Now if only they'd spend time.... Oh I don't know, keeping the biggest game companies from leaving the group. ESA, how about a little more energy giving gamers what they want from E3, and less time slapping people on the wrist for what China makes a huge production of.

3drage

@interstate78:
You don't outlaw knives because people use them to commit murders.

DimensionWarped

I think there are exceptions for everything. For instance, I don't have any qualms with pirating the PC version of San Andreas so that I can play Multitheft Auto. Why? Because I bought it on PS2 when it first came out and was the only option.

DimensionWarped

@ZeroBlade: If game publishers knew that Peer-to-peer apps would be outlawed and abolished, I wonder how many of them would mind allowing you to download from their servers if it could reduce piracy to a minimum.

You're comparing apples and oranges. The P2P networks' are almost exclusively used for piracy. Since they exist, of course they are put to some good use but nobody can deny that they're a plague and have widespread piracy to an unprecedented level.

interstate78

@pinshot: While I agree that pirating a game that is crap is fine (I don't mind driving a shovelware company into the ground) you can't just say that that is the primary reason. I know a lot more people that download every game they can rather than pay, even for greats like Bioshock, the Halo 1 and 2 and Bioware games (Mass Effect, KOTOR, ect.) Those companies. all deserve to get money so they can keep making great games. If pirating had a heart, it wouldn't matter, but, since there are so many that don't care, it has to be stopped, in my oppinion. Like a school of fish, you all sink or swim together.

Also, the idea that the ability to mod a console is the reason PS1 and 2 won is ridiculous, while that may have pushed console sales for a small portion of the population, the average owner did not mod their system. It sold well becaseu it had amazing 3rd party support. Which in turn made it have great games, which in turn, is why you would ever want to mod it in the first place. So, that's that.

R3Verb

@interstate78: No it isn't. Torrents can be used to download linux distributions or other free software. Just today I downloaded Fiesta (free Korean MMORPG) as a torrent since the DDL was slow.

Applications don't pirate, people do.

affenvampir

@superbabyproject: well played sir. full of win.

jon.doe

@interstate78:
No they aren't you dumbass. P2P apps such as those for torrent files have extremely widespread applications and are used for things like distributing large freeware applications and sites like OCRemix use them to conserve bandwidth while dealing in high volumes of files. There are many thousands of legitimate uses for P2P software that are put into practice every day. Fact is, you might as well have said CD burners should be outlawed.

DimensionWarped

@FrigidAir44: you said ''the reason PS3 and 360 games are 60 bucks is because they choose to charge that much''

Yet it was reported recently that 70% of games are not profitable.

So I guess according to your opinion, their only reason is that they just *feel like it*. It certainly has nothing to do with the rising cost of actually making huh? no, that would be too logical.

Do you have any idea by how much the price of making games today has risen in comparison with the snes days, over 10 years ago? Haven't you notice that since the early 90s the price of games has only risen by about 10$ while the price of a can of soda, rent and minimum wage have doubled? Nevermind the fact that we now have 'greatest hits' selling for half price, something unheard of until the PSX days.

Certainly it's the evil 'Big Companies'. A huge scam to get all of our moneys!

interstate78

@FrigidAir44: Yeah that's it. Obviously the fact game makers have to pay MSFT and Sony in order to print the game onto media has nothing to do with it.

-Z-

@Ghede: Crisis averted.

[ZTF]

@I love Maria Ozawa: I speak on behalf of all Dragon Quest fans, you could of gone without ever playing DQVII and been ok. (Kidding) Glad you had a chance to play it.

Eviscerate

@ZeroBlade: Their not They're...

ZeroBlade

@I love Maria Ozawa:

Piracy my be your excuse to in order to play those games, but you could just as well buy import systems and games in order to play them.

PS. I <3 Maria Ozawa as well.

BlackANUS

@interstate78: They're only purpose is not piracy, they are often a much better alternative than direct downloads for all parties involved. What you are suggesting is more along the lines of banning cutlery because they could be used to stab somebody, while ignoring their potential for positive results (Like food preparation.)

