BioWare: Piracy is always a problem

Piracy is a hot topic for any PC developer, so when Destructoid went to check out Dragon Age: Origins in Edmonton, they took the opportunity to ask BioWare whether a loyal fanbase makes piracy less of a problem and, if not, how the studio deals with it.

"Piracy is always a problem, for all media," answers Mike Laidlaw. "Certainly offering people editions of the game that include bonus items do help encourage them to purchase the title rather than pirate it, as do options like additional content that check for valid copies of the game, these measures help because they don't penalize the legitimate users of the game by adding additional steps to install or launch, for instance."

[Major_Tom]

They're still not looking at it from the right perspective.

[Christopher]

I'm guessing you're talking about the perspective of if they make games people want, they'll buy it, right?

Well, just a bit of a clue, this is BioWare, one of the few companies that can boast having a spectacular record with the quality of their games, both from a gameplay, storyline, and graphical standpoint.

Now, when they come out and say pirating is always an issue, it's not because they don't make the money, because they do, which is why EA snapped them up quick while allowing them to do whatever the heck they want with their section of EA and why Lucas Arts went to them to make the next gen of Star Wars MMO. The reason they say it is because regardless of what gamers say, there is a large number of people out there who pirate what they can, regardless of the quality of the game. Why? Because they can, because it's easy, and because it costs them next to nothing to do it.

Honestly, the concept of people only pirating games that deserve to pirated is old and cliched. People pirate games because they're cheap and because they don't care.

Luckily, BioWare is a company that makes great games that millions of people buy, allowing them to continue to bring us great games, like they have been doing since Bladur's Gate.

[Nihilism]

Well they just got 2 pre-orders from me, mass effect 2 and dragon age, paid in full, keep up the good work bioware.

I know i'm alone on this but i securom done right is far better than just cutting LAN from a game, and it's far less intrusive than having to have a constant internet connection. As long as you can revoke your installs and the drm uninstalls with the game, i'm cool with it,

but the spore DRM and the original mass effect drm were ridiculous.

The day that there are no offline single player games due to DRM etc will be a sad day

[Pandamobile]

Having the game require a Steam activation could help with a lot of the piracy. (not all of it, but it would help).

And EA's still going in the wrong direction with SecuROM.

[Chubear]

Only for developers who have games on anything other than a PS3.

By the time hackers figure it out properly, it'll likely be a yr or 2 before (or even after) the PS4 launches. Imagine the savings developers and publishers would have gotten in that time period that ordinarily would have gone to gaming pirates.

I just thing publishers and developers that put their product on anything outside of the PS3 have only themselves to blame. The PC market is a different type of beast and though they lose an insane amount, it's not entirely too bad on developers... or so I've been led to believe.

[evrfighter]

"By the time hackers figure it out properly, it'll likely be a yr or 2 before (or even after) the PS4 launches."

And what? it'll still be based on a revised cell and blu-ray. The technology will remain the same. so It would take about 2 days before ps4 games were cracked.

If they were to completely change the architecture of the cell psu. That's asking for a major backlash of all dev's who invested much time and much money into developing for the ps3.

[Pandamobile]

Yeah, I can imagine most devs being really pissed off if Sony ditches the cell BE in the PS4. All that time and effort put in to programming for this overly complex CPU, just to have it go out the window and have to learn a new architecture from scratch for the next gen.

[Major_Tom]

How did what I say imply that BioWare makes less than enjoyable games? I didn't. The counter-piracy measures that are being taken here are more or less being targeted at the completely wrong group which are the legitimate customers. They're not hurting pirates at all, they're hurting the customers who buy their product.

Thanks for the wholly unnecessary clue.

I even have a Lieutenant Commander Shepard limited edition HyperChild figurine #5 of 2500 that is officially licensed Mass Effect merchandise by BioWare.

I've been PC gaming for a long time, I know how good BioWare games are you don't need to tell me. I still have an unopened Baldurs Gate II: Shadow of Amn box right on my PC desk.

[Christopher]

Then your perspective is still misguided.

