Lack of DRM

[Plzbanme]

I notice that there seem to be a lack of DRM. I am just given a download link I could just hand out to a number of friends. It is strange to me. Is there any story behind that? Does the dev have a like a buy when you can kinda thing going on?

[Justin C]

No, Tynan does not endorse piracy. He expressed his opinion in another thread about the subject, which was subsequently locked and then deleted.

But DRM is pretty pointless. It doesn't stop piracy and it often punishes your legitimate users. Most Indie games go without it.

[rtiger]

This is also still alpha, and the game doesn't auto update. That link also is limited use

[Mathenaut]

It's better this way, I think.

[RemingtonRyder]

Well here's something. If you don't buy the game, you can't be an officially designated tester. I wouldn't say that's a major incentive, but if you like the game and want to get involved that way, then alas, you need to part with $30.

[wolfman1911]

I seem to recall Tynan saying something along the lines of 'I can either put effort into preventing piracy, or I can put effort into actually, you know, making the game.'

Makes a lot of sense to me, who cares how good your anti piracy measures are if the game that it's protecting isn't good enough to be bought?

[Tynan]

I seem to recall Tynan saying something along the lines of 'I can either put effort into preventing piracy, or I can put effort into actually, you know, making the game.'

Basically. We're on the honor system here.

Please don't share your link. I'd appreciate it.

But beyond asking, I can't stop piracy. Anything I do to try will just waste my time (thus making the game worse) or get in the way of real users (thus making the game worse). So I just ignore it and hope people like the game/me enough to actually buy it.

[morefire31]

I had pirated the game, In my defense, I was tired of buying games that after a few updates wouldn't run. After I spent countless hours with the game, it was easy to realize that i'll be playing this game way passed it's value, like, xcomEW, terraria, minecraft and space engineers to name a few. Sometimes, a pirated game can lead to a sale if {like in my case} the culprit is anxious for the latest updates

[warden]

But beyond asking, I can't stop piracy. Anything I do to try will just waste my time (thus making the game worse) or get in the way of real users (thus making the game worse). So I just ignore it and hope people like the game/me enough to actually buy it.

I can't begin to tell how completely this supports my views. DRM only serves to make things difficult for legitimate customers, it's always a nightmare. Always.

The game was a fantastic buy as it is, reading this made me want to gift another copy to my significant other. Getting her to play would be harder than defeating piracy, though.

[b0rsuk]

People are happy to pay for a great game. Pirates don't substract from your account, software piracy is not theft. If you have 100 000 sales and 1000 000 pirates, you make profit. People are more likely to pirate bland games without lasting value.

[Snownova]

I for one may have "sampled" a less than legal version of the game before buying, simply because I've been burned before with early access games. But once I saw how great Rimworld was, I couldn't wait to throw money at Tynan.

Let's face it, pirated games are the demo or shareware versions of today.

[Mathenaut]

It's more than just supporting views, it's something backed by numbers.

There's always going to be assholes about it, but Tynan is taking the proper approach of not stressing those people - nothing to be done and no real loss from them anyways.

What's important are the people introduced to his work and wish to support it, and it sounds like there are plenty of just such people here.

[RemingtonRyder]

I was introduced to Rimworld by Ben, Tacos and Hotaru. Not a hard sell after that.

Granted, watching someone else play a game is not the same as playing it yourself. But you can make a value judgement based on what you see.

I think I'll try my hand at another Rimworld video.

[MsMeiriona]

I bought the game after watching 30 minutes of Nash streaming it, but yeah, it is -very- easy to potentially share. Frankly, I see it being used less for piracy and more for people who have purchased it using the game on multiple machines, which I'd imagine is very useful for testing.

[Monkfish]

I was introduced to Rimworld by Ben, Tacos and Hotaru. Not a hard sell after that.

Granted, watching someone else play a game is not the same as playing it yourself. But you can make a value judgement based on what you see.

I made a value judgement based on the videos/information on the website, having accidentally stumbled across it (likely by way of Prison Architect; I was playing that at the time and Rimworld appealed to me for obvious reasons), and just outright bought the game. I've bought many games in Early Access like this where I've seen videos of the game being played and thought "yep, that's something I could get into", closely followed by "and that's a reasonable price to pay". Cher-ching.