News - PS Jailbreak modchip banned but Sony face long battle against piracy

[Ferral]

Thing is with console games a lot of them are overpriced when released.

I usually hold off till they hit the budget label or get a pre owned copy.

Look at Kane & Lynch 2 for example with regards to its single player campaign, it lasts around 4 - 5 hours and you have spent £40 on it. I havn't purchased it and wont as I'm not interested in this title, got this info from various reviews on the net with regards to single player. I must also state that I have not pirated the game as I dont do that. With that kind of value I can see why people would download it rather than paying for it. Now thats a complete rip off if you dont do the multiplayer side of things.

On the flip side I purchased Borderlands few days after release for £40, main game lasted a good while so was worth the money, not forgetting different characters that you you can build up in different ways so it has decent replayability. I still pick up and play this game now and it was money well spent. I even bought some of the DLC for it and cant wait for Claptrap Uprising.

Publishers should look at the pricing on specific titles, stuff that isnt as mainsream wont sell as well, so if they lowered the price more people would pick it up instead of pirating the game.

[kalniel]

If you don't think a game is value for money then why don't you (one) just not play it? That's the only way you'll send a message that the game is over priced. Most piracy occurs regardless of price, so the publishers aren't going to see piracy as a protest against price.

[Ferral]

Thats what I do, think something is not worth it wont buy it till its cheaper or not at all. Was just using Kane & Lynch 2 as an example on how some games are a bit of a rip off which will lead to piracy in a smaller way.

Like mentioned in the thread previously though, you get people that just download everything regardless. Then you have the old casual piracy where stuff is passed between friends (like the old Commodore and Speccy days). Casual pirates may well just copy the game or movie until they are done with it then delete it.

[Rob_B]

You've only got to look at the iPhone for rampant piracy where games cost 59p, cost isn't an issue as mentioned.

I vote with my wallet, I very rarely buy new games to be honest, just got Quantum of solace for the PS3 for £4.98 new from GAME, that's all it's worth but for that price it passes the time!

I've got some alerts setup on Gamestracker for anything I'm interested in, when games hit £10/£15 I consider them.

RRP on new games are shocking though, considering one arguement for DRM etc was 'if people didn't pirate then games could be cheaper' however the PS3 was, if anything, more expensive than the 360 version even with 0% piracy (and the whopping few pence extra a blu-ray disc costs) then we can see that doesn't hold water.

[finlay666]

kalniel was citing PC game prices. And I don't know where you were going for your n64 games, but I was paying £40 RRP for new n64 games.

The cost of producing an N64 cartridge was far higher than producing a CD.[64] Publishers had to pass these higher expenses to the consumer and as a result, N64 games tended to sell for higher prices than PlayStation games.[61] While most PlayStation games rarely exceeded US$50,[62] N64 games could reach US$79.99,[62] such as the first pressing of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.[65] Games in Sony's line of PlayStation Greatest Hits budget line retailed for US$19.95, while Nintendo's equivalent Player's Choice line retailed for US$29.95. In the United Kingdom, N64 games were priced £54.95 at their time of release, while PlayStation games were priced at £44.95. In the United States games were priced at around roughly $49.99 at the time of their release.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_64#Production

I never said that was what I paid, I said that was what the RRP was

Ferral: People take piracy too casually these days. Looking at the indie games such as world of goo, peggle, PvZ people will pirate regardless of cost (WoG PWYW sale where you could pay 1p as an example) and even big PC games like arkham asylum that had hooks in which caught people out when they tried to complain about a buggy game to the developer on their copied version, making them look like fools

DRM is only a hindrance to the very casual copier in most cases, many know of the scene rips now where they are cracked properly, and they arent difficult to find

[kalniel]

RRP on new games are shocking though, considering one arguement for DRM etc was 'if people didn't pirate then games could be cheaper' however the PS3 was, if anything, more expensive than the 360 version even with 0% piracy (and the whopping few pence extra a blu-ray disc costs) then we can see that doesn't hold water.

