By on 17 Oct, 2011 at 12:15 PM
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Life, The Universe, And Gaming — Wait, What?! [Column]

Life, The Universe, And Gaming — Wait, What?! [Column]

Oranges!

Okay now that we’ve got this column under way — I never quite know how to properly start these things off — I’d like to talk about something that wasn’t actually the intended topic for this week. No, that topic has been moved to two weeks from now because I need more time to work on it, something I assure you will vindicate my reasons for postponing it.

Look at me punting my next column before I’ve even properly begun this one.

So, the last game I properly played on PC was The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings.

I would count Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne, a game I’ve been playing religiously since 2003, though recently only ever for DotA (Defence of the Ancients for my non-DotA fans friends), but really DotA is nothing but an addiction and one that has successfully been quelled (recently, and for the moment). Like a Quelling Blade to that tree above the neutral creep spawn just to the left of Sentinel’s bottom tower.

I should note that in recent times I have almost entirely taken to using an Xbox 360 controller instead of your traditional mouse and keyboard, something that I previously favoured above all else for any and all types of games. Guitar Hero aside.

Seriously, my skills with a keyboard and mouse are incredible, ironically especially for games that prefer controllers. Games like racers, beat-em-ups or football simulators: I’m simply better at, with a keyboard.

Or I was.

Nowadays, I will happily use my Xbox 360 controller instead. Even for such games as first person shooters and real time strategy.

People sometimes say, “But Cavie, you crazy man-beast, isn’t it so much slower and less responsive compared to using a keyboard and mouse?” to which my usual reply is, “It’s CaViE tho. But yes, and I don’t care because I’m good enough with it anyway. Also, man-beast? Really?”

In any case, apart from The Witcher 2 — for the moment a PC exclusive (which I play with a controller anyway) and so entirely unavailable on Xbox 360… for the moment — the vast majority of my gaming has been done on Xbox 360.

My motivation and justification for this is the exact same, which I will present in the form of an unordered list, because I can, and because unordered lists are sexy.

  • Achievements and GamerScore make me happy.
  • The online experience is just better.
  • The controller is more comfortable in my hands and preferred to a mouse and keyboard.
  • I needn’t buy all of my games at retail price.
  • Pop — Achievement Unlocked (I really enjoy achievements).

Just a few hours ago — many more hours ago by the time you read this — I remarked to Dean that I count up to fourteen Xbox 360 titles around me that don’t actually belong to me. They are all games that my very generous friends have lent to me. Quite a few friends at that, with some lending me quite a few of their games. Good times.

The point is, all of those are games that I would have otherwise been unable to play without either purchasing brand new for myself, or pirating. The latter is a sin punishable by death — hanging from the gallows and all that — so it doesn’t even count as an option.

So purchasing, basically.

Except even then I couldn’t because being a university student who has ridiculously high fees to pay each year, my resources available for gaming remain on the exact opposite side of abundant. In fact, for many years now I have been trying to save up for a PS3 and a new HD monitor, but thanks to the few games that I do buy, neither fantasy has been realised. I call them fantasies because that’s all they’ve been, for those years. I am open to bribes, though. Not sure what I can offer, but by all means propose something.

Incidentally, and quite unsurprisingly, the only game I’ve ever paid full price for — and pre-ordered, at that — is Dragon Age II. It’s true.

I’ve been pretty lucky that way, with regards to games. Lucky, or smart. Take your pick.

The majority of games that I’ve played were either borrowed from friends or second-hand purchases from eager sellers who were willing to part with their games for far less than it was worth. Seriously. A few months ago I got the Crysis 2 Limited Edition and Dead Space 2 for under R400 in total.

Electronic Arts — a company that I have previously defended time and time again — however, do not seem to enjoy this fact. If they had it their way, I would be forced to pay for every single game that I’ve played over the years. That way even more of their executives can add shiny new rims to their Lamborghinis and Ferraris.

You all know what I’m talking about by now. You’ve read my feature on the pending war between Gamers and the Online Pass system that seeks to police their gaming.

Tell me, by borrowing games from friends, by trading and buying games second-hand, am I doing something wrong?

Certainly not legally so.

So why should I be punished for it?

Ah, that’s right. Because they can get away with it. Publishers, that is.

Don’t worry, this column won’t devolve into yet another apoplectic rant about the Online Pass, but I will first make a few points before moving on. Again, let’s use unordered lists. Bring sexy back!

