Fallout 3: Proving the haters are right?

[Wrestlevania]

I don't get the argument with the Stealth Boy. You could already get one in the first Fallout.

Wasn't aware of that, but it makes little difference (in my opinion) in the grander scheme of things. Which might be why Black Isle didn't include it in the second game, as it didn't fit in very well canonically.

The Stealth Boy back-story makes for interesting, though.

[DanJW]

I'd have to disagree massively with you on Rockstar, the animations in GTAIV are terrible except when they are procedurally generated by the Euphoria engine. They are all completely stiff and lifeless and really bother me, I found it to be a really poor showing for such a high budget / profile game.

OK, but that's not their only game. I was thinking more of the GTAIII series and Bully.

[eljay]

OK, but that's not their only game. I was thinking more of the GTAIII series and Bully.

Yeah I felt that way about San Andreas also, I guess the animations would have been fine for the first two. No experience of bully.

[DanJW]

Fine whatever. My point still stands.

[Cigol]

Back on topic, the XBOX 360 version of this has been leaked to the internet. As far as I'm aware Bethesda don't feed into the whole piracy is killing the PC rumour, so a missed opportunity to sit here feeling smug, but it's still nice to be reminded it's not just the PC which has problems with piracy.

Still, I'll give it a wry smile - they couldn't be bothered adding trophies to the PS3 release even when the XBOX release comes with them as standard. The PS3 of course is free from piracy... but lacks the install base and support to take advantage of it

[Wrestlevania]

Is this a gold disc release or beta or what?

[ThunderPeel2001]

It's almost impossible to play pirate games on a 360, AFAIK. You need to modify the hardware, which can be checked when your 360 is updated. You need a DVD drive that you can butcher when burning it, too. Not to mention Dual Layer DVDs. I bet only a minuscule percentage could possibly play a cracked game.

[Wrestlevania]

I've been shown; it's a doddle and you get change from a tenner.

[Cigol]

It's almost impossible to play pirate games on a 360, AFAIK. You need to modify the hardware, which can be checked when your 360 is updated. You need a DVD drive that you can butcher when burning it, too. Not to mention Dual Layer DVDs. I bet only a minuscule percentage could possibly play a cracked game.

You're not serious? Ignoring the 'almost impossible' comment; look at any public torrenting website and read the comments for some PC releases. Half are from people who don't know what .rar files are, how to mount an .iso, what a crack is, how to find it, or indeed where to put it and so forth. There are difficulties to overcome on every platform (re; piracy) but once you've got over that hurdle it's as easy as stealing candy from a baby (and a lot less harrowing).

[Wrestlevania]

I like how Bethesda's marketing people seem to think plastering banners with "Maxim 5/5 | FHM 5/5 | Loaded 5/5" will somehow shift copies of this game. I mean... fucking Loaded is now "critical" press worth taking note of?!

Really, well done, morons. That's right; your biggest obstacle to sales here was the perception that lads' mag readers might not have heard of Fallout--and there's a fucking good reason for that, mind. Just outstanding target audience identification there, superb.

Cock-ends.

[Chris]

I like how Bethesda's marketing people seem to think plastering banners with "Maxim 5/5 | FHM 5/5 | Loaded 5/5" will somehow shift copies of this game. I mean... fucking Loaded is now "critical" press worth taking note of?!

Really, well done, morons. That's right; your biggest obstacle to sales here was the perception that lads' mag readers might not have heard of it. Just outstanding target audience identification there, superb.

Cock-ends.

I imagine if that kind of thing really was totally ineffective, movie studios would have stopped doing it decades ago.

[Wrestlevania]

Fair point, but it still makes my piss boil.

[Cigol]

I imagine if that kind of thing really was totally ineffective, movie studios would have stopped doing it decades ago.

I'm pretty sure they do if it's a film of any stature.

[Chris]

I'm pretty sure they do if it's a film of any stature.

The difference is, and this is just an unfortunate reality, your average citizen, even a cultured one (perhaps especially a cultured one), hasn't the slightest clue what games are "of any stature." They're also extremely unlikely to be familiar with any good (or bad) game journalism outlets -- plus, the people with whom those outlets hold some cachet don't need to see them advertised, they already read them. I'm sure if publications like the New York Times (or whatever) start giving Fallout 3 rave reviews, Bethesda will be more than happy to trumpet that, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if that happened.

