I’ve been meaning to post about this for some time now,  but I wanted more to see how the company would react to their “pay what you like” initiative and how it’s end users would adopt it.

And to be honest? it’s a *LOT* like how the Saul Williams / Trent Reznor or the Radiohead projects of the same ideology played out. There was a fair number of legitimate purchasers opting to pay, even the most modest amount of money to not have to pirate the software, but since Wolfire have been brutally honest about their figures during the whole event, one can see that there was still an alarming amount of piracy going down with the Humble Bundle.

And that kind of rubs me the wrong way. I mean, if you want to pirate some content from a huge company that treats it’s employees and customers like trash? (lookin’ at you, EA.) Then go for it. I doubt very many people outside of the board members of said huge company would care much. But to rip off a smaller studio who’s profits are largely going to charity? on the surface it appears to be a monumental dick-move.

And that’s because, well, it is a dick move. There’s no getting around that. BUT one thing to think about is why people would choose to pirate this bundle over donating even one red cent. There have been a few takes on why one would do such a thing out on the web. One that I found particularly interesting was the fact that being able to pay for this software largely relies on where in the world you happen to find yourself in. If your country isn’t in the list of supported areas, you’re basically shit out of luck and HAVE to pirate this software. Also, there’s the glaring problem of online payments that has yet to be addressed by anyone: if you’re not using a credit card, you are going to get ripped off. It’s nice to see that PayPal is an option, but the processing fees mean that you will be paying far more than what the advertised price on Wolfire’s website says. Paying for items online is still like wading through a ridiculous line of middlemen looking to take a slice of your transaction money at any given possible instance.

And that brings me to the most glaring problem that every person selling a piece of intellectual property who complains about piracy: we are still on the tail end of a rather large rescission. It is naive to assume that every person who is pirating your products have any money to spend to begin with.

Take me for example: I love me a good video-game as much as the next guy.. but I’m 27 years old, live with my girlfriend in a decent apartment in the city and have all the normal bills and living expenses any other person living in a city has to pay. That adds up to a lot of money before you can even get into picking up odds n’ ends for home entertainment. And lets face it: gaming is expensive.

I used to game on my old PC as a teenager, but for professional reasons jumped to using a Mac in 2003. So, naturally, I game on a console these days and the crazy thing is that I’m gaming on the cheaper option, even after I bought the Xbox for $250 dollars, a flat screen TV for $450 and a spare controller that went missing for about $50. That’s damn near $1000 dollars gone and there aren’t even any games in the picture, yet. (and if you want to game on a decent purpose built PC? add another 650 – 1000 dollars to that equation.)

So were talking, at this point, easily $1000 – $2000 dollars to just get your rig operational. And then developers have the gaul to march in with new titles that can cost up to 90 bones? and they’re suddenly mind-blown that piracy is taking off during financial hard-times? wow. that’s short-sightedness like none other, if you ask me.

Now, it does suck that this kind of backlash can get up on a noble and endearing project like the Humble Bundle, but if there’s to be change to an industry? it has to apply to the whole industry. it’s as simple as that. Gaming, for what it’s worth, is far too expensive with almost zero quality control on the developer’s end, whatsoever. The kind of investment that it demands from the end user is so ridiculous and expensive titles can be so horrendously bad and uninspired that I often find it extremely difficult to put it into words how out of line this whole situation is.

I, myself, have been burned on buying a new game and having it blow-ass, leaving me with a hole in my wallet where 60 dollars used to be and I’ll never see again. And if you’ve been gaming for any longer than 5 years, I’m sure you’ve felt that sting as well.

If only there was a way to return a bad title. The end users are at the absolute worst disadvantage here and I find it hysterical that developers and publishers are so bent out of shape that after years of horrible and mediocre titles, they’re struggling to keep people opening up their wallets now that the customer has found a way to circumvent the copy protection on these games. If there was a way to return or refund on a bomb of a game to ensure that the flops would cost the game creators credibility as well as money? this wouldn’t likely would have been a problem, to begin with.