Ubisoft: piracy hounds DS, reason why they retreated from PSP, will launch anti-piracy tool this year |
Ó
Ubisoft is hell-bent on putting its foot down against piracy as they are targeting this year to come out with a piracy solution for their games on the various platforms. The publisher has admitted that their products have been dealt a heavy blow because of the piracy, and they are now working on a tool that should cushion the impact of the said problem.
CEO Yves Guillemot discloses, "Altogether on console, the piracy is low. On the PC the piracy is quite a lot. We are working on a tool that would allow us to decrease that on the PC starting next year and probably one game this year."
Having described it as a tool, it is suggestive therefore that the solution they are working on is not an existing form of DRM, but rather, is an internal solution. Guillemot specifically zoomed in on the problem with piracy on the DS handhelds, referring to the R4, pinpointing the rise in Spain. He further characterized the DS sales in the country as "going down at a very strong level."
But the problem is not necessarily limited to Spain and, obviously, has spread on to other countries. "We see it coming country by country," Guillemot said. To counter this on a physical level, he suggests adding in extra collectibles like figurines to go along with the copy of the game.
We see when we put other things with the product (people) go and buy the game. We need to make sure that the value is better when they buy the box then when they download (the game) from the Internet.
Nintendo, for their part, has committed themselves to helping out Ubisoft. Guillemot reveals, "Nintendo has been able to slow down piracy a lot in Japan. They are now putting pressure to make sure it decreases in many other countries." He remains optimistic, "We think we will be able to solve this matter."
What of the PSP? He said that piracy was also one of the primary reasons why they retreated from Sony's handheld. But that won't be the case any longer as there are now "new ways to control piracy." Guillemot promises that Ubisoft will then be reinvesting in the handheld.
Related Articles:
- PS3 Slim spotted in a street market
- Evangelion: Jo is first anti-CFW PSP game, more to come?
- Arakawa: Dissidia is good enough to convince even pirates to buy it
Via Kotaku
Contact Us:
The QJ.net Network |
 |
| Site | Feed |
| QJ.NET | RSS |
| Nintendo DS | RSS |
| PlayStation 3 | RSS |
| PSP Updates | RSS |
| Wii | RSS |
| Xbox 360 | RSS |
| MMORPG | RSS |
| Personal Computer Games | RSS |
| iPhone - iPod Touch | RSS |
| QJ.NET Forums | RSS |
Add QJ.NET
User Favorites - December
User Favorites - December
Categories
Archives
Accessories
Add-ons
Applications
Artwork
Batteries
Cheats
Deals
Emulators
Events
Featured Articles
Firmware
Flash Applications
Flash games
Game Demos
Games
Hacks & Exploits
Homebrew Applications
Homebrew Demos
Homebrew Development
Homebrew Emulators
Homebrew Games
Homebrew Themes
How-To
Humor
Imports
Interviews
Magazines
Mods
MY QJ
News
Off Topic
On Shelves This Week
Opinions & Analysis
Podcasts
Previews
PSP Go
PSP Minis
PSP Slim & Lite
QJ How-To Series
QuickJump QuickGuide
QuickJump QuickPeek
Reviews
Rumors
Scans
Screenshots
Site News
Titles
UMD Movies
Videos
Weekend Warrior
Wi-Fi
December 2009
November 2009
October 2009
September 2009
August 2009
July 2009
June 2009
May 2009
April 2009
March 2009
February 2009
January 2009
December 2008
November 2008
October 2008
September 2008
August 2008
July 2008
June 2008
May 2008
April 2008
March 2008
February 2008
January 2008
December 2007
November 2007
October 2007
September 2007
August 2007
July 2007
June 2007
May 2007
April 2007
March 2007
February 2007
January 2007
December 2006
November 2006
October 2006
September 2006
August 2006
July 2006
June 2006
May 2006
April 2006
March 2006
February 2006
January 2006
December 2005
November 2005
October 2005
September 2005
August 2005
July 2005
June 2005
May 2005
April 2005
March 2005
February 2005
January 2005
Comments [refresh]
All I Cared About Was them Going Back To The Psp
I even stop dl 360 games... I found some of the older PS3 titles under $20. I don't mind buying those at that price... too bad publishers have no idea that price is the biggest factor for my pirating. But then I can't speak for everyone.
probably everybody's biggest factor. I don't need to pirate DS games, I pirated PSP games because I hate/hated my PSP and didn't feel like spending money on games I wasn't sure would be good but now I just don't play it (til Birth by Sleep comes out anyway I'll buy that) and for 360 I pirate the games I feel aren't worth my support. In my opinion the 360 has it worse when you think about the money lost to piracy even if it is easier to get things for DS.
