Michael Pachter, famous video-game researcher and analyst, is just one of many games industry heavyweights interviewed by Eurogamer in their current look at video game piracy. According to Pachter, piracy is “ruining” PC games and “forcing them online.” The biggest PC titles are showing piracy numbers as high as 80 percent.
Pachter draws a comparison to Asia, claiming, “This happened in China 15 years ago, and in Korea in the last decade, and it’s happening in the West now.” This problem of piracy forced Asia into a free-to-play model.
Matt Ployhar, president of the PC Gaming Alliance, explains, “Free-to-play really got momentum quickly in Asia for several reasons, chief of which was that the only way local games ISVs [independent software vendors] could make money was to ‘give the game away’, then hope for a micro-transaction on the back-end (e.g. pets, weapons, clothes, etc.). This proved to be so effective that it pretty much replaced older (off the shelf) business models.
“Piracy persists primarily in those markets that persist in shipping a retail boxed good; namely Western game devs heavily focused on shipping games into the console markets.”
The experts also weigh in on DRM, with Capcom US Vice President Christian Svensson saying that it’s a mistake to think that it can convert thieves into legitimate buyers. According to Svensson, money isn’t the only reason, sometimes not even the primary reason, people pirate games.
“There’s a huge chunk of people that no matter what you do, no matter what measures you put in place, even if you deny them access to the content – they will never be a paying customer,” he explains.
“That has a lot to do with culture, a lot to do with education, a lot to do with ability to pay, and it also has a lot to do with the very basic thing of could they even get access to the content – is it for sale in their country legitimately? There’s a lot of content that ends up in China that is not available for sale legitimately in China, because it hasn’t gone through the governmental hoops and approvals and/or there’s no partnership with a Chinese publisher on the ground to make that happen.”
Svensson even admits, “Some of the [reasons people pirate] are, quite frankly – and I hate to say it – quite good reasons. If they can’t get it any other way, that’s a pretty major [reason] for them to try and do that.”
Pachter disagrees however, saying, “Piracy was born out of ease,” citing the fact that “everyone” has access to internet and hard drive these days, and many think its quite acceptable to share software.
However, president of the PC Gaming Alliance Matt Ployhar thinks that consoles may be in even more trouble, According to Ployhar, in “less developed markets”, demand for modded consoles is strong.
He also discusses secondary sales, which he claims is a real problem. “Secondary sales have been devastating to the console markets and continue to be a key detractor,” he says.
“While it’s great for the EBGames/GameStops of the world, very little of that money ever trickles back down to the games ISVs if at all.
“You add up secondary sales plus growing piracy in the console space, which is largely subsidised by the content, and you have a very real threat to the continued existence of consoles being able to survive.”
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