10gamerknow.htm

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  live up to the hype, its a good idea to start waiting to buy the games after 
  you have read reviews on them. Find reviewers who seem to have tastes similar 
  to yours, or are critical in an objective way of the game and can let you see 
  its advantages and weaknesses. Buying anything without knowing what you are 
  getting is foolish, the cliché "Buyer beware" has been around 
  for thousands of years for just that reason.

<H3><FONT COLOR=YELLOW><I>8 - If you want games without bugs and that cost less, don't rush to buy them the second they are released.</I></FONT></H3>

<p>Buying software when it is first released will always invite problems, beware.
<p>Games will often fix their major bugs within a few weeks of being released 
  and you can either apply patches that are available on their web page or possibly 
  they will have released new versions of the software which are now being sold 
  in stores.
<p>If you consider software too expensive, then remember that software goes down 
  after it has been out for a while. Good software will still be just as fun a 
  month or two after it's released and could easily be $10 to $20 cheaper. This 
  also weeds out a lot of games that were not popular, so you may miss out on 
  something good, but also you will miss out on the flops as well. Reading reviews 
  and playing demos is key in your game selection process.

<H3><FONT COLOR=YELLOW><I>9 - Pirating games isn't cool or beneficial to yourself in the long run</I></FONT></H3>

<p>Forget about the cost estimates you've heard for how much piracy costs the 
  game/software industry. Forget about the fact that it is illegal or a wrong 
  thing to do. After all, how many people really care about things that don't 
  negatively affect them in some way?
<p>So ignoring all the usual facets about other people, how does piracy affect 
  you?
<p>First off, you cant return games to most stores anymore directly because of 
  pirating. SO many people used to buy games, take them home, copy them, bring 
  them back to the store and repeat ad nauseum, until the stores just wouldn't 
  tolerate losing any more money and changed their policy. A lot of people currently 
  do not have software stores in their area that will accept returns, and when 
  they have valid reasons for returning software (such as it was too buggy and 
  kept crashing), they now cant, directly because of piraters abusing a previously 
  normal service retail stores provided.
<p>Some people might say that this is because of developers or publishers, in 
  truth it is NOT. Retail stores maintain the right to send ANY amount of games 
  back to the publishers and they don't have to pay for it. They can send back 
  unopened boxes, they can send back opened boxes, they can send back damaged 
  or crushed boxes, it doesn't matter. Retailers are in complete control over 
  their own return policies with customers, but they ALWAYS have a return policy 
  as far as publishers go, so they never lose.
<p>Piracy hurts game developers and game developers MAKE games. How does this 
  affect you? Well, imagine that instead of games we were talking about farmers. 
  Forget the fact that software can be copied regardless of the materials they 
  come on, or that games are data instead of an object. Just take the examples 
  that you ingest a game similarly to you ingesting food made by a farmer.
<p>The farmer works to create the food, that is their job, and that is their service 
  they provide and are paid for. The game developer creates the games that you 
  play, which is their job and they get paid for. If you steal their game, instead 
  of buying it, then you are not giving them any money for their work. Since we 
  are not concerned with the fact that an object is lost or not lost with this 
  example, then the affect is the same. The farmer or developer does not make 
  as much money as they would have if you paid for the game. How does this affect 
  you? Well, if they cant make enough money and their company folds, or they just 
  see that they aren't getting anywhere in the industry, they will leave for greener 
  pastures where things are more stable.
<p>Contrary to a lot of popular belief, developing games is NOT a privilege and 
  no one is doing them a FAVOR by purchasing the games. They are creating a product, 
  and as such, they deserve to be able to be paid for it, like anyone making any 
  product. If they cant support themselves, then they will leave. This leaves 
  the gamers with less people to make them games, which is what gamers want.
<p>I've often heard people say that if they couldn't make money, then they weren't 
  any good anyway. How many farmers have lost their lands because of flaky weather 
  conditions or bad shipping of the products destroying them, or a negotiation 
  between their purchasers not going through or getting too little for a crop 
  because other farmers have produced more than is in demand? Does this mean these 
  farmers aren't any good at what they do? This same line of thinking can be applied 
  to game developers. If you disrespect them and abuse them by stealing their 
  work you will lose people who could have otherwise made you things you enjoyed.
<p>A final note, that may seem apocalyptic, but it isn't all that far from possibly 
  happening. The PC game market is rather small compared to the console market. 
  Consoles sell on average for 3-5 times more units than PC games, and have a 
  higher hit-to-miss ratio as well. Consoles are harder to pirate, and less people 
  do pirate them, as its not as easy to pass around information on the Internet. 
  It is very likely that you will see more and more development companies leaving 
  the PC market and heading for the consoles with games you might have liked to 
  play because they will make more money on the consoles and have less of a chance 
  of going out of business.
<p>Granted, not all companies will do this, but piracy is a factor here, and this 
  is a possibility. There are already a number of advantages to developing for 
  consoles such as: consoles have standard hardware so you don't have to make 
  20 different versions of your routines to support all the different configurations 
  users might have, consoles are dedicated for gaming so people who buy them buy 
  more games than computer users, console games sell MUCH more than PC games, 
  consoles last for an average of 4-5 years which gives you a stable platform 
  to work on for an extended period of time as opposed to the ever changing PC 
  API/hardware world.
<p>There is also a misconception that game developers are rich or make a lot of 
  money. You know about John Carmack and his famous Ferraris? There is a reason 
  they are famous, because almost NO ONE ELSE HAS ONE. You don't hear about directors 
  and their famous cars or mansions, because famous film directors do make a LOT 
  of money. Its not absurd for them to live in a multimillion dollar house. Game 
  developers do NOT make that kind of money though. John Carmack and company are 
  very very rare in their earnings. On average game developers make about 30-50% 
  LESS than they would if they had some other programming job.
<p>There are more advantages and there are advantages to the PC as well, but as 
  a gamer, you should take this into consideration if you care about the future 
  of games, and specifically, what YOU will have available to play in a few years 
  time. 

