Other than being ethically correct, what are the benefits of playing with original game CDs

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What are the benefits of playing with original game CDs?

Posted On: June 10, 2023

Please don't take me in the wrong sense. I am not advocating for piracy. In fact I want to know about the advantages of playing with original game CDs so that I can attract gamers in my region, in India, to join my server.

Please note that this is not a localized issue again, as piracy is a problem everywhere. As this community being against piracy, I expect to get some good answers/ideas so as to complete my market analysis regarding this.

My own experience and some ideas.

I would tell a few things from my own experience. Piracy is very common here in India. To be honest, when we were in college, we used to play lots of games in multiplayer, all with pirated copies, on our college LANs.

And after we passed out, I hardly found any friends who had the enthusiasm to play.

So, I was left alone, and then I tried to join the public dedicated servers (those which appear in the list while playing - in the game's interface) but I got kicked out because I was having a pirated copy.

Then I started looking for cracked servers. I found a few but they would be either always empty or too far so high in ping etc.

So, I decided to purchase an original CD but now the problem of high ping frustrated me. I was not aware of the problem of absence of dedicated servers around my region because I had never played with original CD before.

(See my point regarding this fact below).

Then I decided to do something about this. But I am not yet sure if I will be able to attract enough passionate gamers to make my local server a self-sustainable one.

So, I want to make sure there are indeed good benefits of spending some money to purchase the original CDs and this would be good enough to attract gamers.

Please note that there are passionate gamers everywhere. There might be lot of gamers around me but they might be having their network of friends and might be playing with pirated copies of the game.

But, can I make this more attractive and target these passionate gamers.

I was not aware of the problem of absence of dedicated servers around my region because I had never played with original CD before.

I guess this lack of knowledge was the main reason I purchased the original CD.

But how many around me would be unaware of that. In case, many unaware enthusiast gamers have done this, then they can be my target to join my server.

Question from user Sandeepan Nath at gaming.stackexchange.com.

Answer:

I'm hesitant to post anything that might be misconstrued as being "in favor" of pirating games, but I don't think its really possible to appreciate the disadvantages of pirating games without also looking at the other side of things.

First up, the advantages of piracy:.

Its cheaper (duh).

It can be difficult to find places that still sell older games.

Many games are not available for online download legally (which is irritating as an impatient "I want to play it now!" sort of person).

Many DRM systems have an activation limit which players may legitimately reach if they change or reconfigure their PC often. Obviously pirated games have no such limitations.

There have been instances of DRM system failures making games unplayable, sometimes for days. Again pirated copies were not affected.

Some DRM systems also required an internet connection in order to play, again pirated copies had no such restrictions.

For games that require that the CD be present pirates can use a mounted CD-ROM image instead.

Certain invasive DRM systems have even been reported to introduce security vulnerabilities and performance issues (however I'm not aware of any cases where these were actually exploited).

The reasons why you should buy your games:.

Its a hassle to install priated games.

Pirated games are often impossible to update.

Pirated games come from an untrusted source and may contain viruses or other harmful software.

Certain platforms (e.g. consoles / iPhone) require that the platform be "chipped" or "jailbroken" in order to run pirated games. This can be risky, prevent you from running legally obtained games and will invariably invalidate your warranty.

Online multiplayer is often not possible with pirated copies.

You don't get any manuals or other "merchandise" with the game (also think about games like Guitar Hero).

Price is obviously a compelling factor as to why people pirate games, but many of the other advantages of pirated games are related to invasive and over-zealous DRM systems - Console games generally don't have these problems and I think the situation is improving for PC games (admitedly after a wave of bad press over games like Spore). .

Systems like Steam and the AppStore are also doing a lot to incentive the would-be pirate into paying for their games by providing demos, easy online purchasing and download of games, and (in the case of Steam) standardised high-quality DRM systems that are less invasive for the user.

Another big plus in favor of buying your games is online play - Online play is difficult (if not impossible) for most modern pirated games. Also pirated games can be difficult to obtain and install.

The other big plus in favor of paying for your games is that you are supporting the developer. As others have already mentioned gamers benefit in the long run by voting with their wallet - in the past when money has been short I fully admit to having copied games, but I've always made sure that I go back and pay someone some money for the games that I enjoyed.

Answer from user Justin at gaming.stackexchange.com.

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