Iron Lore closes

[SnakeCharmer]

Um.

Right click the icon > compatability > Compatability mode . check the box "Run this program in compatability mode for Windows XP Service Pack 2" > Apply > OK

Shouldnt that work?  Not being snarky, just geniunely curious.

[Modern Angel]

Tried it. Honest to god, I know a guy in a different town who's a Vista wiz for a tech company... knows his shit quite, quite well... and he couldn't figure out what it is. I gave up.

But the main point is this guy is an asshole.

[Strazos]

Eye of the Beholder and all that. I had zero problems. Neither did anyone I know personally.

[Signe]

I didn't like his game and I don't like his whiny bitch ass, either. 

He put me in a mood.

[Kageru]

I never got any official support. The game is still in my steam account and I can't play it. Fuck this guy blaming his consumers. New line of work.

THQ banned the sale of their software over steam here in Aus.... I guess they didn't want those sales anyway. Tools.

(I know the real reason is because they wanted to price gouge, but that doesn't make me any better aligned to them).

A.

[Signe]

A.

What does that mean?

[UnSub]

That dev post is a pretty clear example of why PC gaming doesn't have the importance it used to. Viva la consoles.

[jmillsy]

A. is the first letter of his/her name.

J.

[Signe]

I'm an idiot.  Sorry. 

[Stormwaltz]

More on game piracy: Rock Paper Shotgun tallies the top 10 illegal torrents on Mininova for March 5. The winner, with 25,724 illegal copies distributed, was a leaked early version of Assassin's Creed.

[Kitsune]

Falsehood #1: "Piracy is killing teh pc!"

Truth #1: Piracy is rampant on consoles, too.  RAM cartridges on the DS and Game Boy, cracked games loaded on hard drives for PS3, 360 and PSP, flat-out copied disks for all of the non-cartridge consoles.  People with a super aversion to paying for their stuff WILL steal it, regardless of hardware inconveniences.


Falsehood #2: "Piracy kills teh profits!"

Tell that to Stardock and their best-selling Galactic Civilizations and Sins of a Solar Empire, neither of which possess any copy-protection.  Ditto for Oblivion.  Whereas Bioshock is full of obnoxious copy-protection, and to my knowledge hadn't been cracked for some months after the game's release, so if the PC version was super-outsold by the console versions (which is something I doubt, honestly, but I haven't looked it up to know for sure), it wasn't because ze germans had pirated it before its release.

People will buy good games, period.  Jackasses will steal games too, but if anyone thinks that Pimply McPirate sitting in his dorm room with fifty torrents going at once was ever going to pay for software, that person needs to be reacquainted with reality.  The best way to deal with pirates is to ensure that they don't take up valuable personnel resources, such as requiring a serial key to access tech support forums.  That way, only legitimate users are taking the time of the support people.  Pirates will steal your game, take that as a given, but act to make sure that they don't cost the company money by tying up support forums and phone support.

[UnSub]

Falsehood #1: "Piracy is killing teh pc!"

Truth #1: Piracy is rampant on consoles, too.  RAM cartridges on the DS and Game Boy, cracked games loaded on hard drives for PS3, 360 and PSP, flat-out copied disks for all of the non-cartridge consoles.  People with a super aversion to paying for their stuff WILL steal it, regardless of hardware inconveniences.

Variation on Truth #1: Piracy is on consoles, but it's harder to get to. You probably need to pay someone to mod your box. You then have to find a source of physical copies, because electronic copies are a bit harder to find (although as more consoles come online, this is changing). On the PC, it's a lot easier to find a cracked copy, patch it up and play.

Falsehood #2: "Piracy kills teh profits!"

Tell that to Stardock and their best-selling Galactic Civilizations and Sins of a Solar Empire, neither of which possess any copy-protection.  Ditto for Oblivion.  Whereas Bioshock is full of obnoxious copy-protection, and to my knowledge hadn't been cracked for some months after the game's release, so if the PC version was super-outsold by the console versions (which is something I doubt, honestly, but I haven't looked it up to know for sure), it wasn't because ze germans had pirated it before its release.