<H3><FONT COLOR=YELLOW><I>10 - Don't complain about things that you want</I></FONT></H3>

<p>If what you look for first, and the reason you buy games is because of their 
  graphics or the hype surrounding them, because they are &quot;cool&quot; games, 
  or because of some character you like or that they had a cool box cover, don't 
  complain because that's ALL you got. You made a purchase based on something 
  and got exactly what you wanted. If you are interested in gameplay you will 
  need to look into the demo, try it out, see what it is like. Read reviews about 
  problems it has, evaluate it for yourself and determine if its what you really 
  want. If it is, go for it and it's fine to comment on things that you wish were 
  better or that had problems. 
<p>If you were &quot;duped&quot; into buying something that turns out to be not-what-you-wanted, 
  you quite possibly didn't look into it deep enough or purchased it for the wrong 
  reasons.
<p>Its imperative that criticism be given on games, developers and publishers. 
  Without this feedback those parties would be in the dark about how they are 
  doing. What is destructive is when feedback is given carelessly, over dramatically 
  or about something that could have readily been seen as a problem. The phrase 
  &quot;having your cake and eating it too&quot;, isn't about getting everything 
  you want at a particular time, it's about being able to be careless or not working 
  for something, but still getting the rewards as if you were careful and worked 
  for it. Without the effort put into something, you will never receive the desired 
  outcome. That's just how things go, inside and outside the game industry.
  
<H3><FONT COLOR=YELLOW><I>Purpose</I></FONT></H3>

<p>The purpose of this article is not to berate gamers for not knowing or believing 
  in the above topics, it is to hopefully educate you on some of the things you 
  couldn't possibly be aware of unless you had looked into it on your own. Being 
  gamers your responsibility is to play games, you don't have to understand how 
  they work, or why. However, some understanding can be essential in creating 
  an environment where gamers and game developers can exist in harmony with each 
  other, instead of on opposite sides of the fence. I think this is crucial as 
  we definitely have a dependent and symbiotic relationship.</P>

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