  • When person A sells a game to person B, person A no longer has the ability to play that game, therefore person B takes over their slot on any possible server that person A has already paid for the right to use. Contrary to the words of developers, server costs remain the same when second-hand sales occur because two players cannot both play a single copy of a game. How is this still a valid excuse for anyone? Person A paid for the ability to use the game online, and person B purchases that ability along with the game, effectively revoking person A’s access. There are no further incurred expenses on the side of the servers, unless you wish to count stats-tracking, the most menial of things that aren’t even mentioned in any EULA. I cannot stress this point enough.
  • If I belong to a household with siblings who also play games, I am entitled to pool resources with them in order to buy games — many people do this already — so that all of us may enjoy it. The introduction of an Online Pass nullifies this pooling of resources since only a single person may enjoy the game online per purchase of a game, especially disconcerting for something like Battlefield 3. Heaven praise Epic Games for not introducing Online Passes to Gears of War 3.
  • The assertion that publishers don’t make money from second-hand purchases is entirely false because for every copy of a game that exists, someone somewhere has already paid full price for it. I’ve always wanted to use this example for something gaming related: If you bought a car from a manufacturer and then sold it many years later, would the manufacturer see a cent of that money? No. So why then do publishers expect to be paid for something they’ve already been paid for? Because they’re greedy, that’s why. Because above all else, gaming is a business to them. And that’s fine and dandy if they remain within ethical boundaries. But they’re not, yet they seem to be getting away with it because “it’s only 800 msp lol”. For now…

Gamers are known for their silly raging, their retarded fanboyisms, their self-entitled natures and their previously misguided attempts at boycotts.

Here is a right, proper reason to call on one, but nobody seems to be willing to heed the call.

Am I really the only person in the room right now that cares enough about gamers’ rights to want to fight this movement towards an online pass system for all games?

My final words on this matter, then: “To the gaming police: Thanks for being the gaming police.”

Well it seems I’ve already overstayed my visit for this week. And I actually had something to talk about at some point in this column…

Till next time, I suppose. Look out for it.

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Name: Caveshen "CaViE" Rajman
Location: Durban
Position: Editor, Columns & Podcasts

Caveshen has published 1350 posts. Read all of Caveshen's posts.
  • SqWrath

    How is pirating a game any different from borrowing it from a friend, legal issues aside?

    • http://egamer.co.za/author/cavie Caveshen Rajman

      One friend buys a game and say, five people play it. One person buys a game and millions pirate it.

      There’s your difference. Numbers. :P

      Also, opting to overlook the legal issues regarding something entirely illegal?

    • http://tydvirtaal-agamersperspective.blogspot.com Duncan Hobbs

      To play devil’s advocate:

      Say I copy the game files and then crack my friend’s copy of Assassin’s Creed instead of having him lend it to me… in that situation, where the numbers are the same, what difference is there?

    • http://egamer.co.za Dean Oberholzer

      Tincan, I think you’re missing a fundamental point. This is from the column: If I give it to you, only you have it.

      If you pirate it, both you and I have it. Essentially it doubles the numbers of copies. That means that the publisher loses out whilst you enjoy. Two people are playing a game which only one paid for. Without piracy its: one person playing, regardless if they aren’t the original purchaser.

      Therefore the number of people playing is directly proportional to the amount of copies available. Effectively, there’s no loss to the publisher. When ever there’s more copies and original sold (via piracy), the publisher loses out..

      Make sense?

    • Anonymous

      Well played, sir. The difference really comes down to morals, if you care for such things.

    • http://tydvirtaal-agamersperspective.blogspot.com Duncan Hobbs

      Well put. GGWP

  • Anonymous

    As I said in your other piece as much as I want to hate publishers for online passes I do see online passes as their Final Solution to piracy which you claim deserves death.

    Online passes prevent pirates from firstly playing online and secondly like in Batman: Arkham City (Which will consume my life come Friday) prevent them from playing certain parts of a game. In fact if they had their way then every game would require a once off online pass activation code which could mean an end to the current method of piracy i.e. custom firmware of course they would move all their efforts on to homebrew but that is a another battle.

    I maintain that the second hand market may just be a collateral damage. 

    • http://egamer.co.za/author/cavie Caveshen Rajman

      1. Online Passes currently only affect multiplayer, meaning pirates can happily enjoy singleplayer anyway.

      2. Most who pirate games on console don’t even go online with those consoles. Those people usually have a second non-modded console to go online instead. Therefore, game fixes, cracks and other such hacks will eventually come about that entirely circumvent any kind of online code because the content already exists on the (pirated) disc, and if it doesn’t, the crack will install it separately.

      3. Punishing the second hand market is not wise, especially when it grants you many, many millions of gamers who will effectively purchase such things as DLC if they are enticed enough by the offering.

      4. We’re forgetting that Online Passes in their current form are essentially the same as the serial keys that come with the PC versions of most games, even ones like Starcraft 2 which log you onto your account and then append that game to you. These games are pirated regardless. This won’t be different on the console.

      Second hand gamers are NOT pirates, so they should not be treated like pirates. More especially, they should not be persuaded into piracy through such punishment.

