186 réponses à ce sujet

[superimposed]

TheLostGenius wrote...

 I thought that the story in Fallout 3 was about as thin as they come. Like it or not, Bioware are some of the best story tellers and character developers in the business.

The story in Fallout 3 was good the first time around, but not great. Bioware's story is still engaging four or five play-throughs on. I just wish you could skip a lot of the useless gimmicks like scanning for upgrades.

[meznaric]

max_ai wrote...


I'll hate myself for doing this, but...

1. I haven't inserted discs for the last few years. Gotta love them digital distributions. On topic, If person A(lice) is pirating something (and she wouldn't buy it either way), it doesn't mean that her friend (aka person B(ob)), who is a legit consumer wouldn't be dragged to do the same. And then we have E(ve) who has quietly listen to their conversation, and even if B was firm in his opinion and still wouldn't pirate, maybe E isn't. And don't let me get started on E's friends...

2. Let's get some things out of the way first.
"Open source" is not a movement.
"Open source" =/= "Free software" ("Free as in speech" =/= "Free as in beer")
What you basically want is "Free software" (free as in beer). While some people are eager to eat the FUD that RMS is feeding them, most (thankfully) don't. I myself release stuff to Public Domain, but I'd never side with ideology that postulates that all software should be free as in beer.
"Open source" on the other hand is a very good ideology, unfortunately, because of the piracy it will never evolve.

3. Don't know about MS, but in companies I worked for spend 10x money on marketing than on development. Hire 10x people for marketing than developers. BUT, dev's usually get 10x the salary of marketing (unless it some kind of big BOSS), and marketing gets the first cuts (see the last crisis).

1) OK, granted about digital distributions. But you are assuming that piracy would be made a lot easier if it were legal. Already in 1995, 6 out of 7 software users used pirated software. Despite this, the wealthiest company in the world is a software development company. Legalising piracy would have a minimal impact on sales because the act of pirating would not be made any easier...

2) I am not interested in semantics. If you want to call it a movement or not I don't care. But, I disagree that open source is not free as in beer. It is in practice both free as in speech AND free as in beer. The reason is that it costs almost nothing to make a copy of the source code which the license allows you to do.

3) OK, I didn't check the statistics for every company. But for MS, the marketing folks earn more than the software development folks. Per head and in total they make more. That's the reality.

[meznaric]

jklinders wrote...

meznaric wrote...

jklinders wrote...

This,

Comparing game publishing and development to music publishing and development is just silly. It costs millions to produce an A-list title game these days as opposed to at most thousands for a 40  to 110 minute long music album. piracy hurts game development and by extention gamers. End of story.

The idea that piracy hurts development, be it software or music, is a myth. Research shows that, in fact, without software piracy the revenue would have been LOWER. Thus, piracy actually HELPS software development. Check for instance this paper: http://www.bepress.c...l2/iss1/art11/ 

Software was not mentioned in that study. try again.

musicians at least can take advantage of the free publicity and make money of their tours.  Somehow I don't see Bioware doing a world Mass Effect live tour.

As an aside advocating piracy is a pretty good way to get a ban here, seeing as it is against the site rules and all....

You should try reading the first sentence ...

Also, let's threaten anyone who disagrees with our corporate political ideas with a ban sounds like an awesome thing. This is why I keep telling people that freedom of speech does not imply freedom of censorship. 

Modifié par meznaric, 28 février 2010 - 01:31 .

[Fjordgnu]

How did this turn into a debate about piracy?



Blehh, anyway. You make some decent points, I'll give you that. Now, in ME, the Reapers aren't revealed right away ( while their existence is hinted at, their precise nature is unknown ), but the Geth are, and that disappointed me slightly.



Having said that, I always saw ME's story as an example of a relatively ordinary story ( in essence, saving the universe? ) done exceptionally well, rather than an exceptional story. I challenge you to find a story that isn't in some way unoriginal when scrutinized, though. Just try reducing the plot to the bare basics. Bullet points help. Also, bold letters.

