Every Monday the LeftStickRight team will take on a different topic surrounding news or interesting topics about games or the gaming industry and open it up for discussion. Our three editors will give their perspective and you are welcome to give your own. Agree? Disagree?
The topic this week is: What would piracy mean for the PS3 right now? What happens if the system is fully hacked?
Tim’s Take
I honestly don’t know that much about “hacking.” The innards of a console are as grand a mystery to me as the cosmos or how they get peanut butter and jelly in the same jar. I have no clue how to “whisper” to the electrons or whatever to get them to overthrow their corporate overlords. I wouldn’t even know which hammer to start with.
But if hacking means easier access to fan-made creations, then I say Godspeed, pirates! I’m sick and tired of waiting while developers throw half-assed new IPs like Dragon Age and Uncharted 2 against the wall to see if they stick while ignoring the franchises people demand! If they’re not going to do it, it’s time to take matters into our own hands.
What I’m really trying to say is, please make my lovingly crafted fan creation work!
My cool new game...perhaps you recognize the concept?
Ian H’s Take
I think the first and most immediate effect of piracy creeping its way onto the PS3 is that the hardware sales would actually start to increase. It’s not hardware that really becomes the issue at this point, just look to the PSP. The PSP sells decently in hardware, but the software sales have never been anything to write home about. The portable platform is plagued by piracy and suffers as a result of that. If the PS3 is sold at as a loss for Sony each time, and they are not able to recoup the money from the software sales because piracy becomes more of an issue it could represent a serious problem.
The other troubling issue would be how to handle their online system. With an open and free network that has no particular tie downs with subscriptions, it is much harder to lock down any issues of people hacking their games. Xbox solves this with their pay-to-play service and can effectively lock down and disable not only an account but an entire system should it become compromised. Microsoft has a whole group assigned to such a task. It would cost time, money and a lot of resources for Sony to do the same, and managing all that over a network that is mostly under the control of the game developers could mean a very messy transition time. If hacking becomes prevalent, more free accounts aren’t difficult to come by, and unless Sony has a system in place to circumvent such things it could strike a serious blow to their online communities.
An online world plagued with unfair advantages that you can't police
One of the things that needs to be locked down is the excuse that people could have to actually go about the procedure of modding their system. If someone can justify it (whether or not it is truly justifiable by these means) by claiming that the PS2 emulation that is capable via that method should be supported by Sony, then maybe that is an issue that they should address rather immediately. Whether their plan is to offer emulation via a software update, or if they are going to be re-releasing PS2 titles via the Playstation Network for some people just knowing that a feature is possible means they are missing out when it is not delivered.
Ian Y’s Take
As I see it, piracy shouldn’t affect the PS3 too drastically. After all, pirates are usually more interested in things like pieces of eight, spices and novelty t-shirts. What good is a ship’s hold full of PS3s? I guess they could cram them down a cannon and fire them at enemy ships. Think of the fragmentation alone – all those bits of plastic and silicon could leave quite a flesh wound.
But who Sony really has to fear are these software “pirates”. If these guys had their way no one would have to pay for games ever, sales would collapse and they’d have to spend thousands on anti-piracy measures. Or at least thats what everyone thinks would happen. This very well may be the case, but Sony has a few factors in their favour.
Firstly, nowadays firmware upgrades are the norm giving them the ability to at least patch some of these kinds of security breaches. Second, from my terribly inadequate understanding of this latest hack, it is still difficult to implement and doesn’t provide access to the most critical of systems. Thirdly, they at least don’t have to worry about the commercial pirating of their console and games like with what happened with the PS2 late in it’s lifespan. At the moment, the cost of manufacturing counterfeit Blu-ray games and PS3 components is far too high.
If Microsoft’s experience with piracy is any indication, it may hurt business, but it won’t kill it.
Piracy, no matter what the system, seems to result in a larger install base. We’ll also see a lot of Craigslist ads where people offer to mod PS3s and are also selling the system with like a hundred illegal games for a massive profit.
With Sony, I can see piracy cutting significantly into software sales once recordable Blu-ray media and hardware drops in price. Sure, not everyone who pirates would have otherwise purchased the games they’re pirating, and I’ve heard pirates say this as justification for their practice. But from a retail perspective, given the state of our economy this hacking comes at a crucial point. Most game stores make most of their money on software, and I’d hate to see the local indie shops suffer because of this.
On the other hand – if there was a software hack that allowed the system to be backwards compatible, I can see Sony rushing to release their own software emulation (though both scenarios I deem unlikely).