Just another example of "us" and "them" that fanboys are used to not applying to the real world.
"LOL MS SUX SONY RULZ SONY WTF IS ON MY WALKMAN?!"
"LOL SONY SUX MS RULZ ZUNE KILLZ WALKMAN WTF IS ON THAT WALKMAN?"
Hope this deal works out well for the two companies.
Only around 18,000 legit owners showed up. The rest were warezed?
To the other buyers I'd like to say, "thank you."
To the folks running pirated copies, I'd like to say...
...thanks for doing no favors to a company that's trying to do right by PC gamers.
...thanks for choking out the servers legit players were wanting to play on.
...thanks for showing your interest in Demigod. You've got a reasonably decent computer and broadband. Please, either buy the game or stop playing the bootleg game. There are plenty of free and cheap games out there for you to play instead if money really is an issue for you (due to layoffs, cut hours, etc, and you're playing off of someone else's connection).
~Chikahiro
I was also planning to buy the City of Heroes: Architect Edition from them, but I'm going to wait to get it elsewhere, also. In the meantime, I going to see where I can get a contact email/phone number so I can directly communicate to them why they lost my business.
In the meantime - Happy (belated) Easter to the Stardock folks. Hope you guys get some comp-time for later on in the year.
Its Arc ID#43254. Enjoy!
By the way - the characters being referenced (Nadir and Meridian) are my own characters on Freedom.
So, you can buy XBLA games through:
1. Live Marketplace on your 360.
2. Live Marketplace on www.xbox.com.
3. Amazon.com.
Not too shabby. Here's hoping Sony strikes a similar (if not improved) deal with the online giant for PSN titles.
So, small reminder - don't trust any announcements today.
If you haven't seen it already.
Honestly? Forget everything. The bit about pricing. The bit about selection. Everything.
You know what got my attention about this ad?
The redhead.
*I feel small and petty but she's really cute!*
A while ago some folks in the industry challenged Brad Wardell and Stardock to come up with a DRM solution that would meet the needs of both consumers and publishers. Well, actually, in his words, "So the publishers are telling us, 'Put your money where your mouth is. Why don't you guys develop something that you think is suitable that would protect our IP, but would be more acceptable to users?'
Well... have they done it? I find #3 to be particularly mind-blowing...
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PLYMOUTH, MI, March 25, 2009 - Stardock announced today that the forthcoming update to its digital distribution platform, Impulse, will include a new technology aimed to pave the way to solving some of the common complaints of digital distribution.
The new technology, known as Game Object Obfuscation (Goo), is a tool that allows developers to encapsulate their game executable into a container that includes the original executable plus Impulse Reactor, Stardock's virtual platform, into a single encrypted file.
When a player runs the game for the first time, the Goo'd program lets the user enter in their email address and serial number which associates their game to that person as opposed to a piece of hardware like most activation systems do. Once validated, the game never needs to connect to the Internet again.
Goo has a number of unique advantages that developer Stardock believes both gamers and developers will appreciate:
1. There is no third-party client required. This means a developer can use this as a universal solution since it is not tied to any particular digital distributor.
2. It paves the way to letting users validate their game on any digital distribution service that supports that game. One common concern of gamers is if the company they purchased a game from exits the market, their game library may disappear too. Games that use Goo would be able to be validated anywhere.
3. It opens the door to gamers being able to resell their games because users can voluntarily disable their game access and transfer their license ownership to another user.
"One of our primary goals for Impulse Reactor is to create a solution that will appeal to game developers while adhering to the Gamers Bill of Rights," said Brad Wardell, president & CEO of Stardock. "Publishers want to be able to sell their games in as many channels as possible but don't want to have to implement a half-dozen 'copy protection' schemes. Game Object Obfuscation lets the developer have a single game build that can be distributed everywhere while letting gamers potentially be able to re-download their game later from any digital service. Plus, it finally makes possible a way for gamers and publishers to transfer game licenses to players in a secure and reliable fashion."
Because Goo ties the game to a user's account instead of the hardware, gamers can install their game to multiple computers without hassle.