[TheUnusualSuspect]

meznaric wrote..

Let's go through this one by one.

1) They already have an easy option of pirating. Open bit-torrent, download and there you go.  And you get the added bonus of not having to insert your disc whenever you are playing games ... Great.

You must be utterly retarded.  I said that IF the option to pirate easily were not there, then they'd HAVE TO buy the game if they wanted to play it, and assuming that they wouldn't is retarded, so the upshot is that piracy deprives developers of money.  Period.

2) Legalising piracy and still selling the games, as they do now, would not significantly decrease the sales.

Prove it.  Prove it now, or the rest of your argument is absolute garbage.  You're honestly saying that a "good will" model will work?  Hey, I know.  Let's have car yards open their doors, provide the keys to the cars, and let people choose if they'll pay or not.

Your proposal is absolutely retarded in the most extreme way that retardation can be expressed.

3) Actually you are wrong about the headcount. Microsoft spends MORE money in TOTAL as well as PER HEAD on marketing than on software development... Check statistics.

Which proves what?  That it's okay to pirate?

Seriously mate, I'm over this.  You are absolutely freaking retarded beyond comprehension.  Your arguments are facile, and I refuse to be brought down to the level of arguing with an idiot and being beaten by experience.

I'm out.

Modifié par TheUnusualSuspect, 28 février 2010 - 01:50 .

[Schneidend]

The Hero With a Thousand Faces



/thread

[max_ai]

meznaric wrote...
1) OK, granted about digital distributions. But you are assuming that piracy would be made a lot easier if it were legal. Already in 1995, 6 out of 7 software users used pirated software. Despite this, the wealthiest company in the world is a software development company. Legalising piracy would have a minimal impact on sales because the act of pirating would not be made any easier...

2) I am not interested in semantics. If you want to call it a movement or not I don't care. But, I disagree that open source is not free as in beer. It is in practice both free as in speech AND free as in beer. The reason is that it costs almost nothing to make a copy of the source code which the license allows you to do.

3) OK, I didn't check the statistics for every company. But for MS, the marketing folks earn more than the software development folks. Per head and in total they make more. That's the reality.

1. You got it wrong. The wealthiest software company (MS), is rich only because it sells to the corporate sector. Game publishers (for instance) clearly can't go that way. Face it, it's easier to legally pursue a company than a single individual. That's the only reason piracy isn't pursued aggressively.
On the same breath: "Scientific experiments show that smoking doesn't hurt your health". Sounds familiar?

2. I think it was you who called "Open source" a movement (correct me if not), I just corrected you. "Open source" ideology doesn't have political agenda nor social one any more than any company which sells its products for $$$ and doesn't release its code.
As for the definition of "Open source" you can check it somewhere else on the web. But I'll say just this, ideally opening your source code should have nothing to do with selling your software for $ or $$$ or giving it away for free. Piracy clearly dis-balances this ideal.

[meznaric]

[quote]TheUnusualSuspect wrote...

You must be utterly retarded.  I said that IF the option to not pirate easily were not there, then they'd HAVE TO buy the game if they wanted to play it, and assuming that they wouldn't is retarded, so the upshot is that piracy costs money.  Period.

[\\quote]

Taking away the option to easily pirate is not as easy as you think. A company develops a security system, followed by other hackers finding a hole in it. You can play cat and mouse, with the end result being only added cost to your company. If anyone is retarded, it is people who came up with this!

And no, as I said before, piracy does NOT cost money. This is your preconception and assertion that you have not backed up with anything. I posted studies that show just how exaggerated the claims by BSA and friends are. The software industry actually PROFITS from piracy. It is not hard to open scientific journals and read. Google scholar might be a good starting point.

[quote]
2) Legalising piracy and still selling the games, as they do now, would not significantly decrease the sales. [/quote]

Prove it.  Prove it now, or the rest of your argument is absolute garbage.