ZeroBlade

oh and while i am whining the biggest reason of all (except money) for pirating a game is simple...GAMERS DO NOT WANT TO WAIT LONGER THEN THEIR INTERNATIONAL FRIENDS FOR THE SAME GAME!And its the same for movies!I think i have said it all...

pinshot

@ShaggE: Presiding was Judge Randall. P. Ownage.

superbabyproject

Piracy sells more consoles.Simple.PS1 won because it was easy to put a 12pin chip in, PS2 even easier to chip and now xbox is the easiest to flash (you dont even need hardware)...so thats that.
The thing i hate most is the fact that a company that creates utter rubbish is entitled to charge the same as a company that creates a work of art...that is what drives piracy imo.Games are too expensive and the developers that complain and say they only just about make enough money back - MAKE BETTER GAMES THEN!!!
And if anti piracy groups want to be taken seriously then they should stop playing everyone for fools "1 download is 1 lost sale" is utter rubbish...people download your games because they are crap and not worth paying for...i for one have never downloaded a grade A title...now that would be theft!

pinshot

this is just like the tobacco industry: they don't hit where it hurts. why all these laws if they could simply outlaw the toxins that have nothing to do with the base product in the first place?

The real source of the problem is the peer-to-peer apps that are too widespread. They should ALL be made illegal.

their only purpose is piracy anyway

interstate78

Just imagine the title of an article in NYC news paper tomorrow, "Fuchs get Fu*ked". Original, No. Funny, No. I don't even know why I posted it.

RyuriTatsujin

Because I live in the UK; piracy is the 'only' way to play games like Dragon Quest 7, THE iDOLM@STER, Xenogears and many others.

I love Maria Ozawa

"Trial Attorney Tyler G. Newby"

...

O.O

NOOB!

Sorry, I had to. It was right friggin' there.

ShaggE

Where have I heard the name Kevin Fuchs before?

zoesch

Does anyone know if Kevin Fuchs and Kifah Maswadi are still accepting orders?

Jimbuck

Don't let them fool you, the reason PS3 and 360 games are 60 bucks is because they choose to charge that much. Not because of piracy. The same games released on PC usually are 40-50 brand new.

Still, I'm glad to see some pirates in jail instead of getting a slap on the wrist.

FrigidAir44

I can think of better things my tax money could've gone towards, but then again, that's rarely not the case.

Señor Vorpal Kickass'o

Am I the ony one that thought "what does the European Space Agency have to do with game piracy?" when reading the headline?

affenvampir

Good, they got what they deserved. I wish this happened more often--pirates ruin gaming for everyone else.

fenderfuel08

Before anyone goes freaking out, this isn't the RIAA. They are targeting major distributors of hardware, not people who torrent .ISOs and roms. These guys made six-digits a year selling this stuff. They got greedy.

Ghede

Good. There is no valid reason to pirate a game. Ever.

Dalren

@interstate78:
They should really ban libraries too. I mean, I can just walk in to a library, sit down, and start reading a book WITHOUT EVEN PAYING FOR IT. I mean, the only reason libraries even exist is so that people can steal money from the authors.

wiregr

how on earth did they cram 76 or more games onto a system? were these minigames? if I install 8-10 full sized games my computer starts to complain..

please buy your music and games people.. unless they are drm bombs, then avoid them..

ps: restrictive drm has done more to ruin gaming by redefining property ownership into glorified rentaldom than pirating ever could.. the new serfdom, you're soaking in it..

railskins

@pinshot: Not true. The Xbox was way easier to mod than tha PS2, and demshits was outsold like 10 to 1.

Seriously, fuck those two guys. Dude made 400k by selling games he didn't make.

Fuck him.

balls187 upside yo head

Ban the Internet. Ban communication. Ban movement. Ban the ability to blink and breathe. The mere act of being able to blink enables piracy. If I wanted to spend the time, I could communicate an rar file containing an iso of a BR disk for Soulplane in the form of a Morse-style code. Or rhythmically breathe it in a way that someone is ready to interpret and write themselves.

DimensionWarped

@pinshot: Piracy sells more consoles.

But most consoles are sold at a loss, to be made up on licensing fees on software. Console makers do not want to sell a console to someone who isn't going to buy several games for it. (The exception is Nintendo, which does sell for slightly higher than the manufacturing cost.)

The thing i hate most is the fact that a company that creates utter rubbish is entitled to charge the same as a company that creates a work of art

They are also entitled to charge less. Or more. Just as you're entitled to stack cost versus quality and make a choice.

people download your games because they are crap and not worth paying for

If they are so crap, don't play them at all.

beeporama (brian.j.parker)

@R3Verb: Hello...PSP?

