World of Goo Co-Creator Claims 90% Piracy Rate

and people wonder why we're getting to "INTERNET REQUIRED" for antipiracy

thanks crackers/warezers/pirates, this is why the PC userbase has to face this plight so often

why are people SO fucking entitled as to demand everything be free? what has to change about video games so people will actually buy things like adults?

Sad. I just bought it today. Pony up pirates... it's $20 FFS.

Why in the world did they delay the European launch on steam???

I'm certain that this figure would be much much lower if they hadn't done that screw up of releasing it on steam in europe and then removing it again the next day. I bought it on the first day on steam, and another two people I know bought it as well. We were talking in IRC about how good it was, and there were a few other people who wanted to buy it as well. But then they removed it! As we speak, it is not available on EU steam. That's when at least two or three people I know said 'ok then, whatever, i'll just pirate it'. And at a slightly steep $20, I doubt they will get around to ever buying it, which is very sad.

They should have released it on steam only, with a worldwide simultaneous launch, and with online authentication through steam (like valve multiplayer games). Then they wouldn't be having this problem!

If a game is, to you, not worth paying $20 for...yet you pirate and play it anyway...what does that say about you as a person? I don't think it says you are poor, or short on cash, but that you are a greedy asshole that has no self worth.

It's a good thing this game is getting all this press about being pirated so badly, otherwise I would never have known about it.

This must suck so much for them, the game is awesome - I was happy to spend such a small amount on it, it didn't really help that it wasn't available on Steam for ages (to europe). I don't get why so many people would grab from somewhere dodgy when it cost so little to start with.

I am always amazed at the people who say they are justified to pirate games because the game isn't good enough to pay for. Software piracy just sounds like one sided mafia negotiations to me. The mob demands 'protection' money that the business cannot afford and takes it anyways if the business refuses.

Joystick: "Gamers demand fresh content from indy developers, so let's make a game called World of Goo!"
Gamers: "I would never pay $20 for this shit, good thing I have a free download waiting right here. I am going to stick it to the man!"
*downloads and plays game*

The vast majority of things you can buy in developed countries have a set price and you can choose to buy or not to buy. Yet when it comes to games (and software in general) there is this third option of don't buy but still use the software. It really just blows my mind. If the game isn't good enough for your elite standards to pay retail, wait for the price to come down or don't buy it.

I want to know how they get their numbers

In a way too bad, but I think it's a smart move by this developer to openly whine about it, because I hadn't heard of this game before, and probably many other people haven't, so it's a good free way to market your game.

Also, is it 90'% of all players are using a pirated version, or for every 10 legit players there are 9 pirates? (i.e. ~ 47% of all players are using a pirated version)? Piracy rate is a very vague way of putting it...

Wasn't this game on Steam? only get demo through search or is it maybe just in usa only ? tried demo today and i like it!, stuck at .. think last map (in demo) takes only 32 mb :P

I genuinely hope this isn't true. This is an absolutely fantastic game on every possible front, and the designers truly deserve to be rewarded for it.

Shame all of you! Pirating from a Indie developer. C'mon this is no EA! Is a pretty good game. You killing creativity from the new emerging companies. Idiots!

To all gamers in the world this proof that the pirates don't care from what company they pirating.

Erroo? It's not in the top 100 on the torrent site I go to. "World of Goo"... seriously? This is budget software from the get go, is it not?

I think it is important to analyze what these numbers actually mean.

If 100 people purchased the game, then 900 people pirated it?
1000 means 9000 pirated it?
10000 means 90000 pirated it?

I sincerely doubt 100,000 people have heard of this game, let alone played it. The actual amount of purchases must be really low to justify a piracy rate like that.

I encourage the developer to release more numbers than just a percentage. Still highly skeptical.

*waits for the inevitable denials from pc elitists.

*Waits for the hate against fledgling developer.

these numbers are bunk. lets forget the fact that pretty much "90%" of the populated world are on DYNAMIC and not static IP addresses.

No, these numbers strike me the same as most. and you know what they say about 90%. "90% of statistics are made up on the spot".

They can eat goat chease.

i'm not entirely sure he knows how large 90% is. request source.

90% of statistics are made up on the spot.

I am very sympathetic to developers in regards to piracy (IMHO pirates are killing the PC platform that they use) and I love Goo, but I question the methods the developers used to arrive at their numbers. Most people aren't even on static IPs these days, so how can counting unique IPs be an accurate measure of piracy?

