Is it "legal" to download games?

[Paranormal erection]

Imma quote cdprojekt red (loosely don't remember the actual quote) on this one: "piracy isn't a problem if you make a good game."

And they aren't wrong!

I have a lot of "free" software on my PC and laptop. Just checked my traffic on my laptop for 9 years I have 25 TB download (it has 500gb HDD, so that is a lot for it). But I decided to buy 60$ kegs on Gwent just because I liked the game and I want them to keep it alive. So they are right about this. I have around 300 hours on Gwent for 18 months. This is 3.3$ per month for 16 hours each month. This is a hobby for me and not much hobbies can give you those "hours of fun" for this price. I spent a lot of time on Heroes 3 too and bought it 2 years ago just because they deserved it.

I don't see the legal problem here because I am not going to pay anything for 95% of this game (supporting only 1 guy currently). They will not make any money from me, but if I play their game and I find it it is fun - I will buy it.
Actually, how much of the games here are using illegal stuff like daz3d renders (the forum is full with free daz3d stuff) etc? If we start from this point, the games contain illegal content that hasn't been paid to the designer at first place. Some of the games might contain music without paying the copyrights.

Just download the game and enjoy the porn inside it. At the end of the day, it is all about ass and boobs.

 

[bobdillan]

And they aren't wrong!

I have a lot of "free" software on my PC and laptop. Just checked my traffic on my laptop for 9 years I have 25 TB download (it has 500gb HDD, so that is a lot for it). But I decided to buy 60$ kegs on Gwent just because I liked the game and I want them to keep it alive. So they are right about this. I have around 300 hours on Gwent for 18 months. This is 3.3$ per month for 16 hours each month. This is a hobby for me and not much hobbies can give you those "hours of fun" for this price. I spent a lot of time on Heroes 3 too and bought it 2 years ago just because they deserved it.

I don't see the legal problem here because I am not going to pay anything for 95% of this game (supporting only 1 guy currently). They will not make any money from me, but if I play their game and I find it it is fun - I will buy it.
Actually, how much of the games here are using illegal stuff like daz3d renders (the forum is full with free daz3d stuff) etc? If we start from this point, the games contain illegal content that hasn't been paid to the designer at first place. Some of the games might contain music without paying the copyrights.

Just download the game and enjoy the porn inside it. At the end of the day, it is all about ass and boobs.

very good points, another thing is, patreon isn't buying a game, it is subscribing to a creator and they give you the game, there is no rule that once you get the game you can't give it around, since you didn't buy the game, you were given it after you gave money to someone, you don't pay for games on patreon, you donate to people and then decide to give you stuff back.

To try and claim they are selling something is stupid because they just aren't to say so would be to change how patreon is supposed to work. If any of these people were serious about selling their game they would only give one time use game keys to a certain tier of patron and sell it via another website... but they can't really do it since most games are unfinished cashgrabs you know like slonique

 

[polywog]

If you ask any old adult game maker (most will deny any knowledge of what you're talking about... who me, no i work at the bank, in accounting) they'll tell you it's a hobby. "A labor of love" "I do it for fun / i enjoy it"
People who lack that driving passion, don't last very long in this business.

As a fan of adult games... srsly I play hundreds of them, and it's never enough, I don't want to discourage new game makers from trying... I want to play your game. BUT, don't get into this thinking you're going to make money at it right away. Your fans will decide when it's time to quit your day job, not you. So many game makers would be unknown, if it weren't for pirates, and forums sharing, and distributing the games to the masses. Get your first finished* game out there. Don't over look that critical word "finished" nobody likes a quitter, least of all someone who abandons ship after ship, when there are passengers on those ships. For every million people who play your game, like any advertising, you can expect one percent to buy. If paid someone to pass out flyers on the street in front of your store, you can count on 1% being interested enough to come into the store... no guarantee how much they will spend in your store, but that 1% who read your ad, will come looking for more. Now apply that logic to the scenario where you don't have to pay someone to pass out your flyers, and you don't even have to pay the pirates the cost of printing. The pirates are out there day and night, rain or shine, hell or high water, advertising for you... and at no cost to you, you still get to reap the rewards of that 1% paying customers. Now does it make sense. Pirating is the best thing ever. 7 million people download your flyer from pirates = 70,000 customers visiting your shop looking to buy something, and it didn't cost you a cent.

I would be remiss, if I didn't also mention the guilt factor. That addition percent of people who pirated your game, and have a feeling deep down in the pit of their stomach that they owe you something, for the entertainment value that your game provided them.

I should also mention that a lot of games are made using characters without license or permission from the original artist, and therefor aren't exactly something that can be legally marketed or sold without crossing into territory that the game maker doesn't want to go. The original artist has a duty to defend their rights, if someone if using their work commercially. Free games are the loophole here... Disney might not be happy about the princesses getting gangbanged left and right, but if you're playing the game for free, then there's no commercial use. Don't feel guilty about playing free games.

