Editor’s note: Some of the efforts that makers of PC games have been taking to prevent piracy are causing a great deal of grief for many PC gamers. But did PC gamers bring this upon themselves by pirating games? A born-again PC gamer, Bryan examines some of gamemakers’ recent shenanigans and how they’re influenced by piracy. -Jason
All Gollum-like melodrama aside, PC gamers (myself included) have a reason to be bummed out. Recent PC-gaming news has been less than stellar; PC superstars are falling like flies. Blizzard pushed Diablo 3 to “Done When It’s Done” status. Assassin’s Creed 2 isn’t coming out until next year for PC to give developers extra “polishing” time. And Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2…oh, dear oh dear. Modern Warfare 2.
It’s hard to think the sky isn’t falling for PC gamers. I’m pretty bummed out about that, because recently, I’ve come to rekindle my love for the PC platform…but that couldn’t begin until I quit World of Warcraft.
By default, my PCs have been used for two things these past two years: Ventrilo and WOW. Using it for anything else seemed counterproductive (unless it’s Patch Tuesday, which is the second Tuesday of each month and when Microsoft releases security patches for its operating systems).
It’s a $600 PC I scraped together last tax season that runs Crysis at my monitor’s maximum widescreen resolution at over 40 frames-per-second with some modest settings tweaks, and I turned it into an MMO box. I didn’t see the tragedy in that until I quit WOW for Aion.
Well, that’s not true. I didn’t realize the full tragedy until I’d played Aion for a month, got bored, closed it and took a step back to stare at my PC tower.
I felt guilt for some reason. I figured it was because not only did I not call my mother that weekend, but I also didn’t bother going to church to see her. But that wasn’t it. I was doing the same goddamn thing I’d been doing for two years already, only with more grinding.
I jumped in my car and drove to Gamestop.* I went to the tiny shelf that they “reserve” for PC games, and I picked up a copy of Fallout 3: Game Of The Year Edition. I took it to the clerk’s counter and watched him grab the discs and manual and stick them in the display case. He then asked me for $50. Once home, I regained consciousness and said, out loud, “Hey! Where’s the shrinkwrap?” I felt immediately better.
I installed it, patched it and started a new game. Keep in mind, I’d played it on the Xbox 360 a while back and it was…OK. I didn’t like the controls, as I often have issues playing first-person shooters with a cramped joypad. It feels sacrilegious.
I fell in love with being a PC gamer all over again. The smooth mouse scrolling, coupled with the unparalleled WASD direction controls, was erotic to the touch, and the smooth bump-mapping and crisp, fully maxed detail of the game, running at a smooth 30 FPS with vertical-sync enabled to reduce horizontal tearing…with a moan of rapture, I was there. I had reached the promised land. Sexual innuendo intentional.
What the hell did MMOs do to me? How did it take me this long to realize just what I’d been missing on the PC? It was embarrassing! I immediately loaded Steam, patched the client, patched Team Fortress 2, and, for shits and giggles, snagged Mass Effect off their store, as it was only $5 that weekend.
After firing up TF2 and getting a few achievements out of the way, I cranked up Mass Effect, and once again, superior controls coupled with beautiful graphical quality had me wondering what crack had induced this level of ignorance for so long.
The PC is a marvelous, wonderful machine, full of wonder and love and tiny little men running along circuit boards singing about everything in the world that is beauty and justice and right.
And then, after being overwhelmed, I slowed down a bit to take a look at what had been going on around me.
Headline: Infinity Ward announces PC Exclusives to Modern Warfare 2: Mouse/Keyboard Controls, Resolution Settings, and Text Chat. Ha ha. That’s cute!
Wait…what? Someone needs to list those as PC exclusives? I thought those were “Things All PC Multiplayer Games Have Because They Are Necessary to Play Games on a PC.” Final Fantasy 7 had an exclusive resolution setting that let you bump the graphics of the 3D models up to double the sharpness of the PlayStation. That was back in ’98, bros. I think it’s time to come up with more interesting “exclusives” 10-plus years later.
Also, PC games traditionally run $10 cheaper than their console counterparts. Why the lower price? For every $60 you pay for a PS3 or 360 game, $10 goes to the console developer. That’s how they make their money after their Black Friday firesales — licensing fees. No such expense exists on the PC. Modern Warfare 2’s PC version sells for $60, $10 more than PC games generally sell for, and with no good explanation as to where that $10 a copy is going. Hopefully, it feeds starving kids in some third-world country, because extorting $10 a copy from PC gamers for the hell of it is just downright rude.
Now, a lot of people were upset that above and beyond all this, Infinity Ward isn’t using dedicated servers for Modern Warfare 2, opting to use their proprietary “IWnet” matchmaking system of the console versions. This is fine and dandy for console versions. Consoles aren’t designed for running dedicated multiplayer servers (aside from generally not being on the right connection to do so in the first place); they’re made for playing games.
