seanmonstar

Uh oh. Considering EA’s recent reputation, do we assume we’re doomed?

1313?

The makers of Game Dev Tycoon, a game where players run a game development company, released a “cracked” version of their own game. It worked just fine, but as the pirates would play, they would start to see this beautiful message:

Boss, it seems that while many players play our new game, they steal it by downloading a cracked version rather than buying it legally. If players don’t buy the games they like, we will sooner or later go bankrupt.

DRM done right.¹

You’ve noticed that terrible practice also, right? The one where you see a game trailer, and then at the end it tells you the list of stores you can pre-order it from, and which bonus-piece-of-crap you’ll get from each?

Kyle McArthur has an excellent in-depth critique of the practice:

If you buy the game, you’re voting that whatever the developers, publishers, or retailers did, worked. It doesn’t matter if you only liked some of it, and didn’t like other parts, the money speaks for you.

Worth a read. And a scotch.

This is Epic!¹ JavaScript has really been gaining ground recently. Soon we will play triple-AAA quality games by going to a website.

We’ve been told by the media that our hobby is somehow different and other in some unspoken way, as though it’s okay to have a drink after work and watch a football game, but playing XCOM is somehow wrong.

And:

We’re already running the country. We treat you when you’re sick. We help you fill out forms for your home loan. We protect you in court, and we may arrest you when you break the law. We send our children to school and we raise them well.

This is one of the best articles I’ve read on “being a gamer”, ever.