Piracy
There will always be piracy.
Music, movies, games. As long as there’s an internet, people will find ways to distribute digital materials online for free.
It’s a fact that game developers need to realise, but it’s not one they need to outright accept.
Piracy is damaging to the games industry, that much we know. What’s often more damaging however, are draconic and out-dated Digital-Rights-Management systems like Ubisoft’s ‘Always-On’ DRM or Securom.
Overzealous DRM drives away loyal, legitimate customers and can be easily overcome by pirates.
This leads to pirates that are playing a game illegally having a better experience than those who have purchased said game and supported its developers.
There are creative DRM solutions that we can perhaps learn lessons from – the likes of ‘DEGRADE’ (Bohemia Interactive) and that of Batman Arkham Asylum.
The former causes your game to gradually degrade in quality to an eventually unplayable level, and the latter removes a vital move from the repertoire of its namesake hero.
Creative though they may be, these DRM solutions are still crackable, and while far, far better than the likes of Ubi’s ‘A-A’ DRM are still not a perfect solution to the problem of piracy.
Piracy isn’t going to go away, but we can combat it.
2011 was the year of the ‘Indie Bundle’ – paying whatever you like for a bundle of independently-developed games with no DRM, redeemable on Steam and other digital-distribution platforms, and often open-source.
The success of these bundles speaks for itself. Millions of dollars have been raised (over 2 million in the latest bundle alone) for independent developers, and for charity, using this system.
It goes to show that PC gamers, when given the opportunity, can be extremely generous.
Of course there are those that pay measly sums like ’0.01GBP’ for a bundle, but thankfully they are outnumbered by much more kindly souls.
Overall, developers need to come up with ways to make people want to purchase their games, and not want to pirate them.
Innovative DRM may play a role in this, but it must be done first and foremost by creating top-quality gaming experiences and connecting with the gaming community.