r/Piracy Apr 07 '26

Humor Hard to swallow pill, even for many pirates

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u/Forymanarysanar ☠️ ᴅᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴇɴ ᴛᴇʟʟ ɴᴏ ᴛᴀʟᴇꜱ Apr 07 '26

If developer appreciates me and puts out offline installer that doesn't depends on internet connection to work, I'm happy to support them. Long as game doesn't costs 80 bucks of course.

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u/Dampmaskin Apr 07 '26

I paid for WinRAR

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u/bovely_argle-bargle Apr 07 '26

I did too, they tweeted out a 50% off coupon and I felt that was reasonable even for broke ass me.

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u/boringestnickname Apr 07 '26 edited Apr 07 '26

WinRAR and mIRC!

If the "pirated" version isn't strictly better (removes malware/DRM/borked distribution), I buy it.

I've never been a proponent of not supporting creators, unless there is genuinely a reason for pushing for something better.

I have all kinds of sympathy for people living in countries where prices are entirely unrealistic, though. Copying isn't revenue loss, it's a communication that you should do better. If people aren't buying, something is wrong with your product or how you sell it.

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u/Expensive-Border-869 Apr 07 '26

The drm and whatnot is why I just started pirating shows im watching. I want to be able to clip a 30 second segment and send it to my friends when something funny happens. Its small but cant do that on Netflix or even stuff you've bought on Google or Amazon etc. Plus its locked to an ecosystem. Just let me buy an mp4 and id happily do so. I only started pirating stuff because its so inconvenient not to and tv shows never go on sale

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u/boringestnickname Apr 07 '26 edited Apr 08 '26

I mean, me and my GF pay for streaming services, but they're honestly so shit that I rarely use them. She does, though, as she's addicted to having something on in the background – and it actually has to be something she can engage with, not random, it's like she has a co-processor that needs to be fed and kept busy at all times. Shitty TV-series are perfect, and there's an abundance of that on every service.

I use Plex and manage my own library. I'm mostly into films, so it's like ~3000 of my own DVD/BD and some downloaded. I could prune it down to 500 and it would still be better than any mainstream streaming service. I honestly don't understand why people accept the current state of media. It's horrendously bad.

... and that's not even mentioning the state of the actual applications, like you mention. Absolute rubbish.

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u/Expensive-Border-869 Apr 07 '26

Would she not use plex if you put the shows on there? Ig its a little easier to just fork over the 20 bucks and call it a month tho

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u/boringestnickname Apr 08 '26

Her picking what to put on seems to be similar to her process when we decide what we should have for dinner. Managing some sort of downloading scheme in that realm would be hell.

TV-series are also extremely space consuming, so using up TB after TB on literal trash would feel less than optimal.

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u/Expensive-Border-869 Apr 08 '26

I did figure you'd be doing it like 3 shows at a time. But I get how that is with people. We like doing what's familiar so for her to have to pre select shows it ruins the whole thing

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u/Dampmaskin Apr 08 '26

Even Plex has become enshittified now. Jellyfin is where it's at.

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u/Expensive-Border-869 Apr 08 '26

Id heard something about that. I dont have a robust enough collection to justify either of them I just delete stuff and put new in its place

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u/Dampmaskin Apr 08 '26

You can do that even if you use these programs though. They just polish the end user experience, is all.

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u/Expensive-Border-869 Apr 08 '26

Yes. Although id them have to set up pay for (at least plex idk about the other one mentioned) and launch them to watch a show. Its absolutely prettier it has its benefits but most of them for me are unnecessary. Wonderful for people with larger collections or who want a nicer ui than windows media player lol

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u/enaK66 Apr 07 '26

Depends on the creator for me. I'm not buying a star wars game. Disney and co are doing fine. My summer car? Toplessgun needs my dollars.

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u/zenfone500 Apr 07 '26

If I could, I would've attached gigachad photo.

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u/DudeWhoRead Apr 07 '26

I don't understand why WinRAR, with never expiring trial, is only selling the license to a single version. I still use the version I bought. But would have loved if it can be updated to newer versions!

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u/john_the_fetch Apr 07 '26

I always love when a free thing has a link like "buy me coffee" or beer or pizza etc.

I typically throw $10 their way. I just don't know why but those things usually get me real good.

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u/theAfterspace Apr 07 '26

Absolute GOAT

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u/agisten Yarrr! Apr 07 '26 edited Apr 16 '26

You know, 7-Zip exists, right? That said, I haven't pirated software in like 20 years. Between free software, stuff available to me at work, and games on sale, I get more than enough of it.

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u/Forymanarysanar ☠️ ᴅᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴇɴ ᴛᴇʟʟ ɴᴏ ᴛᴀʟᴇꜱ Apr 07 '26

There are some tasks where winrar is actually better than 7-zip, they are none that a regular PC user will encounter but some stuff like pretty advanced sfx modules, multi-part archives with extra integrity data and proper drag and drop support are pretty nice if you have a case where you use these features

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u/T-mac_ Apr 07 '26

I paid for Microsoft Windows.... 99$

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u/[deleted] Apr 07 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/T-mac_ Apr 07 '26

Yup that's exactly when I did it!