Yeah, SecuROM isn't the best, and it could be better, but it is a necessary creature due to what people have done. Yeah, sure, people who don't pirate are getting annoyed, but take that away and the only people getting hurt are the ones who are supposed to be getting compensation from their creation of the product. That's a better solution, make it more comfortable for the group of people who are ripping them off to begin with? With our without SecuROM, you can still play and enjoy the games.

Oh, and if you want people to understand exactly which direction you're taking with your comments, you might make them a bit more clearer next time. I really don't care what you have that shows love for BioWare, I only responded to what you presented, which wasn't much to begin with.

[Major_Tom]

Haha, no offense but you should be a CEO then, DRM hurts absolutely no one but the consumer, the product buyer.

You're still in the group of users who believes some how, some way, magically, these individuals are being robbed for every person who downloads a torrent with their product. They don't lose money, there's nothing invested in that and what I'm saying is the infrastructure needs to change in order to profit off what is happening. I don't expect you to understand and many people don't.

The harder these corporate juggernauts try their grip lessens with every release and they completely fail to see the point. They are essentially doing this to themselves. For people to avoid the draconian digital police you have to employ people who are willing enough to give back to the community and work around it.

You do not understand that as soon as the digital age arose of broadband these companies quickly came to realize there product intentionally could be marketed amongst a user base. What is the vast properties of these user base? Exchanging information as you and I would in person instead, it's a digital peer to peer transaction.

As an example you give your friend a copy of Modern Warfare to borrow. Why would you do that? What for? Would you tell him to get his own copy? Would you tell him the consequences of what could happen if he didn't buy his own copies?

How about the price hike that Activision is intiating with Modern Warfare 2? These companies do not include figures like yourself they simply do not care. The people who make those games, applications, music, and movies are all being well paid however there are a lot of organizations that would like you to think otherwise.

The only people you should really care about and be worried about are those indie developers who really give it there all without the help of a publisher which is a great feat in itself, undeniably.

Point is the media medium has come full circle and now it has completed itself without grace again. Anything you've ever taped off of TV, watched at a friends house, watched outside in a bar (or inside) is potential loss of a consumer. These people are not being robbed of there hard work, but these people do need to start understanding they can profit heavily from this.

Alienating legitimate user bases was and still is not the progressive benchmark towards finding a resolution.

This isn't the 1980's where consumerism really is capitalism, it was individual for the consumer to become the primary hivemind of a nation especially with something as so easy as digital media as you formally put it. What happened here really, essentially is a digital revolution. The people have control over something that large (greedy) corporations don't and BOY does it PISS them off.

The poor have access to tools they would never have in the first place, this can (greatly) improve the facets and happiness of day to day life. See the problem has always been money, it's rooted in money. So do you see where we have started again? With not being able to afford things. It's not so much as a sense of entitlement but a sense of connecting and well being and being communal. Obvious this covers much more than just games but what other reason would it be than 'money'.

[lowcarb]

"I know how good BioWare games are you don't need to tell me. I still have an unopened Baldurs Gate II: Shadow of Amn box right on my PC desk."

I'm not to sure if Bioware had anything to do with baldurs gate 2.

[Pandamobile]

They only made the game...

[Christopher]

You said: "You're still in the group of users who believes some how, some way, magically, these individuals are being robbed for every person who downloads a torrent with their product."

Look up copyright law, now. Come back and tell me what you just said above with a straight face.

I'm not rooting for the concept of potential buyers, I'm rooting for the concept of protecting one's own property; tangible, intangible, digital, or hard-media. Every business has the right to protect their investments. Own a business and I'm fairly certain your point of view on this type of matter would change greatly.

You said: "They don't lose money, there's nothing invested in that and what I'm saying is the infrastructure needs to change in order to profit off what is happening. I don't expect you to understand and many people don't."

Yeah, profit off of piracy... Which the definition of is to steal without paying... So if they make modifications that would make it profitable for them, then the methods of piracy would just change as needed to ensure that the persons pirating don't need to pay anything for the application...

You said: "Alienating legitimate user bases was and still is not the progressive benchmark towards finding a resolution."

