ROFL and while you are at it the code should be 100% bug free (when first written) and 100% un-pirateable. The people claiming they use piracy to see if a game is good are almost all just saying that to justify it, just as they are when they claim games are too expensive. - when developers put out demos and drop their prices it makes no difference to the level of piracy. These people steal - why would anyone trust what they say? Also you are worrying that if you try to stop people pirating your game they will say bad things about it? I think you may have your priorities a little askew there
suggest to see: as⋅sume /əˈsum/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [uh-soom] Show IPA verb (used with object), -sumed, -sum⋅ing. 1. to take for granted or without proof; suppose; postulate; posit: to assume that everyone wants peace. 2. to take upon oneself; undertake: to assume an obligation. 3. to take over the duties or responsibilities of: to assume the office of treasurer. 4. to take on (a particular character, quality, mode of life, etc.); adopt: He assumed the style of an aggressive go-getter. 5. to take on; be invested or endowed with: The situation assumed a threatening character. 6. to pretend to have or be; feign: to assume a humble manner. 7. to appropriate or arrogate; seize; usurp: to assume a right to oneself; to assume control. 8. to take upon oneself (the debts or obligations of another). 9. Archaic. to take into relation or association; adopt. verb (used without object) 10. to take something for granted; presume. Origin: 140050; late ME (< AF assumer) < L assūmere to take to, adopt, equiv. to as- as- + sūmere to take up; see consume and also: ig⋅no⋅rant /ˈɪgnərənt/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [ig-ner-uhnt] Show IPA Use ignorant in a Sentence adjective 1. lacking in knowledge or training; unlearned: an ignorant man. 2. lacking knowledge or information as to a particular subject or fact: ignorant of quantum physics. 3. uninformed; unaware. 4. due to or showing lack of knowledge or training: an ignorant statement. Origin: 132575; ME ignora(u)nt < L ignōrant- (s. of ignōrāns), prp. of ignōrāre to ignore; see -ant
Not true. I pirate games for my PSP a lot just to try them out. Most games on that system don't have demos (unlike the App Store), and they tend to be pretty expensive too (unlike the App Store). It does get tempting to just download and play games without paying, but I have rules set up for myself: 1. Only download games without demos. 2. You beat it, you buy it. I've got a bunch of games that I pirated, beat, and had to purchase a copy. I've actually got four unopened games in my closet, still with the plastic wrapper on them (it is a LOT faster playing games off of your memory stick rather than the disk, so I never even bothered opening them). 3. Import games are fine, unless they get brought to the U.S.
As he(?) should. Not only can pirates generate a bad word of mouth, but at least on PC this stuff tended to bug out on some legitimate customers too. I'd be wary of alienating one's buyers and prospective buyers!
First and foremost, the bundle should be encrypted. Ever look at a Qualcomm BREW 2.0 game binary? The whole thing is encoded end-to-end. Change one byte and the whole thing won't even decrypt or decompress. An APP/IPA file is nothing more than a renamed ZIP, just as with all their other files. Take note, Apple, it's not just the developers losing out big time, but you as well.
I'm really surpised Apples encryption scheme is so loose. It's not like this is a new problem, consoles and other smart phones have strong encryption already. Esp puzzling since Apple acutally makes their hardware, why they don't include hardware encryption into the scheme, which would make it virtually impossible to pirate. Oh well. -ddn
I agree you can't stop piracy totally, but piracy is a non-factor for platforms like the ps3 and xbox 360. They use strong hardware encryption on all the data and executable code, so bypassing those would require modding the hardware itself vs just changing the software like how it works on the iPhone. -ddn
That comes with some risk and requires modifiying the DVD drive in some fashion, for most would be pirates that would be too large a barrier vs jailbreaking your iPhone to run decrypted executables (low risk). -ddn
I get where you're coming from, but it's still not terribly arduous (then again, the PC, PSP, DS and Wii are all fairly easy at the end of the day...). The only platform that hasn't been "hacked" to play pirated games is the PS3... maybe Apple could try get some tips off Sony
They have! Both platforms are polluted with tons of crap games and finding anything good is hard as hell... It's quite similar, really.
There is absolutely no benefit in doing this. Instead of losing some customers on jailbroken devices to pirated copies, you lose all customers with jailbroken devices. Do you really think someone will remove the jaibreak just because of your little game(s)? Furthermore I doubt that it is impossible to remove your check, if someone really bothers to crack your game.
Until there is a Hardware security available on the iphone, everything software could be patched/altered or whatever.... so you can just delay the crack but soon or later it will come.
Take a lesson from the PC games, DRM or anti-piracy technology only prevents the game from being cracked for 2-3 weeks. After that it's on the torrent sites fully playable. The only scheme which have shown to reduce losses to piracy is strong online verification. It's no suprise MMOs are the most profitable, since they have almost no pirarcy handicap (and they charge monthly fees ) It should be possible to develop a scheme using the online verification protocol provided by the in-app purchase API to check if the user is a valid one (that's if they are online). Even then that is still hackable (hook the API etc..). -ddn
A couple additional points: * Supporting Jailbroken devices is a can of worms even aside from piracy: those modifications can take up RAM and make your game crash. Now your app is getting bad reviews from Jailbreakers even when the game runs fine on a normal device. (I don't necessarily suggest blocking Jailbreak users, but I'd consider adding a disclaimer to the text that the game may be less stable on a Jailbroken phone.) * Delaying piracy, even by half a day, is useful. It affects your early sales, and thus your climb up the popularity chart (if you're lucky). Even if I can't stop piracy, I still hope to delay it when I release my game.
I would say DARE, or just never trying it. Otherwise your hooked and your life will spiral down the drain.
