Jox

October 11, 2011 at 4:41pm

Q2) Do you think DRM systems work?
There is no clear leader to this question, but demonstrates that publishers might have more success
with some other anti-piracy method than a DRM.

There are 4 answers to this question that effectively amount to "NO", but they break them up to make it seem that DRM is not a problem (an obvious bias of this "poll").  39% of respondants said that DRM systems do not work.  How is that not the "clear leader"?

Q3) Do you think PC Game Publishers should use DRMs?

Again, another unnecessarily complicated question.  The answers should be yes, no and not sure.  They seem to be deliberately attempting to convolute the pool of responses.  For the record, 35.2% said that NO, publishers should not be using DRM.  Putting aside all other considerations, it remains as true today as it did 10 years ago:  restrictive DRM schemes inconvenience paying customers ONLY.  Pirates don't have to deal with them at all.

Q4) Do DRMs encourage you to buy?

46.3% of respondants seem to agree with the 35.2% of respondants from Q3.

Q6) What would work?

The vast majority of respondants said "cheaper games", followed by "added value".  The gaming industry will argue that even when they do lower game prices, piracy continues to be a problem.  There will always be someone who will steal if he/she can.  However, look at a game like Valve's Left 4 Dead series.  When it was released, it was about $50 for the PC version, but not long after release it started to become available online (through Steam) at increasingly reduced rates, or discounted as part of a group buy (purchase 4 copies for you and your friends, save $5 per license, etc.  Left 4 Dead still has a large following for 3 reasons:  1) it's a well-designed franchise that's fun to play.  2) it continues to receive updates and patches.  3) there is a thriving mod community.  When it becomes easier to purchase the game and not regret it (install only to find it's laden with bugs / released too early), piracy will diminish to the point where it will cease to be worth mentioning.

 

I've been a PC gamer since the late 80's.  I put in more hours with the original Prince of Persia than I care to mention.  I was young and didn't always have a lot of disposable income (and that's all I'll say on the matter), but as an adult, with a family, I find that my time for gaming is greatly diminished and I rely much more on Steam sales to satisfy my gaming needs.  I'd say that fully 90% of the games I currently play were purchased a year or more after launch and at considerable savings to me.  Not only financially, but by the time I got them the majority of the bugs that may have plagued them were patched out.  These days, it's pretty uncommon for me to purchase a game within 30 days of launch.  It happens, but it's rare.  When it does happen, however, it's after much information gathering regarding the game's performance (i.e. does it run, or is it a buggy piece of crap?) and consulting online reviews (gamespot, etc).  If I'm going to spend the money, it damn-well better be a finished product.

Making games more affordable and (perhaps more importantly) not treating your customer base as an extended beta-test group would go a long way toward rekindling the PC games market.  When I shell out for a piece of software I expect it to work.   I get that there is a wide array of hardware on the market, but even if I can't run it in DX11 at 90 FPS with 8xFSAA/16xAF I should, at least, be able to install it.  So simple a concept is lost on altogether too many publishers who rush their products to market before they are complete.

Make the games WORTH buying and people will buy them.

-Jox

 

 

AETAaAS

October 11, 2011 at 1:55pm

I'm no statistician but I at least know about sampling bias. And I take particular exception at the purpose of having an OS question. DeusEx HR was released to Windows but not Linux or Mac (winter release IIRC). Perhaps I'm reading too much into it, but I think it is deliberately trying to make Windows users look worse.

But I accept it is also true that a lot of piracy happens on Windows... Mac users probably don't know what a torrent is, and those who do would think to themselves; what am I trying to do running this game on a Mac? :p

bingojubes

October 11, 2011 at 1:50pm

one would guess that, with the "truthfulnes" of the survey-takers, they would have the smarts to lie about where they get their torrents, so they don't give away that truth to kill their favorite sites quicker.

Brad Nimbus

October 11, 2011 at 12:46pm

Ya know I actually downloaded this (I know shame on me) Although I did it with the intent of using it as a demo. The game was excellent and in the end they got my money. I think betas should be public anyway.

alex_dh9

October 11, 2011 at 11:58am

This is funny. Games are too damn expensive though.

alex_dh9

October 11, 2011 at 11:58am

This is funny. Games are too damn expensive though.

TommM

October 11, 2011 at 12:08pm

I found the most interesting response was that these illegal downloaders average 3 illegal game downloads a month.  That's 36 a year based on this survey.

And people say, "pirating isn't a problem."  Uh huh...

level1paladin

October 11, 2011 at 11:55am

They don't really tell us how many people actually answered the questions.  I'd say most people would close the browser once it popped open.  I doubt anyone would take the time to answer questions about the illegal activity they were just busted for.

I say the questionaire results are bogus.

aarcane

October 11, 2011 at 10:57am

So cut to the chase already.  What are the results of the survey?