[\\quote]
Those who pirate music buy 10 times (yes!) more music than those who do not pirate (http://www.guardian....-buy-more-music). Similar results hold for software. Piracy is effectively free marketing. This is what people don't get.
[quote]
3) Actually you are wrong about the headcount. Microsoft spends MORE money in TOTAL as well as PER HEAD on marketing than on software development... Check statistics.
[\\quote]
Which proves what?  That it's okay to pirate?

Seriously mate, I'm over this.  You are absolutely freaking retarded beyond comprehension.  Your arguments are facile, and I refuse to be brought down to the level of arguing with an idiot and being beaten by experience.

I'm out.

[\\quote]

Fine by me.

Modifié par meznaric, 28 février 2010 - 02:13 .

[meznaric]

max_ai wrote...

1. You got it wrong. The wealthiest software company (MS), is rich only because it sells to the corporate sector. Game publishers (for instance) clearly can't go that way. Face it, it's easier to legally pursue a company than a single individual. That's the only reason piracy isn't pursued aggressively.
On the same breath: "Scientific experiments show that smoking doesn't hurt your health". Sounds familiar?

No. No respectable scientist would claim this in a journal. But yeah, I agree it's easier to pursue a company than an individual. Which is exactly the reason why legalised piracy would NOT significantly hurt the gaming sector. They already have little to no legal leverage. Nothing would change if it was legal.

max_ai wrote...

2. I think it was you who called "Open source" a movement (correct me if not), I just corrected you. "Open source" ideology doesn't have political agenda nor social one any more than any company which sells its products for $$$ and doesn't release its code.
As for the definition of "Open source" you can check it somewhere else on the web. But I'll say just this, ideally opening your source code should have nothing to do with selling your software for $ or $$$ or giving it away for free. Piracy clearly dis-balances this ideal.

Yes, I called it a movement. I meant there is no point to debate whether it's a movement or not because it doesn't matter to the piracy issue and it's really a matter of semantics. But just for the record, I don't agree that open source movement does not have a political agenda. GPL is specifically designed with politics in mind. Just look at the FSF website.

What makes you say that piracy disbalances open source? Am not sure what you mean.

[AtreiyaN7]

I played Oblivion and Fallout 3...and neither was as good as any of the BioWare games in terms of story and how things play out. Did you forget the patently stupid forced decision in Fallout 3, DESPITE having Fawkes in your group (assuming you're a good karma-type)? They "fixed" that in Broken Steel, but seriously...the original ending was a serious mistake (which many, many people complained about on the Bethesda forums anyway).

[meznaric]

AtreiyaN7 wrote...

I played Oblivion and Fallout 3...and neither was as good as any of the BioWare games in terms of story and how things play out. Did you forget the patently stupid forced decision in Fallout 3, DESPITE having Fawkes in your group (assuming you're a good karma-type)? They "fixed" that in Broken Steel, but seriously...the original ending was a serious mistake (which many, many people complained about on the Bethesda forums anyway).

I agree with the comment about the ending. But if you forget that (or think of the Broken Steel ending instead) the overall story structure is much more interesting than the Bioware one. The story in Bioware games feels very modular. In Fallout3 it just flows naturally.

[Vaenier]

lol, I just realized, my favorite 4 game developers all start with a B.

Bungie, Blizzard, BioWare, Bethesda.

[77boy84]

I remember when someone posted a ****ty picture of how all bioware stories are the same, and then someone from bioware posted in the thread and ripped them a new ****.

I wish I could find that post, because it applies nicely to this thread.

[Nozybidaj]

77boy84 wrote...

I remember when someone posted a ****ty picture of how all bioware stories are the same, and then someone from bioware posted in the thread and ripped them a new ****.

I wish I could find that post, because it applies nicely to this thread.

This one?

gza.gameriot.com/content/images/orig_320200_1_1257581825.png

[77boy84]

Nozybidaj wrote...

