alt Hacker NewsFor a long time now I've found it weird that people who like single player games on PC (and to a lesser extent older consoles which had piracy enabling mods) didn't acknowledge the long game consequences of their actions, or at least were willfully ignorant to them because everyone loves getting something for free. It seems to be a variation on Goodhart's law - you get what you reward - if the reward for a company (big or small) in spending lots of time and money isn't as good as other options, those other options will get more investment in the future and the ones you do like will get less.
The other option I can see for the large companies is that any project involving tens or hundreds of millions of dollars is likely to be insured, and a condition of that insurance is they take all reasonable options available to get the most success out of it that they can. If they don't they need to reduce the risk which probably means less resources allocated which again may not be interesting to the companies capable of making grand experiences versus other options.
Replies
It’s hard to see from a US/Euro salary perspective, where not spending $60 is a moral decision, but you can start seeing how someone in a 300/mo salary country doesn’t think “I’ll save a bit and buy it” and instead thinks “I’ll never be able to afford this and this studio made millions anyway” and just pirate it. I’m not that articulate with my words but I hope you get what I’m trying to say.
> For a long time now I've found it weird that people who like single player games on PC (and to a lesser extent older consoles which had piracy enabling mods) didn't acknowledge the long game consequences of their actions, or at least were willfully ignorant to them because everyone loves getting something for free
Why are you equating people who like single player games to pirates? Are you suggesting devs who made single player games were caving under some kind of market pressure that was ultimately unhealthy for them?
The difference in global, high-speed internet access between Quake and Fortnite is huge. I think that explains why live service games are a recent thing more than piracy. That, and Valve set the blueprint for gambling and loot boxes with TF2.
Regardless, I think the jury is out on Live Service games being "safer" to make. There's certainly a lot of people chasing what Fortnite has, but there's a lot of graves and layoffs. It seems like the single player studios are shutting down less because they were unprofitable, and more because building a sustainable business on selling good products doesn't sound good to investors trying to make an exit.
This single issue convinced me most people have zero moral convictions and will lie to themselves to preserve their self-image.
> For a long time now I've found it weird that people who like single player games on PC (and to a lesser extent older consoles which had piracy enabling mods) didn't acknowledge the long game consequences of their actions
Isn't historically piracy positive for sales [1]?
That said, I'm pretty sure the real issue is that single / local coop games are just not appealing and so they get weaker sales. Like wtf was with Pikmen 2 not letting player 2 control louie? And then when local games start to sell poorly they get divestment but I'm pretty sure it was just lousey games and not piracy.
[1]: https://www.engadget.com/2017-09-22-eu-suppressed-study-pira...