KaliKOtt

@interstate78: "Since they exist, of course they are put to some good use but nobody can deny that they're a plague and have widespread piracy to an unprecedented level."

High speed internet has done that (e.g. rapidshare is mainly used for piracy and is not P2P), ban DSL. If everyone has dial up again piracy won't be a problem.

Your line of reasoning is riddicioulus. Dou wou want to ban scanners to stop book and comic piracy, too?

affenvampir

@interstate78: Nobody is denying that P2P apps are used for piracy. You're the one that's denying that P2P apps are used for things unrelated to piracy too (Linux distros, freeware games, basically anything open source). The problem is the trackers which allow pirated material, not the protocol/applications.

Codemasterflex

I always want to jump into these threads and defend people who pirate and then buy, but frankly it's such a small subsection of the group it's barely worth mentioning. I'm one of them, admittedly, and I'm not remotely ashamed of it. Why? I can't rent PC games, plain and simple. Blockbuster rented a few titles back when people thought live action cutscenes were the way to go (bless 'em) but no longer.

Señor Vorpal Kickass'o

Im all for stuff like this. I believe targeting people who are simply downloading for personal use (which the RIAA seems to love to do) is kinda bs, but targeting people who are trying to make money off said is definitely the way to go.

@8bitcity:

well if a game is bought used from gamestop that means somebody had to buy the game originaly. in the case of a pirated game, it was never bought at all. so your logic doesn't work at all.

demonknightinuyasha

@8bitcity: when you buy a used game, the next person will buy the new one instead because there's no used ones in stock.

EVERYTHING you do has consequences.

interstate78

@interstate78: Well, not necessarily. Unless their sole purpose was really for piracy, they should be legal. As long as there is one tiny bit of freeware on filesharing programs, they'll continue to be legal.

Mink_Car

@affenvampir: Europe has a "Space Agency"? Who knew(outside of Europe)?

DrunkenTrom

@Ghede: Isn't it just a matter of time till they start stalking people in the parking lots and fining single mothers 200.000$ for using Limewire?

I'm not pro-piracy, but instead of going the way of RIAA and molesting the working man - they should go for people making money out of pirated games, lower game prices and move toward digital distribution.

bakakensai

@interstate78: In case you couldn't tell, I was being sarcastic. Funding aside, the point I was trying to make was just because there's the possibility for abuse doesn't mean that everything should be outlawed. That's like outlawing automobiles because you can kill people with them. Sure, by outlawing them, the mortality rate would drop to 0, but is that really the best solution?

P2P has quite a few applications outside the realm of piracy. Much faster download speeds when you're grabbing large files such as linux distributions, large model files, movies (believe it or not, not every movie on the internet is a stolen one from the theaters) anything with a large filesize for example. I'd rather grab the Debian DVDs over bittorrent so I can take advantage of everyone with a fast connection than trying to find the single server that can give me speeds faster than 10KBps.

wiregr

@8bitcity: One could argue that each used game was still initially purchased new, so no matter what, the developer still got some money from that physical copy, whereas digital copies only require one physical source. Still, I get what you're saying.

kylenalepa

@Dalren: There are plenty of valid reasons to pirate a game. Remember the cases (forget the exact games, but there were a few) where people bought games but couldn't install them because of faulty copy protection? Their only recourse was to download a pirated copy to play what they paid for.

What about games where there is no demo available? Console games, at least, you can rent at a store, but what about PC games? Are we expected to fork over $50 (or more in other countries) for something that, let's be honest, has a decent chance of being a steaming pile of crap? Reviews only help so much in determining whether one will enjoy a game or not.

Don't get me wrong; piracy is illegal. I know this. Most pirates know this. But the only time I would consider it to be immoral or unethical is if you are downloading something you'd normally buy or if you are reselling downloaded games, profiting off of the developers' work. Otherwise, I can sleep easy at night.

kylenalepa

You guys realize that game companies MAKE ZERO FUCKING DOLLARS OFF USED GAME SALES.

So what's the difference between pirating games and buying a used game? Gamestop's wallet.

8bitcity

I'm cool with anything data-wise that follows the hacker ethic, and that's something these guys violated big time.

mhlaxp

Bravo. I hope they nail all the suppliers.

BigWeather

@DimensionWarped: Also, in the UK, that's exactly what's happened funnily enough.