    • Anonymous

      1) The single player of Arkham City is getting effected by the online pass. To play the Cat woman sections which is SP you need to activate an online pass. I foresee this continuing.

      2) Yes they don’t and by forcing them to go online it increases the chance of them getting banned. There is a large population of dumb pirates who just got their xbox flashed by some guy and know nothing about ban waves and the finer details of xbox security. As for hacks to bypass the online pass MS seem to at least have a handle on that with the recent ban wave. It will however decrease piracy in the short term while pirates find a way to bypass the online pass. 

      3) Of course it is a dick move and they will suffer in the long term as I said in the first paragraph in my comment in your other article but for a industry that takes on average 2 years to make a game and even longer in some cases they are surprisingly short sighted. However it doesn’t mean they won’t do it.

      4) Yes homebrew will probably take care of it but hacking an account seems to be more detectable than the current method of spoofing the fw. The xbox is a lot more restrictive than the pc is in employing bypasses and hacks. As online becomes more central to the use of the xbox especially with more and more games contaning an MP component as well as services like netflix and the like in the US you are going to need more and more to be online with your xbox. 

      MS and Sony will forever be playing a cat and mouse game with pirates until the end of time.

      Second hand gamers are not pirates but they may become collateral in war against piracy.

  • http://egamer.co.za/ Azhar Amien

    We’ve already mentioned the idea of multiple people living in the same house who all play games and the shit storm Online Passes does about that, but what about the following hypothetical example:

    I activate my Online Pass on my PS3. My PS3 gets a YLOD weeks later. Are you telling me, after I go replace that PS3, that I can’t play my damn game online anymore despite the fact that I paid for it AND had to get a new console?

    This hasn’t happened to me, but my launch model PS3 did get a YLOD after 5 years of owning it. It happened just before FIFA 12 released, and I thought what if my PS3 had broken a week later, after I got FIFA 12? The thought occurred to me then after I replaced it.

    It’s ridiculous.

    And to end off I will simply quote what I said in the Gamers VS Online Pass article:

    “Personally I’ve always been of the belief that if I pay for something, I should be able to do whatever I want with it. If I want to use my Call of Juarez: The Cartel disc as a Frisbee because it’s a shit game, I should be able to. If I want to give it away, I should be able to. And if I want to sell it, I should be able to. It’s my property.

    I know there’s a lot more to the issue than that, but that’s just how I feel about it at a basic level.”

    • Anonymous

      It’s absurd and instead of being over protective to the detriment or those who actually buy their games, publishers should cash-in on the used game market. Strike a deal with retailers to give them a share of the second-hand spoils or something.

      This will likely push up the price of pre-played and new games but it might just be a worthy price to pay if it means we can rid ourselves of DRM, online passes and the whole bucket of shit that’s been dumped on the industry.

      As for piracy, I second THQ’s creedo of, “Make a game worth pirating, then worry about it.”

      Publishers are doing just fine with piracy in full swing, Fat cats don’t need to get any fatter.

      Why punish those who will go into a store and buy your game full price or even at a reduced second-hand price? It’s likely that they’ll keep buying your games if they enjoy playing them so rather focus on making good games and reward those who purchase games in-store with bonus content or something rather than dampen the experience.

  • Treble

    Lol you can tell you Indian by letting other people buy games and you play them and enjoy it and give it back to them :D

  • SqWrath

    You still have really offered a valid reason why they different. Most people play through a game once, once they have played it they have no real use for it. If you borrow that game from them and play it, you have done exactly the same thing as pirating it. (You get to play the game for free).

    “One friend buys a game and say, five people play it. One person buys a game and millions pirate it. 

    There’s your difference. Numbers. :P”
    Just because there’s a natural limit on how much the company can lose, doesn’t change the fundamental principle, when you make the decision to not buy a game and rather borrow it from a friend you are having exactly the same effect on the company who produced it. You are not buying it and that company loses out on your money. You are not supporting the industry, you are just as bad as a pirate. Do not deceive yourself. If you don’t have the money to buy the game that’s fine, but you have no right to feel any better than if you had pirated it.

    “Personally I’ve always been of the belief that if I pay for something, I should be able to do whatever I want with it. If I want to use my Call of Juarez: The Cartel disc as a Frisbee because it’s a shit game, I should be able to. If I want to give it away, I should be able to. And if I want to sell it, I should be able to. It’s my property.”

    I mean are you even thinking about what you saying. You are clearly not paying for the disc but the right to play the game. The disc is your property but the contents of the disc clearly are not, you merely have a right of use. You can do as you please with the disc, but as soon as you grant someone else the ability to play, you have over extended your right of use. 