Ehh.. be careful saying you pirate stuff so openly, QJ does have your IP and email information!
@lavino - Believe me, companies know you like the $20 price point, but they can't remain in business if they start their games at such a low price. The costs of developing games is rising exponentially every year, to the point where publishers are hesitant to try new things in current games, or acquiring new IPs. I will say that not all games deserve support from me, too. Personally, the only PSP games I own are the two Star Ocean games, though I bought ToEternia new, too. I also have an Xbox 360 and feel that Microsoft could use the support with it's massive RRoD problems, but have definately been wanting it chipped or flashed. As for Wii, I can only dream of throwing a chip in it.. There isn't anything on it that I remotely want to play. The new Tales game was OK at best! I'm rambling now, heh.
You see it like it is. I think companies SHOULD include more incentive to purchase the physical copy, I'd LOVE LOVE LOVE a figure of Xion or Kairi from KH. I'd buy a collectors edition for $120. You have my word.
Simply put. not everyone pirates. Us who actually buy games get the shaft because of it piracy :(
I really don't see what Ubisoft can do tho... they can't implement anti-piracy in any handheld or console and DRM on teh PC is thus far a POS that more or less makes just installing ur games a hassle.
In the end price is everything. I love my PSP and DS but refuse to pay $40 or more for a game! Handheld games should not top over $20. $20 I'm fine with 100%, but if it's $40 I just wait till it drops in price.
Console games... I practice the same thing more and more... I just wait till the game drops to $40 or so instead of paying $70 for it when it's released. Sure... that may mess up their sales and there's a chance used games will take more of that money away, but I really don't know what they expect. Someone like me who buys a lot of games is hit hard if I buy just 1 for each my PS3, PSP, DS and 360 per month! It nears $250!!! THat's just retarded!
if they retreated from psp because of piracy..why r they still supporting wii and xbox? the only reason they r ahead is because u can mod them ...and thats a fact
The truth of the matter is is that Ubisoft is making bad games. Hence why their sales are lowered. If you don't believe me google their Imagine games and see how many of those they have released in the past year.
Bwahahahahaha Guillemot - Guerillamod this stupid greedy monkeys ubisoft "retreat from PSP" lol why they didn't retreat from nintendo's? the piracy on nintendo smaller or smth? ha ha ha
PIRATES ROCKS!!! soon,very soon all this protection-inventors will retreat from they offices and even warm houses!!! we put in your ass this your "internal solution" , don't spend your money for nothing - this maybe hold pirates week or two and will be cracked ^_____^
just made games and get your part of money and sit quiet in your office, if you want more, you get nothing!
Dragoon , WHY you buy piracy copy when you can download a LICENSE ISO from piratebay, for example ?
))))))))))))))) ))))))
ubisoft retreated from the psp?.. then why are they releasing assassin's creed: bloodlines on the psp this coming november?.. but i dont care about ubisoft anyway, as long as square-enix or other rpg publishers still support it, i'll buy games for the psp..
The DS is by far the easiest system to pirate games on - flashcards are under $15 and there is no complicated process. (Not condoning piracy or practice it - just pointing out thatthe DS is the most easily pirated system.)
Guess that why Dragon Quest IX has done so poorly with only 2 million copies sold in Japan in the first couple of weeks ,sarcasm>
Piracy doesn't affect games sales - continuously producing crappy games does. And UbiSoft is king for that.
I for one am glad that they won't be producing for the PSP. It just makes it that much easier to filter out the crappy new releases.
and everything to do with the "secondary sales" which, for some companies, count as piracy. SPORE, for instance, with it's "three installs" limit, had no secondary sales so people who were waiting for that magic $20 price point knew they weren't going to see it. Thus, they became pirates. (Or avoided the game entirely, they didn't miss much).
The problem is the companies are treating "secondary sales" as "piracy" because they see people buying the games, backing them up to R4, and reselling them. THEREFOR SECONDARY SALES ARE PIRATES! ALSO GAMESTOP.
I won't be suprised to see "activation" or "license" codes coming to the consoles.
Are you completely retarded?
The Commodore 64 was the most wanted machine in the 80's, and also the most pirate machine of the 80's. Piracy has nothing todo with games selling. People who are into Piracy did not buy the gane after all.
The reason widespread piracy and secondary/used game sales, too, for that matter, exist is that prices are too high. It's really that simple.
Only an idiot would pay $35-$40 for a DS title. If video game manufacturers lowered the base price to $19 their sales would triple over night.
