#AND THE DEV SUPPORTS PIRACY

[moreeels]

breaking my silence I THINK DOORS IS BETTER THAN PRESSURE......!

[that-dumb-moth]

Okay, so, fucking PSA. Please read if you're interested in helping either Robert Kurvitz, the Disco Elysium team, or the Internet Archive:

DO NOT CLAIM THAT KURVITZ UPLOADED A COPY OF DISCO ELISYUM ON THE INTERNET ARCHIVE, REPORT THE UPLOAD, PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD

Internet Archive:

I'm a person that enjoys community projects like the Internet Archive. They hold crucial positions in public knowledge and do not deserve to be labeled "piracy dens" and do not deserve the legal difficulties associated. By sharing copies of software whose copyright holders still actually care instead of reporting them, you are putting the Internet Archive at risk. Once the Internet Archive gets sued into oblivion, you will no longer have the wayback machine, thousands of copies of scans of rare books and boxes will be lost, and endless piles of abandonware trapped in long outdated storage mediums and standards will no longer be used again. And even worse, once corporations learn that legal pressure is enough to take out public knowledge, they will press down hard on services like the ones Wikimedia offers (that includes wikipedia if you're unaware). Say goodbye to the crowdsourced knowledge of old, and hello to corporate refined knowledge, likely alot of which is AI generated.

Robert Kurvitz

Robert Kurvitz has a very poor relationship with ZA/UM and thus, it doesn't take long to tie a motive to him publishing pirated copies of DE. And as he's the one with the motive and not Internet Archive, it's entirely possible legal action could be pointed at Kurvitz instead or worse, also. And that's where the problem occurs... people keep claiming the file was uploaded by Kurvitz himself. But that's a claim made by the uninformed. The way the Internet Archive works is that each file uploaded is primarily credited to their original authors with credit to the uploader placed to the side. However, people sharing the file are claiming that, due to a misunderstanding, Kurvitz is the one who uploaded the file. When in reality, it was a person using a pseudonym. This simple mistake can undoubtedly prove disastrous.

The DE Team

There's no doubt that the team behind DE were immensely fucked over. And we truly need to fight against that scumbaggery. So, how do you support the DE team? First off, don't pay for DE. And if you're not willing to go to the greynet, just don't fucking play the game. I'm sorry, but hosting pirated games on honest sites like the IA just causes more trouble than needed. Also, please, do not share links to pirated copies and more importantly, don't try claiming the devs endorse piracy. Even if they do. Corporations are little shits that like to sue you over everything.

I don't know if any of that makes any sense. But thank you anyways for reading this.

[directdogman]

opinion on people pirating your games?

I could think of a few legitimate reasons someone might pirate my work. Maybe they're barely keeping their head above water and can't afford $6-8 for entertainment, maybe they live in a country where it's harder to buy games on Steam, maybe they have no way to make online purchases, or maybe they just feel like it. In a digital age, you can't really do anything about piracy. If someone REALLY wants to pirate a piece of work, they'll find a way. I like to keep easy to find piracy links out of the main community hubs, but other than that, I just leave it be.

Either way, I don't judge. Everyone's circumstances are different. I'm very fortunate that with merch + games sales combined, I'm able to feed myself and pay rent while focusing on my passion full time. Not a lot of people get that opportunity, y'know?

If anyone reading this has pirated my work and wants to help the game (but can't financially support DT), the best thing you can do is share with others why you like the game and get other people talking about it! It doesn't cost me anything if you pirate DT (since it's all just bits, bytes, 1's and 0's), but recommending the game to others sure does help me!

At the end of the day, I'm glad people like the game enough that they'd want to pirate it! I remember pushing DT a lot in the beginning and struggling to get people to try the FREE demo! What really makes me happy is that people DO play DT and have fun doing it! That's what game dev is all about :)

[transfaguette]

always sucks when one of the biggest companies in a space is also The Worst

Unity, which for a long time the majority of indie games and several AAA titles have been developed in, recently announced a new “Runtime Fee” that would charge developers $0.20 per install of their game, starting January 2024. Retroactively!!!! Yes you heard that right. Got a new computer and want to reinstall your favorite game you bought 3 years ago? That’ll cost the dev $0.20, when they themselves make no additional money. A bad actor could, in theory, install a game hundreds of times just to hurt a developers bottom line. But even just in benign scenarios, its enough to threaten the viability of small indie studios. Even if devs wanted to jump ship now, number one they’d have to port all their games to a new engine, a monumental task on its own, and they’d have to learn a new engine and new workflow, new pipeline, etc. This is catastrophic to the indie scene.