    • http://egamer.co.za/ Azhar Amien

      To be honest I can’t agree with what you’ve said, or maybe you haven’t explained it clearly enough or worded your explanation incorrectly. Either way, I completely disagree. Where’s the line? I do not think I’m overstaying my welcome if I buy FIFA, my friend does not (or even splits half-half with me), and he just plays the game with me. I do not think I’ve over extended my right of use if I lend a game of mine away to a friend. Your analogy can be correct for online multiplayer, because that’s a service, but I fail to see how games are “special” compared to other products.

      If I buy a DVD, it’s mine. If I buy a book, I bought the physical book (likewise with a movie). It’s mine. I might not technically own the content, but I own the physical disc and if you’re saying I can do as I please with it, then technically yes I feel no guilt in giving someone else the ability to play it. What I do with it is of no right or relevance to its publisher as long as it’s within legal boundaries. The same goes with the game. It’s not a service, they’re selling a product.

      Maybe our perspectives just differ in this matter, but I see no reason why games should differ to movies, books, furniture or applesauce in this respect.

      However, for online multiplayer, that’s a different argument, because I agree with you that I’d then be buying the right to use the feature and play online on their servers. And then, in my opinion, your analogy would be correct.

      But personally, unless it becomes illegal, I’m not going to not let my friend play my games because I only bought the rights to use the discs contents.

      And on top of that, I disagree that you’re just as bad as a pirate if you’re in the second hand games market. For me, I see nothing wrong with selling my old game, and then taking that money and buying a brand new game. That’s how most people do it, because buying games is expensive. Or trading one game for another. The used market actually has benefits for the new market. Perhaps the company loses money, but the used market is by no means evil, and exists for practically everything, and not just games.

    • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=602797306 Imran Amien

      You’re just arguing semantics here… the secondary market promotes the industry but in an indirect way… if you can’t see that, you’re an idiot…

    • http://egamer.co.za Dean Oberholzer

      Is pirating getting the game for free or getting a slavish copy?

      If pirating is getting the game for free (original) I don’t know where the law could ever stop that, seeing as you own the property of the disc and you’re merely just transferring your right of use. That would be a normal transfer of rights, wouldn’t it? Cession does exist.

      If pirating is getting a slavish copy (similar to copyright on literary works) then it’s another ball game. A slavish copy of a game means that lending, giving away or borrowing isn’t piracy because it’s not a copy.

      So I think we need to find “what piracy is” before we can actually continue. Naturally, this way would be looking at it from a completely legal perspective.

      Now, as far as I know, piracy is a slavish copy of work. Namely, the source code and intellectual property on the disc which belongs to the copyright holder was duplicated. Therefore this makes copying a game a breach of copyright laws and not theft, because you’re not really stealing anything — because stealing means that you’re depriving the person of the enjoyment of the thing. You’re not depriving any company their copyright on that content nor are you breaching it. But so you know, you may make copies of your own games for backup. However, once you lose the original disc you need to destroy backups.

      Giving a game away isn’t a slavish copy. The game publisher still maintains the right to their content and it hasn’t been infringed upon. Your right, which is “use”, can undoubtedly be transferred via the laws of cession — which is giving someone else your right (in this case its the right to use). I think that when it comes to group viewing and getting money for viewing or rental, there’s a problem because cession doesn’t fully take place and that’s a breach of the second copyright which is “use” – all games have more than one copyright, it could be three or four different ones. However the only one that applies to us is use – because we’re not copying or pirating it, but borrowing.

      Also because the disc is your property, there’s no problem there – with the physical transfer. So I think a major issues does pop up where it’s borrow or lend versus giving away. But, as far as that goes, the infringement of content is non-exist where the infringement of “use” is the problem. And I do think that cession is an important concept here, because if it wasn’t publishers could sue shops for second hand games – because they are violating rights. But they aren’t because of cessions and the rights were transferred?

      But interestingly enough, games offer two player modes on the local console, so this could also be a breach in some way?

      “When you make the decision to not buy a game and rather borrow it from
      a friend you are having exactly the same effect on the company who
      produced it. You are not buying it and that company loses out on your
      money. You are not supporting the industry, you are just as bad as a
      pirate.”

      I think that this is a yes and no though. It has the positive where the player could buy the game to play two player. But the negative is as you mentioned, not supporting the market if there’s no purchase. My example isn’t that weighted though. However it could include marketing by me saying “Oh my crap that game is cool”. Cheap example again, I know.

      However I think that buying a game or selling a game does help the market. By me selling a game I essentially get money back for my product. It’s legal to sell as we’ve discussed because of cession. If I get money back for my product, then I can buy another game and that helps the market again. The money my second hand friend gave me is recycled into the next purchase. Therefore we’re just getting games for a cheaper price, where as far as I know, is not illegal. So essentially the second hand game market allows money to be added into the market for new games, money that wouldn’t have been put in before.