Both Stardock titles are niche, imo. Oblivion sold so well it didn't matter if a few hundred thousand pirated copies existed.

As for Bioshock, PC players tended to view it more harshly than console players, which probably accounted for some sales discrepencies. Also, my understanding is that it took 2 weeks for the copy protection to be worked around, so PC sales could still have been impacted by pirates. There has been a tendency for console games to outsell PC games 4 to 1 anyway (at the aggregate level). The big question was if the two weeks of not being available to pirates for PC justified the cost of 2K's licensing / development of the copy protection. 2K hasn't publically commented about that, so I don't know.

People will buy good games, period.  Jackasses will steal games too, but if anyone thinks that Pimply McPirate sitting in his dorm room with fifty torrents going at once was ever going to pay for software, that person needs to be reacquainted with reality.  The best way to deal with pirates is to ensure that they don't take up valuable personnel resources, such as requiring a serial key to access tech support forums.  That way, only legitimate users are taking the time of the support people.  Pirates will steal your game, take that as a given, but act to make sure that they don't cost the company money by tying up support forums and phone support.

If you need a serial key to access the tech support forums, it'll be easy enough to find a key generator online that will give you what you want. Because, you know, if you're going to pirate software, a little thing like a serial code isn't going to stop you.

Piracy is helping to drive PC games development towards either the 'sure thing' hit or low cost title (conversions of hit console games, sequels and licenses) which are guaranteed profits regardless of piracy or towards alternate pay models (such as subscription models or micro-transaction systems) where a studio is willing to potentially sacrifice a box sale in order to see a continual stream of revenue from a player. For all those who lament that PC games lack innovation, the ease of piracy on the PC is one of the driving reasons because companies don't want to take the risk. It's also why more titles are coming out on consoles as a preference (that, and the other advantages consoles offer over PCs in terms of developing games).

Piracy also helps kill the profits of games. If the game is a huge unit shifter or has a dedicated niche audience who will buy it, this is less of a problem. For every title that sat borderline on the proft / loss sheet (or worse) thanks to tens of thousands of pirated copies floating around so they don't get picked up again / the studio gets dissolved / the dev team get fired, you've got piracy to thank for at least part of that.

I've always enjoyed the defence that "piracy is always going to happen, so developers should just lie there and take it" that comes from the player base (and Will Wright). It smacks of personal entitlement and selfishness that its okay for the studio who spends all the time and risk in developing something should just accept losing a few million in revenue thanks to piracy because... well, it's just like that! 

Here's the issue: if Pimply McPirate isn't going to pay for his rights to use the software, he shouldn't get the right to use it.

Defences of piracy I'm looking forward to seeing:

Piracy actually helps to sell more games!
It's too difficult to stop piracy, so why try!
A game lost to piracy is actually worth nothing!
If only games were good, less people would pirate them!

[Azazel]

Variation on Truth #1: Piracy is on consoles, but it's harder to get to. You probably need to pay someone to mod your box. You then have to find a source of physical copies, because electronic copies are a bit harder to find (although as more consoles come online, this is changing). On the PC, it's a lot easier to find a cracked copy, patch it up and play.

Real life Truth #1: Piracy on PS2 is incredibly fucking simple. Much simpler than on the PC. I'm a schoolteacher, and pretty much every kid who has a PS2 has it chipped. Almost anyone with a PS2 is aware they can get them chipped for very little money. Both of mine are chipped as well for that matter, and if I were to buy another one, the first thing I'd do would be to go get it chipped. Your source of physical copies = any rental outlet (like any video library) + anyone with a DVD burner. And these kids don't bother with PC gaming. They play their pirated PS2 games till the cows come home, and also buy a bit of original software when they really want something or want it NOW. (like the WWE games, for example). There's just so many of the damn things (PS2s) out there that even the very occasional purchases of these kids who burn 95% of their software is enough to still give it good sales. Combine that with the recent price drops due to PS3 and 360, and PS2 stuff still moves healthily.