 

[bobdillan]

@polywog I would disagree, if 1 million people play your game and only 1% buy the game then you have made a bad game, and when I say 1 million have played I mean really played, like they at least have some sort of interest in playing the game.

If you make a good game and 1 million people play it, I would wager that at least 50% would buy the game, when people enjoy something and they can give money (if they have some to spare) to the person responsible for their enjoyment they in most cases will, hell if people are willing to pay $70 to get a game that they have never even played, they are more than willing to pay $20 to a game they already played and loved.

Just look at summertime saga, this game is bloody well free, yet the dev is getting thousands of dollars... why? because people enjoy the game, it is unique, while I like a good daz game as much as anyone, there are a plethora of them to choose from, while summertime saga doesn't, the only one I can think of that comes close to being similar would be A Town Uncovered, and in that regard summertime doesn't have much competition because of its higher update quality.

Fans are willing to wait if you deliver, the fans who lambast and attack people for not updating enough are not real fans, they are just greedy, unless they are the fans who have been burnt by false promises without much of an apology or explanation from the dev.

but realistically speaking if you make a good game (and I mean good not alright) about 70-80% of those who played it would buy it (assuming they played it without paying for it when you should pay for it), take subnautica for example, that game went around on torrents, yet it still made a lot of sales and a lot of people bought it on steam (I own it as well) because it is a genuinely great game.

This is my perspective anyway, and a bit of evidence that you should take with a grain of salt cause I could be wrong. also if you are thinking "woah that is a lot of text for something simple." I put my thoughts on this post so it is messy just my opinion, so throw it to the wind if you feel like it.

 

[polywog]

If you make a good game and 1 million people play it, I would wager that at least 50% would buy the game

If that were remotely true, I'd be a billionaire. Over 10 million followers (combined social media) and while I am handsome and charming, I'm not delusional enough to think that they are there for my good looks. I'm fairly certain that most, maybe not all, but most of them have played my games, and I can assure you that less than 10% have paid me anything. I wouldn't be where I am without my fans, and I appreciate them all the same, whether they paid or not.

There are some factors that throw a curve, when it comes to adult entertainment. For example, not everyone is a bachelor, they have wives etc. and it would be hard for them to explain these %#$^ charges on their credit card to their loved ones. I'm not calling you a liar, or disputing that you've sent checks to all the developers of 50% of the games you've played and enjoyed, I'll take you at your word, and If one of those checks was to me, I thank you, but not everyone has the freedom you have from prying eyes looking at their finances. Maybe marital infidelity is bad, and playing an adult game behind your spouse's back is a form of cheating, but I don't judge. I would feel horrible, if I found out that someone's wife left them, because she found a charge on the credit card for one of my games. I wouldn't ask them to take that risk, and I can't fault them playing my games without paying under those circumstances.

I'm no saint, as I said in a previous post, selling adult games is like dealing heroin, meth, or crack cocaine. It's a dirty business. You give out free samples on the playgrounds... everywhere. Get em hooked on the stuff. Once they're an addict they'll pay anything to get their fix.

 

[bobdillan]

@polywog
very good point, though in my example I am more talking about actually buying a game, not so much supporting someone (although I may have muddled the two together in my comment a bit), and my thoughts are more related to games that you can straight up buy, although I didn't consider the porn factor, which is an important one, as I myself have never actually purchased a porn game, as I don't have an account on such websites to do so, and on the rare occasion (like once or twice) I did put a bit of money into one (stupidest thing I have done cause it was one of those pay to play sort of shit pretending to be free) I used a prepaid card, which wouldn't properly work with patreon and such.

also I am broke as hell and in uni increasing my already 30 thousand dollar debt XD so I don't really have any money to give to any patreon account I would actually want to support (not gonna bother naming any as it wouldn't really matter). so yeah that XXX factor really does throw my argument out the window as it mostly applies to non-porn games as they don't have the added adult barrier to them. also 10 million is freaking impressive although since that is combined I would say that the average of all social media would be a better estimation of the total following you have, but that doesn't account for people who follow but never check back.

Also out of curiosity what games have you worked on (I have no idea :S )

 

[piekiller]

all of this bullshit now all there how do call you internet company and thay tune it off. and even if thay thick your a pirate.

 

[knight photoshop]

Man life is boring

 

[Carrera]

I pay for FINISHED and GOOD games. The rest, no.

 

[A.R.K.A.N.G.E.L]

This place is a pirate forum. You will see a lot developers active despite us being the ones you are "ripping off."

I'd rather have fans who pirate the game than have them not play at all or pay for it when they live on a budget.

I know for me once I play a game a little if I really like the game and it's ongoing I'll usually become a patron, right now I don't have any currently but later I'm gonna patron Blackwebgames and Recreation tonight along with a few others. I use to patron a couple other creators but since covid some have taken a break (I hope) it seems.

 

[Flecc]

Is it illegal yes and no . lot of devs have public builds if it is a matter of concience just download them. a lot of games on here are patreon builds if it is down to concience suport them .

