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The Big, Scary Numbers of Piracy in 2008

I’ve been looking at this list TorrentFreak created, the one of the top ten most pirated games of 2008 according to BitTorrent tracking. It is utterly fascinating, but not, as many people latched onto, because Spore is the number one most pirated game of the year. That’s an eye-rolling obvious thing to reveal, the same as if you were told The Dark Knight was the pirated movie of 2008 (Surprise! It is). So the most heavily marketed PC game of the year was the one the most people tried to get for free. So what?

No, what’s interesting is how gigantic some of these numbers are. I’m going to go ahead and say this list is almost certainly low-balling the number of people who pirated these games, as only taking into account a certain number of well-managed trackers, as TorrentFreak did, leaves out the private trackers and people who got lucky on bad trackers. And of course, there are the people who went to their local unmarked van for a clandestine exchange using unmarked bills, but that’s neither here nor there. Let’s assume these numbers represent a conservative estimate.

It was predicted by people paid to predict such things that Spore would sell about 2 million copies in September, and while EA hasn’t released the actual numbers if that turns out to be true that would mean Spore is doing okay. In this case, we’ll define “okay” as “more copies are being sold than being stolen.” After the jump, things will no longer be okay.

Men Are From Hyrule, Women Are From Simville: If Gender Defines the Games We Play, Why Does Everyone Play By the Same Rules?

The problem with working on the internet is that you inevitably find yourself plummeting down some horrible information vortex while trying to be productive. It could be some hyperlinked sentence in a Newsweek article or that godforsaken new email icon popping up on your screen, but no matter the form it comes in, your cognitive process is sent down the road of endless consumption, natural curiosity leading you by the nose, sniffing out even more useless information. Today, Pete Smith sent me a nugget of knowledge from the Wikipedia entry on game addiction and, so, I fell down the information rabbit hole.

Somehow I missed this back at the end of May, but Professor Allan Reiss of Stanford University published a study on the effects of videogames on male and female brains. The experiment entailed monitoring a number of men and women’s brain functions while playing a simple strategy game; players gained control of territory from other players by clicking on dots on a screen. MRI scans of the players’ brains, both male and female, showed activation of the mesocorticolimbic centre, that lovely chunk of grey matter associated with addiction and reward. The scans, however, showed more activity in the mesocorticolimbic centre in men than in women. Reiss’ conclusion was that this explained men having greater interest in the common videogame, one in which territory is at stake, than women.

I find the Professor’s findings damned peculiar in light of the most successful PC game in all of history.

Captivating Discontent: Where's the Nintendo Love, Capcom?

Written by Derrick Sanskrit

Like a lot of other gamers, I was rather perplexed by the announcements at the Capcom’s recent Captivate ‘08 event. Sure, Street Fighter IV is starting to look like a worthwhile return to the franchise and Bionic Commando just looks awesome - both got me wanting to pick up that Xbox gamepad again - but what the hell happened on the Nintendo side of things? Neopets Puzzle Adventure and Spyborgs?

Capcom doesn't really believe that ALL Nintendo gamers are eight years old, do they?

But as the media rolled in, I started to warm up to these new IPs.

about the blogger

John Constantine, our superhero, was raised by birds and then attended Penn State University. He is currently working on a novel about a fictional city that exists only in his mind. John has an astonishingly extensive knowledge of Scientology. Ultimately he would like to learn how to effectively use his brain. He continues to keep Wu-Tang's secret to himself.

Derrick Sanskrit is a self-professed geek in a variety of fields including typography, graphic design, comic books, music and cartoons. As a professional hipster graphic designer, his recent clients have included Nerve, Pitchfork and MoCCA, among others.

Amber Ahlborn - artist, writer, gamer and DigiPen survivor, she maintains a day job as a graphic artist. By night Amber moonlights as a professional Metroid Fanatic and keeps a metal suit in the closet just in case. Has lived in the state of Washington and insists that it really doesn't rain as much as everyone says it does.

Nadia Oxford is a housekeeping robot who was refurbished into a warrior when the world's need for justice was great. Now that the galaxy is at peace (give or take a conflict here or there), she works as a freelance writer for various sites and magazines. Based in Toronto, Nadia prizes the certificate from the Ministry of Health declaring her tick and rabies-free.

Bob Mackey is a grad student, writer, and cyborg, who uses the powerful girl-repelling nanomachines mad science grafted onto his body to allocate time towards interests of the nerd persuasion. He believes that complaining about things on the Internet is akin to the fine art of wine tasting, but with more spitting into buckets.

Joe Keiser has a programming degree from Johns Hopkins University, a tiny apartment in Brooklyn, and a fake toy guitar built in the hollowed-out shell of a real guitar. He writes about games and technology for a variety of outlets. One day he will stop doing this. The day after that, police will find his body under a collapsed pile of (formerly neatly alphabetized) collector's edition tchotchkes.

Cole Stryker is an American freelance writer living in York, England, where he resides with his archeologist wife. He writes for a travel company by day and argues about pop culture on the internet by night. Find him writing regularly here and here.

Peter Smith is like the lead character of Irwin Shaw's The 80-Yard Run, except less athletic. He considers himself very lucky to have this job. But it's a little premature to take "jack-off of all trades" off his resume. Besides writing, travelling, and painting houses, Pete plays guitar in a rock trio called The Aye-Ayes. He calls them a 'power pop' band, but they generally sound more like Motorhead on a drinking binge.