[ThunderPeel2001]

You're not serious? Ignoring the 'almost impossible' comment; look at any public torrenting website and read the comments for some PC releases. Half are from people who don't know what .rar files are, how to mount an .iso, what a crack is, how to find it, or indeed where to put it and so forth. There are difficulties to overcome on every platform (re; piracy) but once you've got over that hurdle it's as easy as stealing candy from a baby (and a lot less harrowing).

Yes, there's plenty of idiots out there... but hacking a 360 is something else (unless they've made major advances since I last "investigated" -- EDIT: They have... to a degree).

It's not easy, in fact it's rather fiddly (read VERY)... but not impossible, provided you don't mind MS possibly bricking your 360 the next time it updates.

Edited October 11, 2008 by ThunderPeel2001

[Wrestlevania]

The method I've seen involves nothing more complex than fishing your 360's DVD drive out of the casing, connecting it to an external SATA card and updating it with hacked firmware.

No chips, soldering or any other nonsense. Not that I'm condoning this sort of thing.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Yeah, it's just that only certain motherboards can add firmware to certain drives. Wrong IDE/RAID chipset on your PC for your 360 drive and there's nothing you can do. But you're right, it's pretty simple... provided it still works after updates :/

Amazingly you still CAN'T play region locked games... How sucky is that?

[Wrestlevania]

Yeah, it's just that only certain motherboards can add firmware to certain drives. Wrong IDE/RAID chipset on your PC for your 360 drive and there's nothing you can do.

That's where my "change from a tenner" bit comes in...

Pick up a compatible SATA IDE card off fleaBay, instead of using your mobo's built-in SATA connections, and there's no risk of corrupted firmware.

[elmuerte]

Pick up a compatible SATA IDE card off fleaBay

make sure you read the description to see if it includes a game disc or cartridge.

[ThunderPeel2001]

That's where my "change from a tenner" bit comes in...

Pick up a compatible SATA IDE card off fleaBay, instead of using your mobo's built-in SATA connections, and there's no risk of corrupted firmware.

Ha! Makes sense now. Don't think I'll actually try it though... I still want my 360 fixed if there's another RRoD!

[Cigol]

A fairly recent interview with Pete Hines is amusing as it was conducted before the 360 leak and discusses the difficulties they face with piracy on the PC. There's no talk of restrictive DRM or jumping ship from the PC, thankfully, and he also name-checks Remo and his article on Penny Arcade. What I didn't understand, and maybe you guys can fill me in on, was how they lose money from tech-support issues relating to piracy. It's not like it's a freephone service, we do have to pay to use it and I find it hard to believe they don't make a profit.

"The amount of money we spend supporting people who didn’t pay us for the game in the first place…it’s f–ing ludicrous. We talk to other developers, guys who are [like] ‘Yeah, it’s a third, it’s 50% of our [customer] support'."

...besides which, what problems are they referring to? I've used all manner of no-cd cracks in my time and encountered very few game specific problems. In fact, they've actually been very useful in overcoming 'faulty' DRM which won't work in spite of purchasing the game! Obviously; you download from the wrong sources and you run a severely high risk of being infected - but that's a general tech support issue, nothing to do with the game. It sounds like the sort of scapegoating which might eventually culminate in them turning their back on the PC, I mean it's just one small step to the other side and there doesn't seem to be a lot of love for the PC right now.

full article here

[Wrestlevania]

I've used all manner of no-cd cracks in my time and encountered very few game specific problems. In fact, they've actually been very useful in overcoming 'faulty' DRM which won't work in spite of purchasing the game! Obviously; you download from the wrong sources and you run a severely high risk of being infected - but that's a general tech support issue, nothing to do with the game.

You spend more than a moment looking at the comments on any popular torrent site - for whatever reason - and it readily becomes apparent that there are a lot of fucking stupid people with Internet connections out there...

[Cigol]

Granted, but he gave the impression they get inundated with what are initially ambiguous problems that are then found to be caused by 'piracy'. That's what I don't get. What problems?

It's like when Sports Interactive said that they intentionally produced bad cracks and released them into the wild with bugs. It later turned out that the people being accused of using cracks, with bad bugs, were actually honest retail purchasers and the bug was in fact notlimited to the crack. Scaremongering and scapegoating.

[Wrestlevania]

I would imagine he means, for example, a moron - knowingly or otherwise - installs a pirated version, doesn't have a genuine disc and therefore can't get the game to run without help. So he calls the publisher's tech support.

It sounds like bullshit, but I'm not so sure it's that much of a fringe case to be honest. There's much more to piracy than just torrenting; people selling mass cloned knock-offs at local markets and garage / car boot sales are fairly commonplace, still, in my experience.