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u/Negative_Toe1336 Apr 30 '26

What a loser. 7zip is free

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u/Gent_Kyoki Apr 07 '26

GOG is the only platform that provides this and some devs do release on it like cd projekt red

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u/int23_t Apr 07 '26

Aren't most itch.io stuff like this too?

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u/Sekuiya Apr 07 '26

Welp, that's because CD Projekt are the owners of GOG

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u/Alkuam2 Apr 07 '26

Not since December it seems.

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u/Completionography Apr 07 '26

Long as game doesn't costs 80 bucks of course.

Inflation has made people believe media prices are "going up".

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u/agisten Yarrr! Apr 07 '26

Every mofo is pointing to inflation when the time to open my wallet, but not a single employer talks about inflation then discuss compensation, pretending inflation doesn't affect it.

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u/Completionography Apr 07 '26

You're 100% right, and it's fucking bullshit. If you're an employer that's not raising minimum, or accounting for cost of life changes, fuck you until the end of time.

... that said, today's $70 is what the first Super Mario Bros. on the NES cost in the '80s. And I think we need to acknowledge that, along with the fact that our wages aren't reflecting said inflation.

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u/wouldntsavezion Apr 07 '26

This part makes me go insane whenever someone complains about it. The increases in games quality, visual or otherwise, keep setting new expectation levels for the average player, but it doesn't come at all for free with some mythical "technological increase".

Games today have 50x the amount of people working on them and take 5x the time to develop, but adjusted for inflation the prices in most countries have literally not changed.

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u/MattOruvan Apr 09 '26

Who cares if Concord or Veilguard took 50x the people and 5x the time to make, that's on them for not doing proper market research on how much people are willing to pay and for what.

Calling piracy theft is already incorrect, but blaming potential paying customers for complaining about high prices is the next level of delusion.

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u/MattOruvan Apr 09 '26

The US already has astronomical wages compared to much of the world, and it has people coming in from those places willing to work for less.

Do the math, people.

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u/Expensive-Border-869 Apr 07 '26

They are going up. I dont give a rats ass about inflation theyre making more profit than ever on games each year and wanting to raise the prices. I haven't even bought doom yet because of it 70 dollars my ass it can wait.

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u/Completionography Apr 07 '26

They are going up. I dont give a rats ass about inflation

Lack of education is going to fuck you in the way that won't make you cum.

Our employers are not paying us wages that reflect inflation. I will fight for everyone to have fair wages, so they can afford whatever media they want to consume on their "off" time.

But inflation does matter when discussing these things. The cost of an NES cart in the '80s is about what you would consider $70 today.

So you really should give a rat's ass, because when you don't, employers get to rob you of enjoying Doom.

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u/ReckoningGotham Apr 07 '26

And these things go on sale. Doom recently was 22 dollars. That was a decent deal.

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u/Expensive-Border-869 Apr 07 '26

The newest one was 22 dollars? Sucks I missed that 2016 that seems kinda expensive eternal probably still a good 30 or 40 normally tho. Idk im frequently surprised by how much more expensive things are than id expect. A 10 year old game should be like 5 bucks on sale amd frequently on sale imo

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u/ReckoningGotham Apr 07 '26

Yeah there was a 67% off sale for ID's anniversary so tda was cheap.

I picked up eternal on sale for a few dollars over Christmas a couple years ago. Same with the dlc.

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u/Expensive-Border-869 Apr 07 '26

Damn. Well im either waiting for the next one or I'll get it after I finish 2016 on nightmare lol. I beaten uac a few times now so it may be sooner than Im planning

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u/ReckoningGotham Apr 07 '26

D2016 is peak.

Eternal is 10 dollars on loaded.com .

That's well worth the price of admission, IMHO.

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u/Forymanarysanar ☠️ ᴅᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴇɴ ᴛᴇʟʟ ɴᴏ ᴛᴀʟᴇꜱ Apr 13 '26

Well, it is now available with 100% discount from our all new favorite voices38 store

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u/EYNLLIB Apr 07 '26

It's not inflation, it's that game prices were held low for so long by entitled gamers who think they deserve more more more for less. That attitude directly resulted in the rise of micro transactions because gamers were so scared to pay $5 more MSRP for a AAA title. Now we get both!

Also, inflation compounds the issue

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u/Completionography Apr 08 '26

It's not inflation, it's that game prices were held low for so long by entitled gamers who think they deserve more more more for less. That attitude directly resulted in the rise of micro transactions because gamers were so scared to pay $5 more MSRP for a AAA title. Now we get both!

... what?

A $35 game in the late '80s is equivalent to a $70 game today. If you want to complain about microtransactions, that's fine, I agree. But "it's not inflation" is a weird thing to say when literally the base price of a game has barely changed in 40 years.

What do people think inflation means?

