Epic's Mike Capps: PC piracy 'changed our business model'

Not as bad as PC. Plus, in the end a lot of people get console banned when they sign online.

Almost every single person in every dorm I have lived in over the past 3 years pirated music and movies, the gamers almost all pirated PC games. This is roundaboutly ~200 people (small school, Victorian mansion style dorms), but I never met a single person who pirated current generation console games.

Same here. Most of my friends will pirate CDs, but never any games. I think you have to mod your console to play pirated games, which is something no one really wants mess with, as it can void warranty and break easily.

The Wii, the DS, the PSP, the 360 all have MASSIVE pirating going on. Funny, around the same freaking time PC pirating took off as well.

It hurts companies but I think there's a few things that are really hurting PC game sales.

1 - The generation gap is smaller now. Much like why the Arcades died, the same reason why PC gaming is hurting. There isn't as big of a leap, if any, on PC games as there was in the past.

2 - DRM makes PC gaming too much of a hassle for the novice. The entire industry needs to abolish this blight and do some serious marketing to let people know the pandemic is over. It's a negative stereotype and people who don't know PC gaming use it often as their excuse to not get into it. (Money is only half the thing, a freaking iPad is as good as a computer upgrade and you do far less on it...)

3 - PC games simply don't get marketed as much or well as consoles. The ones that do, though, seem to succeed quite well, hmm...

4 - Gaming integration on PC is still terrible. It's easier than ever to hook up a PC to a TV and yet there's no GUI or Front end that makes it easier to manage for the wimps out there.


Funny how that list is almost everything the publishers and devs brought on THEMSELVES...

Those crazy-ass pirates messed them up good!

Just because there are a lot of XBox 360 torrents floating around doesn't mean there is "massive piracy".

Playing pirated XBox 360 games is somewhat a pain in the ass, and it is a worse experience than playing retail. For example, you could get console banned. Most people will pay for a better entertainment experience.

PC games are easy to pirate, and the pirated versions frequently provide a better experience than retail. For example, no one wants to deal with Ubisoft-style DRM. So you see much higher piracy rates for PC.

SSSSShhhhh...

Piracy rates on the consoles only go up substantially when there is a softmod (ala Wii, PSP, PS2, original Xbox, Dreamcast, etc). The 360 and the PS3 don't have this problem currently. As a result, the piracy rates for 360 and PS3 games are far lower than on the PC, by any count.

Maybe there are modchips for both consoles (I really don't know) but the percentage of the total game buying population that even knows what a modchip is, much less how they can get and install one, is extremely small. We're talking losses of sales in the millions on the consoles, and tens of millions on the PC (depending on the game). It's obvious why a company would want to go the console route first.

This is really all a moot point, isn't it? Piracy isn't the issue with PC games, it's that no one wants to bother with the hassle of keeping a PC with a cutting edge graphics card, and figuring out why games crash and all that. (It doesn't help that the least invasive form of DRM out there requires you turn your DVD or blu-ray drive into a hardware dongle.) Steam's helping a ton -- retail PC gaming has pretty much gone the way of the dodo, but at the end of the day console gaming is where the money is.

@onan -

I understand what you are saying, but I have a hard time believing that millions of people pirate PC games just so they can go "aww, it doesn't run on my PC!" over and over again. Maybe they can't play the new games with all of the settings on high, but they can still play them.

Maybe that is the reason the PC market hasn't grown at the same rate as the console market (or one of them anyway) but it doesn't change the fact that a ton of would-be customers choose to pirate games on the PC side for little reason other than because they can, and because it's so convenient for them (because of DRM, region restrictions, etc). This means lost sales for devs, which lowers their incentive to create games for the platform.

@ Massmass

"The Wii, the DS, the PSP, the 360 all have MASSIVE pirating going on. Funny, around the same freaking time PC pirating took off as well. "

I'm guessing you must be pretty young (compared to me anyway). PC piracy took off at pretty much the same time as PC gaming, it's just far more obvious these days because you read about it on sites like Joystiq.

"Just because there are a lot of XBox 360 torrents floating around doesn't mean there is "massive piracy"."

The figures of around 2 million downloads for some of the games shows the massive piracy on consoles. It piracy really was an issue they would be only developing for the PS3 but they ain't, its more likely that theres some big money from MS to develop for the console (and MS are starting to regret pushing the console becuase now windows based PC sales are beign pushed back, Steam on mac will further that)

And before anyone marks me down for being a PS3 fanboy, i have a wii,PC,360 and PS3, the PS3 is the only one currently thats Disc piracy free (but the downloadable games are being "shared" a bit)

You win the garbled sentence award!

