Vitali Kirpu and Alex Poysky, the developers behind Pixel Piracy, have “pirated” a copy of their own game, offering a free torrent download on their site. Because if you can’t beat ’em, appeal to their sense of decency.
“We aren’t idiots, we aren’t high”, they write on the game’s site. “We believe that anyone who wants to pirate our game will do so anyways, and feel it’s a much safer bet to offer those people the official link to our game in hopes that they keep their computer’s virus free.” It’s as much an act of promotion (the game is about piracy, after all) as it is appealing to people’s sense of decency, but this isn’t Call of Duty we’re talking about here. No publisher or team of lawyers is going to care one way or another how it all pans out. If these guys can bait people into trying their full game for free then paying up later if they like it, best of luck to them.
Pixel Piracy [Site, via Indie Statik]
Pixel Piracy [Steam Greenlight]
Comments
12 responses to “Studio Pirates Its Own Game, Because Why The Hell Not”
What they should also do is put a paypal donate link on the site
People who pirate indie games are just dicks. You can complain all you want about corporate greed and publisher BS, but with indie developers you’re hitting directly at the men and women who spent large chunks of the recent life often in financial stress and complete lack of sleep to give you something that is non-formulaic and original…and for 1 quarter of the price of most AAA games (mostly)…
really what more do people want?
This “trend” by indie game makers of torrenting or pirating their own game is becoming as boring as:
* websites live streaming themselves play games
* unboxing videos
* people destroying hardware with explosives/guns/microwaves
Completely agree. Instead of trying to combat piracy like the other 99% of the industry is doing they’re making a mockery of it. Appealing to people’s sense of decency and high morals is like asking a monkey to write a bestseller… it *might* happen, but chances are you’ll just get shit throw in your face.
Except, it’s the only true way to make piracy ‘ work’. There’s no ‘combating’ piracy – it’s technologically and socially acceptable to the point where the only way you can deal with it is if you provide a better service to the consumer than the pirates do.
But they never do. They usually offer an older version of the game while the latest version is on torrent sites, this is nothing more than cheap publicity to appeal to the neckbeards and Gamasutra readers
You know that isn’t true, especially in this case. Although the snide remark certainly gave your comment more juice, bravo.
Struck a nerve?
Not really – it’s just that ad hominem attacks are a sure sign of a weak argument. I find it funny that you lashed out at a nondescript group to try to prove your ‘point’ that no one cares about people trying to make the idea of piracy work in a positive way.
tl;dr you done goofed
No… I definately struck a nerve and I got negged (twice) for it
Im sorry I offended you
This seems more like a publicity stunt then anything, I don’t see this convincing anyone who would’ve pirated the game to instead spend money. If anything I can imagine more people downloading it for free from their website – lots of people are fine with pirating but don’t like torrent sites.
I still stand by the idea that the best way to beat piracy is to provide a better service for those who use legal means (i.e. enticing people to do that). This kinda does the opposite, it makes it easier (and safer) for pirates but does nothing to encourage legal purchasing other then the obvious “we need your money to live.”
It’s sort of like shareware. Here it is for free, if you like it please pay for it.