Poo_and_Weeeee

Who really cares if some pirated say, DQVII? It's not like the game's new anymore, the only way to get a copy would be second hand, so you're not supporting the developers in any way. If developers really care about fans having a chance to play their older games, then they'd offer them as digital downloads, and of course, some do, and that's usually PC devs, obviously due to the nature of the platform. But loads of other times, you're screwed.

Poo_and_Weeeee

@wiregr: you pay libraries with your taxes.

All of you guys have no valid arguments. you won't admit to yourself that it's the source of the problem.

It used to be that pirating was exclusive to some sort of underground network. Now anybody with a PC and an internet connection can be downloading a game in the matter of a few clicks.

It's an anonymous crime, that's why it's so widespread. If it took some real effort you can bet your ass less people would do it. The reason it's so easy is access to P2P apps on which you find almost othing but pirated material

Get real people. it's right in front of your eyes yet you deny it. what a fakkin load of bullshit

interstate78

@interstate78: Moreover, a large portion of the money you pay to buy a used game is reinvested in buying new games.

emag

@interstate78: And the reason 70% is not profitable is only because of piracy, not the fact that 70% of games don't deserve to be profitable?

As for these pirates, trying to profit six figures of piracy should get you locked up.

arstal

@GViper: @GViper: @[ZTF]:

What's sad is that all your arguments are really saying ''we can't stop it, so let's not try''.

I'm pointing out P2P because it's the most flagrant offender out there.

Some dudes chatting it up on newsgroups? yeah, like THAT would be a big problem. Pirates pirating illegal p2p software? sure! at least it won't be freely available from any website and those who do will be shut down.

when you take legal p2p out of the equation, it suddenly becomes much harder to freely pirate stuff left and right.

interstate78

So long as the target the drug dealer, and not the drug user, I'm cool with it.

/bad analogy overloading!!!

Wait ... what the hell are we talking about?

PhilipWPerna

These threads always make me tired. Not that there is anything wrong with this article, it IS honest-to-goodness gaming news. It's just that arguing about piracy is like arguing about abortion. Everyone comes to the debate with their views set in stone and we all just go out back and beat on the dead horse for a hundred posts or so. I think I'll avoid taking a few whacks at it this time around ;-).

@bakakensai: Appeal to probability does not a convincing argument make.
[en.wikipedia.org]

NateN

@GViper: Back-up? Hell, most people who know what they are doing prefer Newsgroups.

@interstate78: Pirates would find a way, regardless of what was outlawed or not. Even if that meant pirating and illegal using P2P programs.

[ZTF]

@interstate78: Where p2p fails, theres always Newsgroups, a pirates backup since time began.

GViper

@interstate78: Or they won't buy it because it's too expensive?

I pay good money for games. LOTS of games and LOTS of peripherals, imports and more as a UK based gamer.

Do I pirate? Sometimes. If I enjoy the game do I buy it? Always. Hence UK PAL Pre-order for Persona 3:FES - A game I have already finished.

Not saying that everyone does that, but please, don't tar us all with the same brush. That'd be like calling all Americans stupid purely because George Bush is.

GViper

@Codemasterflex: what I'm saying is that if p2p didn't exist, there would be alternatives that are less inclined to lead to piracy.

everyone would be better for it in the end.

(except pirates)

interstate78

While it's good that they were caught, this is hardly a deterrent for the hardcore warez group members. People think they're invulnerable to repercussions of things they do on the internets.

It's a good thing (for the pirates) that there isn't more money being put into the fight against piracy. I imagine that if there were more people on the job and "undercover" working against these guys, we'd see news like this every week.

Omatic

@interstate78: No. There are too many good applications to outlaw P2P.

It's a way to get news (via videos or other means) in countries where a lot of sites are censored or banned.

Blizzard uses it extensively for game downloads and updates.

Countless mod makers distribute their games and patches with it and would never be able to afford the bandwidth otherwise.

Your argument really does boil down to us banning guns, knives, CD-Rs, DVD-Rs, possibly other forms of writable media. Basically anything that can be used for bad should be made illegal no matter the practical applications, right? "No, P2P is different." No, it's not.

Yes, piracy is a problem, but making P2P illegal isn't a good solution. The means to the end really do make a difference.

There's an entirely new distribution method out there and businesses need to get with the times. A lot of old businesses are trying to hang on to the old model. Piracy, while wrong, is push-back against that model. We have better ways now and consumers want to see them taken advantage of. Get the games on Steam or some other distribution system with great community features and things like achievements and the ability to play your game from any computer. Don't over-charge. Make quality games that have great gameplay.

