if buying a game means I don't own that game then pirating doesn't mean I'm stealing that game. think of it this way, name me one thing you can buy in the world and not own it?
Indie Developers have mentioned that if pirated movies, games and music didn't exist they themselves wouldn't be able to make such great games due to a huge paywall on practically every movie, game etc nowadays and do not mind people pirating their games since they can turn out to be great sources of motivation to make such games.
Wise words from the goatβ you should support indies if you can but culture shouldn't exist only for those who can afford it. Ultrakill wouldn't exist if I hadn't had easy access to movies, music and games growing up. If you don't have money, you can support via word of mouth."
I personally donβt because I am fortunate enough to not have to, but it can really be helpful for everyone else who has to
can i sell the game i buy? also why do i care if people who buy the game dont mod it? I BOUGHT the game they didnt buy it for me, think of it this way. if i buy a shirt i can burn the shirt, disform the shirt i can sell the shirt. i cant do that for a game and so there has to be different rules for the game and so thats why it is also allowed to PIRATE the game.
you're entirely missing the point, sure you don't own the game in a legal sense but we're not arguing legality (and it's meaningless in this instance to go there). you pay for the license to access the game therefore accessing the game without that license is equivalent to stealing. let's think of it a different way, if a person pays for a lifetime gym membership and a person doesn't pay at all but also uses the gym, are they on the same moral pedestal? the person paying doesn't own the gym equipment, does that make it morally correct to use it without paying? and this is just an example from the top of my head, there's better examples that involve licenses in which case it's still unfair/illegal/morally questionable to make use of <whatever> without the license
you can use whichever terms you'd like such as "ownership" and "stealing" but both are ultimately irrelevant to the point you're making
also I'm not sure where you got the "most games don't allow mods" thing, from what I know it's the opposite
i couldnt care if its equivalent to stealing the game, ITS LITERALLY not stealing. no matter how yellow the water is no matter what if it looks like pee its still water. and for morally, let me ask you; if i told you its morally not correct for you to drink water infront of me, would you ever drink water infront of me? you would ask how is that morally incorrect and so im going to ask you whos morals are we standing on? who makes the moral good and moral wrong?
yeah sure buddy, it's not "stealing". it's still illegal and you're making use of products that you haven't paid for the license to use πΉ and your moral questions are also stupid, try using your brain for a moment to think about why two people paying different sums for the same product (and one supports the creator while the other one doesn't) aren't on the same moral level
lets put it this way.
is it okay for everyone to pirate the game, such that the developers get paid nothing? intuitively no, correct?
so is it okay if 80% of the people to pirate? 50%? at what point does it become okay? and when it does, what makes it okay for YOU to pirate it, but not okay for everyone else to?
the semantics of whether or not its full "ownership" or a "digital access license" is irrelevant - point is, you're not paying for a service which you're supposed to pay for, aka, stealing.
brother, you need to separate whats ethically wrong and what is a security-related mistake. if i walk in a dangerous part of town at midnight and get stabbed, just because i could have made better routing decisions doesn't make the stabbing itself okay. similarly, just because companies can invest more in pirating protections doesn't make pirating ethical. if everyone pirates, studios make no money and games won't be made. if you pirate, you're just freeloading off the people who have paid for the game to actually support the studios, which is clearly unethical.
i'm not going to crucify people for pirating - i do it too when the content is inaccessible in paid format. i think its similar in scale to shoplifting. that said, jumping through semantic hoops to somehow justify it to yourself and others for the sake of moral superiority is the problem. pirating is stealing. i don't care if you steal, especially if its from mega-corpos who have made their fair share of decisions with questionable morality. that said, you shouldn't try justify it in a way that makes it seem like its a good thing to do.
Ive helped out in indie projects and everyone I have ever asked about it is all for piracy, they know people who are going to pirate the game are either not in a financial position to buy the game or will buy the game after testing it out
Any word of mouth for a game whether its from paying for the game or not is great for the game
Games im not sure about I still pirate first if I can and buy later if I enjoy it, I would never have played my favourite game ever (Disco Elysium) if I didnt first pirate it to try it out
Generally the only people who care about piracy are the marketing team and higher-ups because they look at someone not paying and think that it loses them money when in reality it doesnt change the sales figures
You don't need to do this weird semantics argument to justify pirating games. Personally, as a game dev, I don't give a shit. It's not like most people are going to pirate games because it's just harder than buying the game. Most of the people who do it are people who wouldn't have bought your game anyway so at least you're getting some exposure.
i know whatr you mean but when people say "OH DEVELOPERS DONT GET PAID" theyre dumb and have never been a dev before in their life, DEVS get paid to MAKE the game and get a commission most of times for each game sold. the only people who are in trouble when it comes to pirating is the big corp guys who underpay and are shitty.
piracy is always right and moral, and don't let anyone ever tell you otherwise. there are literally no disadvantages to pirating a game (except for when someone has disposable income and still chooses to pirate indies). it is of utmost importance when it comes to video game preservation especially in current times where the execs and publishers pocket all the profits and try to nickel and dime the consumers.
I've built up my steam library with ~400 games, most of which I pirated when I was a kid. quoting this from the dev of UTLRAKILL, one of my absolute favourites -
culture shouldn't exist only for those who can afford it.