      The money from second hand games don’t benefit the first game, but rather the games thereafter. And let’s be honest, if games were cheaper more people would buy it. And more copies would be sold. And the company would make more money. 

      Because the price of a game’s creation is as much as the first copy. Thereafter, everything is null and void because it’s a copy. Making the second copy of a game costs nothing, and the third and so on.

      So games can be cheaper, and it will help sell more. But the pricing is structured like this: because a lot of people won’t buy, the amount that do buy will cover the necessary costs. But isn’t it if the price drops the demand increases? So if the price halves, demand doubles, same effect? And because we know that a game is only as much as the first copy costs, companies still win and get their money back, because making double the amount of copies that they make now is essentially free (costs negliable for discs etc).

      Azhar: a game has the same copyright as a DVD / movie. More than one where you get right to use and not the content on it. Whereas the physical properties are yours to do as you wish, just cannot copy it.

      However there’s a chance that lending a game and a book can be seen in the same light. But also not. I think you just misunderstand the laws regarding copyright and what is on a CD etc. Physical and intellectually property is different areas of law.

      But, that’s my take and I think it’s about how piracy is classified. And there’s no proper classification because some think its stealing (which is cannot be because there’s still the original) where others see it as a breach of rights.

      Really debatable, but I do think that the second hand market helps and it does re-invest or add money which wouldn’t normally be available and it’s only doing this because of pricing. The market is fighting pricing a different way. Economics, that’s all it is.

  • Anonymous

    Azhar has an excellent point in that the used market actually does some good for the new market. Most people would not have the money to buy half the games they do without being able to freely sell off old games. Thus, by using the second-hand market they are allowing the new market and the respective publishers of games to profit from their purchase of said games.

    I think you may misunderstand the concept of ‘overstaying your welcome’ with regard to purchasing a game, SqWrath. If I buy a game, I have effectively paid to use that content and can do whatever I wish within the confines of the law.

    It’s like buying a lawnmower. You can destroy it if you like and that’s just fine. You could lend it to a neighbour and that’s just fine as well. However, if you reverse engineer and disassemble it then copy the design and sell it as your own, that’s not fine.

    Logically, there’s no way we can all afford to buy most of the game’s we want so borrowing from friends is the logical option. I’ve got a rough system with friends where if one friend is getting a game that we’ll only play through once, he gets it and then lends it to us and vice versa. It allows us to play most of the games we want to without going bankrupt.

    Admittedly, piracy and even perhaps borrowing does lead to some smaller studios and publishers losing out and suffering but the majority are actually still quite profitable. They still make a sizeable excess in revenue and do by no turns just about break even. A large part of the drive against piracy is greed in my opinion.

    If you read my comment a little further up, you’ll see how the industry can actually embrace the second-hand market.

    In the case of indie games and smaller studios/publishers I do feel bad to pirate their games since they do need the money and should get it so that they can do bigger an better things. However, industry leaders such as Ubisoft, Activision, EA and their subsidiary studios do not have this problem and can spend as much on a game as Universal would spend on a Hollywood production. It is ironically, these giants who demand that we curb used games sales, put an end to piracy and insist on forcing increasingly totalitarian systems such as DRM and online passes on us. yes.

    DRM-type systems serve only to inconvenience the person who’s actually bought the game because should Ubisoft’s servers be down, they cannot play the game they’ve bought while some pirate is able to play happily away. Online passes make a degree of sense but what if you have siblings or co-own a PS3 or something of the sort?

    Have the 10 Commandments of Barney been forgotten? Especially No. 6: Thou shalt care by sharing.

    Reward the people who still buy games rather than punishing them.
    Piracy is an issue and a tangible one at that but the methods being used to combat it are intrusive and serve only to hinder those who have bought the game. There is also no reason why big publishers or studios should put measures in place to starve the second-hand market when they are more than sufficiently profitable.

  • anthony nell

    I love how this argument has gone round and round and ended up at the same point. What CaViE said all the way up there (past all the TL;DR horse poop) is about as succinct as one could be on the matter. The gaming industry has many ways of fighting piracy of its wares, and this choice is the one that pisses the least BIG people off.

    Now by big people I mean companies and industry leaders that have stakes in the video gaming industry, ie. Blu Ray disc manufacturers. Go ahead, laugh, tell me I’m wrong… I dare you fat boy. Sharing games is killing off their revenue, but its not our problem, and they have no right to tell us how we have to conduct ourselves without consulting us. Gaming is a worldwide community of real people who care about what we do for fun. Possibly the biggest community of fun seekers on earth, and the people who cater to us used to be cool and different to all the other asshat industries of a similar nature.