As for PC piracy. I used to pirate most of my games when I was unemployed/student. I didn't get around to playing most of them, but c'est la vie. Ones that I woud have bought if I didn't get the warez version first I could count on one hand. This applied to PS1/PS2 games just as much, if not more than PC games, though, since PC games generally drop in price and stay on the market longer than PS games. OTOH, since getting a good job, I've been buying my way through titles I played and enjoyed in the past as warez.

[KallDrexx]

Real life Truth #1: Piracy on PS2 is incredibly fucking simple. Much simpler than on the PC.

Yes but the piracy rate for current gen non-portable consoles is low (but yes not nonexistant) due to the fact that if you mod your console it can lock you out of the online functions of the console (which become more significant every day).

Tell that to Stardock and their best-selling Galactic Civilizations and Sins of a Solar Empire, neither of which possess any copy-protection.  Ditto for Oblivion.  Whereas Bioshock is full of obnoxious copy-protection, and to my knowledge hadn't been cracked for some months after the game's release, so if the PC version was super-outsold by the console versions (which is something I doubt, honestly, but I haven't looked it up to know for sure), it wasn't because ze germans had pirated it before its release.

Guess what.  The stardock devs are fans of a ton of action games and play them all the time.  Guess why they make 4x strategy games?  Because the demographic of fans who enjoy those types of games are more likely to purchase the game rather than pirate them.  They've stated this quite a few times.  They are smart and decided to cater to an audience that buys games rather than pirates them.

Bioshock was cracked 2 weeks after it released (I know because I had coworkers who were waiting for it to be cracked so they could get it), and the only reason it took longer then most games was because it was the first game to use a new version of securerom. 

The best way to deal with pirates is to ensure that they don't take up valuable personnel resources, such as requiring a serial key to access tech support forums.  That way, only legitimate users are taking the time of the support people.  Pirates will steal your game, take that as a given, but act to make sure that they don't cost the company money by tying up support forums and phone support.

I disagree that tech support is a reason people will purchase a legitimate copy.  I can be assed to go to a tech forum to try nad solve a problem when I bought a game because, well, I put down hard earned money (which I can't get back) for a game and I want to be able to continue playing it.  If I didn't pay for it then i really don't care and I'll write it off as a crappy and bug ridden game (even if the fault is a software conflict on my machine) and delete it off my machine.

It's a fact that people are more attached to things they have purchased then things they have gotten for free.  Entertainment is exactly the same. 

[Simond]

blah blah blah

Got any sources for your opinions?

Also: Please bear in mind that modifying consoles is illegal in at least one of the three major video game markets worldwide.

[bhodi]

Also: Please bear in mind that modifying consoles is illegal in at least one of the three major video game markets worldwide.

And so is speeding.

[Simond]

Speeding doesn't get mod shops shut down by manufacturers.

[Threash]

I've always enjoyed the defence that "piracy is always going to happen, so developers should just lie there and take it" that comes from the player base (and Will Wright). It smacks of personal entitlement and selfishness that its okay for the studio who spends all the time and risk in developing something should just accept losing a few million in revenue thanks to piracy because... well, it's just like that! 

Not because "its just like that" but because their only way to fight it is to make things harder for their real customers.  Im no expert but as far as i know they are correct in saying piracy is always going to happen and like the music industry its becoming more of a scapegoat for failure rather than a symptom of the problems.  I havent dled any games in about five years or so but when i did the option was never pirate or buy, it was always pirate or dont play, and i did end up buying a lot of the games i pirated if they were good just to access something that wasnt available on the warez version like multiplayer in nwn.  I can afford to drop 50 bucks on a buggy piece of shit ill never play nowadays so when i feel the need to i do, but five years ago most of the time i dled a game i ended up feeling like the gaming companies owed ME a dollar for the cd i wasted burning their pos.

[Valmorian]

Anti-piracy measures on software do not work.  Period.  What they DO cause is a certain amount of resentment from legitemate users.

It seems like a no-brainer to me.

