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THQ's Fitch Pegs Piracy For PC Failings, Iron Lore Closing
by Leigh Alexander
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March 3, 2008
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Following Titan Quest creator Iron Lore Entertainment's recent announcement that it has closed its doors and ceased its development efforts due to lack of funding, THQ creative director Michael Fitch has spoken out, placing the blame for the studio closing on piracy.
In a post on the Quarter To Three forums titled "Venting my frustrations with PC game-dev," Fitch explains that the costs of PC game piracy extends beyond lost sales, suggesting that pirates confronted with games that crash due to security code and copy protection may spread negative advance buzz about a game, using Titan Quest as an example of a "self-fulfilling prophecy".
Said Fitch, "If 90% of your audience is stealing your game, even if you got a little bit more, say 10% of that audience to change their ways and pony up, what's the difference in income? Just about double. That's right, double. That's easily the difference between commercial failure and success... if even a tiny fraction of the people who pirated the game had actually spent some god-damn money for their 40+ hours of entertainment, things could have been very different today."
He also lashed out at hardware vendors, calling integrated video chips and integrated audio "two of our biggest headaches." Compatibility issues and uneducated PC users are also a huge obstacle, he says, pointing out that there are endless possibilities for user configurations and many users have several apps running at once.
Said Fitch, "PC folks want to have the freedom to do whatever the hell they want with their machines, and god help them they will do it; more power to them, really. But god forbid something that they've done - or failed to do - creates a problem with your game. There are few better examples of the "it can't possibly be my fault" culture in the west than gaming forums."
He also lambasted a game reviewer for failing to alter Titan Quest's score even after admitting he had made a crucial oversight in evaluating the game's features.
"Making PC products is not all fun and games," he concluded. "It's an uphill slog, definitely. I'm a lifelong PC gamer, and hope to continue to work on PC games in the future, but man, they sure don't make it easy."
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You are in for a big wakeup when you finally try to ship a cross platform title. Oh my god you make me sick.
Right now I can go to www.isohunt.com, or www.torrentz.com or any number of different peer-to-peer services and start up a download of any pc game I choose in seconds.
"Fresh tactics" aren't what's required. We live in a world where any American only pays for a single-player game if he chooses to. Any economist will tell you that a business doesn't have a prayer if anyone can easily get your product for free.
Why isn't the industry doing more to stop this?
Good games sell well. Full stop.
Sorry. Second language.
OK well that's only half of it, you have to have Digital Distribution with an online component that's compelling enough for people to go out and buy that serial code so they can play online.
I don't know, PC piracy has always been awful, IMO. Best of luck with whatever you decide to do.
It would be funny if they couldn't pirate the game and simple no one played the game. I wonder what you would say then.
Small developers are hurt more by piracy than the Blizzards of the world and you can't compare WoW to Titan Quest... TQ was not a BAD game, I actually enjoyed it as it was a good addition to that genre. Game's don't alway have to be better than the one before it just to be considered GOOD. How many movies have you gone to in the same genre and thought to yourself, "it was okay. not ground breaking but worth $N and 2hrs of my time". Games are no different. I'm saddened that they closed their doors but I understand completely his frustrations.
I do admit that I would have played the game more if it had a multi player element but it's hard for small developers to make "the everything game" right out of the gate. I applaud their actions and hope to see more developers take up the challenge of keeping hardcore PC games alive.
There are complications beyond all of your and my comprehension as to why a publisher or developer do not add resources to preventing piracy. Everything takes time and money; two luxuries that are often not available to a young company. Give the guy a break; he just had to put an axe to his dreams but at least he went the distance; that's more than a lot of people can say.
How is a publisher supposed to justify making a PC exclusive - or even a game where PC is the focus - if the sales numbers are so massively disparate between PC and console?
I'm a PC gamer myself, and this burns me up.
This is just another whiner attempt to blame piracy for a terrible product, which it truly is...
It's just a little funny and a lot sad how someone could honestly defend a statement like, "It's okay to pirate this game because it sucked... but I'm going to play it through to the ending credits anyways." Oh well, I once heard somewhere, "You can't argue with Stupid". So true... So true.
If we want to receive more returns on our products, it is us who have to analyse and adapt to consumer habits, and find business models that work better. Blaming the consumers is not constructive.
I could see an argument for piracy as a way to try-before-you-buy but there are likely less people who would be willing to pay once they've experienced the game.
No one is "blaming the consumers" because "consumers" implies people who pay for goods and services. The pirate mentality is that if they pay for 1 game a year it's enough to kill their guilt, even though they steal 10's of games each year.
Also, I'd like to point out Galactic Civilizations II: no copy protection whatsoever. Heck, some copy protection vendor was posting a torrent to the game, but it didn't seem to hurt Stardock's sales.
With his worry over piracy and annoyance at the variance inherent in PCs, it sounds like he'd be a lot happier developing for the console.
There are people that will blame it on the PC, and say Consoles don't have this problem. Unfortunately there is one huge issue with how consoles operate. They are closed systems. A PC is an open system it allows you to do what you will with the data it uses. A console system is closed and is designed only to allow you to do what you are allowed to do. The hardware itself is the copy protection. You can modify your hardware, but then you're risking hardware fingerprints or identifiers changing which could result in online verification issues. A modified console is the same as a single player PC game that doesn't have any online requirement.
In the end you're not allowed to do what you want with your console if you wish it to still operate as that closed machine. You are allowed to do what you want with your PC and it is still expected to function.
The markets in the world today are changing. People have always been about freedom of ideas and free exchange. People want to share their experiences with other people. Often times this results in the sharing of games, songs, etc that violate copyright law. It's not often their intent to give the man the finger, it's an effort to share their experiences. Some people in the market work with this, others work against it.
Essentially a pirate is someone who does not belong to your target market or demographic. They're the same as a 72 year old person who enjoys Cribbage, when you're selling a first person shooter title. They're not contributing to your cause and asking them to, or blaming them for a lack of success is simply not working toward your proper audience.
Second, I don't understand how anyone can attack Michael Fitch for complaining about what most people in the industry consider widespread problems. Is he whining? Yeah a little, but he just saw a very talented studio full of hard working people bite the dust. I think he's entitled, and he makes some good points. Medium sized studio development on the PC is really difficult right now. Compatibility is a mess that can only be easily solved by studios with longer time-frames and more resources (like Blizzard). Likewise, piracy is a huge problem because it's tricky to integrate DRM software that is effective enough to deter people who casually pirate games, and yet not obtrusive enough to cause performance issues or other complications that frustrate legitimate consumers.
It must be exasperating for developers and publishers in these situaitons, and they often succumb to a combination of these sorts of elements. Titan Quest was a GOOD game. Not great, by any stretch of the imagination. But in a healthier industry climate I have no doubt it would have been good enough to sustain a studio the size of Iron Lore.
And those who would claim that good games always sell no matter what hardships they have to face should really think twice. There are way too many examples to the contrary.