And this isn’t handled through the platforms they sell their games on like steam or itch.io, it’s woven into the backend of the engine itself. Unity claims they have systems to detect piracy (but they’re proprietary and secret!) and developers won’t be charged for illegitimate installs. But none of us can be actually sure of that. They are literally making “piracy costs the devs money” a real actual legitimate argument.

And to top it all off, their ghoul of a CEO dumped his shares right before the announcement. They Knew this would be hated and they’re trying to get away with it anyway.

Do note, this only applies to games that already meet the threshold for profit sharing. If you are a hobbyist or making a project for school etc, this won’t affect you.

What can you do? Keep in touch with your favorite developers and indie publishers on social media. Hopefully with enough backlash and support for indie developers, they will retract.

[unclerippuascension]

hi just saying this bc im starting to see a few posts in the tag talking about it, but if you are thinking about or telling people to pirate pizza tower because of what mcpig said five fucking years ago and the two ~problematique~ enemies in the game, you're a scumbag, full stop. like mcpig isn't the only one getting money from this game, you guys know that right? the other devs and the composers (one of which is apparently black and non-binary!) also get part of the profit. this isn't like pirating old games that companies no longer support and aren't making money off of anymore, you're taking money away from a game that's barely a year old made by people who most CERTAINLY deserve to get paid for their efforts over the course of half a decade. i don't care if you think mcpig is an awful meanie raycist or whatever, just don't let some stupid moral crusade screw over people who don't deserve it.

if you wanna play the game, then just buy it; and if you're really that against the idea of giving mcpig money, then don't buy the game and play sugary spire or something. the answer to this kind of video game discourse isn't always piracy, believe it or not.

Try to start some clown-ass debate in the replies or reblogs and I will block you on fucking sight.

[game-boy-pocket]

Just going to say, I am very pro video game piracy. But there's fucking caveats.

I mostly am only pro piracy for RETRO games. Games for consoles that are not longer being supported. I think re-releases are fine if you don't mind input lag and a lack of sanlines, or potentially bad CRT filters, but making you buy them again even though you bought them digitally already, or tying them to a subscription service is not fine. It's because I pumped so much money into the Virtual Console releases on the Wii, and again on the Wii U and 3DS only to be told I have to wait for releases again but need to pay a yearly fee just to access the games and connect to the internet every few weeks, that I got fed up and started buying real retro consoles and everdrives loaded with roms.

I think piracy is also great or playing romhacks, which SHOULD be officially supported. It's fucking stupid that so many Japanese devs are so behind the times and clueless about modern gaming culture that they'd rather people play illegally than support hacks/mods officially.

Now what I don't support is pirating brand new games on actively supported consoles. That's just asking for trouble. And that goes double for games that struggle to make many sales. I don't want to hear anybody bitching about F-Zero, Star Fox, or Metroid if they don't pay for those games. As for games that DO sell well enough but you don't feel like supporting them, at least wait for the console to stop being supported, there are billions of games you could be playing instead on older hardware, are you so fucking spoiled that you can't play a game that wasn't released in the last 3 years? Jesus man. And use your fucking VPN.

Be a pirate but don't be a stupid pirate.

[aaron-dee]

Citra and Yuzu were against preservation.

The fact is without piracy, there is no preservation.

Yuzu had active anti piracy built into the emulator preventing certian games from launching, Super Mario Wonder took a few days to be supported on Yuzu despite there being no real reason for it, Ryujinx was playing it fine pre release so there was no reason for this other than yuzu devs flawed views on emulation, this extends to their goodbye message in which they actively show anti preservation and anti emulation stances by saying "We hope our actions will be a small step toward ending piracy of all creators’ works".

Say it with me kids, there is no preservation without piracy.

Fuck Yuzu. Rest in piss.

[recreationaldivorce]

it's funny cause you don't see devs rallying against foss or software piracy or anything compared to certain artists throwing a fit over art "theft", despite the fact that the former would have more ground to stand on based on the fact that software does need to be actively maintained and abandonware is likely to be buggy after years of being unmaintained. but like u finish drawing an image it's done. it's not going anywhere. it's not gonna break. literally nothing that happens to anyone can undraw your art. at least devs could argue about the ongoing labour requirement they would like to be supported with but I've straight up never seen one express those views

[gravedirtandbriarthorns]

Also we were talking about piracy (of the illegal downloading variety) and I hit my dad with fact that I pirated the art program I use and then because I liked it so much i saved up to go back and buy a legal, licensed copy of the software to support the devs despite already having a completely functioning copy, and this man had the nerve to come back with "Sure, you didn't get a legal copy because you wouldn't be able to update it."