Yeah. What piracy tends to do is reduce the number of viable products out there, which ends up reducing competition. If that reduces too much then you can get a monopoly situation where prices *may* increase without downwards pressure from competition, but it's not certain. In markets like the PS3 you have quite strange market dynamics due to the licensing processes. What the effect of lack of piracy there will do is encourage more developers to release games for the system, all other things being equal. Unfortunately all other things aren't equal, and developing for the PS3 isn't always the cheap option! But maybe lack of piracy helps keep that a viable market for developers, despite the additional costs.

The situation's probably different in the OS world - pirating Windows for example only helps strengthen their position as market leaders, because by pirating Windows you're not buying or using a competing product, thus it's harder for others to enter or survive in the same market.

[jim]

But what you're referring to are people who make copies for themselves (often via downloading). And a lot will, I don't know about 'most', but anyway, trying to spend a mountain of money to get them to pay for the game is a false economy, if they don't want to pay for it, they wont pay for it. Here's the kicker, publishers KNOW this already, they're not complete morons (usually). DRM isn't about stopping pirates or downloaders, it's about controlling legally purchased content, and removing ownership from LEGAL licensees. DRM has *never*ever* stopped pirates or downloaders.

What I'd be interested to know is the casual piracy market.

I agree fully that there are "long-term pirates" who will pirate anything and everything, and DRM won't stop them. If they can't pirate Assassin's Creed 2 yet, there's a library of 5,000 other games awaiting their attention.

Thing is though, what about average joe? I remember speaking to a relative of mine, years ago, whose son had just bought a Playstation 1. He said "It's £50 for each game, or you can spend £100 and get it chipped, then the games are £5 each. After 3 games, it works out better." Or words to that effect.

I think there are a lot of people who currently buy PS3 games, but if somebody came to them and said "Here you go, here's a USB stick that enables your PS3 to play backed up games" I don't think they would turn down the opportunity.

I suspect that inconvenience is worth a lot to a casual audience.

[gtech]

Well hopefully Sony have stopped the piracy ....for now

http://kotaku.com/5631427/rumor-sony...yline=true&s=i

I prefer to be able to go online with a legit game. I love my psn too much to get into ps3 piracy.

[tiggerai]

I'll be cleaning this thread up after Lowe's warning and contacting those involved by PM.

[Lee H]

Looks like the need for this USB device stated is no more as they're now using a HTC desire running open desire to get the software loader onto the PS3.

It's going to be a fun few months watching all the updates appear for the PS3 to combat all the new threats they're exploiting.

[finlay666]

Looks like the need for this USB device stated is no more as they're now using a HTC desire running open desire to get the software loader onto the PS3.

Doesn't even need a mobile phone... they have done it with a graphical calculator!

http://forums.hexus.net/gaming-news/...ml#post1976616 (bottom video in the article)

[Avenger1324]

I do have to question the amount of coverage and the way in which the media have covered this.

Not only did this highlight the breach, it named the product so people could then Google for it, and even went on to state the name of the next one being released to get around the ban.

Now even those with a casual interest in piracy know exactly what to search for, can find it easily and put their order in. As the news spreads and people become aware it can be done with a mobile phone, all this case will have achieved is rapidly spreading the knowledge about how to run pirated games on your PS3

[aidanjt]

I do have to question the amount of coverage and the way in which the media have covered this.

Not only did this highlight the breach, it named the product so people could then Google for it, and even went on to state the name of the next one being released to get around the ban.

Now even those with a casual interest in piracy know exactly what to search for, can find it easily and put their order in. As the news spreads and people become aware it can be done with a mobile phone, all this case will have achieved is rapidly spreading the knowledge about how to run pirated games on your PS3

I have to question the objectivity of Australian courts for banning it in the first place. Anyway, freedom of speech, and all that silly liberal stuff.

[Agent]

I do have to question the amount of coverage and the way in which the media have covered this.

Not only did this highlight the breach, it named the product so people could then Google for it, and even went on to state the name of the next one being released to get around the ban.

It's a tech news article on a tech news site. It's their job to report things like this.
Security through obscurity isn't really the way to go about it.

Now even those with a casual interest in piracy know exactly what to search for, can find it easily and put their order in. As the news spreads and people become aware it can be done with a mobile phone, all this case will have achieved is rapidly spreading the knowledge about how to run pirated games on your PS3

A simple Google search for "PS3 Piracy" will provide all the info people need. Blocking out the names of products really doesn't make a difference.