[Kitsune]

I disagree that tech support is a reason people will purchase a legitimate copy.  I can be assed to go to a tech forum to try nad solve a problem when I bought a game because, well, I put down hard earned money (which I can't get back) for a game and I want to be able to continue playing it.  If I didn't pay for it then i really don't care and I'll write it off as a crappy and bug ridden game (even if the fault is a software conflict on my machine) and delete it off my machine.

It's a fact that people are more attached to things they have purchased then things they have gotten for free.  Entertainment is exactly the same. 

No, I don't mean that pirates will be more likely to pay for a game for access to support, I mean that denying support to pirates will save a company from losing money through wasted time on their tech support lines.

Got any sources for your opinions?

Oh, you mean for my facts?  Of course.

http://forums.galciv2.com/?ForumID=161&AID=107193

There is probably some irony that this whole thing occurred just before last week's EBGames.com top selling games list got posted on their site. They list Galactic Civilizations II as the top telling PC title and the #2 overall (all platforms).  And that was before this incident.

http://pc.ign.com/articles/855/855663p1.html?RSSwhen2008-02-28_112000&RSSid=855663

February 28, 2008 - In just 23 Earth days, Sins of a Solar Empire has managed to sell over 100,000 units. This makes it the bestselling PC game last week, toppling even the mighty Call of Duty 4, and The Orange Box.

http://blogs.ign.com/Stardock_Games/2008/01/29/78711/

I remember hearing at a conference that when an executive at a big publisher heard that Galactic Civilizations II shipped with no CD copy protection that they quipped “I hope bankruptcy treats them well.”

Millions of dollars in sales later as one of the top selling PC strategy games at retail (according to NPD) over the past couple of years let’s me say “Ha!” in response.

Do not misconstrue my statements as being in any way pro-piracy.  I don't pirate software; everything on my computer is 100% paid for.  However, piracy is a simple reality that can't be contested.  People have stolen software, are stealing software, and will steal software.  Battling piracy is a futile waste of time and money and only serves to aggravate the non-pirates, and claiming that piracy was a factor in any game's failure is idiotic.  If, say, 30% of the market steals video games, that 30% will steal your game.  That same 30% stole every other game.  Your sales will not be higher or lower, percentage-wise, than anyone else in the market.  If your game sold 70,000 copies, and that other game sold 140,000 copies, you didn't sell less because teh pirates took it.  You sold less because half as many people wanted your game. 

Of the people who wanted your game, the same percentage were pirates who stole it, and if they were somehow prevented from stealing it, they wouldn't be inclined to buy it.  A car thief who drives off in a Mercedes isn't going to have bought the Mercedes if they couldn't steal it, and Bill Gates wouldn't steal a car when he can get it faster by throwing credit cards at it.  Thieves steal things to get them for free; if they had enough disposable money that buying something was a no-brainer, they wouldn't have bothered stealing them in the first place.

[Hoax]

Anti-piracy measures on software do not work.  Period.  What they DO cause is a certain amount of resentment from legitemate users.

It seems like a no-brainer to me.

Truth.

As to whether priating is ok, no its not ok, but for real?  Fuck single player games on PC anyways, that can become console territorry for all I care.  Until pirating gets so nefarious that the online server can't tell that your not using the real thing and everyone is playing games online that they never bought.  I'm not aware of things being that way, so it really doesn't matter much to me atm.

But I see people dropped from TF2 with that steam login error, are those people trying to play w/ Yarr versions?

[MahrinSkel]

Also, the post is almost as bad as an "I'M LEAVING U GUYZ R MEAN" post.
Meh, piracy. Weak.

Yeah, I think it's especially ironic that he makes comment about the "it can't possibly be my fault culture" when the whole point of his long diatribe seems to be "it can't possibly be my fault".

Not to mention that he spends a couple of paragraphs talking about how the anti-piracy code caused his game horrible word of mouth, which tanked the sales, but fails to connect the dots.

--Dave

[Azazel]

Interestingly, Iron Lore just pushed out Dawn of War: Soulstorm. You know, instead of Relic.

