Lame NoCD Cracks !

[kosmiq]

Uhmm.. Just a little thing I've noticed here... Isn't this thread about "Lame NoCD cracks"?

Or it might just be me getting it all wrong.
Please do not take this the wrong way now, the discussion is indeed a very important one and has some good arguments going.
And sure the thread creator do mention "The only people who could possibly find a LameNoCD crack useful are people who don't own/have the original game CD, you know who you are! ".
But still, come on...

Anyway now when the discussion is up and running I can contribute with my little part to...
Sure warez ain't really good as they do hurts the creator of it and brings down the profit. But in some ways I can see usefullness in warez too.
If you are little unsure wether to buy that game or not. It is always on the web and you can try it out (I am no "go-warez thinking here, only realistic).
So when you've tried it a little you might think "this game kicks some serious *ss. So what do you do next? Well you buy it of course.
So in that way you can save your precious money (in case you don't have that much to spend on games) and not waste them on some crappy games.
Sure this will result in that the developer won't get as much cash, and may stop future development from them. But still, from a consumer perspective it is good as you can find out which games to support and not with your hard earned money.
Where the real problems is with those that downloads everything to simply play, brag, delete and never think of it again.
Those are the people that kills developers. Serious gamers owns the original and uses that. If they ever bought a crappy game it will be changed for something else anyway.

Live as I learn, no way!

[DABhand]

I know what your saying. But..

Wouldnt it be nicer to hire the game and try it that way?

Cause if you download it you are stealing it, cause when you buy a game your buying the right to play it, if you didnt buy you dont have the right to play it. If you follow me

[Joe Forster/STA]

Hi DABhand,

Your reply clearly shows that you haven't read enough documentation about the inherent problems of DRM - and, as part of it: copy protection - yet... It's quite hard to argue with someone who's not (yet) on your level of knowledge. However, as you're definitely an intelligent guy, I wanted to take this opportunity to make you see and understand...

Im afraid to say that you seem to be fixed on the pro-warez arguments there.

Read again what I wrote. I was talking about "warez factories" being a pain in the @ss and the average customer knowing nothing at all - in the beginning - about warez. This is not a pro-warez argument.

Who said warez isnt hurting people, offcourse it does, the less thats bought the less money goes back into developers, next time their games will be crap

Most of the money goes to the game publisher, not the game developer. Also, a _true_ game developer will stay up through the night, not eat, not drink, just to be able to release his game - it's not about money, it's about fame. Yes, it has limits so there definitely are tons of unfortunate games that have never been released but that's the minority (I hope!).

The reason for crap games is the lack of ideas or enthusiasm, or downright bad programmers/graphicians/musicians or idiotic management. _Not_ the lack of money! See freely downloadable nice small games (e.g. retro-style remakes of old games) or serious ones - Live for Speed demos were free - as an example of free but good games!

Copy Protections wouldnt be so severe if everyone werent greedy gits, thats a fact.

What you fail to understand is that the "greedy gits" are those "warez factories", not the average users. Yes, there are plenty of people who like getting games for low prices or for free - otherwise there would be no need for these "warez factories" - but, and I'd like to stress this again, it is the "warez factories" that actually MAKE MONEY with warez, not the average users, whether they A) buy original games, B) buy pirated games or C) download pirated games for free. And this is the biggest problem: game publishers are so short-sighted that they use copy protection, not understanding that this WILL give problems to the average users - part of which do buy original games! - but it WILL NOT give problems to "warez factories". Do you understand it now?

a guy (I wont name him) had a small time software house, he worked hard on a game he was working on and was looking at a projected $250k sales, the game an RTS was only $5 he made $30kish he couldnt pay for other things as he had to borrow money from a bank to start his venture.

Yes, this is unfortunate. This is why (small) game developers ask for the financial support of (large) game publishers. However, this means that the game publisher will raise the price of the game significantly, and a very large percent of the profit will remain at the game publisher. But this is how loans, banks and life in general works. If you don't have enough money in the first place, you're f*cked, no matter what you do: others, who give you a loan, will take back much more afterwards.

At the end of the day, im not gonna buy a new TV so ill steal yours, that would be exceptable yes?

Oh, please, spare me this bullsh*t! You and I both know that software is way different, by its nature, than a "physical object"...

Joe

[DABhand]

Difference in physical yes, but ideals are the same im sure you will agree.


And in terms of crap games, its true. Say your making a game, hypothetically, and it gets warezed heavily, are you going to have the same enthusiasm as the last game?

This is the case for many developers who now make ports of console games not taking time to give good PC support or good PC quality testing. Dare I say Enter the Matrix or Tomb Raider 6.


Its obvious we have different views, neither is bad or good, but its been an interesting debate all the same. Thats until some smart ass comes in and ruins it :P (lets hope not)

[noscript]

Dont talk **** guys! it IS the price!!! Nothing else. Why downloading 3-4gigs when I can get the game for 10-20€/$,

I buy low budged games, and never some starforce games coz they **** me up with scratching the cd for more then 5mins only to say me that I have an original cd. In fact at low budget many of the comercial Protections are removed and I do NOT need a cd in drive and I dont have to swap cds for games which read 100% of their game data from HDD.