Game manufacturers and content produces love love love to count pirated (and used) copies as "lost" sales but the fact is, at the prices they're being offered the majority would simply be *missed* sales if people were unable to pirate.
I mean I doubt they retreated from the PSP, I mean theres another article in the PSP section of this sight that has Ubisoft saying that the reason the sales of Assassin's Creed 2 being so good will be because of the PSP.
Not to mention, piracy is pretty much the SAME exact thing as game rental stores, if not better. Game rental places buy a game and let everyone share it. They don't even buy it for full price, they get it at a wholesale price. Not to mention the fact that after 3 months of it being on the shelf the game's creator no longer get a precentage. Maybe even less than that, they're only required to pay off the rest of the game. And then after that they get all of the profit. I'm inclined to believe that worldwide there are more video game rental stores than pirates. We pay for the game full price and share it with everyone else too.
Don't get mad at us Ubisoft, we're just mimicking what society tells us is alright!
you know how they said they are putting an anti-piracy thing later this year right? so I think it will be done by are earlier than november
That's exactly what I was thinking. PC, Wii, DS and 360 are all pirated WAY MORE then the PSP. It's clear they have their heads clear up their rear ends.
Their actions make no sense aside from typical know-nothing share holders making decisions based on poor information and padded statistics.
I think it's hilarious how much money people spend on anti-piracy when, in the end, piracy is alive and well. With one exception.....PS3....hum.... Even microsoft is getting it right with their new OSs.
they blame piracy for there own faults, everyone knows it and they wont admit they just suck at making games
Guess what comes out in Oct ? PSP-Go.
No doubt Ubi is counting on selling alot of copies online to new PSP-Go consumers.
PSP-Go is primarly a re-launch of the PSP with a better strategy against piracy.
Now we will have to wait and see if it stays uncracked liked PS3 or if the PSP-Go has it's own vulnerabilities . I am thinking Sony spent alot of time on PSP-Go making sure it would not be cracked though.....
Hacking a PSP is MUCH easier than a DS....especially before psp-2000/3000.
DS IS a simple process, but still, you have to order things online. To do that you need a CC or have to get a money order. Then you have to wait for the stuff to arrive. Definitely a much huger hassle.
The majority of PSP's you just need to download some stuff off the internet and follow easy instructions. If you had a version 1.00/1.50 you didn't even need to do anything...they basically came hacked out of the box.
I always assumed that rental stores needed to maintain a license with each company, which would see a percent of the rental profits go to them....I did some research just now and this is not the case.
Anyone with a large collection of movies/games and a storefront can just start renting them out, without having to answer to the publisher, other than paying the retail price of the game/movie.
This might be what piratebay is trying to do now that it has gone "legal", just using a digital storefront.
Regardless, I only pirate games that I would not buy anyways....I play them for an hour or two, confirm that I did not want to buy the game, and delete them. I've only bought one game for PSP, and that was wipeout at launch....since then nothing has come out that interested me or that I could not play a better version of on my 360 or PS3.
PSP needs more games that are small and cheap and are meant to be played on the road in 10-30min bursts.
PSP has way too many games that are just dumbed down console games. Games you have to spend hours playing, not very good for playing on the bus and other random places, which is what handhelds are for.
You pirated PSP games because you are retarded.
psp now requires to actually do things now. and you may have to buy a battery.
DS is lock and load. all you do is buy a cflash cart and you're set.
And the iphone. omg that is plug and play hacking now.
UBisoft , your games dznt sell well bcz u dont produce good games ,
also a PSP spookperson said in qj.net " psp piracy is only 10%" and DS games are targeting jap market for the most so i think its " 5%" piracy since most DS players are kids .
so whats wrong with UBISOFT !!!!!!!
are ubi gona dead
1 - canceling 4 games this year
2 - canceling handled games
3 - and no great games for about 3 years
they meet have big internal problems .
And you can check they're PSP library and see how bad the can make games...is like when Activision said might stop making games for Sony...from all PSP games by Ubisoft I find Driver 76 and Splinter Cell the more decent ones and still are not great, the thing is that laa of their games could've been better but they havent find a way to make gameplay good on PSP, and other componies have...in ever genre
in compare with you i'm genius ^___^
yeah! and you forget - 4
4 - Ubisoft you are greedy monkeys! you want all money in the world for your ***** games
retarded, retarded ... you like some problems with it? :) there is one Proverb in Russia - "who what is sore that he is talking about" - what are you have paper with diagnosis and can't stop think about it? lol or anti-piracy whores wash your brain every day repeating "only retarded people pirating games" about 1000 times and ask you for repeat? bwahahaha brainsweeded monkey zombies ^___^
and ZX-Spectrum same thing. pirates make clones of ZX itself , not soft only - it was so popular!