Goo will be released on April 7 as part of the upcoming Impulse: Phase 3 release. Stardock also expects to be able to announce multiple major publishers making use of Goo in April as well as adding their libraries to Impulse.
Impulse is poised to exceed one million customers in the next week despite only being launched nine months ago.
To learn more about Impulse, visit www.impulsedriven.com.
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Yeah. Seriously. Holy smokes @_@
Older opinion piece by Brad Wardell, and its a must-read.
Once again, I have to say, I love Wardell.
Read it, and comment below.
As I've said before, "free" isn't. Money has to come from somewhere. And while most gamers don't care where so long as they don't have to pay it, a recent change in Sony's PSN might affect what they get.
Sony is now billing publishers for data transfer over PlayStation 3's PlayStation Network, the only such fee for content holders among the major platform holders.
The policy, first reported by MTV Multiplayer and verified by Gamasutra's own sources, was established in October 2008 and institutes a 16-cent per gigabyte fee for all downloadable PSN content.
Free content only racks up charges during its first 60 days of availability, but paid content remains metered indefinitely.
Console competitors Microsoft and Nintendo do not charge publishers for bandwidth, although both also host downloadable content on their own servers. Microsoft likely covers those costs with its Xbox Live Gold revenues, while Nintendo -- which limits Wii downloadable content to much smaller sizes than either Sony or Microsoft -- is content to foot the bill itself.
Major PC-based digital distribution services like Steam and Direct2Drive also do not have an equivalent bandwidth fee.
At $0.16 per gigabyte, Sony's rates are relatively in line with low-volume content delivery rates maintained by on-demand services. Amazon's S3, for example, has a range of $0.17 per gigabyte down to $0.10 per gigabyte, depending on total monthly volume.
Given 1.5 million PSN downloads of the Resident Evil 5 demo (which was said to have been download a total of 4 million times across Xbox Live and PSN) at 942MB -- more than twice the size of its Live counterpart, oddly -- Capcom would see PSN bandwidth fees of $226,080. Using Amazon's progressive scale, that same volume of transfer would run only about $143,700. That figure would likely drop considerably more if using a high-volume commercial host.
The policy could affect the size and type of content publishers host on PlayStation Network, depending on how much it impacts the bottom line.
"It definitely makes us think about how we view the distribution of content related to our games when it is free for us to do it on the web, on Xbox Live, or any other way -- including broadcast -- than on Sony's platform," an unnamed publishing source said to MTV Multiplayer. "It's a new thing we have to budget. It's not cool. It sucks."
Still, Sony claims that publishers are hosting the same level of content regardless.
"We work closely with them to bring their amazing content to our growing audience, and we are focused on ensuring we, and our publishing partners, have a viable platform for digital distribution," said Sony spokesperson Patrick Seybold. "We foresee no change in the high quality or quantity of demos and games available on PSN."
Publishers may rethink those practices depending on the long-term implications of the fees.
"It's like leaving your phone off the hook for a long distance call," said another unnamed publisher source. "The meter is still running."
I'm wondering why the change. Did Sony underestimate the cost of running PSN? Is Sony forcing the games division to make more money to aid the rest of the company's ailing financials? Do they think the PS3 and PSN is firmly established enough dispite what their competition is?
I've occassionally joked that PSN is the Republican online plan - best for large companies with deep wallets and a desire for more control. In all seriousness, the large companies should have least trouble with this; the EA's, the Ubisoft's, etc. But smaller companies (and titles)? That's another story. And while one could easily scoff at the Capcom RE5 numbers, "It's only a quarter-million dollars," that's still money not being used for other things. A company could use that money for more downloadable content (free and paid), more advertising, a new game, or just not spending in and be that much closer to breaking even (and eventually profitability).
I'm not sure how this will play out in the long-haul. I'm hoping it doesn't discourage smaller companies from using PSN - an unexpected hit could end up being an unexpected pain in the bank. I think they need to have a sliding scale like Amazon, definitely. Likewise, they had better use this is a bargaining chip with companies - do X for us, then we waive Y% of the bandwidth fees. Granted, this would not be well received, but still...
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