While I don't have any hard facts or statistics to back this up, I would be willing to bet that companies that aren't willing to do digital distribution in the PC market, or make you use their own proprietary platform when there are more mature, nicer to use platforms out there, see a higher percentage of piracy than those games that are released on platforms such as Steam.

Falcon

Prison? For pirating software? That's so stupid. The crime isn't serious enough to put two probably-nerds in the same building as murders, rapists, and other assorted real criminals.

Do Kesubei

I think the biggest problem is not piracy, but game retailers selling used games. There is something wrong when they make mega-profit off used games and NON of that goes back the developers. That's where my tax money should be going is into research to fix THAT problem and not piracy.

Granted, the guys in this article were making money off of piracy. That's definitely one thing I don't condone is making money of piracy, throw the book at people who make money off of piracy, but leave the people who don't alone.

I think people honestly pirate for a variety of reasons, people are tending to slump piracy into one reason as to why people pirate and just like reality, it's a grey area and not black and white. Reasons being that the game will never come to their country, games ARE expensive, release dates for your country (people should have to wait over a year to get the game that will come, especially if no translation is required... i feel bad for Australia, they get the most fuxed out of any region I read about for game launches), people are poor and everyone is entitled to equal living rights.

RTW

The list of excuses for piracy is as long as it is old, it's stealing, regardless if the game was good or not, your still a thief for doing it.

Pwnieboy was BOCultist was Epaminondas

@R3Verb: I love the idea of a bunch of kids downloading and playing a totally crap game because if the game sucks that's A-OK. C'mon man. Nobody is wasting their time downloading a game they don't want to play.

Sandvich

ah yes the original xbox was amazing when modded.

Piracy has alwaysw been around and always will be. It is impossible to defeat it because as the techj evolves so too does the software pirates knowledge and abilities. Some of the hacks that come out these days are simply mind boggling...i often wonder how people have the time or resources to put into ripping apart firware...but they do...and there better at piracy then the multi billion dollar companies are at beating it.

The only hope for media companies in general is to find common ground with "pirates" and users of pirated stuff. And on that build a system of fast, efficiant, quality product delivery that is affordable to all.afterall no kid likes standing there picking between 2 AAA titles with only £40 in his back burner. That is also what drives piracy.

i dont wish to go into if i would commit piracy or not but one thing that would prevent me from ever doing it would be a)always have universal same day release as it is unfair to give other countries a headstart on leaderboards etc. b) there should be an option for download of your game as i hate going to town c) if my CD becomes scratched (xbox) i should have the option to burn another or get free replacement and d)if my game is buggy, glitchy and generally poorly programmed it should be treated as broken and i entitled to a full refund...and then i would never download anything...there would really be no point!

pinshot

@8bitcity:
I do everything in my power to not buy used from GameStop due to this. A used game is supposed to be a bargain, pricing it at a measely $5 below retail I'd rather pay the extra $5 and know the developer / publisher / etc. are getting paid. I'll buy used if it is not available new due to being an old game or if the used price is a significant (say 50 - 75% off) savings.

BigWeather

There is no point in targeting the demand here, what are you going to do, strap kids into a classroom and show bad pictures of why you shouldn't pirate. It is far easier to just attack and shut down all torrent sites that are known to pirate games in large quantities.

In the end, there is no reason to torrent, don't say crap likes its too expensive, I want to test drive it, etc. Still, the price of games should come down, but a pirated download doesn't mean a lost sale. People who pirate generally have NO INTENTION to buy the game anyway. So if you crack down hard on the pirated suppliers, then there will be less of it.

antisniper

@Eviscerate: she is hot

pinshot

To be honest it actually amazes me that we even cover this as if it is that important. I think the biggest problem facing gaming today is the behaviour of some people when playing online. Games companies should spend more time on figuring out how to prevent people being racist, team killing, lag glitching and being a general annoyance to other gamers...that would make gaming more fun (online) and innevitably lead to more sales.Piracy is only such a problem to smaller companies...thats why the really big companies really dont try to do anything about it.

pinshot

@pinshot: Unfortunately this is only a big problem for those who cannot moderate themselves accordingly with "ignorable" behavior by having the self control to mute, block, and/or report these actions.

