, but it prevents the problem from becoming an even worse one.

DRM is supposed to be like locking your front door when you go out. The lock is not ever going to be 100% deterrent against theft. But it is a message that tells the would be thief that they are not welcome. And if they push forward, they are breaking the law (or at least the integrity of the resident). DRM should be the same.

But you are never going to stop Piracy. there will always be people who feel entitled to something they haven't earned. they will justify it all till their blue in the face, but it is still stealing.

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

For the third time, the fact you think it's not good quality is not justification for piracy, any more than it's ok to steal McDonalds or bad music or any other product. Don't use it.

That's the point - but you are also not getting it right for this product. An 82% rating to repeat this again is a good rating. Not everyone likes any game.

You had several people in just this thread say they really liked it. But it's not the point.

Quebert wants to buy a sequel. He can't. Piracy was enough to kill the sequel.

It doesn't make piracy the ONLY issue - why, if they just made an AMAZING game that sold better, that would have fixed the problem! So the hell what?

It's like saying 'ya, George Bush got enough fraudulent voted to change the election in his favor, but if his opponent had been better, that would have solved the problem'. SO WHAT?

The piracy is wrongly denies, and it's harming both the fairness of compensation for game makers as well as the creation of games. Period. Stop blaming the victim stolen from.

Post after post after post is showing my point about how ideology is the cause of the views being posted, not facts.

I'm not justifying piracy, I'm justifying the lack of sales on the merits of the game. And I know of what I speak, I played through the thing. Again, as plainly as I can say it, you can't blame piracy for mediocre sales of a mediocre game.

 

[Craig234]

I don't pirate, and I can afford to buy as many games as I want.

I didn't buy Bulletstorm because it didn't appeal to me. Did they lose my sale to piracy? No, they lost it to not making a game that I wanted.

Instead I've pre-ordered Wasteland 2 and Borderlands 2, am playing SWTOR and Star Trek Online, etc. etc. and etc. Make a game I want and I'll say "shut up and take my money!"

Exactly - this is the right approach.

I didn't buy Bulletstorm because it didn't appeal to me, too. When the price went to $5, I bought it (twice oops) because I though I'd like to try it for that price.

I pre-ordered Wasteland 2 and Borderlands 2, and the new Al Lowe game for that matter.

Heck, I subscribed to Star Trek Online for over a year and barely played, I just liked there being a Star Trek game like that and didn't bother cancelling, until I did.

Thing is, the piracy issue can mean they don't make the game you would buy - just as Quebert won't get to buy Bulletstorm 2. Or me buying two copies when cheap.

 

[LurkerPrime]

Since pirates generally pirate a bought copy, you want customers who buy the game to get that crap? Not making sense. Or are you suggesting you can flood the pirates?

Just flood the torrents full of crap thats hard to differentiate between. Sure some people will wade through the noise to find the correct pirated copy that works, while others will just give up. It also gets alot harder if half of those games actually work at first, then randomly crash, or some other glitch. Legitimate users wont have these issues, b/c they have legitimate copies of the game.

You got me all wrong Craig, I dont support piracy. Unfortunately its something thats going to happen. Sure it costs X to produce a game, but it essentially costs $0.00 to electronically copy it. Does this justify piracy? no. But a pirated copy is not a lost sale, so it doesn't equate to lost revenue.

 

[EDUSAN]

software piracy is too deep into the everyday activities it does not even look as doing something wrong anymore (thats the general idea)

As some people said: "i buy the games i want to play" and that is true, we almost always do that.
the bad thing is i dont think any of us has enough money to buy every game they want.

Its a mix of stuff

1) its too easy to pirate games, in comparison to "steal" (copy) food from Mcdonalds
2) games are too expensive, specially at release. How much food from mcdonalds do you buy for 1 skyrim (60 dollars)?
3) people tend to buy games that require multiplayer. Single player games are hit here, although i love them
4) Lots of shitty games, LOTS... and if you get into account point number 2 it makes you think "do i really want to pay 60 dollars for this game?"

and maybe a couple points more that i didnt think of.

I played bulletstorm, pirated it... i got bored fast and unintalled it. I recalled it was not such a bad game but it didnt interested me. When it was on sale i almost bought it but even at that moment i thought "not worth it".
I bought Deus Ex: HR for a couple dollars more instead

 

[Craig234]

I'm not justifying piracy, I'm justifying the lack of sales because of the merits of the game. And I know of what I speak, I played through the thing. Again, as plainly as I can say it, you can't blame piracy for mediocre sales for a mediocre game.

Excerpts from list of 10,000 reasons Gore lost 400 voted to Bush in Florida:

From the 'legitimate' section:

- Not good enough jokes in speeches
- Positions on many issues
- Didn't spend more on advertising
- Didn't spend enough time in Florida
- Wife not prettier
- That goofy accent...

From the 'not legitmate section':

- The felon purge list intentionally being over broad excluding tens of thousands of legitimate voters
- Ignoring the law and a court order to allow residents who committed felonies in another state who had the voting right restored to vote, costing thousands of votes
- Setting the machines in Republican districts to return erroneous ballots to voters to correct, while keeping and invalidating them in Democratic districts, costing many thousands of Democratic votes and far lower rates of ballots rejected in Republican precints than Democratic

From the 'oops' section:
- A butterfly ballot design flaw (by a Democrat) causing thousands of Gore voters to vote for Pay Buchanan on accident

And so on.

Now, I'm making the point the NOT LEGITIMATE issues are a problem. Piracy WAS WRONG and WAS ENOUGH TO CAUSE THE CANCELLATION OF THE SEQUEL.

Your points 'the game was only 82% and if it'd been a lot better that'd solve the problem' is no more relevant than saying 'who cares about stealing votes, Gore is to blame'.

Stop blaming the victim and denying and ignoring the issue of piracy.

 

[Lonyo]

I didn't buy Bulletstorm.
Didn't pirate it either, because I didn't care about it at all.

 

[ImpulsE69]

SO wait...all that was because you don't agree with piracy? For the 100th time, no one is condoning it. The argument is that the game was bad and they are saying it failed due to piracy which is just not the case. It's the cop out that many companies are taking instead of the real reason. It's a scare tactic to appease the stockholders. Blame the pirates and we can be justified in firing half our devs after the game comes out. Blame the pirates and we can justify not putting out patches for our broken game. Etc etc. Own up to your own shortcomings, quit taking the easy road.

EVERYTHING software based gets pirated. EVERYTHING. I MEAN EVERYTHING. That is not a hyped up item. EVERYTHING. Even if it's not cracked there's a torrent for it.