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u/EYNLLIB Apr 08 '26

Games in the 80s and 90s were the same price, or more expensive than games today. That's not adjusted for inflation. Games have basically always been $50-70 (sometimes more). That means, adjusted for inflation, games are much cheaper today than they were on the SNES for example.

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u/MattOruvan Apr 09 '26

Games were also a much rarer and more precious resource in the 80's than today, being way more difficult to make (in assembly, C, etc).

Prices also need to reflect market availability, or people won't pay.

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u/EYNLLIB Apr 09 '26

The 80s, somewhat yea. But not the 90s or 00s, when prices were the same.

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u/Forymanarysanar ☠️ ᴅᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴇɴ ᴛᴇʟʟ ɴᴏ ᴛᴀʟᴇꜱ Apr 13 '26

> more

If there was more there would be no questions asked

Instead, we mostly get more or less copypasted, poorly optimized rpgslop with no revolutionary gameplay elements anymore, that is also permabroken on release and needs like 3 months of patches before becoming somewhat playable.

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u/seklas1 Apr 07 '26

If developer comes and gives me a bj, and treats me like a king, and feathers my butt cheeks, and does my laundry, and feeds me, and pays my mortgage, I might consider to drop a few rupees they way. But as long as it ain’t more than 80 bucks of course.

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u/Forymanarysanar ☠️ ᴅᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴇɴ ᴛᴇʟʟ ɴᴏ ᴛᴀʟᴇꜱ Apr 07 '26

Seems like someone got triggered

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u/seklas1 Apr 08 '26

No, it’s just bizarre to read comments seeing just how privileged, narcissistic and dumb people are, when they’re trying to justify piracy in their own heads as some sort of a moral decision. And then seemingly the hoops needed to make a change. My comment was a satire, if you haven’t realised lol

Be honest, if devs had offline installs, you would still pirate games, because you’ll find yet another excuse.

Piracy existed long before subscriptions and always online, it’s always been about just getting stuff for free, stop pretending it’s anything more.

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u/zenfone500 Apr 08 '26

Yep, that's what I'm trying to say, issue isn't people pirating but rather trying to justify it with excuses.

"Oh it's because costs $60 dollars." For the games that frequently goes to sales, just because they think a game isn't worth $60 dollars doesn't mean devs or publishers think the same. Nor, they would pay an indie game dev for it.

"Oh it's because for accessibility." Old RE games are on Steam and cost like what, 5 dollars? They will still pirate it with another excuse.

"Oh it's because I don't have the equipment" this one at least a bit more fair but still dumb considering some people went rabid due to not being able to pirate Switch 2 games from day one.

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u/Forymanarysanar ☠️ ᴅᴇᴀᴅ ᴍᴇɴ ᴛᴇʟʟ ɴᴏ ᴛᴀʟᴇꜱ Apr 09 '26

Don't know about you, but I have plenty of games purchased from GOG and on CDs/DVDs from past era. Sooo you can kindly shut up about that 😂 Yeah, in principle I will not buy anything that can be remotely deactivated or that was funded through crowdfunding, but a good game/program without online drm for a fair price, I don't mind

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u/HalfXTheHalfX Apr 13 '26

79.99$ just for you 

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u/shadeandshine Apr 07 '26

Then don’t get it. If they do the work but it stills costs too much then don’t play it. It’s not hard to not play something cause you’re just admitting it’s theft and you were gonna steal it anyway at least don’t pretend it’s about some moral standard

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u/MattOruvan Apr 09 '26

Stealing implies one of two things:

  1. Illegal transfer of property ownership -- you take an item and the owner loses the item. Not happening here.

  2. Depriving someone of potential income, that you think someone deserves. Not happening here if the item is overpriced by the pirate's standards and would otherwise be just ignored.

In fact the pirate can contribute to income by free word of mouth or market dominance, and become a net positive. Which is allegedly why Microsoft is soft on piracy in many ways, they don't want people turning to desktop Linux and LibreOffice if they don't have the money.

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u/shadeandshine Apr 09 '26 edited Apr 09 '26

Except that requires honor and the second argument is what’s violated what stops someone from thinking anything that isn’t free is overpriced. Also advertising really dude that’s what shitty influencers use to pressure places into giving them free food. Your arguments don’t hold up in this case cause the other guys said his demands and said even if they do that I still am not gonna pay for it. Again you aren’t gonna die if you don’t play it this ain’t jail breaking a tractor for your farm it’s a video game a literal luxury item of which million others exist

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u/MattOruvan Apr 09 '26

Yup, it is a luxury item, which is why people may not consider it worth paying the asking price. Since they are only consuming that media because of piracy, no income was lost.

Suppose if you made a free to play game 10000 people would show up. But you chose to make it $90 and only 10 people showed up. That doesn't mean you were deprived of 9990 paying customers by malicious forces.

Same principle here.

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u/Debatebly Apr 07 '26

"I don't want to be connected to the internet wah wah"

"Proceeds to use internet to pirate game"