Devolver Digital Sounds Off About PC Piracy

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While Ubisoft and its studios complain about the problem that is PC piracy, other companies like Devolver Digital and Bethesda are cleaning up thanks to PC gamers. Skyrim has consistently been at the top of Steam’s charts since it launched a couple of weeks ago, and Serious Sam 3: BFE hasn’t been doing too bad itself.

What’s the secret? According to Devolver Digital CFO Fork Parker, “people will pay for awesome.” At least, that’s what he said on his Twitter feed, elaborating on his comments later in an interview with with Destructoid:

Piracy is a problem and there is no denying that but the success of games like Skyrim and our own Serious Sam 3 on PC illustrates that there is clearly a market willing to pay for PC games. It’s on the developers and publishers to put something out on the market that’s worth paying for in the first place. Those that place the blame on the consumer need to rethink the quality of their products and the frequency in which they shovel out derivative titles each year.

Parker also said that digital distribution services are doing for video games what iTunes did for music, and with all of the deals that are available at any given time, there’s many people out there that will happily pay for a good PC game.

While it’s true that publishers won’t be able to completely end piracy, making a game that’s worth the asking price helps a lot. Having a good game to offer consumers doesn’t necessarily mean that fewer people will pirate it, but there’s a good chance that more people will buy it outright.

Knowing this, I can’t help but think that Ubisoft‘s problems with piracy stem from the fact that it doesn’t seem to want to put the work into making a good port – Ubisoft’s PC games are generally ports of console versions, and most of those are delivered with flaws or long after the console version was released. Maybe if Ubisoft reconsidered how its handles PC ports instead of focusing on DRM all of the time, its luck would change?

That’s just a guess, but delivering a solid port can’t be nearly as hard as going to war with PC gamers, can it? Head down to the comments section to tell us what you think – is Fork Parker right, or do you disagree? Leave a comment with your thoughts!