Don't ask for 'cracked' copies of files here.

[yoodaa]

quote:

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Originally posted by ryu:
i live in eastern europe, in ex- soviet republic; my mother earns 190 USD a month, i attend university, and my younger brother - secondary school; i also work in evenings to pay up for my PC and rare inet connections;

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Now I'm curious....what's your PC and how much did it cost?

[yoodaa]

quote:

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Originally posted by BlackRaven:
I suggest we not judge too harshly until we've "walked a mile in their shoes." I've seen, but never lived, the poverty that exists in some parts of the world.

My ire is reserved for those of us who live in the more affluent countries and still pirate games.

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Gee, I wonder if a person would die if he or she never played Wizardry 8. If it was food that we're talking about, then I'd agree with you and say not to judge too harshly. However, we're talking about a game -- a luxury, not a necessity. I hope that you can see that there's a big difference there. The excuse of being poor doesn't hold water when you're stealing a luxury item.

Whether you're poor or not, pirating is still wrong.

(btw, for all those that answered "yes" to dying for lack of wiz8, you're ADDICTED [img]smile.gif[/img] )

[Gilrad]

I, too, play games that are pirated, but I dont just rip every company I can see off left and right. I have ethics to maintain (An Internet Swashbucker with ethics! What a concept!)

I did indeed buy wizardry 8, because the game has enough attention to detail that I know for sure that Sir-tech didn't just produce this game for the same reasons that countless other companies do.

I do, however, have every single Mega Man X game on my computer in some form or another, and if Yatsuno wasn't working for Squaresoft, I would probably do whatever I can to pirate any Square game I can to make a stand about how I just hate games made for the sole purpose of making money and gaining popularity.

Say what you like, but know that what I buy I end up playing and enjoying much more than anything I could possibly acheive through a game I disagree with enough to pirate.

[fable]

@Gilrad, how do you justify denying a company that produces a game the right to the money it requires for its purchase?

[*C*]

I think companies that sell programs for $200 or more should be spanked. Windows being one of them. [img]graemlins/moon.gif[/img]
It's amazing how all of the popular professional programs(that would make lots of money at low prices) are extremly high in cost.

[ryu]

well my machine is duron 700, 196 sdram; 32mb ATI video; 20gb hdd; it cost like 650 USD; to people saying i stole the luxury item - we do not mine the coal in the mines during day and night you know, we are trying to have sorta normal life here; we even sometimes go to the cinema or enjoy icecream; and i might seem very weird, but i like PC games, especially rpg very much; well, i have to work after university, but hey, i do not complain, i simply try to explain why am i not able to buy original game;
i would gladly pay like 10% of salary for a 'luxury item'(especially knowing they had expierenced financial shortage and my 2cnts would make game developing a little more possible), but not 25%;
i am not proud of what am i doing.. but what do i do ??
i can click 1k times on some banner if it is what creators want;
gee i feel very damn guilty :/ it just can't be that i am a thief !

[Gilrad]

In respons to that question as to how do I justify it, I belive it is just as bad as a boycott, as I would never spend my money supporting such a cause with personal reasons behind it.
Lets tear this apart, shall we?
Take Final Fantasy. I was too young to successfully evaluate most of the versions until much later, in which I played not for entertainment, but for knowledge.
Seven, like most games that hit a great technology bump (coughWiz8), was incredibly well-made. Not only did it take full advantage of the technology at the time, but it was incredibly well-polished, and there were very few things that were either overpowered or underpowered and useless.
Now look at Eight. By the look of how horribly unpolished it is, it was clearly obvious to me (as well as a good majority of the hardcore FF fans) that this was horribly unpolished, something that I noticed even before I became aware of the evils of Mainstreamism. The way the game played out, as if most of the ideas were thought up in a short amount of time and taken into effect in an even shorter, suggested that it was not the creator of Final Fantasy's idea to make Eight, at least not with so little time to prepare, and was rather suggested and rushed through by Squaresoft, who saw a large enough fan base in both Japan and America, that they could probably get more profit from selling a half-assed Final Fantasy, followed by another, than selling one good game in the time it took to make two. It is reasons like this; putting money and selfish reasons ahead of the creator's true desires, that I condone.
In contrast, take a look at the anti-government band Rage Against The Machine. Although I am not the type to listen to music, as it is more mainstreamised than the Videogame industry could ever be, but that band is a picture-perfect example of a person or group of people who do what they do for all the right reasons. They made music, possibly to enlighten the listeners, possibly because one or all of the members do not feel satisfied unless they are creating something. In either case, the moment--that is, the very moment people started listening to them because other people say they are cool, the moment they became mainstream, they split up. Possibly because they would be hipocrites if they continued, possibly because they ran out of things to rage about. The point is, that they were not in for the money, the popularity, or the thought of them being any better than the average person. Those are the type of actions that earn my respect, not the likes of Tomb Raider.

[fable]

I may be missing your point--I see (and agree) about why you don't like some games, but I don't understand the logical connection that lets you jump from that point to getting a pirate copy of anything.

[Gilrad]

This leads into my strong views of Mainstreamism. Possibly the worst thing that ever came out of media, when anything relies on it's advertising, and gives that precedence over everything else that makes good games, they then rely on the mainstream. Whenever someone wants to spend money on something because someone else (either base level, say, your friend, or to the media level, say, commercials) says it sponsors Mainstreamism. When you see those pop concerts, bands that come and go within the month, just about everything that thrives off of public opinion, you see the epitome of the mainstream, in all it's horrific glory. A radio station has to play a song three times a day because the person who plays it likes it, and so everybody who listens to that station starts liking it, and sooner or later that group gets big enough to sway the thought of those who dont listen to the station, and sooner or later you have a mainstream sansation.
You now may be wondering what is so bad about listening to what other people say, and, at times, taking it for gold? Doing what other people do, simply put, dehumanises all who practice it. If we fall victim to outside opinions, and eventually copying their actions, then you lose your sense of identity. You would then be nothing more than a pawn for those who influence you the most.
Now if that isn't bad enough, to lose your humanity, it turns out that there are COUNTLESS people who suffer from Mainstreamism. Some moderately, the "Different" people (although sometimes they could just be copying the style of being Different, thus becoming an oxymoron of all he thinks he stands for), while others are so ignorant, they challenge their mind so little, and are so meek to all that surrounds them, that all people do is take advantage of those people by stealing their money through advertising that make that person think he wants a luxury that could have gone to a neccecity, and walk over them because if somebody can't think for himself, he can't fend for himself.
So you may wonder, then, Why do I even play games, if I say all media is a form of dehumanising the masses for profit? Because in a sea of evil, some sail true. Some create for the people, thus one of the reasons why Final Fantasy 9 was nogistalgic, some create to help, such as Rage Against The Machine's view that people have the right to know and suspect, others do it for the simple desire to create. I experience it as well, but I can't explain it. I get the urge to make something, be it writing, visual art, or music, I create. I dont know what I do with it (I usually post it to find other people's views and what I can do to make them better), but either way, I get a creative urge, which is possibly the only reason why all humanity is not doomed to be pawns.

That, sir, are my views.

[fable]

Oh, why didn't you say that you didn't have a good reason for pirating software? Would have saved you a lot of time and effort.

[ 01-09-2002: Message edited by: fable ]