     The online pass is not the only way to kill piracy off, and making it the only way is not the right way. Sharing is indeed caring and gaming is built upon this amongst other notions. We share everything together we gamers, except for un-caps when waiting in line at the jet respawn. We share our time together online shooting and spelling things, we share resources and most of all we share fun. The fact they’re trying to tell us we can’t share anything else, especially things we have paid for (as in CaV’s example) is male bovine excrement. 

  • http://twitter.com/Thanticore W. Marais

    I feel that the real main issue here is price: charging 800 MSP is ridiculous. The is the price of a decent XBLM game.
    If people are willing to pay 240 MSP for an avatar item, why will the be unwilling to pay an equal amount to gain access to online features?

    I think if they lower the prices of these so-called “online passes”, gamers would be less hostile towards it. I know I will.

    My issue is less with the principle and more with the price.

  • Adam Meikle

    I think what’s lacking in this line of argument, wholly, is the geographical implications of online passes. Lest we forget the reality of our contemporary society, where we still have third world conditions across the globe. The measly broadband in third world countries, like South Africa, does not equate to sufficient internet connectivity and the implementation of online passes will be another slap in the faces of internet-challenged gamers.

    Disparaging consumers will be the victims when they won’t be able to access content due to the restrictions of online passes. The truth of the matter, and the crux of the argument, is that we can jeer and complain all we like; yet,  the publishers will still pursue the online pass system as they are only concerned with the North American markets, and Asia and Europe (and South Africa is a fringe peripheral matter altogether). That’s where the profits lie, and consumers (your general gamer) can be quite gullible and fall into the trap of conspicuous consumption because of marketing ploys, the reiteration of shoddy benefits. The cash flow in third world countries is a perilous house of cards, and the secondhand market is a vital part of
    gamers gaining access to games in the first place. Reiterating, the point made thoroughly throughout the commentary and general discourse that gamers of our ilk are thoroughly and perpetually screwed, to pardon my language. The market is already saturated with an abundance of secondhand games and it needs to be taken advantage of more effectively.

    But we are undeniably stuck with publishers who don’t want concede to a freer structure within their product life cycles, with concepts such as micro-transactions and free-to-play being dirty words in industry speak (the industry speak of the major players). However, I think the mobile market and Steam may be breaking up traditional retail norms, brandishing a new era of freer online markets. But, again I point back to the reality that most gamers may not have internet access, and online passes will draw very bold lines across the geography of the gaming community. Also on a side note, remember that not all gamers are morally individualistic persons such as ourselves, with the mental capacity to actually care about such matters. Think about who the gamers are and watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCbbAA2suvs&feature=player_embedded. These are still some of the assumptions about gamers. I’m very frightened about where the industry is heading

  • Anonymous

    Everything^^^ 

    TL:DR

  • http://egamer.co.za/author/cavie Caveshen Rajman

    What really gets me upset is that most gamers would (hypocritically so) take the side of publishers and defend the actions of the rich, upon the (relatively — and let’s face it gamers would sell their kidneys for games) poor, instead of banding together and standing up for themselves.

    Do they not see that their rights are being infringed upon? How is a bigger noise not being made about this? If Online Passes had some restriction on Dedicated Servers, would there then be a bigger noise? Or is it because the infringed parties constitute mostly console gamers who are too busy professing their undying love for Halo 3 and Uncharted, to stand up for themselves when it matters?

    No, instead let’s defend publishers whom — I should are already making billions off games (not an attempt to justify piracy) — for asking gamers to pay a little more for the ability to play a game they’ve already paid for.

    RRPs for games should rather say “Rxxx + ~800MSP”.

    Each and every time someone goes off at a tangent talking about the finer points of piracy and making duplicates of a game, they miss the point of the Online Pass’s infringement on basic gamer rights entirely.

    For consoles, we buy the rights to use the console but do not technically own them. The same does NOT apply for games, to my knowledge. We are sole owners of our games, even if we do not own the copyrights associated with them. If that make sense.

    Also, I’d like to thank @Clones694 for being my sparring partner during the debate that preceded the writing of this column, a few days ago, where we made mention of many of these points and then jousted a bit over various aspects of said points.

    • Anonymous

      Firstly most publishers pull dick moves from time to time but you have to separate your feelings about them and look at it objectively. It is less taking their side but rather facing the facts that they are a business and need to make a profit for every game. If they don’t and go under gamers won’t bat an eye lash because there are so many other gaming studios.

      Gaming studios making billions is a testament to them making great or highly addicitve games or at the very least really good marketing departments as well as the growth of the gaming market. If games were to increase or decrease in price then they may make more less revenue depending on their demand curve and their cost X volume sold function. 

      Where were the hordes of “loyal” gamers when all those studios went under during the recession. They were playing what ever game the other studios of the publishers were dishing out and not caring past a moment of nostalgia for one of their games.

      Legally the point is moot.But if gaming companies changed the terms would they stop people from buying them?