And I'm just sitting there like. Yes, your child who has used the exact same cell phone for the past 7 or 8 years despite it the speakers blowing out and the charging port not quite working right unless you wiggle the cable is just so and the screen being cracked and the corner of it having a bunch of dead pixels and would probably still have the same model if not the exact same, repaired phone except it's so old finding someone who will service it is a pain bought a program because I couldn't update the perfectly functioning copy I did have. The child who, their whole life, as worn sneakers held together by duct tape because "they've still got good soles, theyre just coming apart a little"? The child who wore the same pair of broken, duct tape and superglued glasses until being forced to get a new pair by a big enough change to their vision because the lens were perfectly fine even if the frame liked to fall apart at the slightest breeze?

Like do you hear yourself?

[fakeasmr]

As somebody who really wants to play a video game but doesn't want to abandon their principles, I need some advice. For you it's Lies of P, and for me it's Baldur's Gate 3. I want to buy a physical copy, but it looks like they're not doing that. That means I have to spend $70 for a digital copy that I technically do not own. Should I suck it up and buy the digital version, or wait and see if they'll do a physical release?

Buy the digital copy and then pirate a copy you can own forever? Or just pirate it, guess it depends on if you want to support the devs. I get it, the physical deluxe edition of lies of P is console only, but I'm still getting the PC version. I figure if I really want that art book, it'll be on ebay some day.

Anyway, piracy is a part of games preservation and is always a viable option. I don't know if any of this was actually helpful

[grayrazor]

When I was a kid, my parents bought me Starfleet Command II in a big box from Sam’s Club.

The game had a bad CD key and was unplayable. The dev had just gone defunct, so there was nobody to reach out to for support.

However, that game had a standalone expansion, so we ended up playing that instead.

A game company’s crappy anti-piracy measure drove me to play the pirate game instead.

[salemruinseverything]

actual anti-piracy measures: lame, overplayed, greedy

screen where the lead dev's fursona pops up, confesses to having pirated two of the main inspirations for the game, asks you to support the dev team where you can, and then lets the game play as normal: based as fuck

[foxgirltail]

Let's step through these claims one by one, shall we?

1. The palworld devs support AI replacing artists

The main thing I have seen is that the palworld devs made another game that uses ai generated art as a gimmick (ai art imposter). The multiplayer game revolves around inputting text into an AI generator, and based on the outputs, guess who the "imposter" (someone given less information on what to make) is. While this game revolves around ai art, based on the gameplay it literally could not exist without it.

I haven't tracked down individual devs twitter's to check if they've said anything along the lines of "I think artists should be replaced with ai", but it doesn't look like any of their 3 other games use ai. Just this one specific ai gimmick game, where the gimmick is that it's ai.

Additionally, the fact that game designers are required to either make all of their own assets (or pay someone else to). If you have an idea for a game and coding skills but no artistic skills and no money you're just shit out of luck. I think ai is a good remedy for this because without it, the game would literally not be released. It's basically the piracy argument - the assumption being "if people didn't pirate/use ai they'd be paying for it" vs the reality of "if this person didn't pirate/use ai they just wouldn't partake of/create it".

Non-issue.

2. The palworld devs steal designs from people

From what I can tell, it's just been pokemon designs? This is a non-issue.

3. The palworld devs have a history of scamming customers with abandoned early access games

I think this is talking about craftopia, which, from what I hear is very similar to palworld. This is potentially an issue but it requires discussing things like "when is a game considered finished?" and "how much do you have to play/enjoy a game for it to be worth it?" and "if it was worth it to buy/play something at the time, but no longer is, is that a scam?"

I think if you go into palworld with the knowledge of craftopia and the recognition that palworld may remain unfinished, and an improved version of the game may be released later that you may have to buy again, you can still enjoy the game for what it currently is.

(also nitpicky but one does not make "a history of")

Again, this could still be seen as an issue, and I don't really have a good solution. Maybe the dev could retroactively make craftopia free, and issue refunds to those that bought it. Maybe they could give a discount to craftopia purchasers equal to the difference between the sales prices (or just keys to palworld, craftopia's base price is $25, palworld's $27). I'm not sure how feasible either of those are on steam, or any other game platform (and I doubt the dev will see this post/thought anyway)

As a side note, craftopia got an update in December (and another one today, Jan 22nd), as well as a development roadmap (also December)? Seems like maybe this game hasn't been entirely abandoned.