77boy84 wrote...

I remember when someone posted a ****ty picture of how all bioware stories are the same, and then someone from bioware posted in the thread and ripped them a new ****.

I wish I could find that post, because it applies nicely to this thread.

This one?

gza.gameriot.com/content/images/orig_320200_1_1257581825.png

It was that picture, but I wanted the post.

I'm gonna go look for it.

EDIT: Found it. That was easy.

http://meforums.biow...05597&forum=144

Modifié par 77boy84, 28 février 2010 - 02:26 .

[TheUnusualSuspect]

meznaric wrote...

And no, as I said before, piracy does NOT cost money. This is your preconception and assertion that you have not backed up with anything. I posted studies that show just how exaggerated the claims by BSA and friends are. The software industry actually PROFITS from piracy.

Sorry, I had to answer this one.  My impressions are not preconceptions.  As I said, I work for a large software&hardware company that makes corporate software.  A specific example was one where it was found that well over US$2B of annual revenue was being lost due to piracy by a Chinese firm that had stolen our software and hardware plans, reverse engineered the hardware, and it was discovered that they'd done this because the software and hardware had the exact same internal faults as ours.

$2B.  Don't tell me that I'm coming from a position of preconception and that I'm blindly swallowing the MRRA or BSA line.  Software piracy has directly affected the company I work for, and me as a consequence.

Piracy hurts those who spent the time, money, and resources to develop the products.  It hurts them period, and no amount of masturbatory self-denial will EVER change my opinion on that.

[meznaric]

TheUnusualSuspect wrote...

meznaric wrote...

And no, as I said before, piracy does NOT cost money. This is your preconception and assertion that you have not backed up with anything. I posted studies that show just how exaggerated the claims by BSA and friends are. The software industry actually PROFITS from piracy.

Sorry, I had to answer this one.  My impressions are not preconceptions.  As I said, I work for a large software&hardware company that makes corporate software.  A specific example was one where it was found that well over US$2B of annual revenue was being lost due to piracy by a Chinese firm that had stolen our software and hardware plans, reverse engineered the hardware, and it was discovered that they'd done this because the software and hardware had the exact same internal faults as ours.

$2B.  Don't tell me that I'm coming from a position of preconception and that I'm blindly swallowing the MRRA or BSA line.  Software piracy has directly affected the company I work for, and me as a consequence.

Piracy hurts those who spent the time, money, and resources to develop the products.  It hurts them period, and no amount of masturbatory self-denial will EVER change my opinion on that.

Your example is a case not of piracy but of something slightly different. In piracy, as most of us know it, you do not rebrand a piece of software and try to sell it as if you had made it. This is where the marketing advantage comes from. Of course if people pretended it was THEIR software they are selling the point I am trying to make would be moot. So I grant that you may have a point in certain very specific cases, but the vast majority of piracy cases does not fall into this category.

[Nozybidaj]

77boy84 wrote...


It was that picture, but I wanted the post.

I'm gonna go look for it.

EDIT: Found it. That was easy.

http://meforums.biow...05597&forum=144

Hahaha, Patrick, u mad.  Must have hit a nerve there.

[77boy84]

Nozybidaj wrote...

77boy84 wrote...


It was that picture, but I wanted the post.

I'm gonna go look for it.

EDIT: Found it. That was easy.

http://meforums.biow...05597&forum=144

Hahaha, Patrick, u mad.  Must have hit a nerve there.

Well, if some guy tried to say everything I worked on as a writer was the same and cliched, I'd be mad too.

[meznaric]

77boy84 wrote...

Nozybidaj wrote...

77boy84 wrote...

I remember when someone posted a ****ty picture of how all bioware stories are the same, and then someone from bioware posted in the thread and ripped them a new ****.

I wish I could find that post, because it applies nicely to this thread.

This one?

gza.gameriot.com/content/images/orig_320200_1_1257581825.png

It was that picture, but I wanted the post.