      Apart from flee markets where most games are probably pirated you won’t find a second hand PC game market. Whether there was once such a thing I cannot remember but in any case it has already been snuffed out by publishers and yet I don’t remember a big noise being made by them so it is not a console gamer thing.Yes PC games cost less but that is as much on the console manufacturers as the actual publishers.

      If you buying a game first hand then the Online Pass infringes none of your rights as far as the EULA which you have to agree to to use your Xbox 360. It gets murkier with transferring those rights. Given that no one has publicly taken the publishers to court probably means that there isn’t much of a legal case against them. Unless there is some massive conspiracy.

      My penultimate point is that publishers aren’t hiding the online passes until after you buy the game. Mass effect, Batman, Uncharted 3 all announced online passes before the games were even released (although hyping the hell out of the game and some of the online pass features before announcing it will only be accessible through the online pass). You are buying the game with full knowledge of what the game includes sans online pass. The RRPxxx is correct for buying the game first hand because when you buy it first hand it is everything you get. On the other when buying the game second hand you need to adjust your expectation to buying it for R”The amount someone will sell it to you”+ 800msp which should disadvantage sellers more than buyers depending on who you are buying from. However this deters the second hand market if there is an extremely eager buyer and and a really eager seller a sale will take place with the publisher taking something off the side for their efforts.

      But being reasonable Cavie I will make you a deal. Given your hatred of online passes and you wanting to make a stand against this if you stop playing any further Dragon Age games or DLC as well as not playing Mass Effect 3 or any other EA published titles I will match that. Remember I have you on Xbox Live so I will know (also because of your Achievement whoring if you were to play the game I know you would never put that much time into a game and not play on your profile).

    • http://twitter.com/Clones694 Akshar Sunichur

      I like this guy. He makes sense. This is what Cavie and I were discussing. I am of the opinion that nothing gamers do will discourage the publishers because we want to play the games, they want to make money. So if we don’t want to pay, we can’t play the games. It’s a catch-22. The fee is, I admit, a tad above reasonable though. I’d pay a once off 400 MSP for an Online Pass if I had to but personally, I haven’t found a need for buying one yet. Maybe when I do then I will be a bit more emotionally involved.. If the Online Pass costs R700 then there is a problem. At the moment, just a nuisance for some.

      Also, if you look at it this way: The system is buying a game, so the publishers get money from it. If we buy a second hand game, the publishers don’t get money from it. Technically it is your game but really, you don’t own the rights to it, you just have possession of it. You can’t change it or copy it. That right is reserved for the publishers. Used game markets are just ways of “beating the system”. And nobody beats the system. At least for long.  Because they can do something about it, they do. If you weren’t profiting from any kind of transaction involving your intellectual property that you want money for, and you could get money out of it, you would. Same principle.

    • http://egamer.co.za/ Azhar Amien

      To be honest the five biggest problems I have with Online Passes are this:

      1. They don’t even always work (look at the latest Batman: Arkham City fiasco, then there was the fact that I know cases of online passes just not actually working right out of the box – the code doesn’t work)

      2. If you’re in a house where multiple people play games (i.e siblings) then only one of you can play online if you don’t share a profile, which is bullshit. If only using the Online Pass unlocked the content for your console.

      3. I don’t like the way they get in the way of single-player content (again, look at Arkham City). They should just be strictly to access online.

      4. The possibility that if you buy a game, use the online pass and your console breaks, you can not use the online pass again, which is completely ridiculous. You paid for the game originally.

      5. The price of purchasing an online pass for a game that doesn’t have one, or has a corrupt one.

      Otherwise, I don’t really care about using an activation code. But I do find it interesting how the most complaints about the second hand market comes from the likes of EA, who are amongst the richest.

  • http://twitter.com/JamieRamsamy Jamie Ramsamy

    this is a hot topic so this is where I like to stir shit up :P

    Ok, let’s tackle it from the starting point:

    What is piracy?

    Well, like anybody who loves Wikipedia (like me, thank you thank you), you can see that “piracy” (in this context mind you) was a term used in 1557.  ”Stationer’s Company” of London received a Royal Charter to monopolise publication.  Anybody who violated this charter were deemed “pirates” as early as 1603. Note that this predates modern Copyright law.

    Now, if you consider the circumstances surrounding this inception, Party A wanted to own the rights to do something and thus a law was created protecting them and thus PREVENTING somebody else from do the say thing.  It Economics and Legal crap rolled into one nasty ass concept that has blossomed into patent rights, copyright, intellectual property law, etc, etc.

    Now, when applied to media, this same concept is warped (let the roasting begin…).

    People, like the HUGE publishing houses have too monopolized the gaming industry and their influence stretches farther than the dreams of Joe Soap with a pitiful allowance to own a game.  Take Dragon Age 2 vs Dragon Age 1.  EA came, it saw, it ruined.