[rk47]

which probably explains its patching future and lots of unfinished content. I already mentioned several nerdrage going on in Relic forums.  Shitstorm's brewing.

[Rishathra]

Relic announced it would be responsible for patches long ago, so the closure hasn't really changed anything.  Iron Lore was on the ropes for a while; the SS contract is what kept them going this long.  Not that I'm terribly confident of Soulstorm's patching future.  I like Relic, but their patch support for the DoW series has been... spotty at best.

[Slyfeind]

Wow, am I the only one here who thinks it's fuckin' rad that this guy bitched out some pirates and bad reviewers? Y'all need to do phone support for Microsoft or something. You will learn to hate the consumer!

[Ratman_tf]

I am .

http://forums.galciv2.com/?aid=303512

tl;dr: Iron Lore spent a lot of time and money targeting a small audience, and got bitchslapped for it.
Stardock aimed for the larger audience of gamers, and made a ton of sales.

Fucking 

[MahrinSkel]

The Stardock guy gets it, the Iron Lore guy doesn't.  Making games for people who have top-end gaming machines doesn't pay, they're quite a bit more likely to pirate the game and there are simply too few of them.  Why someone will spend $4,000+ on a gaming computer but get all self-righteous about how they shouldn't have to spend $50-60 on the games for it makes no sense, but we've all seen it.  My "new" gaming rig is second-hand, an Alienware that represented the cutting edge only a couple of years ago but that my wife got me for Christmas for $500, because the old owner was getting a new $5000 triple-SLI rig that got an 18K 3DMark benchmark compared to this system's mere 13K.

It came with about 30 games loaded on it, all of them cracked pirate versions.  Maybe he bought the games and installed the cracked versions so he didn't have to mess with disks.  Want to bet on it?

There simply aren't enough people willing to pay for AAA PC titles to make it worthwhile making them.  And two MMO's with big budgets, lots of buzz, but high hardware specs, have bombed out (Vanguard and TR), so there simply may not be a AAA PC market worth targetting anymore.

--Dave

[UnSub]

There simply aren't enough people willing to pay for AAA PC titles to make it worthwhile making them.  And two MMO's with big budgets, lots of buzz, but high hardware specs, have bombed out (Vanguard and TR), so there simply may not be a AAA PC market worth targetting anymore.

Although defences can be made regarding Vanguard and TR flopping, I agree with you. Given that PC piracy is so widespread and relatively easy, it's no wonder that game developers are looking towards consoles or towards piracy control mechanisms such as subscription fees or online verification.

Thus far, the learnings about using piracy control applications have been: make it smooth on the customer. If the Iron Lore guys had installed a "This is an unauthorised copy. Please buy the authorised copy <link>here</link>!" they would have avoided the problem of people thinking their game crashed all the time.

[Azazel]

Thus far, the learnings about using piracy control applications have been: make it smooth on the customer. If the Iron Lore guys had installed a "This is an unauthorised copy. Please buy the authorised copy <link>here</link>!" they would have avoided the problem of people thinking their game crashed all the time.

Total agreement. A simple line of text over the frozen/crashed game screen would have solved that problem right away. Hell, even include that little element in the 1.1 patch along with "crashing issue when leaving first cave fixed" in the Patch Notes. Like, DUH.

I mean, Titan Quest is a good game, and nicely made at that. You'd think people capable of crafting something like that could figure out the obvious commonsense solution to "their game crashes" hurting sales.

[schild]

Nah, he's just ignoring the pink elephant in the room.

Titan Quest should've been a 360/PS3 release as well with downloadable expansions. They'd be rolling in it. Maybe then Blizzard would make a console Diablo that didn't suck

[Ragnoros]

Nah, he's just ignoring the pink elephant in the room.

Titan Quest should've been a 360/PS3 release as well with downloadable expansions. They'd be rolling in it. Maybe then Blizzard would make a console Diablo that didn't suck

This man speaks the truth!

Here's hoping Too Human is good, doesn't bomb, and is more Diablo then M:UA. Even if M:UA was an RPG Classic

[Azazel]

Yep, schild is also right on the money.