It seems like alot of people here admits that they have or had a pirated version of Demigod. Is it because they are in some sort of need to tell it i don't know, but just for the record, if you download a pirated version of a game, like Demigod and go out to buy it a week after doesn't make it ok..
By downloading a pirated game you help the community of pirates, well you say you just won't share the files, but on some degree you will always share and/or help those pirate douchebags.
So please stop pirating stuff, i can myself admit i have downloaded games before, but that was before i was aware of the situation and how they are destroying the videogame market, there are previews, reviews, gameplay videos, alphas, betas, screenshots, developer diaries and so on, so you can see if its a game for you, and if that doens't convince you, try a demo if it's possible, if not there are a load of communities that can lead you on your way to a game that suits you, so what i am trying to say is.
Please stop pirating games, you are cheating the developers for alot of moeny even though you buy the game afterwards, poor companies
Stealing food to survive is one thing and a different scenario that *may* qualify for a different perspective...stealing a completely unessesary thing for entertainment is wrong. There is no weaseling around this.
You are not enlightened...you are a criminal.
False analogy.
If I were told at a college's open day that I will be taught by the best tutors in the country and then, when I arrive at the college, the tutors are terrible and are teaching totally incorrect information then I should not be expected to pay for the course. The same argument applies to gaming. I simply don't get why the consumers of the games industry are just happy to be ripped off by false representation of the quality of games and yet they'd throw a tantrum and demand reparations if it happened in any other market. It's an inconsistency that, so far, no-one has explained.
If I were to go to college and 'steal' the teaching and I found it up to the sandards that I expect from a teacher then I'd feel guilty because the other party, i.e. the college, would be fulfilling their end of the bargain and I'd not be fulfilling mine. Read around the Social Contract if you want to better understand my system of ethics.
Oh look! Infallibilism has reared its ugly head yet again. "It's wrong because I say it's wrong". Sorry, your argument just doesn't work because you state things as if they are a priori truths when they clearly are not. If it were the case that "stealing is stealing and that is wrong" then there'd be no need for any differing systems of ethics. Christian deontology would rule all.
Try and reform your arguments so that they show some reasoning.
Actually, you are the one without any real justifications on why what you do is not wrong. Stealing is wrong because if everyone stole games, the commercial game market would crumble. If everyone just stole everything our entire economy would crumble and our society would fall apart.
These games are created on the principal that if a person(s) invest their time and money they will receive compensation for their effort. If everyone stole games demigod would not be, thus making your code of "ethics" completely and utterly incompatible with the nature of software and decent society in general.
You are meerly lucky that there is enough good people out there with REAL ETHICS that basically support the moral weasels such as yourself. With us, the industry can survive...with only you it will certainly die.
Your ethics = complete and utter fail on every level, and is ENTIRELY dependent on people with our moral system to have the nice things you get to steal.
Enjoy your welfare games.
I'm not arguing with you about piracy. I think it's wrong but I know I'm not going to change people's views on it.
Here's the problem with the 'try before you buy' and 'poverty' argument fitting together IN THE CONTEXT OF YOUR POST:
That was your claim. You even put an 'End of Story' at the end of it. The fact is, you don't pirate games because you're a student with almost no money (some people might but not you). You pirate games because you are trying to be prudent with your money and you want to make sure that you are getting a quality game for the money you spend. Your 'pirate because of no money' argument is baseless because you obviously have SOME money to put down on a game at SOME point. And since you do have SOME money you could simply be patient and wait for the game to have a good demo, watch gameplay trailers, read reviews, etc. and then take a chance on it. However, your main point is that you need to 'try before you buy'.
My guess is that even when you are out of school and earning thousands that you will still pirate not because you are poor, but because you want to 'try before you buy' and you still want to be prudent with your money. Over time you will have learned that 'trying before you buy' is the only way to go no matter what your income level. And you will never 'take a chance' on a game by laying down your money without trying it out first.
After we all got rich due piracy, we try to ban it.
You show an, at best, novice understanding of deontology. What you have stated is a very poor stab at Kant's theory of Universalization: a theory which is already widely discredited.
