How Steam killed piracy for me.

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Stardusted

Limp Gawd
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May 10, 2007
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I am posting this to tell you about my strange relationship with game piracy. There was a time when people wrote "hey, I download it to see if I like it, then I will buy it".

Not even once did I believe anyone who said that. It seemed like an excuse to me and I bet to practically everybody else. I was also a fanatic regarding digital content. If it was not in a box, it was not for me.

Things changed for me in 2013. I had a Steam account I never used (got Dirt via an amd video card purchase, redeemed and uninstalled steam). So, a friend decided he wanted someone to play with. He gifted me a copy and kept pushing me to install Steam. One day I did.

Fast forward to the present year and day since I don't want to drag this too much. I have more than 600 games (yes, of course I will never play them all, what a silly question), I am a Steam addict.

The funniest thing of all though is that I am going through the toughest time of my life in the past 4 months. I mean, like not knowing if I will have to eat the next day tough. Still, being fortunate to live in my own place and minimal bills to pay, I refuse to play any pirated game, even though I won't be able to afford it.

It's not that I didn't try, mind you. I did. I thought to myself, fuck it Chris just download the goddamn game and play it. But I couldn't. It felt like a demo! Even though it was the full thing, the whole game, it FELT like a demo just because it wasn't enlisted in my Steam collection!

And I couldn't make myself to play it.

That's that. A small piece of perhaps meaningless confession for the eyes of all you [H] to see. After all, since I read these forums for many many years, it only felt natural to spill my (gaming) guts. Sorry if I bored you, peace and health to all of you. :)

PS: Steam or it doesn't count! :D
 
I use Steam as a matter of convenience and generally its lack of expense. On the other hand, I do worry about the day "my library" is no longer accessible, though.

Your story really echoes how I feel about Amazon and music. I used to just hunt down everything I wanted and download it. Now, if I want it, it's usually on Amazon. Why bother pirating it when I can just have it now, in the next 5 minutes, in decent quality, for a couple bucks?
 
Got to say i am similar, i had my "linux iso" years when i was like 16 years old up to early steam y..ears, then when Steam came along, bam, i had no reason to any more, download linux iso's so much
 
Achievements are worth the cost of the game not to mention how Steam keeps your stats :p.

I do agree though that demos should be more abundant like how it used to be about a decade ago.

Most of the games being released are complete junk and have no demos.
 
There was a time when piracy was more convenient than legit gaming, mostly because you knew that while you were digging around to find that CD you needed to insert to get the game to start (a CD which inevitably was not in the box with all the others, because you had taken it out the last time you played), you knew the pirates were merrily playing away without any such hassles. I know I'm not the only person who has downloaded cracks for games I've bought just to bypass that crap.

Yes, Steam is DRM bla bla bla but it's only intrusive when some idiot publisher starts stacking other shit on top of it, or if you're in the unfortunate position of having sucky internet. But the ability to re-download whenever I want, and above all the auto-patching, makes it a no-brainer these days. And I have Origin installed (as a glorified Mass Effect series launcher) and to be honest I've had no issues with that either. I wouldn't ever buy another phsyical copy except, you know, I needed the Witcher 3 collector's edition.

Speaking of which, people sometimes talk about how they like a physical copy to "display" or whatever, but most game packaging is utterly pathetic these days.
 
every game I have owned for the past 6 years or so has been digital. If they don't sell a digital version I pirate the digital version. Owning physical media died many years ago some people are just slow to adapt.

If I can buy it and download it with relative ease I do that. If they make it more difficult then going to pirate bay they lose my business.
 
Damn, I thought I was the only one. Now, I'm no addict, but I do have a few games I'll probably never play.

I used to pirate everything, but music is something I would buy if I liked it. (I own at least 500 physical CD's plus countless digital albums). Games, Now it's just easier to have it in my steam collection to load on anything and not worry about going on my linux laptop to find cracks (not doin that shit on my windows box haha)...

I have too much crap I collect already, I don't need game boxes too. :)
 
I use to download cracks all the time to bypass stupid CD-ROM DRM. I hated having to have the CD near by if I wanted to play a game. I am half and half on piracy now. If I know I will play a game for hours on end, I will buy it. Some recent ones are DA:I, Civ 5, Civ BE, upcoming GTA5, Terraria.
If I am sure I will only sample a game for a few hours, I will most likely pirate it. some recent ones are, Far Cry 3 and 4, The Evil Within, Splinter Cell.
 
Working in networking killed it for me. I did some work with our network SecOps team and we went over malware and the nefarious ways haxors get access to people's computers and I decided that I just couldn't chance it anymore. I just won't dowload cracks or games unless through a trusted source (steam, origin, etc). I'd either not play it, wait until it went on sale, or bite the bullet and pay full price.
 
Not saying that piracy is a great choice, but with the garbage that companies are putting out for $60 these days it feels like an option to make sure you're not getting screwed over.
 
(18) You will not discuss, suggest, engage, or encourage any ILLEGAL ACTIVITIES. Links provided to locations that deal with any such activity are also expressly forbidden.

This rule includes the illegal downloading of "ISOs" ;)
 
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