Hotline Miami Creator Shows Understanding Toward Piracy, Wins Gamer Respect

If you are broke you are broke. Nothing you can do about that but tighten you belt if it comes down to pirating games to save 20 to 60 dollars then that's the way it has to be. I'd rather support living in my apartment then support a gaming company I like. My life comes first. That is the bottom line and I'm glad to see someone open in understanding that simple logic.

I want to be understanding, but I think that reasoning is severely flawed. Video games aren't a necessity; you aren't going to die if you can't have them, so it is much harder to be sympathetic to video game pirates than, say, Jean Valjean stealing a loaf of bread. Not having the spending money needed to buy games isn't a good reason to pirate them, it is a good reason to do without them.

How is it flawed if there is a "Safe" way of getting a product for "Free". If I could get bread for free I would do it and I do it to save money. I'm not endorsing it but if there is way to keep your hobbies there and have change to save most people will do it.

Generally I only pirate games I probably wouldn't have tried and i buy games I like through GOG and Steam, but I don't feel bad about pirating either way because I'm only one person and my dollar won't make or break a company.

I used to buy every game I wanted when they came out, now I have to torrent most PC games because I just can't afford them. If I want to play online I wait for a price drop or sale, and for console games I pre-order the ones I want to make payments. Living in an apartment when you move away from parents eats all of your game money.

And lowers your meal quality!

I was unemployed for damn near a year until recently. I recommend homemade chili, or black eyed peas with bacon. Both are EXTREMELY cheap to make, can feed you for days, and have protein, fiber, and minerals.

Not going to lie, I lived off of mayonnaise sandwiches for a couple weeks. Mayo on bread. I was basically a hair away from putting on a mask and robbing my parents.

My girlfriend and I are on a strict diet plan and it is cheaper than buying the usual crap. Also, bacon isn't cheap the last I looked. It is almost $5 a pound in every single store where I live as is most meat.

Lasagna, man. $2 for noodles, $4 for meat, $2.50 for sauce, and small curd cottage cheese for another $2.50. It'll make a 9x13 pan that lasts a long ass time.

Bacon's not that high, here Publix usually has Smithfield 3 for $10, and you're using a half pound of bacon max with a bag of dried black eyed peas, which should feed you at least 4 or 5 times (I eat once a day). You can also replace the peas with a bag of kale or collards (can you tell I'm southern yet?) Best thing about all this; chili, peas, greens, it's super easy to cook and reheats well.

And Chuni, you're a better, or at least stronger, man than I. Mayo is fvckin nasty.

Well to be fair it was Miracle Whip.

Crazy amount of respect to this dude, his love of his creation far outweighs the care for his wallet. I hope he has a long prosperous career based solely off this news article. Wish him all the best.

More of this dude, less of EA.

I need more EA MOAR

About freakin' time someone breaks the "you are against piracy or YOU ARE QUIET!" stance i see in gaming sites these past years. That you bought the game or you download it for free, you are STILL part of the gaming community. Let no publisher tell you other wise and let no close minded gamer say it's your fault a game company got shut down cause you use bit torrent.
A video game survives through the time thanks on the community and support of fans rather then the wallet and the stocks, that's my maxim right here!

I really want to get this game but I don't have a lot of dosh at the moment.

To the morons saying they pirate because they're broke and need to save money. Get a second job, sell some of your useless ****, quite buying starbucks every day, but to feel justified because you "need to pay your bills", well man the **** up and go without

Jesus christ is this generation ever entitled, you ****s will be the first ones crying that the game industry collapses.

I wont play the innocent card, I've pirated before, but in rare circumstances, such as there being no alternative to getting the actual game, such as xenogears in North America, or an english version of Front mission, or in other cases where I'm using boot camp on my mac and have no possible way of knowing if the software will actually run on my virtual OS, if it does I usually go out and purchase the games

Every single one of you whiny ****s that pirate are the reason people like myself have to deal with DRM, and to hear you say you have a right to do it makes me realize how ****ed this generation is when it comes time for you all to make decisions that will affect the rest of society

So the way i get this is... The cop are beating you up so you blame the car thieves?

And your third paragraph pretty much contradicts your first one. Ya could of save up money to import the game with a non-U.S console (like i did). Then the rest of your argument is a tourette syndrome thrown at straw-men.
You are better then this Icepick! Take a breather and try again.

that was an insanely weak analogy to begin with, but lets run with it, if there were a very large number of car jackings going on in my neighborhood, which in turn increased cop presence massively, then yes I would blame the car thieves, why would cops be beating me because people are stealing cars? How in any way does that make any sense

Secondly it's not in any way a contradiction, I don't speak a lick of Japanese, so how would I in anyway be able to enjoy the videogame if purchased in it's overseas format? I wouldn't be able to enjoy the game, so there would be no point to buying it. There was literally no English version of Front Mission until modders placed one up after emulation.

Secondly, are you aware of what a straw man argument is? How did I in anyway utilize his quote out of context?
"If you are broke you are broke. Nothing you can do about that but tighten you belt if it comes down to pirating games to save 20 to 60 dollars then that's the way it has to be. I'd rather support living in my apartment then support a gaming company I like. My life comes first. "

He says he's broke, so he supports himself first, and therefore feels justified pirating because he can't afford it otherwise he runs the risk of coming up short on rent, so the solution would be not to buy games, how is it ok to steal them?

Lets say his hobby was RC planes? But he can't afford em, so he breaks into the store to steal them. that's ok? It's no a straw man, it's literally what he said," I can't afford it, but I feel I need it anyways, so I steal it"

Dude... do either of you read your posts before clicking "Add Comment"?

Also, I've been broke to the point of having to borrow rent money from family while waiting on payment from the VA. It sucks. I still played games by going through stuff that I didn't finish and by borrowing stuff. Then I interned at a small online entertainment review magazine and got games for free so long as I wrote about them. It's not hard to game on a budget, just like it's not hard to pirate.

But here's a question: American military on deployment have nearly unlimited access to pirated software, music, and films. Is that wrong? Also know that deployed military make nearly double their regular pay and there are organizations that will take their money and send them the entertainment they want for the same (or sometimes reduced) price that people back in the States get it for. Entertainment piracy isn't stealing, it's borrowing an experience.

Your beef with people who pirate games when they have no money is laughable. Guess what the difference is between a pirated game and one that's not being played? The developer gets 0 dollars in both cases... their game is just being played and appreciated in one case. Which is exactly why this dev is fine with it. He gets that people who pirate games when they are broke buy games most of the time, and are not the ones causing companies to use DRM. Also you say "**** people who pirate games... Well I pirate games... But my reasons are justified..." Uh, yeah buddy, LMFAO.

But its easy to obtain and its free what more is there to say. Stealing? well heck if i knew stealing was this easy i would have been doing it years agoI mean at this point im surprised there isnt some guy that just comes to my house and installs pirated games for me oh wait, there is. :)

video game piracy is not stealing in the traditional sense because it does not deprive anyone of the item taken. A video game is just information, like a song or a movie or a news article, and piracy isn't so much the taking of the information as it is access without permission. Where access was limited to physical copies of the information, such access was valuable. Where access is capable over the internet for free, the access is no longer valuable, and people won't pay a premium for it anymore. If producers want to increase the value of permitted access, they can do that by restricting access (probably impossible) or adding value to the permitted access as compared to pirated access. If they continue to offer no additional benefit to permitted access, then they shouldn't be surprised when people are reluctant to pay for something that has zero value. The only other option is state enforcement of what should be private interactions, which just adds an unnecessary transaction cost.