Surprisingly enough, sales numbers for games going forward would disagree with you. Even more surprising is the ease in which people have moved to consoles, which has software that is less pirated. Just look at what WoW gets away with because the users care more about the game than the invasion of privacy with their data collection methods.

Why is this so? Because it's the nature of the beast in almost all retail venues. Customers are screwed over in many ways, but it's necessary to maintain the profit, which leads to more jobs, more products, better competition, etc.

===

But, hey, it's okay Major_Tom. I'm too stupid to understand your "high seat" theories and economic models for the future of video gaming. So, no need to actually elucidate on what you're talking about. Just keep throwing out there those statements of "it could be done differently, but I don't expect you to understand." With comments like that, progress will be made!

[Major_Tom]

Copyright laws, you mean the ones that are getting a national reform in many countries bound by outdated ideologic men who sat on pedestals high above us ants? People such as bankers to protect their own investments and unloyal citizens with the sums of what they have amassed from usually shady practices?

You cannot steal something that you can copy readily. It is not a stolen copy it is a digital copy. There is only the loss of potential sales not the application of real world sales data.

Again, thinking like a traditional CEO. If you can get it for free, why would you charge again? No, that clearly will not work and that's what they are in the process of doing. The exact same thing.

If I was to draw a diagram of a flow chart, it could follow into something similar analogy; One friend buys the game, and then shares with many. Does this mean NONE of them will buy it? No it means that he has shared it with many.

Music companies, more or less independent artists are starting to understand how to reap benefits from this unilateral and unbiased system. By promoting themselves with free content. Nine Inch Nails, Radiohead, just to name a few have released full albums in every format imaginable for free on torrent websites. Hundreds and hundreds of Gigabytes of free music and media. Thus the music industry is bouncing back, they've noticed the exposure is actually.. dare I say it.. GOOD.

I never said I had a solution, I'm saying that eventually one will be found. I didn't mean to come across pompus or even insult your intelligence I just wanted to open your horizons and explore something that you might not have.

[Major_Tom]

By the way a true loss in sales would equate in x person acquires digital goods, burns on to disc and than x person proceeds to sell digital goods for their own benefit.

People do, do this but this is not nearly as big as bit torrenting itself. I'd assume this is less than 2% of the scene but by then you're seeing a redundancy where sales would start impeding on the black marketeer.

[Christopher]

"You cannot steal something that you can copy readily. It is not a stolen copy it is a digital copy. There is only the loss of potential sales not the application of real world sales data."

Theft, technically no (yeah, I get pissed at those lame videos on 'stealing' movies at the beginning of my DVDs as well). Breaking the law due to infringement on copyright law, yes.

Copyright laws have been around and their primary purpose has been to protect the rights of individuals and small companies. It has been successful in many ways, especially for authors and developers of their own items. The issue isn't in the law, it's in being able to find who infringed on your copyright and prosecuting them. That's why torrent sites get focused on instead of individuals. Copyright doesn't need reform, technical advancements on tracking and preventing digital copying of items does.

"If I was to draw a diagram of a flow chart, it could follow into something similar analogy; One friend buys the game, and then shares with many. Does this mean NONE of them will buy it? No it means that he has shared it with many."

And yet has broken no laws in the process. Same with used game sells. Remember, I'm not supporting the concept of potential buyers, which I stated above very clearly. This is a legal matter as to the rights of the person who owns the IP in question.

"Music companies, more or less independent artists are starting to understand how to reap benefits from this unilateral and unbiased system."

Primarily because they make a ton more money off of concerts and merchandise than they do actual disc/mp3 sales.

"I never said I had a solution, I'm saying that eventually one will be found."

Unfortunately that's less likely considering the arena in which we're talking. All software can be reverse engineered, and the speed at which cracks/key gens are made today are proof of the inability for developers to stay ahead of the people who do such things.

Sad, but true, the best weapon that businesses have today is discouragement. Even if it leaves a bad taste in our mouths.

[STONEY4]

Well piracy for ME1 wasn't a big problem because you couldn't get past the galaxy map and your save files would corrupt randomly around the point. Every ME torrent had this problem. And the reason I know is because I used to read GameFAQS Mass Effect forums for a while.

