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Ok – apologies in advance – this may be a bit of a rant, but I don't think it's misguided, given the publisher's actions.

Listen up 2kgames, because I'm going to try and help you.

First, let's take a look at piracy. Piracy is caused by three factors: product quality, product price, and product availability/usability. If it's a crap product, people will pirate it. If it's drastically overpriced, people will pirate it. If it's not easily available where they are, people will pirate it. Most importantly, if you make it too difficult/intrusive, people will pirate it.

I'm going to repeat that last one again, since it bears repeating:

If you make your product too intrusive, people will pirate it.

Got it? Good. Let's move on.

Just as there are three reasons for piracy, there are three groups of customers.

First, there are always people who will pirate your product no matter what. (For future reference, let's call them Group A.) These are people who would pirate it even if you sold it for a quid on special at Tesco. So what should you do about them? Forget them. They won't pay for your product anyway, so trying to convert them to paying customers (or trying to force them, for that matter) is a lost cause. (This group also includes the crackers, since many groups will crack things just for the fun of it.)

Then there are the loyal fans (Group B). These people will buy your product no matter what. They'll rave about every last little bump-mapped pixel, and basically earn their forum label of “fanboys.” You could make your game cost £100 and require six forms of identification and a blood test – these people would _still_ shell out major cash for it. Basically, Group B are your best customers.

Then there's Group C. Most of your customers fall into this category – and I understand why it can be frustrating: they're a royal bitch to please. They demand a quality product at a reasonable price. If it fails any of the three tests (price, ease of use, or quality), then they'll pirate. On the other hand, if you make a product that passes all three, they'll buy it.

Ok… so we've gone over the three reasons for piracy, we've gone over the three groups of consumers, so let's see how you did. You released a fun game with great graphics (check.) You released the game at a market-standard price (a bit high perhaps, but still – check.) You crippled that product with one of the most intrusive protection schemes known to man. FAIL. As we say on the internet: “Epic ***** fail.”

Your use of DRM isn't even logical – you applied it to the demo! You know – the version YOU GIVE AWAY FOR ***** FREE! That one. Were you concerned about piracy of a freely distributed version? Do you get paid a per-install kickback from SecuROM or something? I've tried to figure out your logic on that one, but I can't.

Oh well. Moving on. Let's talk about the actual game. It's great – you've got a winner on your hands. You've got almost everything required to please Group C – except the inclusion of some downright evil DRM. Group B were eating out of your hand from the moment they read the first reviews. Group A have already cracked, packaged, and torrented your game, so they're a lost cause. Your success at this point depends on making Group C happy.

So what can you do to make us Group C people happy? First, forget about Group A. You'll never get a dollar from them, nor will you ever include DRM that they won't break. (I mean… a quick Googling would have shown that SecuROM-protected games get pirated just like the rest…) Now that you're no longer trying to force Group A into buying the game, you just have to make the whole process as comfortable as possible for Group C – that means NO ***** rootkits, and no DRM on the demo. That last tip is a pretty important one too – the demo is the one product you WANT people torrenting, mirroring, sharing, burning, etc.

It's really not that hard. We're not all dirty evil pirates – we really do WANT to buy and play a good game. We'll happily type in a short little serial number, or look up a word on a page in the manual (perhaps before your time…) if it's a quick and easy process. We WON'T happily turn over kernel-level control of our machines to a company as downright ***** evil as SecuROM – those guys make Sony look responsible. If you make the DRM too intrusive for us, we'll just turn to piracy, since it provides a value (ease of use, rootkit-free product) that you do not. That's the free market in action. Sorry – but that's the reality. It's just not worth our time to pay £35 or so for a product which is the digital equivalent of a sharing a small jail cell with a man named Bubba.

By the way – ask Real how well their intrusive “Rhapsody” DRM scheme worked out. It sucked _so badly_ that even $4.99 albums couldn't gain them customers. Don't follow their lead.

Love,
The Gaming Community