However you cannot support them all unless you super rich of course .

My take on it is advertising for the devs ,I have supported quite a few games over the years financially,But never would have found or heard of them without this site. So it is a bit of a double edged sword piracy yes, advertising for backers yes. So i wouldnt worry to much about the legal side other than if the genre is outlawed in your durestiction.Play the games if you enjoy them and can support the devs go for it even if you cant support the dev financialy talk about their game and put the word out their .Have fun and dont worry about it

 

[Deleted member 2910840]

I support a couple of games on here through Patreon and wish I could support more, but like most of us on here, yeah I've downloaded a few..

I also used to get lots of the big AAA games on Piratebay as well, but got fed up with the viruses and waiting for cracks, so I pretty much buy them on steam. God, I think I might have actually developed a conscience

 

[baloneysammich]

AAA games ... I pretty much buy them on steam.

Sometimes I feel bad when buying a game during a Steam sale. Other times I feel bad for buying a game on Steam at full price. Or feel bad for others, like for example when my brother asked what I wanted for Christmas, and I said "I'm waiting for Skyrim to go on sale, so I wouldn't mind some Steam $" but instead he bought me the game at full price. Sorry fam, didn't intend for you to get ripped off like that...

 

[Deleted member 2910840]

Sometimes I feel bad when buying a game during a Steam sale. Other times I feel bad for buying a game on Steam at full price. Or feel bad for others, like for example when my brother asked what I wanted for Christmas, and I said "I'm waiting for Skyrim to go on sale, so I wouldn't mind some Steam $" but instead he bought me the game at full price. Sorry fam, didn't intend for you to get ripped off like that...

I get what you mean. I did it today, paid full price for Kings Bounty 2 on Steam, then 1 hour before release, decided it wasn't worth it and got a refund. I just decided to wait for it to go on sale.

 

[Ross_69]

People here talking about morality, but OP asked if it's "legal".

Pretty sure it is legal to download here, since it's straight-up download. Torrents are illegal in some countries, since by downloading a torrent you are at the same time sharing it.

Doesn't mean that police will be knocking down your door for torrenting smut, but they technically can.

 

[alala69]

Regarding Japanese games.
If you buy the base game you can download the English version here. It's not really legal, but like a classic game in general the developers won't say anything because you bought the base game.

 

[imelman]

Well, the act of downloading an product without paying is inherently illegal, however considering certain circumstances, like an already free-to-play product, a removed/banned/out of print game, and the likes of that, I can see and know why it is rather...a complicated grey issue overall that is in no real fault of either developers or people - again, depending on case.

However, the porn games themselves are classified as illegal in countries which also criminalize porn, which means if you download a paid porn product, its double illegal - one for not paying if its paid, and two for the fact its porn...which makes pirating porn games, as opposed to non-porn ones inherently less dangerous and less likely to be removed by copyright because of their already questionable nature that makes others ignore them when it comes to copyright and licenses, unless you get caught, of course. I think.

Not every person can support developers financially and provide feedback instead, which is also a good thing for having a good product to satisfy them. Though conflict from either side is expected, like when a dev is outraged at presence of pirates so they implement DRM-like features, such as Patreon only content in an already paid game because reasons, and users who urge others to pirate because the dev appeals to another spectrum, like political differences(yes, some users urge others to pirate because the dev offended them by being a complete opposite of what they think, I wont go further to avoid potential drama but you should get the point).

 

[Silver]

I think it depends on the jurisdiction. If you are from a developed country, it's more likely to illegal to download if the copyright holder filed a case against it, otherwise nobody cares. However, they won't arrest you, at least at the beginning, they will most likely to through the ISP to send you a warning to stop downloading, but if you didn't comply, you will be forced to pay a fine. I am sure if they keep pursuing, and you become a pain in the butt to them, you will eventually be arrested. However, I really doubt a small creator will invest time, energy, and money to lock you up. Even a big company won't do it as it's not worth at the end depending on the media type. Movie producers, song publishers will probably come after you, and game publishers are unlikely. Disconnecting your Internet connection will most likely be the final outcome. You still have to be caught to be warned. If you were never caught, you will never get in trouble. Here most of the links are hosted in popular file servers not in torrent format, and therefore ISP is less likely to find what you download. Either way, I strongly suggest you to use a VPN to be totally safe. Cops are not gonna scrutinize you for piracy unless you are a big uploader, especially if you upload Hollywood movies, and songs.

 

[A.R.K.A.N.G.E.L]

Either way, I strongly suggest you to use a VPN to be totally safe. Cops are not gonna scrutinize you

The whole thing was spot on just didn't want a wall of text. Basically protect yourself doubt anyone is gonna come after you still never hurts to be safe and If you like somethinv and you can afford to support a creator please do. Either by donating, leaving reviews, or both.

 

[Deleted member 1684328]

Why do people resurrect and 3 year old thread?