Yeah no kidding. Were you trying to be confusing? Is this some example of a literary device to mock Mike Capps' words?

Not sure, but sir, you need a book.

Newsflash Epic:

PC put you on the map. and as I've always said- you don't hear valve bitching about piracy. Follow a model that works.

liked*, even

No kidding. GOW is great and all but the last classic game Epic made was UT2004

GOW is there game of this decade. In ten years, the Epic game that will be remembered from this decade is definitely the original GOW. Its the reason why i bought a Xbox 360!

I remember a time when nobody though GOW1 was going to look likes it screenshots and it came out and blew EVERYONE away.

I agree fully. It's not that either GoW games are bad games, because they are very well-made and fun at times, its just that, to me, they embody a lot of bad trends in new games these days. Macho men, lots of gore, brown and gray, and cover systems (which I personally hate) really turn me off to those games.

" Macho men, lots of gore, brown and gray, and cover systems (which I personally hate) really turn me off to those games."

Its funny that you name all of those, because in regards to GOW, there is no competition. GOW does all those things better then any other game around. The cover system is the best hands down (so smooooth . . . why cant other games get this right?) and in regard to having gore, no game has yet to take it to the level gears has and stilll be good. Plus on top of that all the grays and browns in the game actually look good and help enhance the horror feel there going for.

You know all those things he listed were what he 'hated' about the game.

Also 'so smoooooth'....easy there big boy.

GeoW* not GOW. >_>

How in the world can you not like cover systems? I'm not a huge fan of Gears of War but getting cover systems to be almost mandatory in action games is the best thing Epic has done this generation. Playing a game like Just Cause 2 is like traveling back in time and it's not fun not being able to take cover in a game.

yeah i know he hated them . . . i just wanted to show how even though he hated those things about the game, they were still mind blowing and are still the industry standard for what other games try to achieve.

"...in regard to having gore, no game has yet to take it to the level gears has and stilll be good."

God of War says hi.

well yeah i guess they do it better, but GOW3 just came out and bodies disappear IMMEDIATELY after they are dead as a consequence.

You cant jiggle the bloody meat pieces around by walking on them like you can in Gears lol

"Jiggle the bloody meat pieces" is one of the funniest statements I've ever read on here.

"How in the world can you not like cover systems?"

I'm getting a little tired of them. Cover systems were so ground breaking when they were first done well, but increasingly they seem to be becoming a crutch for mediocre level/battle design and AI. To me, cover systems are starting to feel very boring and rote.

Personally I have a hard time comparing GoW to UT. Both are great games for different reasons.

besides, a chainsaw on a machine gun makes all of your arguments invalid.

I understood you perfectly.

I believe Epic is already passed caring about the backlash from PC gamers. Evidently they have already felt that backlash with piracy of their games.

Epic makes this statement because they are tired of people stealing their games as if they have a right to do so. PC gamers will always find an excuse to steal games because they can. There is no prosecution and torrent makes it very easy to obtain a pirate copy. Piracy will continue to escalate until the PC platform is only have flash and MMO games.

I can also hear you over a mile away on a Playstation/Sony article. : )

being an apologist no doubt . . .

i think i said all i needed to in the past 4 years where EPIC makes it annual declaration where pirating killed their sales.

also, not my fault gears of war was a horrible port.

A horrible port that i purchased anyway to support a good developer.

yea, wont be making that mistake again.

right on cue :)

i wouldn't call 1 hour right on cue, either way, i couldn't leave your post there without me answering, it'd just make you look stupid, and i'm not a meany.

Hey you know if you look at the times ... when I saw the desi post is when I posted "right on cue" and it just happened that you posted like a minute before that. I'm not that good to where I'd refresh and post a minute after you replied. Just figured you two would come in here with the sword and shield.

And what about you coming into all the Sony/Playstation articles with a sword and shield in tow? Hmm?

Nah I've been mad chill on all that over the last 3 months. I don't even post that often anymore.

ALL OF YOU, STOP ACTING LIKE CHILDREN!

Dirty mouth? Clean it up with new Orbit Mist!

For a good clean feeling, no matter what.

"also, not my fault gears of war was a horrible port."

Uh, it was a great port minus a few bugs(minor). And Epic didn't port GoW on PC, it was People Can Fly. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People_Can_Fly Just saying.