So! All in all! 2 non-issues, and only 1 potential issue depending on how you see it

Here's one of the devs talking about the development of palworld, if that may be of interest. It's entirely in Japanese so I'll leave the translating to you

[smoothcrumbinal]

personally i’m a firm believer that mcpig has moved on from his past bigotry

and honestly the fact there’s really only one bigoted stereotype in the final game is a testament to how little he let his past ideologies seep in

if you don’t want to support the devs but still want to play pizza tower, piracy is the way to go. i think this is one case where it’s okay to separate art from the artist

[fox-stuck]

This is rad! I just want to add some context because this can be a rad upload without the information that currently isn’t fact checkable:

> this looks like an upload of the game originally from GOG and is several years old (2023). I’d still recommend grabbing it but it’s (probably) not Robert Kurvitz who uploaded it. The name is most likely being used as a pseudonym.

Get the game! But media and computer literacy are way too low to not be honest about where people are getting their files from and thinking it’s the original dev will create a false-sense of security and make folks not take precautions.

> description is awesome but also makes me doubt it’s Kurvitz: “Support the original creators, such as Martin Luiga on Patreon, instead of lining the pockets of the CEO that illegally used funds from the company's own coffers to buy himself a majority shareholding of the company to kick the creators out and try to cash in on the popularity of the game!”

If this upload goes down there are tons of other places to pick it up without giving money to ZA|UM - who deserves to rot. Piracy is hugely important especially when companies and corporations have more rights than individual people ever will. That being said be safe and take precautions <3

DISCO ELYSIUM

IS NOW ON INTERNET ARCHIVE

UPLOADED BY ROBERT KURVITZ HIMSELF

[medicinemane]

I'm almost feeling up to stuff again, almost recovered from having people in my house the past 3 days

Still sitting here yawning even though I've been up for hours, just kinda tired. Trying to get my thoughts together enough to message people

Anyway, not really related to any of that, but I'm booting up minecraft and it's like man... all the market place stuff, it's just... no thanks man, I got mods and more broadly speaking I got java edition (java is such an awful version in every way except for the part where it's the best, ie it runs like ass a lot of the time, but the customizability can't be beat and also my redstone door wouldn't work on bedrock)

"Buy skins!"... I can find skins online or even make my own

"Here's a lion or an octopus or maybe some weird colored tnt(?)", yeah, I know what mods are and while they may be a pain... I can totally track stuff down and get things working

Java is janky as hell. Mods are kinda broken messes... I think if microsoft didn't have a conflict of interest where as I'm noting this directly competes with a money maker, they might actually improve modability (I think the reason they don't try to kill it is understanding people would riot)

Modding sucks with stuff like... still want to make some kind of winter village (maybe whenever I get a new computer and can turn this into a server box), and the Fairylights mod is... it's non negotiable, it's half the point of it

...I haven't kept up to date on what version the dev has that on... I don't even know for sure if they're still supporting it. Modding is a pain in the ass, it's just also infintiely better than the alternatives

I just like having control over my games and how I run them and... minecraft's at the real intersection on that stuff

I own my world (it's on my computer, not a microsoft server), but I don't own my account (someday I'd like to figure out how to run a server where it's all whitelist and no one needs an account... just on principal about owning games... just hasn't been worth it yet)

You can kinda do anything with java edition so long as you can figure out how to do it, but it'll be a pain and a hassle and even logging into a modpack can be a pain cause... you need a launcher for the client, you can't just launch it... it's literally easier for me to launch a server than it is for me to boot up either my vanilla or my modded client to do single player... and that's messed up to me

(The server I literally just double click "Server Start.bat" which tells it how much memory it can use and... done. My client I have to boot a launcher and then microsoft has to agree that I'm allowed to play)

Love minecraft, hate microsoft, mojang was never perfect though the literally encouraged piracy and that's literally how I got into minecraft was with a pirated copy

I love owning my worlds by having them saved to my computer, but I hate not owning the ability to play minecraft (This is a big problem with stuff like steam too, to be clear. You don't own a single game on there either, they could take any of it away at any time and... they have from windows 7 users for the crime of running an old OS. You only own it if it's on your own harddrive with no DRM... which my server is, my client isn't)