The same point you are articulating can be said about any other online experience that doesn't involve gaming. Some people cowardly crave attention behind their monitors/mics on the internet. It happens and you cannot prevent all of it. It is hard to police people within a medium of communication that isn't heavily policed already. Pigeonholing an issue with only game companies themselves to do something that has been asked far longer about the internet itself in general from the government is pie in the sky. Your asking for a form of control on something that touches the lives of other countries with other governments, so the best advice and solution in dealing with a medium such as that is again to moderate yourself accordingly with ignorable behaviors and mute, block, and/or report those actions.

TC

Yea, I'm sure most game pirates earned $390,000 cracking Quake 4 in their mom's basement.

This is exactly the kind of information they use to distort the whole background of piracy. If you earn money with somebody else's work, of course you're stealing it.

If a friend copies a game for you, to convince you it might be fun and you d/l a crack from a warez site... that's not a business.

They just put Mafia-esque money-making schemes in one pot with 12-year olds downloading random games they shouldn't even be able to buy in a store. Games they weren't even terribly interested in in the first place. Games, that would have cost them hundreds of dollars per month, that no-one in their right mind would ever pay for games you aren't absolutely sure you want.

Also, if this is really one of the "largest piracy investigations conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Justice", then it's a pretty pathetic victory, anyway.

lumpi

@interstate78: I just smell the shitstorm coming

Altima NEO

Ah yes. We at the ESA applaud the US government and police force for bringing these two horrible horrible pirates to justice. We are also thankful that the government is not trying to limit our sales with their outlandish claims against video games, and we are extra thankful that the govnernment continually sides with us as we continue to hold our games hostage despite that the consumer has actually purchased the games.

Can you even buy games anymore? Aren't they all still locked to heck and back, and by the time you finally get it installed and running you've accidentally violated the copy protection 18 times?

Saxboy

@antisniper: That won't work. If you shutdown one tracker a couple of days later 2 or 3 new ones open up. Then there's the problem of trackers that are located in countries where it isn't illigal to do what they do (like TPB).

Narishma

Good, screw any bastard that would make money off of somebody else's work.

Kytano-Skorpius

@Do Kesubei: They're just as much real criminals as the violent offenders.

Dalren

@interstate78: I wouldn't say their ONLY purpose is piracy, but that's probably how most people use P2P. Personally, I use P2P for rare/out-of-print stuff.

topraman517

@ZeroBlade: I love downloading the latest release of Ubuntu on Bittorrent as the next guy but... oh, wait... the next guy would rather download games and movies... Houston, we have a problem.

BtownDesignGuy

@8bitcity: So Gamestop employees don't deserve to make money?

topraman517

@interstate78: ROFL at "anonymous crime". Anyone with any smarts knows how to track IPs to a service provider. Anyone who takes a couple days to read up on the subject can track IP usage statistics. And since most ISPs have clauses that state they'll rat you out of you're doing anything illegal on their networks... well.. It's not so anonymous now, is it.

Ignoring that argument for a minute, your original statement of P2P software being used for piracy only is bunk. P2P software was originally created for business use and some (usually smaller) businesses still use P2P software to this day to alleviate client-server overload.

Do a lot of people use P2P for piracy? Yeah, they do. But to say the only use of P2P programs is piracy is shortsighted at best. It would be like saying file transferring on IM programs is only for piracy. I'm sure a lot of people transfer pirated software, music and movies over IM programs, but that's not all its used for.

Captiosus

@demonknightinuyasha:

Except a used game can be bought and sold by Gamestop several times, not just once, so the original argument has at least a little merit. It's not like a rental, where Gamestop pays a royalty for each used copy it sells... at least, not as far as I know...

@DimensionWarped: But what if knives were, arguably, used to kill people more often than they were to cut meat? Kind of like how, for example, handguns are used to kill people far more often than they are used for hunting? Wait a minute... does anyone actually go hunting with handguns?

Point is, I don't pirate using P2P apps. But everyone I know does. Talk about an inconvenient truth!

BtownDesignGuy

@pinshot: Okay, but why would you download anything less than Grade A in the first place? I mean, why waste your time with something that is not all that great? There are tons of Grade A games throughout gaming's history, and if you somehow managed to play every one of them, shouldn't you be doing something better than playing mediocre games? I mean, you can't love gaming THAT much, can you, that you would even want to play the shitty games? At that point you should get some mental help.

The whole "I only pirate stuff that sucks" argument is monumentally stupid.

topraman517

@Ghede: Indeed. The ESA figured out some time ago that it's the heads you want to go after, not the bottom user.

