Indie Pirates: Yarr a buncha dicks.

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So I just read a post from an indie developer talking about their brand new release having already been pirated. I’m not going to mention which game or which developer, largely because I don’t wish to exacerbate the issue. But I did want to take a second to share my feelings on the piracy of independent works.

First, lets take a second and get the usual justification bullshit out of the way. Yeah I can understand the rationale behind pirating some things. Maybe its because it isn’t available in your region. Maybe its because you hate all the vile DRM that pervades modern publishers games.  Maybe, just maybe its because you’re a poor bastard with entitlement issues and aren’t willing to fork out upwards of fifty dollars. Whatever, I get it.

What I don’t get is in a circumstance where a game is none of those things and is pirated. In this case the game doesn’t have crap tons of DRM, isn’t made by an evil empire, and it will only set you back £5.99 or in non posh monies about 9 dollars. Thats right you went to the trouble of pirating a game that would have set you back a whopping one and a half hours of flipping Whopper Jr’s. And to make matters worse you don’t even have the ability to cower behind the ideals of fighting the man.

The MPAA, RIAA, and Uber Publishers are a bunch of douche bags for destroying individual creativity and marginalizing media into the mainstream garbage all for the sake of profit. But you don’t have that argument to fall back on here, and you’re just as bad because you are doing the exact same thing by not supporting those who have taken on the challenge of being creative and carving out their own piece of the pie by making a game you obviously want to play. I would go so far as to say that the damages rendered by those of pirates ripping off indie developers are substantially greater than those perpetrated against major corps due to their inability to absorb such unforseen costs regardless of scale.

Who knows maybe I just have a Robin Hood complex, but I can’t get over thinking the rotten individuals perpetrating this are a bunch of bitches.

  • FreakyZoid

    Unfortunately some people will just pirate things no matter what. I think it's not worth getting too worked up about these people, since they would have never paid you, and it isn't really a lost sale.

    I mean, some people still download mp3s for free when they can be bought for a tiny cost. Some people pirate 69p iPhone games. It's just not worth getting angry about.

    Better to channel your energy into being more thankful to the non-arseholes who continue to buy your games.

  • http://www.twofedoras.com GeoffS

    You're absolutely right. There will always be a certain amount of wallet friction and that wont change no matter how low the price goes.