Developers are building their own grave.

BTW: Movie and music industry flourish... They get more and more millions every year....

[Joe Forster/STA]

Hi DABhand,

Difference in physical yes, but ideals are the same im sure you will agree.

IT IS EXACTLY THE IDEAS IN WHICH PHYSICAL OBJECTS AND SOFTWARE DIFFER FROM EACH OTHER! This is exactly why many organizations are against e.g. software patents: you shouldn't be able to copyright an algorithm, just like an idea that someone else can also come up with, without "stealing" it from you. It would be very sad if scientists couldn't base their ideas on the ideas of other scientists - the development of technology would slow down a lot! Similarly, software patents are against the development of technology and mankind in general.

You can own a physical object, you can take it into your hand. But you cannot own a piece of software, as you cannot take it into your hand. Although I definitely wonder what's going to happen when they do create the technology of Star Trek's replicator which would be able to copy physical objects _exactly_ - then will copyright holders be really f*cked!

Say your making a game, hypothetically, and it gets warezed heavily, are you going to have the same enthusiasm as the last game?

In many cases, the game publisher pays a FIXED AMOUNT of money to the game developer. Which means, the game developer doesn't care about how many copies of the game have actually been sold. The game publisher invested money into the development of the game; now they want to get that money back plus as much profit as it is possible.

As it has already been pointed out, the fact that a game gets warezed may also mean that people are interested in it and like it - in short, it is a good game! If you are the enthusiastic type of game developer, you could even say, "hey, they [they, the publishers; not we, the developers!] sold a hundred thousand copies and there's an estimation of another few million warezed copies, MAN, DOES OUR GAME RULE!" Okay, that's a bit unrealistic... [Edit] Still, you could wonder why Valve took the distribution of Half-Life 2 into its own hands, by letting pre-purchasing customers download the encrypted game files, instead of the usual way of releasing it via the publisher...!

Joe

[k1rr3d]

The chinese warez factories that Joe refers to, MASS PRODUCE pirated games which they then sell all over the world. The extent to which they take their piracy is radical. The pirated cd's have the exact same label as the originals, they come packaged in a cd case that has labels identical to the originals and where the originals come with a manual, so does the pirated game.

You could very easily mistake the pirated game for an original, the only obvious give aways are:

1) All copies of the game have the same serial number, if a keygen is not included on the disk.

2) The sales person or should that be pirate (ahoy ! me maties !) asks you prior to purchasing whether you are familiar with the procedures involved in cracking a game.

I kid you not ! Every now and then our police (pirate-hunters) nab some fool at the airport smuggling in pirated games and movies, on other occasions they've raided (plundered/sacked?) some or other place and found up to as many as 12000 pirate copies of games and movies.

The point Im trying to make is as follows: It is the MASS PRODUCTION of pirated games that cause the most damage to game sales and those involved in mass production are largely unaffected by copy protection, they probably employ a number of crackers on a full-time basis.

The area in which copy protection is most effective, and only just, is in the preventing of gamers loaning their games to buddies while still playing them (both cant have the originals at the same time). This leaves me thinking about 2 things:

1) Is loaning a game to a buddy, once you've finished with it (so he uses the original disks while playing), OK ? or is this a form of piracy ? He didn't pay to play the game.

2) Is loaning a game to a buddy, while you're still playing it (with a NoCD crack), OK ? or is this a form of piracy ?

I would find it difficult to believe that there isn't one of us who hasn't done this !!!

In closing, copy protection is not an effective means of tackling piracy, not only is it largely ineffective but it also does not discriminate between honest customers and those using pirated software. Is the inconvenience caused to the honest customer justifiable in terms of the amount of piracy actually stopped ?

It's kinda like standing at the front door of your store and subjecting each customer to a body search before they leave the store, to make sure that none have stolen anything, irrespective of how much money they've just spent in your store. Meanwhile some thugs have ripped off the back door of the store and have stolen all your stock........The really sad thing is, the next day, your standing at the front of the store again...

I think until such time as a viable alternative is found, we're pretty much stuck with what we currently have... Im currently playing Sid Meier's Pirates ! and I therefore feel, I can related to this issue

Looking forward to your replies..

k1rr3D....

[Joe Forster/STA]

Hi guys,

Just on a side note, I got a bit carried away with my "free software, public algorithms, no patents" agitation... Of course, I was talking about production software, not games.

Joe

[TippeX]

Originally Posted by k1rr3d

The point Im trying to make is as follows: It is the MASS PRODUCTION of pirated games that cause the most damage to game sales and those involved in mass production are largely unaffected by copy protection, they probably employ a number of crackers on a full-time basis.

actually, they probably just buy access to the warez groups servers and dl from there, so they dont 'employ' crackers per se. Thats the 'bad part' of the scene, where corrupt people try and make money. most copy protection is based on the concept of deterring 'casual copying' ie: people at home, people who arent so pc savvy, not industrial pirates, and the companies realise that..