And you can check their PSP library and see hoe bad they can make games, Is loke when Activision said might stop making games for Sony...from all PSP games by Ubisoft I found Driver 76 and Splinter Cell Essentials the most decent ones and still are not great, the thing is that lots of their games could've been better but they haven't find a way to make gamplay good on PSP, and other componies have...in every genre
Simply put, Spain is currently the country with the biggest unemployment rate in Europe.
People are low on money and entertainment is not a priority (for most) when you need to buy food for your family first. One doesn't need to be a genius to realize that (I can conclude CEOs like Mr Guillemot aren't exactly bright when they say what he said).
Also, on most countries in Europe the games' price is absurd (except UK, bless some of their online stores).
60€ or 70€ for a game is just retard. We're talking between $80 and $100, in some cases games with more than 1 year (this happens where I live). It shocks me, am I the only one?
I can tell you I buy all my PS3 games on UK stores since their price drops after a few months, but I (almost) never have paid full price for any. As for other platforms I own (PS2, PSP, PC), well... I won't comment that in public ;)
As others have mentioned above, if publishers lowered the prices on games then sales would boost, I have no doubts. In all platforms, not only those that can't be pirated (PS3 is the only one afaik).
Really if you have a good paying job, it's easy to shell out maybe $39 for a new ds game, or $50 for a new wii game, theres also plenty of used games at gamestop that run less than $10 or $14 (used of course); Nintendo should fight piracy on the DS, the R4 isn't a good thing at all.
With the PSP though it's different, all you need to do is install CFW and put the ISO on the mem stick and bam its that easy, still I buy games for the PSP.
I think Ubisoft has the right to do this, if it brings down there profits...
Yea, I had a C64... Huge Piracy on that! I knew a guy that had stacks and stacks of the 5 1/4 disks! :) Also you get get on the BBS and download tons of stuff! AH, the 80's!!! :)
Articles like these always remind me of a debate I had many years ago with a mom-and-pop computer store owner. His profit margins created markups on hardware and software that made it cheaper for me to fill up on gas, drive 50 miles to the next computer store and buy what I needed. His excuse was twofold: those dastardly skull-and-crossbones lackeys and the high prices set by manufactures and software publishers.
There isn't an excuse legitimate or solid enough to mask greed. The man's sole business was this shop. He was 'hurting so bad', but his Maserati never missed a tune-up or a paint job.
To software companies: this is pretty @#$#&! simple. If one can't even afford your products in the price bracket that you sell 'em, *THEY AREN'T A VALID SAMPLING POOL FOR YOUR VOODOO PIRACY STATISTICS*!
On the other hand, I find that to be a weak justification of why someone pirates a game or software title. However, it is what it is.
Yes, I've played many a game through those means. The $60 MSRP reflected half of my electricity bill, a service that was about to be disconnected. I can't play games without a hot outlet, can I? :)
I don't even care to read into how hard it is for game studios to play like little Hollywood types and spend $10 million to make a football player's fingers reflect a real-life player givin' it up to God after a touchdown.
To the game companies: it's a compromise. Look at ways where you can shift your business to churn out a product at a more reasonable product. In the same turn, consider just how deep and wide your cookie jar hand is at the moment.
Most people love to have that hard copy sitting on their shelves. It's akin to why many are not fans of solely digital distribution. Folks would pay for it if it didn't cost 30-50% of what they probably paid for the system hardware in the first place.
I won't blather anymore, I promise :). Thanks for hearing me out.
Love you, QJ!
'...to churcn out a product at a more reasonable PRICE.'
Sorry 'bout that!
You know, maybe if Ubisoft would make good games like they used too they might notice a sudden raise in profits.
Just sayin'.
a company who let a girl produce game will never rich the top , who saw the ENd ware TESt by a groupe of blondes , too sexy and comercial for a bad bad game . and the girl from As CREED made game so repetetive like her makup every morning . pls UBI let real designer and gamers produce your games , Money comme after .
Agree with you about game companies using piracy as an excuse for everything. "Nobody bought our 3D Golf game from the store! It must be piracy! Even though the game has been on torrent for months and nobody wants to dl it even for free, IT MUST BE PIRACY!"
Piracy has been around as long as personal computing has been around. Why can't these greedy asshats just be happy with making a massive profit?
Being a game developer and sobbing about piracy is like the CEO of Walmart sobbing about shotlifting... what is he going to do, close all his stores and lose out on billions nationwide because people steal about a mil in merch every years. Take your fat bonus and STFU.