RawSteelUT

@interstate78: "Peer-to-peer" is simply too broad. If stuff's going to be banned, you need to be precise. BitTorrent has proven a useful tool in the widespread distribution of large files such as Linux distributions and WoW patches. What I assume you mean, however, are file sharing networks like Frost/Limewire and their ilk, in which case I totally agree. They're not used for any legitimate purpose (those are covered better by torrents), but are only used for people looking for free stuff, especially music.

Hell, banning file sharing networks would both lessen piracy (as torrenting actually involves sniffing out websites and dealing with ISP throttling), but would curb virus penetration significantly as a pleasant side-effect.

RawSteelUT

@Pwnieboy was BOCultist was Epaminondas: "The list of excuses for piracy is as long as it is old, it's stealing, regardless if the game was good or not, your still a thief for doing it."

At the end of last year, I was hankering for some Diablo II action again, but couldn't find my Diablo II expansion CD. So I pirated it. And then stumbled across my CD a week later.

Before Doom III's release, I had it on preorder. But being in the UK, the release date was about a week after the US release date - and also conflicted with a new job I was starting. So I downloaded it. Incidentally, the reason I'd pre-ordered was because I'd really enjoyed the Doom III beta I'd downloaded. And even though the final game wasn't as good as the beta (dunno how they managed that), I didn't cancel my preorder. Although the stats based purely on me would show that 67% of sales were lost to piracy. Idiots. They couldn't have got any more of my money - I bought on release day at inflated UK prices.

I'm one of the people who also buys all the games they download (unless you count that horrible radio play 'Star Trek: Legacy' as a "game"). :P For me, it's a matter of convenience, whether it's a lack of demo or a delayed UK release date or StarForce copy protection or some other DRM problem.

And as for the chap who claims one can just import games not available in one's own region - yes, that would be ideal and preferable. So make consoles region-free, and stop SONY from shutting down import sites like Lik Sang and trying to make importing a crime.

Finally, more on-topic, pirating for 6-figure profit is absolutely on a par with theft and fraud of that magnitude - of course they should go to prison.

PenguinJim

I believe that these people got what they deserved, but I think they should focus on real crimes. Our country is already up to our eyeballs in debt, we really don't need to put so much tax dollars into these investigations. And one last question...WHO THE FUCK HAS $500,000!?

biohazrd901

Lol, the ESA trying to scare more people into not pirating. As you can see they don't mention exactly what these pirates did... Which is SELL boot legged video games and modded consoles. They didn't just download and share games, they sold physical products.

Pirates can't be stopped, and they won't be. This is just a petty scare tactic that might get the occasional person to grow overly worried and cut back on music/game/movie downloads.

People who are complete anti-pirates don't know the roots of piracy. Hackers and pirates helped perpetuate the internet and technology into what it is today. I understand that some 15 year old in Michigan downloading SNES roms isn't really helping to change anything, but get over it. It's going to continue happening, and there is no use trying to fight it.

DirtySyko

@Do Kesubei: Or they could just throw them into the same building as the other thieves, burglars, white collar criminals....

MeanMillz

@pinshot:

That has got to be the worst argument for stealing from a company I've ever heard.

So according to you stealing from Sony somehow earns them more money? The PS1 and PS2 dominated the market because pirates stole games??? Huh, that's odd because when I go to a store to get a game they still have these funny little price tags on them. Weird, I know. Capcom expects me to pay for their goods??? Let's keep one simple and basic idea in mind. The more that is stolen from one company the higher the prices will go. Okay?

So I don't like Paydays. I hate them actually. By your logic I can run on over to my local Meijer and steal a few of them because they're utter rubbish. It's not my fault that I'm stealing the candy bars, the company that produces them should know that I find them less than grade A. Hell, I would NEVER think of stealing a Snickers because those taste great.

Please tell you that you know deep down how foolish your justification for theft is.

TooGoodForKotaku

@affenvampir:

lol, what does the European Space Agency have to do with space travel? They might as well get involved with gaming because as a "Space Agency" they fail. I feel really bad for my American brothers when they are forced to share such a small area in the shuttle with those free loading Europeans (Yes Europeans are nothing more than cosmic hitchhikers..."Space station or bust lulz"). Sad really.

Oh and anyone stealing games should go to jail. Period.

TooGoodForKotaku