[Major_Tom]

That didn't last very long that was a deterrent for perhaps, a week really. I know a few people myself who couldn't afford Mass Effect themselves and decided to download it once I told them how good it was.

[wxer]

"BioWare: Piracy is always a problem"

yes bioware
and as you know the 360 is a hacked system
just like all the 90's gaming console

so just bring mass effect to the ps3
and i promise you guys wont have a single problem
like Piracy or consoles thats over heats because of your games

:)

[ChozenWoan]

if your reading this then chances are....

[free2game365]

No, but you'll have a problem of people not buying it. Since most people in the US would just buy it on the 360 and most people in Europe would buy it on the PC.

[Sarcasm]

Not a problem on the PS3.

Edit: I didn't say it won't EVER happen on PS3. I'm just saying it's not a problem for it.

But it's already almost going on 3 years, and it still hasn't been sucessfully hacked.

Pirates are more interested in the 360 anyway because of the DVD9. Who the hecks want to pay for Blu-Rays discs to burn, or buy a BD Drive just for that. or download 15-30gb for one game.

That's why the 360 is the target of choice because it's as easy as the PC.

The PS3 may get hacked but it won't be until for at least a couple more years or longer until BD drives get cheaper, BD's themselves get cheaper, and Pirates having enough persistance to break into the PS3's OS.

[OmarJA]

Oh they will bring ME2 on the PS3...

Don't worry about that.

[Jamescagney]

But that's the thing, hackers are persistant. And isn't the PS3 supposed to be on a 10 year lifetime? A modchip will get made, and Blu-ray burners will become a cheap upgrade. Then the last half of the PS3s life will become pirate material.

To say it's not a problem on PS3 is kind of obvious. Even on the time frame you can't be sure...

[Sarcasm]

Umm... You just paraphrased everything I just said...

"The PS3 may get hacked but it won't be until for at least a couple more years or longer until BD drives get cheaper, BD's themselves get cheaper, and Pirates having enough persistance to break into the PS3's OS."

"But that's the thing, hackers are persistant. And isn't the PS3 supposed to be on a 10 year lifetime? A modchip will get made, and Blu-ray burners will become a cheap upgrade. Then the last half of the PS3s life will become pirate material."

I said the next couple of years, you said the last half of PS3s life.
I said BD drives get cheaper, you said Blu-ray burners will be cheaper.
I said Pirates having enough persistance to break into the PS3's OS, you said hackers are persistant.

This is the strangest argument/discussion I've ever come across lol

[RedVsBlue]

The only reason piracy is not a problem for the PS3 is because it is not standard to have Blu-Ray Drivers & Burners on PCs & Blu-Ray burners are not even really wanted as to expensive. When that changes it will happen

[Jamescagney]

@Sarcasm

Piracy makes an appearance on every console at one stage or another, if you think the PS3 is any different you're wrong.

I guarantee you that people are working on it right now, it's just a matter of time.

[thebudgetgamer]

but were talking now not the future and right now the ps3 remains unhacked.

[Jamescagney]

Yes the ps3 isn't hacked yet, thanks for the info.

EDIT: Yes thebudgetgamer it was a bit of a smarmy comment tbh, lol. Sorry.

[thebudgetgamer]

a bubble for your smarmy reply.

btw: great choice of avatar and screen name.

[OmarJA]

Poor BioWare is stuck with a last gen garbage console that gets hacked sideways...

Kiss your ME2 exclusivity goodbye xbutts, oh that right! it was never an exclusive on the 360.

[Pandamobile]

wrong comment*

[wxer]

@OmarJA
yes

work hard on that beta testing xbots
im sure ME1 and ME2 and all the LDC's well be all in one blu-ray disk
with more content in it and more resolution

well i cant wait

[Pandamobile]

So PC gamers are "Xbots" too? Don't be an ass.

[OmarJA]

I said console...

[wxer]

@Pandamobile

i admit
the PC always gets the best when it comes to mlutiplats thats on PC

but console wise
the PS3 well get a better version of this game

[Pandamobile]

Was there even any confirmation of it coming to the PS3?