I'm gonna go look for it.

EDIT: Found it. That was easy.

http://meforums.biow...05597&forum=144

Thanks for the post. His arguments are just what I feared.

1) It's easy. Great, if every developer just did what was easy we'd all go back to playing pacman. Go figure.
2) Easy to understand. Man, this is just as patronising as it gets. "Ooh, we don't think our players are intellectually advanced enough to deal with a more sophisticated story"
3) The comparison he makes to romance novels is excellent! And modern critics agree that romance novels have very boring templated story structure. Exactly my point.

I really don't see how this was meant to be a smashing Bioware rebuttal of the points in the OP.

Modifié par meznaric, 28 février 2010 - 03:18 .

[jklinders]

meznaric wrote...

jklinders wrote...

meznaric wrote...

jklinders wrote...

This,

Comparing game publishing and development to music publishing and development is just silly. It costs millions to produce an A-list title game these days as opposed to at most thousands for a 40  to 110 minute long music album. piracy hurts game development and by extention gamers. End of story.

The idea that piracy hurts development, be it software or music, is a myth. Research shows that, in fact, without software piracy the revenue would have been LOWER. Thus, piracy actually HELPS software development. Check for instance this paper: http://www.bepress.c...l2/iss1/art11/ 

Software was not mentioned in that study. try again.

musicians at least can take advantage of the free publicity and make money of their tours.  Somehow I don't see Bioware doing a world Mass Effect live tour.

As an aside advocating piracy is a pretty good way to get a ban here, seeing as it is against the site rules and all....

You should try reading the first sentence ...

Also, let's threaten anyone who disagrees with our corporate political ideas with a ban sounds like an awesome thing. This is why I keep telling people that freedom of speech does not imply freedom of censorship. 

i did read the first sentence. I had pointed out that software is a different market than music with a very different cost. Your link did nothing to refute that.

Second it is not my rule. Just don't say you were not warned if a mod bans you. Don't worry I didn't snitch if that is what you are worried about:whistle:

lastly, you are saying that people should not be paid for work they do. how would you like it if you took a pay cut becuase your workplace had suffered looses due to people not paying for services provided? This is the part of the equation I am not getting. not a single one of you piracy advocates can do anything to prove stealing games is making game developers richer.

meanwhile legitmate buyers are suffering under increasingly invasive DRM as publishers and developers fight fort their rights and paychecks.

[superimposed]

TheUnusualSuspect wrote...

meznaric wrote..

Let's go through this one by one.

1) They already have an easy option of pirating. Open bit-torrent, download and there you go.  And you get the added bonus of not having to insert your disc whenever you are playing games ... Great.

You must be utterly retarded.  I said that IF the option to pirate easily were not there, then they'd HAVE TO buy the game if they wanted to play it, and assuming that they wouldn't is retarded, so the upshot is that piracy deprives developers of money.  Period.

2) Legalising piracy and still selling the games, as they do now, would not significantly decrease the sales.

Prove it.  Prove it now, or the rest of your argument is absolute garbage.  You're honestly saying that a "good will" model will work?  Hey, I know.  Let's have car yards open their doors, provide the keys to the cars, and let people choose if they'll pay or not.

Your proposal is absolutely retarded in the most extreme way that retardation can be expressed.

3) Actually you are wrong about the headcount. Microsoft spends MORE money in TOTAL as well as PER HEAD on marketing than on software development... Check statistics.

Which proves what?  That it's okay to pirate?

Seriously mate, I'm over this.  You are absolutely freaking retarded beyond comprehension.  Your arguments are facile, and I refuse to be brought down to the level of arguing with an idiot and being beaten by experience.

I'm out.

Actually, piracy is already profuse. Legalising piracy would make no difference to statistics as legality is not an effective deterrent.
And, time and time again, no matter how much effort they put in to protecting their games, they are always cracked sooner or later.