The game surely sells more than enough to recover its cost. PC developpers started to really whine about piracy since they began porting games to consoles.
The gaming industry is already too big, there is too many AAA games. Too much money involved equals less creativity because you can't take risks with $20 millions.

I bought World of Goo but I stopped buying the next AAA FPS, RPG unless I truly enjoyed it.

This is why we need DRM.

We need better and stricter DRM to fight this crime.

That's like 50-50. That's not so bad - weren't people like EA saying that there were 8 or 9 pirated copies to each original?

I think their numbers are just a bit inflated over what attention they would normally get. I've never even heard of this game, yet it was a top torrent. I'm sure your usual download everything and try the best people (which is a shitload of people honestly) put it through the ringer.

I'm sure just about all of them never heard of it.

Here's a business model for them, put it on steam for 5 bucks, cause I wasn't interested in the game to play it or buy it or steal it, but if it was 5 bucks on steam I'd probably get it

I like how the new marketing gimmick for PC game devs is now to scream piracy! its sure to get you on the front page of every gaming site.

But at the same time it fucks the platform, because when pc developers go looking for investors they are instantly turned away because of the piracry = low sales issue. I wish developers would just shut it and quietly join together to come up with a practical solution to the problem.

I tried the demo and really enjoyed it. I just don't feel its worth $20. I'm waiting for it to go on sale and than I'm picking it up. Never pirated it, but it happens. It doesn't matter if it uses DRM, it happens. In the case of recent SecuROM limited activation DRM I think it actually increased piracy. Maybe reducing the price would help or offer a free one supported by adds. Give a more meaningful online multiplayer component. Any of these options could help.

While I do feel it's a shame that so many people decide to steal copies of games instead of paying for a developers hard work ... I think that a lot of developers are misrepresenting the facts of what it actually means when someone pirates their game. I'm a former PC developer myself and have a lot of friends in the industry, indie and otherwise (I only mention this because I understand where they're coming from), however there are definitely two sides to the coin. To be clear this is not a "pro-piracy" post.

Here is the thing that I think most people forget - Pirates don't pay for games, period. That's why they are pirates. It doesn't matter if DRM is in place or not, if someone wants to steal your game, music, movie, whatever they are going to do so - it sucks and it's a shame, but that's the way it is.

The other thing people forget is that the reason that the percentage of pirates that then turn around and make a purchase is so low is because THEY ARE PIRATES! By very definition they are not making the purchase to begin with, nor do they have any intention to.

What kills me about statements like this is that developers like to count the pirated copies of their game like all of those people were going to buy the game had they not pirated it. WRONG! They never intended to buy your game and they never were going to ... so to count that against your earnings is quite flawed in my opinion. It's like counting every single demo download as a purchase, it just doesn't make sense. It's the same problem when NBC counts all the YouTube views of SNL against what they could have made from commercial spots during that time if the clips weren't "stolen" and people had be watching it on TV instead (due to the fact that higher ratings is equal to more money per commercial spot). It's idiotic, since those people were likely never going to watch it on TV anyway. I'm generalizing here but you get the point.

The saddest truth of it all is that DRM and Anti-Piracy measures ONLY HURT THE CONSUMER. People seem to conveniently forget that Pirates don't give two craps about DRM, SecureRom or any other anti-piracy measures. They crack it, steal your game anyway, and move on. We - the customer who paid for the game then get to deal with virtual limitations, and sometimes have to jump through hoops to do basic things with a product that we legitimately purchased. How many Pirates had to call EA to get additional activation codes to install Spore? Exactly 0.

It's just bad timing releasing a good independent game like this right now. My wallet is already stretched thin by Gears of War 2, Fallout 3, Far Cry 2, Saints Row 2, and more. A happy, creative game is just what I want as an in-betweener, but I also really don't want to spend more.

So how many of those addresses connected for more, then lets say, a week never to be seen again? I guess if they want to charge people to play a game to see if it's worth buying, then I'd claim 90% piracy too.

Now if these are figures of casual and hardcore players of the game I'd feel ashamed.

Gosh, people are cheap, the game is 15 bucks.

The Secret of Mana box art deceived me into reading this. =*(

Its a shame. Bad boom.