Week 22: GDC

The Games Developers Conference runs every year.


Its a place where you can do to different conferences covering different concepts and subjects within the game industry such as:

• Piracy



• Specific games e.g. Viva Pinata and the game engines specifically designed for the game



• Know Your Players: An In-Depth Look at Player Behavior and Consumer Demographics



• Autodesk 3ds Max 9: Advanced Techniques for Next-gen Pipelines

To do this, you have to schedule and plan your conferences. Its such a popular thing you have no other choice. Its a very popular thing to go to, and lucky people like Capt' Powell get to go (what do u have to do to go?) mind u, benefits us anyways doesnt it haha! Thousand of people go, to both present and give lectures, and just simply listen to them and delve deeper into the fast expanding games generation.

On the website, i found an area which said it would focusing on piracy and the effects it has on the industry. This interested me and i decided to investigate further. The speaker of this particular seminar is Todd Hollenshead. The session description reads as follows

This session will discuss the state of the piracy problem the game industry faces, paying particular attention to the impact Internet piracy has on the PC game industry. Todd's experiences battling pirates and hackers over the past 10 years as CEO of id Software offers lessons in what to do, as well as what not to do in best protecting you company and game assets from those that fly the Jolly Roger.

Piracy is mainly driven by the high costs of living and products across the world according to an anonymous person who wrote an article on 3DGPU.com The link to the article is: (http://3dgpu.com/archives/2004/08/02/the-state-of-game-piracy-today/)

They state that as each game costs around $45, or £40 for us, we put off buying brand new box games. WHen the target audience is under 18, they dont always have the cash to pay for these games, and with parents having mortgages, phone bills, gas, electric, car insurance and maintenance etc to pay, they dont have the spare money either. It also concludes that there is an average of 2 games which would take our fancy ever month, but paying nearly £100 for them is extreme, especially when it coould go on paying some kind of bill! ALso, the fact that every so often, an upgrade is needed as a new console comes out and the games for the previous ones cease production. LIke when the xBpx 360 was released, they stopped making games for the xBox itself.

Its factors like thish which drive people to priacy and buying things illegally. Yeah ok so you could get caught but theres millions of people over the world who do it, and if it will save u a feq quid, why not? You have no proof what the money will go towards. It can be the equivalent of buying 5 for the price of one in the shops! Bargain...................mostly. What bugs me thouhg, is that people say that piracy is wrong etc etc and its breaking the law, yet they still invent and allow things to be collected, which will over-ride the copyright and enable you to copy games and films etc. They bring out better CD Burners, dvd disks with more space on, Logically, this makes no sense to me. But hey, maybe that is just me....or does anybody else think that that is a bit silly??

http://www.smh.com.au/news/Breaking/Campaign-against-video-game-piracy/2005/04/04/1112489386775.html

Tha above link gows to a website which demonstrates what Australia has done to help target and prevent Piracy within that country. It states that the Australian public dont see piracy as a crime, nor do the rest of the world apparantly. (You cant even go on holiday without being pestered by people who are selling pirate dvd's.....ones which havent even come out in the UK yet!). The Australian Crimestoppers Chairman Peter Price has put out many warnings to parents that piracy can do more harm than good. It can gain you and your child a criminal record! We dont want that. He has also put into place a 'law' which states that anybody caught with a pirate copy of a game or equivalent, they can be put into prison for between 2 and 5 years, and face a fine of upto $55,000 Australian Dollars.

And no, i dont know what the English equivalent is!

Piracy is like a big circle. You buy it, you copy it, you sell it and make a profit. Microsoft uprade thier cd burners and things, people create programes to overwrite copywriting blocks and then you start again, you buy it, you copy it, you sell it.

Personally, i dont support it. I dont know what piracy funds, wheher it simply be just an extra job for somebody, or terrorism. I dont always agree with retail prices or indeed pay them, i mainly borrow off of other people, and if i like it, ill find a cheaper way of getting it which doesnt involve piracy! Ive never had the spare cash to spend £40 on a new game! I still dont now, especially since i am a student and lets face it, i never have any spare cash. Too many bills to pay! I understand that the price is mainly so companies can make a profit considering how much it costs to create a game, but still its just too much!

You wouldnt steal a car, You wouldnt steal a handbag, You wouldnt steal a television, You wouldnt steal a DVD, Downloading pirated films is stealing, Stealing is againt the law, Piracy its a crime. Illegal downloading - Inapprioriate for all ages.

(To watch the advert, Click This http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSQQ1NqOaA4)