Missed opportunity: PC needs more suitable experiences, not piracy control

May 10th, 2010

If publishers could ever contain piracy, PC game sales would go through the roof, right? That's not what one aspiring developer thinks. No, piracy isn't the problem, says indie game maker David Rosen. Poor use of PC technology is.

"While many game developers blame piracy for their decreasing PC game sales, it is clear that this is not the problem," Rosen blogs (via Ars Technica). To prove his argument, Rosen points to iPhone game piracy, in which 80% of all pirated copies of games are downloaded by the same 10% of iPhone users (aka "jailbreakers").

Nevertheless, "it's easier for these developers to point their fingers at pirates than to face the real problem: that their games are not fun on PC," Rosen writes. "The games in question are usually designed for consoles, with the desktop port as an afterthought. Their field of view is designed to be viewed from a distant couch instead of a nearby monitor, and their gameplay is simplified to compensate for this tunnel vision."

So play to the PC's strengths, and you're golden, Rosen concludes. "Blizzard is one of the most successful game developers in the world, and it develops exclusively for desktop computers. Why do they succeed where everyone else fails? They create games that are designed from the beginning to work well with the mouse and keyboard, and with all kinds of desktop hardware.

"If developers spent more time improving their PC gaming experience, and less time complaining about piracy, we might see more successful PC games."

Imagine that. Using innovation to attract more gamers.

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