BulletStorm didn't sell well because of piracy

[BFG10K]

No it's not an accurate analogy because something of value is lost when someone abuses welfare, parasites consume resources for their own gain and deny other people of that resource.

Actually it’s a completely accurate analogy. Game development can only exist if it’s funded through paying customers. If everyone pirated games and nobody purchased them, the gaming industry would cease to exist.

In that instance, something of value would very much be lost, and the pirates would be the ones denying other people of that resource.

It’s no different to welfare abuse. If everyone was on welfare then the system would collapse. Welfare only works if enough people work and contribute money to it by paying taxes.

As for the rest of your comments, don’t make the mistake of thinking I support DRM because I actually can’t stand it. That includes the cloud based DRM that Steam serves up.

What I don't accept is pirates leeching off the money I paid for a game and using the “I wouldn't of bought it anyway” argument. Or people that play through an entire game and then "decide" it's not good enough to buy.

These people feel they're entitled to something for free and don't need to contribute in any way, exactly like welfare abusers.

 

[BFG10K]

Oh, comparing piracy to welfare abusers? That is just disingenuous. You might have a point if pirating a copy prevents another person from buying an original one, but it isn't…

Oh really? You mean like if someone acquires a CD key illegally (e.g. keygen), registers it, and then stops a legitimate customer from using it?

Because that’s what happened to me a while ago when I purchased a boxed game and tried to activate it on Steam (CD key already registered). Fortunately EB games has a lenient return policy so I was able to get another copy, but for most other stores I’d be SOL.

But that’s okay, because I’m sure that pirate would’ve never brought the game anyway, right?

…and if anything the self-entitled assholes are major game developers these days who thinks they have the right to screw PAYING customers as they please.

Again, don’t make the mistake of thinking I support DRM because I don’t. I hate DRM.

What I’m talking about is people who think they have right to enjoy a game for free because the “publisher is an asshole”, “I wouldn’t of brought it anyway”, "I played through it all but didn't like it", or whatever deluded reason they come up with.

 

[Bobisuruncle54]

It's pretty simple... the game is crap. Honestly, my favourite part of it was the first 30 seconds of the start screen music. The rest of it was just an insult to PC gamers, as if they had all had forgotten excellent FPSes that came before Bulletstorm. Even the latest COD games play better than that bastard child of a shooter.

As gothamhunter mentioned, piracy is a constant, but good PC games still sell very well.

 

[Bobisuruncle54]

Actually it’s a completely accurate analogy. Game development can only exist if it’s funded through paying customers. If everyone pirated games and nobody purchased them, the gaming industry would cease to exist.

In that instance, something of value would very much be lost, and the pirates would be the ones denying other people of that resource.

It’s no different to welfare abuse. If everyone was on welfare then the system would collapse. Welfare only works if enough people work and contribute money to it by paying taxes.

As for the rest of your comments, don’t make the mistake of thinking I support DRM because I actually can’t stand it. That includes the cloud based DRM that Steam serves up.

What I don't accept is pirates leeching off the money I paid for a game and using the “I wouldn't of bought it anyway” argument. Or people that play through an entire game and then "decide" it's not good enough to buy.

These people feel they're entitled to something for free and don't need to contribute in any way, exactly like welfare abusers.

IMO the problem people are having BFG is that they may think that you are insinuating that piracy is "theft" rather than "copyright infringement". Your post insinuates the idea that one pirated copy of a game = one lost sale, but welfare abuse is categorised as fraud, not theft. I can see where the parallels can be drawn, but piracy is classified as copyright infringement for very important reasons. If it was classified as fraud, it would a criminal offense, not a civil one (but it can be civil in some cases). Piracy cannot be classified as fraud because it does not involve deception, nor can it be classified as stealing for obvious reasons.

Let's make it easy. The following statements are both false, and the truth lies somewhere in-between. We cannot support either statement with any hard data, which is why it remains such hot topic and ongoing debate:

Every pirated copy of a game is a lost sale.

No pirated copies of a game result in lost revenue for the game developer.

 

[thejunglegod]

It's pretty simple... the game is crap. Honestly, my favourite part of it was the first 30 seconds of the start screen music. The rest of it was just an insult to PC gamers, as if they had all had forgotten excellent FPSes that came before Bulletstorm. Even the latest COD games play better than that bastard child of a shooter.

it was not just a "shooter". it had many other dynamic elements that made it different from default FPSs(read COD). The game tried something different and as far as i am concerned, i loved the idea of looking around at your surroundings trying to come up with fun ways to eleminite an opponent. one thing i hated a lot was the constant hand-holding, "Kick here", "Leash here", got silly after about a point.

And i once again repeat, the game is not bad, and its not excellent, its somewhere in between. Another "similar" game would be Singularity. I like games which leaves us to do the thinking, rather than letting you hold a gun and make you go berserk.

 

[Bobisuruncle54]

it was not just a "shooter". it had many other dynamic elements that made it different from default FPSs(read COD). The game tried something different and as far as i am concerned, i loved the idea of looking around at your surroundings trying to come up with fun ways to eleminite an opponent. one thing i hated a lot was the constant hand-holding, "Kick here", "Leash here", got silly after about a point.

And i once again repeat, the game is not bad, and its not excellent, its somewhere in between. Another "similar" game would be Singularity. I like games which leaves us to do the thinking, rather than letting you hold a gun and make you go berserk.

Such gameplay has been around for donkeys years, and many have done it better.

 

[coloumb]

Companies can only speculate piracy was the main reason for poor sales. And can we actually say someone who pirates the game could be lopped into the equation of a lost sale when they probably wouldn't have purchased it anyway?

How about instead of blaming piracy companies instead show us hard data as to why the game didn't sell well -

- anonymous surveys so people can be honest about why they didn't purchase the game [maybe they didn't know about the game due to little/no advertising, maybe they downloaded the game and deleted it 10 minutes after playing, price of the game, etc].
- projected sales vs actual sales on all both platforms [consoles and pc/mac].

It's just easier to blame piracy than to accept it was their fault.

 

[thespyder]

this isn't directly related to Video game Piracy, but definitely watch the video. it has relevance to the discussion in hand.

http://www.ted.com/talks/rob_reid_the_8_billion_ipod.html

 

[PlasmaBomb]

I played the demo and didn't think much of it so didn't buy.

This.