You have failed to note relevant criteria. The actual maxim is not "If everyone pirated games ..." it's "If every poor student pirated games ..." But this maxim isn't nearly dramatic enough for your purposes because it simply doesn't end up with some apocalyptic break down of society. IF every studen stole games THEN very little would change in the games industry as those students stealing the games would not have had the money to buy them in the first place.
You also fail to note that one day I, and others like me, will no longer be poor students but highly paid PhD holding lecturers/writers/academics. We will then no longer need to pirate games because we'll have the money to buy them outright. However, unlike yourself, I'll understand that I'm not morally superior because of my ability to purchase products, I am merely further ahead in the capitalist cycle.
Your arguments also show infallibalism in assuming consumer-capitalism is the only economic system but this is not my field of study and the best I could refer you to would, again, be either the Social Contract of the Theory of Specialization. However, I have neither the time nor the experience to battle you on economics.
At least you're more fun than the other guy! You have some thought behind your posts at least.
You are correct in your assumption that I will probably always 'try before I buy', but I do not think you've grasped (through no fault of your own: empathy with others' causes can be tough as, after all, we're not them!) the relation that this has to poverty. Poverty came first. If I were still a kid, still living with the incredibly healthy income from my parents I'd just buy everything that reviews had lead me to believe I'd like (because I'd have no reason not to). But now that I cannot afford to be so carefree about costs (poverty comes here) I have to evaluate through piracy and set up some system which I consider fair by which to evaluate whether or not to buy something I've pirated. I've noticed that this has yielded far better results than just blindly trusting reviews or demos so yes, I'll probably always pirate first (unless it's more convenient not to).
But why is this wrong? The companies that are worth supporting get supported and those that I deem unworthy get less money. This is surely as consumer-capitalism should be (if it wants to hang on to any shred of non-egoist thinking).
Actually I just have shown you are in fact in great enough number DETRIMENTAL to the industry, and without people like me this whole thing isn't even possible. You are just on what's basically welfare. The fact the morals you live by cannot possibly uphold a healthly market shows that it is in fact negative, and not a viable moral philosphy to live by. You are able to squeek by because of ME. That's right...I support your ability to play games.
You have pretty much admitted that you don't actually live by any morals (not any beneficial ones at least)...you meerly leech off of those who do.
"You also fail to note that one day I, and others like me, will no longer be poor students but highly paid PhD holding lecturers/writers/academics."
Exactly, when you grow the **** up one day and live by better standards and morals you will be part of society...because right now you are a cancer.
Actually no, this is untrue. You support companies I choose not to support. I've bought Demigod legitimately because I love it. So you're not actually allowing me to pirate Demigod for evaluation, you're allowing me to pirate any of the dross I don't buy once I've evaluated it. But why? If it held your attention for some time and you enjoyed it then fine: you've contradicted your own point as you've shown that there's always some people that'll buy the games from each theme (I'm more enclined towards RTSs, Hack 'n' Slash etc) and thus there's a demand for games across the board to varying degrees. So me not buying it doesn't change anything, because there's still a consumer to produce the games for. If it is because your very limited system of ethics allows you to be easily exploited by companies then it's time for you to rethink your beliefs.
Your welfare analogy is also very shaky. You're going to have to provide reasons why legitimate welfare (i.e. helping others out with costs when they genuinely cannot afford to help themselves) is immoral when many of the contemporary philosophers our mondern concepts of liberty are based on, such as Mill, support genuine welfare. It seems to me that you have a very immature concept of ethics. You presume that hard capitalism is ethical and then argue from that standpoint without seeing that pure capitalism appeals to all of humanity's worst instincts, jealousy to motivate, egoism to pride one's own success above others without any remorse, lack of compassion to have no moral objections to taking people's money for something you yourself know is inferior etc. I'm by no means a socialist, (I personally believe it's dictatorship in disguise) but that doesn't mean I presume the infallibility of the current system.
I do not wish to argue further with you, I am not going to change your mind and you are most certainly not going to change mine.
Currently, it's wrong because it's against the law. You should follow the laws of your country whether you agree to them or not. (This is within reason of course; I wouldn't expect you to follow the law if your government told you to murder at will. Thankfully, copyright law is no where near the same thing as murder).
We really don't need two threads on the same controversial subject with the same people (Renevent/BGH) arguing the same arguments. I'm locking this to direct the duscussion to the previously existing thread: http://forums.demigodthegame.com/349309.
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