Spring RTS Engine

With the onslaugth of HL2 and steam, we got the first in what could be a series of very bad progress for the future of pirating games and programs.

Picture this. 30 years from now, when your toasters, your alarm clock, the moon and Alaska all have internet acess and those who haven't had contac with a computer before their 40's finaly die... devolpers all over could get on a mad scheme to follow the Steam model. Every game and program you purshacse wants to connect to the internet and register you. You have no excuse, no "i got no internet ". Everyone has internet. Most pepole have internet but no phone!

Now, the code for registering inbedded and encrypted in the program, altering it is hard to the point of nearly imbossibole. Offcourse, HL2 was cracked, but when did it come? half a year after release? (not talking about those cracks that were fixed very fast) So now you get your cracks up to a year after the game is released, and then you can't even play online...

Will that be the future? A death to pirating as we know it?

I don't think it'll happen. Annoying people only increases demand for warez and even Apple and the RIAA already admit that DRM isn't that good of an idea. The more you annoy people the less they want to buy a legal version and, more importantly, the less they consider your program worth it. That means they'll either wait for the bargain bin or not buy it at all in most cases.

Also considering how stores like Gamestop subsist only on used game sales (the rest doesn't bring any money) and these lockdowns would make used game sales impossible you'd see fewer stores even carry games. If we add the people who won't be buying anymore once they know they can't sell the games back when they're done with them to save money and increasing development costs to stay on the cutting edge I think those who do that will get destroyed sooner or later.

technology is faster than law, that creates abuses from both sides, each side blaming the other for the things they "have" to do

several reasons i think piraty will not die:

ethics of copying != ethics of stealing, some cultures dont really think that copying something is so horrible

you dont have to go to a dark alley and deal with a drug dealer to pirate a game, you are still your tipical sweet child

the world is not homogenous, but internet is: people who earn +3000$ and people who earn 10$ a month can log in the same forums

if you are poor you dont play with rich children, they live in the other side of the city and they dont want to touch you, its the same the other way around, you stay with your friends and share you opinion about games/movies so that your mates play with you [this is a extreme case, i suposse i can say this without hurting anyone]

but in internet there are all people together, you get ALL the opinions and recomendations of products that wether you are supposed to hear it or not

its a mixture of lots of things: people who are full of pride because they can break profesional encryptions, people who want to play a game / watch a movie the have no other way to get, people who think that pirating is the cheap version of buying, people who want its media to be pirated so that lots of people recomend it to buyers / create standars, etc

maybe in the usa its harder to pirate media, but in other countries the law simply doesnt care, and being already not morally rewarding to buy....

we are trained to be weak willed consumers who buy buy buy, whether we have the money or not

Those are some fine points for the internet, but it dosen't change the fact that the big evil companies want to steal your monies! :O

And laws dosen't edit much, GOVERMENTS can't stop us unless they do some world wide pirate head hunt, which is not needed in the eyes of many.

what is dicussed here is IF the HL2/steam model can get widespread and destroy our chances to be called theives!

Probably not, people will just continue to crack the neccessary steam DLLs/programs in addition.

Whats interestign about steam is it makes it so easy to just pay and download games i dont even want to pirate them.

Ishach wrote:Whats interestign about steam is it makes it so easy to just pay and download games i dont even want to pirate them.

Damn good point, I've spent so much more money on online subscriptions this past year...

I can't believe this discussion is happening on the forum for an open source game. Of course pirating will die...




















When everything is open source! Open Source FTW! You can't pirate it because they give it away!

10053r wrote:When everything is open source! Open Source FTW! You can't pirate it because they give it away!

open source food, fuel and electricity!!!!

i want open source money i can recompile over and over again xD



thats actually a good point, pirating is usually problematic (soft upgrades, loss of features, etc), with OS you go back to install & it works


but people still feel like the king of the world when they steal? 3000$ soft suites from big companies, even (specially) if they dont really need it

Radja wrote:

10053r wrote:When everything is open source! Open Source FTW! You can't pirate it because they give it away!

open source food, fuel and electricity!!!!

It's called communism



Open-source = communism

Edit: Doesn't tux look soo cute with that hat

Radja wrote:

10053r wrote:When everything is open source! Open Source FTW! You can't pirate it because they give it away!

open source food, fuel and electricity!!!!

i want open source money i can recompile over and over again xD

i vote for freeware beer :)

Nah, the pirating will never die. As have been stated above - some people just don`t think that copying is something terrible...

Take Windows XP for example... Serialnumbers? - here you go!
Activation remover? Sure! Come again!

it`s like asking "Will there someday be no computer viruses?"

lol XP activation removes itself if you ask nicely...

omg i never knew i was communist (i use linux xD)

tux is cute, you could turn it into a krogoth it would still look cute



communism and capitalism are in my opinion both broken, because they believe in the happy idea that the individual will work for the good of the swarn... i mean the people just because its the right thing

Naah, capitalism is broken for a different reason, customers aren't informed enough to make the decisions that are best for them (and marketers do their best to keep it like that) so monopolies have an easy time keeping their position and destroying everyone in their path.

Both systems seem to be designed for a market of essentials (e.g. food, water, ...)m, not a market that involves scientific progress and luxuries.

I FUCKING HATE STEAM! It is asinine and makes it harder for people to try a game with me to see if they like it. It only halfway stop pirates, frankly, if I could get 2 friends online in darkmessaih with me they would probably buy the game but multiplayer spawns are not even possible.. I HATE STEAM.

I am sure piracy will still go on. Dispite valves crap hoop jumping.

smoth wrote:I FUCKING HATE STEAM! It is asinine and makes it harder for people to try a game with me to see if they like it. It only halfway stop pirates, frankly, if I could get 2 friends online in darkmessaih with me they would probably buy the game but multiplayer spawns are not even possible.. I HATE STEAM.

I am sure piracy will still go on. Dispite valves crap hoop jumping.

Cant they play the demo :S

they can but the demo is a gimp most of the time. A multiplayer spawn is better. Hell I bought the game but had to DOWNLOAD the multiplayer anyway. Often times demos are shoddy and lack the full features.

One of the things that happens a lot at lans is people try your game with you. If they have a good time, they will buy it. If they do not like it they will free space up and that game is gone.

Spawns help this in a legal way.

capitalism is made to support a inner market style economy, where everybody buys and sells, in a customer - seller system things go a little odd

how im i suppossed to develop economicaly if i just earn money to buy goods / services? i cannot enhance my shop since i have have none, and i wont use my money to enhance my workplace (its not mine anyway, its my boss' or my boss' boss' boss' ....)

buying a better house / car / whatever wont make me stronger economically, on the contrary, those goods lose value every second they age

money loses value by time and customers are the black hole who endures that loss

BF1942 Pirate Mod FTW!!!

smoth wrote:they can but the demo is a gimp most of the time. A multiplayer spawn is better. Hell I bought the game but had to DOWNLOAD the multiplayer anyway. Often times demos are shoddy and lack the full features.

One of the things that happens a lot at lans is people try your game with you. If they have a good time, they will buy it. If they do not like it they will free space up and that game is gone.

Spawns help this in a legal way.

Actually, the thing I notice is at Lans everyone just keeps the game afterward for the next lan, and no one buys the game.