PCs are macho machines. They can run a match that gives everybody an equal opportunity to run equal pings and allow for a more stable gaming environment. Most clan/legion-based gaming (that PC FPSes often run) depends on servers operating 24/7. It’s difficult, to say the least, to get legion play out of IWnet.
Infinity Ward has their justifications. IWnet takes the frustration out of PC gaming newcomers and lets them jump right into the fray with matchmaking services instead of trudging through silly server lists. For the casual PC FPS gamer, I suppose that would be true.
Wait — casual PC FPS gamers? They’re marketing the multiplayer aspect of a multiplayer-oriented game to the minority of a minority? Furthermore, ping is one of those things that lets you see just how strong (in a whole number value) your experience on a certain game or server should be (as opposed to cellphone signal bars). Let’s see…today’s an orange day…no, wait, blue. No, wait, five bars! Scratch that — three!
I would’ve liked to see emoticons. Maybe next time! Assuming there’s a next time, of course.
Very good, valid reasons exist for dedicated servers. Residential Internet is notoriously godawful at trafficking upstream data, something that dedicated servers are able to bypass as they run on a business-class Internet connection. Ever wonder why some PC games can have 64-versus-64 multiplayer matches, whereas most (if not all) console games do not and, more to the point, can not? There’s your answer.
Another minus to client-side serving is the client bias. The difference between a ping of 50 and a ping of 150 is literally milliseconds, and any PC gamer will tell you that it makes all of the difference in the world — especially when it’s a ping of 0 versus 150. Clients have no ping because you’re playing inside someone’s game. This isn’t very fair to the visiting team, is it?
IWnet essentially does this: It quite simply sniffs for games with open slots and points people looking for a game in their direction. Pretty simple. However, Infinity Ward’s attitude takes the one thing that makes the PC such an attractive multiplayer platform — the utility of dedicated servers — and downplays one of its greatest strengths as one of its greatest weaknesses, and does so unabashedly. This is disturbing, especially since Infinity Ward’s roots stem from PC gamers.
Now, I’m not saying PC gamers make or break their market; it’s quite obvious that the big money’s in console game sales. What does it say, then, when almost 200,000 PC gamers voice their dissatisfaction — and further, that they aren’t really that worried about it?**
In other news, Assassin’s Creed 2, originally slated for side-by-side release with the console versions (excellent), has been delayed until after the new year (bogus). Officially, it needs more “polishing.” Also officially, they don’t want PC pirating to put a dent in holiday sales. I find both of these to be acceptable. Waiting two extra months to pirate the game will probably prove to be a wonderful antipiracy tactic. And if the delay allows Ubisoft to keep invasive DRM software from the final release, I say push it back to March. They’re also working on a few extra PC exclusives (probably implementing that state-of-the-art keyboard/mouse support). It’s cool, but it’s still depressing. Ah, well — I probably wouldn’t be able to afford it until after Christmas anyways.
And in a mostly unrelated note, Diablo 3 doesn’t even have a release date. I looked everywhere for one. I’m waiting for the reveal that it will launch on the PS3 alongside the PC release with exclusive DualShock 3 controller support.
I walk back into this sad, postapocalyptic state of PC gaming, and I’m left with the reins, with a choir of angry PC videogaming nerds singing “Where Have All The Cowboys Gone?” behind me, fearful of the events on the horizon. If this marketing move pays off for Infinity Ward, will we be seeing more of this in the future? If you can piss off 200,000 gamers in an already small market and still manage to pull a pretty profit, that sends a clear message that PC gamers are ready and willing to roll over and take another.
The scary part comes when other gamemakers look at this example and say, “Hey, it worked for them. It should work just fine for us.” If so. we’re in for a seriously depressing age for PC gaming.
I suppose this is probably better than deciding it’s simply not feasible to turn a profit on the PC due to piracy and community volatility and abandoning it wholesale. That would be downright sad. I can cope, as long as it doesn’t happen until Mass Effect 2 hits; I’m almost done with my good girl/bad girl profiles, and they’re ready to import!
I guess the hard question is: Did PC gamers bring this seemingly violent attitude toward us upon ourselves by pirating games? Or did gamemakers cause this by making it easier to pirate games than to legitimately own and use them? I’ve received false negatives when installing games. And let me tell you, it’s horrendously frustrating to have purchased software that you cannot use because of gamemakers’ attempts to protect their investments. It wouldn’t hurt so much if it weren’t for the fact that, more than likely, two days after the game hits shelves, someone’s already cracked the copy protection for pirates to download the games without a worry in the world.
It’s not exactly a sound business model.
* I must warn you that at this point, I was walking and awake, but I don’t remember any conscious thoughts. This isn’t an exaggeration; I was literally zombified.
** Not that they have to worry about it anymore. Modern Warfare 2 has been modified by code jockeys to allow the joining and creation of private servers on the PC platform. Ironic that it had to come from the underground, hardcore gamer scene, isn’t it?
***Forgive my poor Microsoft Paint skills. My budget’s pretty low these days and I didn’t pirate Photoshop. Or get Gimp.