    The concept of piracy has progressed from protecting the intellectual property of it’s legal owner to slapping the title of “pirate” onto those who don’t BUY a game “legally”.  Make no mistake, my dear congregation, this is not a moral war, no no no.  This is an economic war.  Morals go out the window when the expected pound of flesh is not delivered.  Allow me to break this down into basic terms:

    Gaming houses conceptualise an idea.  They organise resources, develop a production line and bam! you have a product.  Now, in order to make sure they at least break even, they obviously have to sell that product at a price that at least meets, or if you want to make a profit, exceeds initial capital investment.

    Now consider Bob.  Bob has a idea to make the best goddamn armchair the world has ever seen that will make you orgasm just but using the “Recline” feature.  Now Bob makes and sells the chair.  5 years down the line, Bob’s chair is at a second hand furniture shop.  His idea is just sitting there, collecting dust and it’s previous owner has whatever fun he/she needed upon buying and then decided to sell it afterwards.

    So why does nobody take up pitchforks and torches to Uncle Van Zyl’s Second Hand Wonders?

    Well, it’s because, unlike the gaming houses, Bob’s chair has components and features that can be patented.
    Your friendly neighbourhood gaming house, can’t do jack in of intellectual property when it comes to coding.  Fair enough they can brand your ass if you use their logo, title, character, etc, etc, but nobody can do anything to safeguard their idea.  Take God War vs Dark Siders.  Or pretty much any FPS where you have to “kill aliens”.  

    Take any example, used TVs, cars, etc.  Once I buy it, I’m legally the owner of the physical object.  If I modify it in a way that infringes the intellectual property, then Sony or Mercedes will own your ass if then learn of it.

    Now, obviously, this boils down to supply and demand.  We preorder Arkham City, the studio has an idea of hardcore demand, multiply that by mainstream gaming demand and whammo! you have an economical basis by which you can attach a price to a game.  

    The golden question is, “does that value equal the resources put into the development of that title?”

    Naturally, nobody wants their hard earned work to be sold for anything that doesn’t make them live a decent life.  But I guarantee you that the prices that we see are in NO WAY reflective of what it will take to not only meet the initial investment, but also, to sustain the studio.  Most staff are contract based anyways so after a project is done, most people leave.  

    Now, the way I see it, these “piracy” laws came into effect to safeguard the publishers, not to stop people from pirating.  Chicken or egg anyone?

    Let’s look at the other side of this:

    But why would people want to pirate?

    When I was a wee lad, I pirated since I was, well, a wee lad.  I had bugger all cash, but I knew how to crack games.  I knew how and if I couldn’t I knew who could and then came the internet…man oh did the internet f*&k up the electronic media industry.  Also, people pirate because it’s easy.  You just used to rip a mate’s CD/DVD and you had the game, no frills no fuss.

    I guarantee you though, when you look at piracy habits, the trend is asymmetrical i.e. people ages between 13-25 are the amongst the highest number of per unit piracy thieves.  Now also consider that this age group, in general, are cash strapped i.e in high schoo; and varsity.  Now I earn well enough to pop down to a store and buy the damn thing and go home so that Jolly Roger trend long ended about a decade ago.

    Now before you digital “bible bashers” beat me over the head with a harddrive, consider the music industry.  The advent of the “mp3″ format and the internet pretty much spelt the end of the music industry as we knew it in 1997/8.  I mean really, who wants to buy the entire album when you realise that about half of it is filler crap anyways.  

    Steve Jobs realised this and created iTunes.  ”Most” people, if given the choice, would indeed pay 99c (in $ mind you), for a song.  it was easier since you search, click download, and it’s on your device in 5 mins.  

    I promise you, if gaming house made their games more affordable and readily available across all continents, and have them released at the same time, I’m fairly certain that whilst “piracy” in it’s most basic form may not be entirely eliminated, it will certainly be diminished. 

    Whilst this may not be a wholly accurate critique given that it’s an opinion but I reckon that this covers pretty much what’s going on there.  If you ever have a product, no amount of regulation or restriction will prevent people who can’t get it, under normal circumstances, from somehow obtaining it – see: “bootlegging” - originally came from concealing hip flasks of alcohol in the legs of boots.

    If gaming houses did their homework and researched their target audience every now and then, they’d realise that the ages stipulated on those age restriction labels can’t afford their games under most circumstances.  Their parents also won’t be buyng them games left right and centre so what will they do?  Pirate.  They’ll torrent, rip, borrow from friends, whatever.  Whether it’s wrong or not can be debated till we’re all blue in the face or till the next awesome title comes out.

    So there it is, my 2 cents worth – pick it apart at will.

    PS:  This crap about paying making us pay for DLC after we’ve bought the goddamn game?! WTF?!