[wxer]

80-90% of xbox360 titles goes multiples sooner or later

and that’s because 80-90% of those games
made by 3rd party developers

and the thing that supports this argument
thats those games are already on PC and that means they got bigger chance to go multiplts and thats because they are already (technically) mltiplats

another example is SC
that game never was an exclusive
and its already on PC

their have been ALOT of xbox exclusives that gone multiplats

we all know that
after 2 generations of experience with microsoft

[Pandamobile]

Yeah but do you really thing Bioware are going to bother porting it two or three years after the fact?

[wxer]

the thing is
they have been asked about it
and they did NOT deny that a PS3 version is already on the way
and this backs up the possibilities even more

[Major_Tom]

When the hell was using the insult xbutts ever considered even remotely funny or witty or anything.

[clintos59]

Bring Mass Effect & 2 to the ps3. Guaranteed not 1 copy will be pirated and youll sell a million + GUARANTEED. :)

[Enate]

I loved Mass Effect 1 so much after getting my new pc last month I've beaten it 4 times since then. Consider it bought on PC but if they put it on PS3 consider me an all of my friends buying it without a doubt.

[Christopher]

I own the first on my 360, I'd buy it all over again and the second one if they announced that both were coming to the PS3 prior to the next year release.

[clintos59]

Totally agree. I have a couple of friends on PSN who said they would love to play mass effect but they dont want to invest their money into an unreliable system that still has problems this late in its life cycle. I totally understand where their coming from.

[THE MAX SPEED 21]

piracy wont stop Mass Effect selling Great compared to some ps3 exclusives.

this comment is no way fanboy oriented.

[Sarcasm]

Mass Effect only sold 2 million copies. Last time I checked from 360 fanboys, anything that sells under 8 million copies is crap.

[THE MAX SPEED 21]

mass effect 1 sold 2millions

Mass effect 2 will sell even more.

Oh and

Last time I checked Fanboys comments Were not to be taken Seriously.

OmarJa you shoud not even open your mouth and call other people ignorant you're like the Master of Ignorence on n4g.

[FlipMode]

"Mass Effect only sold 2 million copies. Last time I checked from 360 fanboys, anything that sells under 8 million copies is crap."

QFT

[Sarcasm]

I was one of those 2 million people who bought ME1. I will buy ME2. It boggles my mind that it hasn't sold more than 2 million.

[ElementX]

No sh!t, Sherlock. In other news, water is wet.

[DiffusionE]

...since when is piracy NOT a problem? Every time a game sells less than expected, it's piracy. Every time a dev-company goes bankrupt, it's piracy. Heck, even bad reviews are attributed to piracy. I'm so sick of publishers crying "piracy" all the time, and still continuing to make games for the platform.

If they're really losing so much money on PC and 360, then they should just make PS3 exclusives. Otherwise, they should just SHUT UP and do their job.

[Jamescagney]

They aren't though, they're just talking about piracy. Calm down.

[DiffusionE]

I tend to get a bit touchy when devs hide behind the "blame-it-on-piracy" mask. And of course, I don't mean in relation to this article.

The biggest culprit is EA, always crying "foul play" with every damn release since 1998. Their FIFA PC versions are total s**t, no wonder people pirate them. And Crysis(published by EA) didn't sell as much as COD4 because it had absolutely nothing else other than extreme-graphics. Did you read anything notable about Crysis other than "screenshots @ this-and-that resolutions...etc...etc...&quo t;? And do I even need to say anything about NFS: Undercover?

Nobody likes piracy, but god-damn these lazy bastards give us half-assed ports and expect to sell 10 million each.....screw that.

[FantasyStar]

What does discussing the PS3 have to do with the "PC" piracy situation?

[Major_Tom]

deafening imaginary piracy deficits.

Some people still think piracy = loss in sales.

[Godofwar3rapes]

The xbox 360 is providing a tough competition

[Pandamobile]

I think piracy was still bigger on the PS1. I don't think I owned more than 5 games of my collection of 50 or so games.

Lol CD burner.

[Trevorthenerd]

bioware can stfu now