Secondly, the level of piracy is directly proportional to it's popularity, and thus sales.
There's also the fact that it is possible to be convicted of Piracy when it is impossible to purchase a copy of the game domestically.
Most importantly, the absence of 'demos' that were so profuse a few years ago means that the only option of 'testing' a game is to pirate it, and the level of 'piracy protection' make it impossible to return a lot of the PC games you buy these days.

But the biggest point to be made is that a lot of resources and energy are being wasted combatting piracy when there are far more serious issues that need to be dealt with. It's like the War on Drugs - you won't ever win, so try to regulate and control it instead of banning it.

Try and link registering Cd-Keys with downloadable content so that the CD-Key registered to the account which downloaded it is the CD-Key required to install it, and then offer DLC for free.

[Vaenier]

77boy84 wrote...

Nozybidaj wrote...

77boy84 wrote...


It was that picture, but I wanted the post.

I'm gonna go look for it.

EDIT: Found it. That was easy.

http://meforums.biow...05597&forum=144

Hahaha, Patrick, u mad.  Must have hit a nerve there.

Well, if some guy tried to say everything I worked on as a writer was the same and cliched, I'd be mad too.

His responce made me lose respect for BioWare. Oh well, Bungie is still the greatest.

[max_ai]

meznaric wrote...
Yes, I called it a movement. I meant there is no point to debate whether it's a movement or not because it doesn't matter to the piracy issue and it's really a matter of semantics. But just for the record, I don't agree that open source movement does not have a political agenda. GPL is specifically designed with politics in mind. Just look at the FSF website. 

What makes you say that piracy disbalances open source? Am not sure what you mean.

FSF has nothing to do with open source software other than the fact that they both tend to open their sources (free soft =/= open source).
GPL is a necessary evil that "Open source" had to take on itself in its early days (early 90's). Still, GPL is just a license, although an undesired one in terms of open source, but historically was just made part of it.
I really hope that this license will be ditched some day as it puts the wrong impression on the open source software, and stimulates it to develop along the lines of free software (which will eventually lead to a dead end).
FSF has political agenda, open source hasn't.

By dis-balances I mean that open source software can be shown in the same light as inventions. The so called "source" is for everyone to see, yet, it can be protected by patents which obligate you to pay money if you intend to implement the ideas. It advances the technological process, creates competition and most importantly rewards your effort. Piracy ruins almost every benefit of this system. Technological process stops, because people will start copying from each other and you won't be rewarded for your invention, hence you'll be less inclined to develop new things.

[AtreiyaN7]

meznaric wrote...

AtreiyaN7 wrote...

I played Oblivion and Fallout 3...and neither was as good as any of the BioWare games in terms of story and how things play out. Did you forget the patently stupid forced decision in Fallout 3, DESPITE having Fawkes in your group (assuming you're a good karma-type)? They "fixed" that in Broken Steel, but seriously...the original ending was a serious mistake (which many, many people complained about on the Bethesda forums anyway).

I agree with the comment about the ending. But if you forget that (or think of the Broken Steel ending instead) the overall story structure is much more interesting than the Bioware one. The story in Bioware games feels very modular. In Fallout3 it just flows naturally.

I enjoyed Fallout 3, but I wouldn't call the structure innovative in any way, except for the Tranquility Lane section, which was unique/interesting. Otherwise it's standard "go here, do this to get to your objective (aka "Dad")." Raven's Rock? Done the infiltrate a military base thing in Fallouts past. Ditto on hunting for a GECK. Also, there wasn't anything that I found terribly memorable in the writing, whereas in a BioWare game, you usually end up with a lot of memorable quotes and lines. FO3 was a solid game and lots of fun, but it didn't strike me as being awe-inspiring as far as the story went.

BioWare has structured stories that flow pretty well. In a Bethesda game, the narratives are pretty loosely connected and don't always come together in a satisfactory manner in my opinion. I prefer the generally tighter writing in a BioWare game, but to each their own.