The Witcher 2 - Character Development & Items Diary

Demos are a marketing tool. They seldom represent the actual gameplay of a game and more a teaser than anything else.

The part about piracy is that PR sold it as a major cause for decline in certain genres, while omitting the other major causes(among which trying to capture as many customers as possible), which, in all likelihood, prevail over piracy.

DeepO said:

And what am I supposed to see there? It´s not like I´ll have some comparative study on those number at hand, you know .

I think it´s common sense to assume that playable demos before release will cut some pirating traffic around the release - some people may indulge in pirating solely for the purpose of "demo-ing" after all and some of those wouldn´t participate if the official demo would be available.

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I think it's common sense that if it made a real difference we would know about it by now.

Do you really think, with all the tracking done by various publishers, that it wouldn't be common knowledge if a demo made a significant difference in how a game is pirated?

JDR13 said:

I think it's common sense that if it made a real difference we would know about it by now.

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Well, depends on what "real difference" is.
I just suspect that there is a difference while you suggested in an earlier post that there is none.
I also think that tracking the difference may be kinda hard - there´s a lot of other contributing factors so to come up with some really telling data there might be need to compare one concrete game released without demo with the same game released with it, which obviously isn´t possible, at least not without other factors being changed.
There may also be a possibility that even if it would be proven that demo indeed cuts down piracy to some extent, releasing it before the game would still be in contradiction with some publishers´ other strategies, like review embargos and such. In this regard DA2 demo came off quite as a surprise for me.
Anyway, kinda pointless speculating, sorry for being off-topic in The Witcher 2 thread .

Soulvomit said:

This debate made me analyze my pirating habits; conclusion:

AAA titles I BOUGHT over the last 5 years:
The Witcher
Oblivion
Dragon Age: Origins
Mass Effect
Two Worlds
Two Worlds 2
Gothic 3 + Forsaken gods

AAA titles I FINISHED over the last 5 years:
The Witcher (3 times)
Dragon Age: Origins (2 times)
Mass Effect (Once)
Two Worlds 2 (Once)

AAA titles I PLAYED over the last 5 years:
Most of them.

What I'm getting at is that I pirate a lot (got no problem admitting it), but I ALWAYS purchase the titles I enjoy.

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Lol, you bought one game per year? A suggestion stop buy any, it won't change anything to any developer nor any game market.

Seeing your crap taste I'm happy you don't buy games.

DeepO said:

I just suspect that there is a difference while you suggested in an earlier post that there is none.

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I was suggesting that there's no difference to the point of having a significant impact, and I don't believe there is. With all the time and money spent collecting and analyzing that data over the last decade, I'm pretty sure they would at least have an idea by now.

I'm sure there is a percentage of people who wouldn't pirate a game if there's a demo, but I also believe that the majority of people who pirate games would do it anyways.

JDR13 said:

I was suggesting that there's no difference to the point of having a significant impact, and I don't believe there is. With all the time and money spent collecting and analyzing that data over the last decade, I'm pretty sure they would at least have an idea by now.

I'm sure there is a percentage of people who wouldn't pirate a game if there's a demo, but I also believe that the majority of people who pirate games would do it anyways.

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I don't think it's that simple. The problem is to make a demo. Game companies have learned sold better a game with words and trailers, but haven't learned do it through a demo.

Also the demo will easily trigger many fake users review that in fact only played the demo, that's a bigger and bigger problem that have to face such companies so a demo should be efficient if it was released at same time or even before the full game, but now it's too much a risk of a reverse effect. So most demo end be released some month after game release and then too late to have a strong effect on sells.

So I think in theory a demo could lower pirating but companies don't know anymore how make them and release them at full game release without negative effects. So in practice demo can't have much influence, they aren't good enough and make lost too many sells, they are released too late so don't have much influence on sells.

sakichop said:

I don't think this argument holds water.
…
These are just from my steam games I have almost 100 games sitting on my bookshelves. Most of which I haven't finished. So I have hundreds of hours of gaming just in the few I listed here. Just because you didn't finish them doesn't
mean you didn't get hours of enjoyment out of them or hours of gameplay even if you didn't enjoy them.

Enjoyment or gameplay you should have paid for.

I suspect if you made the games you would see it very differently.

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I guess you missed the part where I said "but I ALWAYS purchase the titles I enjoy" then?

9 times out of 10, I only put a couple of hours into these titles, with no enjoyment at all. I guess I could purchase these games… and live on the streets. The 1/10 games I do like, I'll buy. A fact my list reflects.

Dasale said:

Seeing your crap taste I'm happy you don't buy games.

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Go on then. Which AAA titles, over the past 5 years, are more deserving of my money then Oblivion, the Witcher and DA:O?

Soulvomit said:

I guess you missed the part where I said "but I ALWAYS purchase the titles I enjoy" then?

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No you left out the paragraph that acknowledged that in my last post so here it is again.

"For one I will take you at your word that you actually purchased these games after stealing them, however I don't believe that the majority of people who steal games then buy them especially with the younger crowd (who I would assume would be more apt to steal them.)"

Soulvomit said:

9 times out of 10, I only put a couple of hours into these titles, with no enjoyment at all. I guess I could purchase these games… and live on the streets. The 1/10 games I do like, I'll buy. A fact my list reflects.

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So what happens if you steal these games and find out you like more than you can afford to buy without having to live on the street. Will you delete the ones you can't afford after 2 hrs of playing them and go without?

Again i'll take you at your word that your list is true and accurate.

Soulvomit said:

9 times out of 10, I only put a couple of hours into these titles, with no enjoyment at all. I guess I could purchase these games… and live on the streets.

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Ah, you could, but pirating itself is clearly a hobby for you. Who would be foolish enough to spend 90% of the time doing something "with no enjoyment at all"?

Soulvomit said:

Go on then. Which AAA titles, over the past 5 years, are more deserving of my money then Oblivion, the Witcher and DA:O?

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Fallout: New Vegas, Mask of the Betrayer - yeah, NWN2 kinda sucks though it has few nice moments, but MotB is basically two games in one (evil vs. good, not counting nuances) if you get over its camera/UI thing and Dragon Knight Saga is in some aspects pure "yess!" material, for example.

I only steel money for drugs.
But I don't steel money to feed my family.
I only rob people that i think have more than they need.
But I don't rob from people that I think don't have enough.
I only stole other peoples work and turned it as mine to get ahead of them.
But I didn't steal other peoples work that wouldn't help me out.
Is this the point that some of you have about games…