Developer Drops Game Price To $0 Citing Android Piracy [Slashdot]

[DP ServBot]

hypnosec writes with news of a curious way of fighting piracy. From the article: "Android based devices are being activated at the rate of million a day and users are downloading apps and games at a rate never seen before. Despite these promising stats, developers of Android based games and apps are not really keen on porting games and apps that have been successful on iOS to Android. Why? Rampant piracy on Android! Madfinger Games has joined the long list of developers who have recently turned their paid Android based game, Dead Trigger, to a free one. Originally priced at $0.99 on Play Store, the first person shooter game is now available for free . The iOS version of the game still costs $0.99 and hasn't been made free." Zero-cost, but certainly not Free Software; one has to wonder whether Open Source games with a "donation" build in the store would do better than proprietary games with upfront costs.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

[The 1 2 P]

This is why I don't put any weight in people telling me that they only pirate games because they can't afford them. People who pirate would pirate regardless of price, which this 99 cent game clearly demonstrates. Because if you really can't afford a 99 cent game then you need to get your ass off the internet and go get a job.

[Enmity]

I don't fully believe their issue has to do with piracy. They didn't provide any real information about whats going on with their software. Also there is the issue that they are pitting two different platforms against each other. Just because its doing good on iOS doesn't mean it will automatically do well on Android. I'm not saying there isn't any issue here with piracy just there was no real information given other then "Our software isn't doing well so were giving it away for free" which also doesn't really make much sense to me. You are having an issue with sales so you give away your product?

I'm really not a fan of gaming on touch devices to begin with so I'm pretty bias against any form of mobile devices for gaming.

The game in question Tegra 3 version looks pretty good, and I feel it would make a good addition to the new Ouya system in the works. I'd be willing to spend $5-$10 on it when that system comes out.

[j_factor]

Is piracy really that much less common on iOS? I was under the impression that it was pretty rampant.

[Enmity]

Is piracy really that much less common on iOS? I was under the impression that it was pretty rampant.

Its rampant on every system. There is no exception.

[fluid_matrix]

Is piracy really that much less common on iOS? I was under the impression that it was pretty rampant.

from what I understand, running pirated software on iOS is a bit more involved than android. I guess the phone needs to be jail broken, similar to rooting android, instead of simply loading the .apk file via a pc.

[jb143]

"Our software isn't doing well so were giving it away for free" which also doesn't really make much sense to me. You are having an issue with sales so you give away your product?

I haven't verified it, but I'm pretty sure "free" will mean ad supported. Just like most of the other free apps on the android marketplace.

And from everything I've read on any mobile developer forum, the piracy rate for iOS devices is much less than Android.

[Frankie_Says_Relax]

I haven't verified it, but I'm pretty sure "free" will mean ad supported. Just like most of the other free apps on the android marketplace.

And from everything I've read on any mobile developer forum, the piracy rate for iOS devices is much less than Android.

The game (which I have on iOS and incidentally is a very fun zombie FPS similar to Call of Duty's zombie survival modes) has a LOT of in-app purchases.

It limits the end user pretty significantly on daily use or weapons upgrades, etc. if you're not going to put a few bucks into the system. I mean, you can play and replay all day long and have a good time with it, but you're not going to get the XP/in-game cash you need very quickly - you're rewarded pretty significantly by buying in with some real cash.

Honestly, this is totally standard iOS/Android "freemium" gaming, and frankly I'm not sure why the dev is making such a stink about piracy being the cause.

Probably because the app is selling so well on iOS that they don't want to cut the price there and lose the income that they're making there without citing some kind of public reason for: free on Android/not free on iOS.

Gorgeous graphics on this one. Seriously:

[substantial_snake]

I'm not really sure how to quite phrase this but I'll give it a shot.

I find it interesting that as traditional game devs complain about the cost of HD development mobile and browser game devs continually push themselves for better graphics.

I wonder how much money things like this or Shadowgun really make versus their initial development costs and I wonder if/when you'll see the same complaints from top tier model devs as well. (since these guys are already complaining about piracy I guess we may already be at that point)

Also if I understand your post correctly this game already relies on mirco-transaction purchases on iOS so isn't F2P advantageous to their business model?

Regardless I rather enjoy the F2P android ports of iOS games. I don't follow "mobile" gaming but the few that I have played that were on iOS only had a small add rectangle at the bottom of the page displaying something akin to a goodle search add in something like angry birds. If that's the cost of a free game on android then I don't mind paying.

[Frankie_Says_Relax]

I'm not really sure how to quite phrase this but I'll give it a shot.

I find it interesting that as traditional game devs complain about the cost of HD development mobile and browser game devs continually push themselves for better graphics.

I wonder how much money things like this or Shadowgun really make versus their initial development costs and I wonder if/when you'll see the same complaints from top tier model devs as well. (since these guys are already complaining about piracy I guess we may already be at that point)

Also if I understand your post correctly this game already relies on mirco-transaction purchases on iOS so isn't F2P advantageous to their business model?

Regardless I rather enjoy the F2P android ports of iOS games. I don't follow "mobile" gaming but the few that I have played that were on iOS only had a small add rectangle at the bottom of the page displaying something akin to a goodle search add in something like angry birds. If that's the cost of a free game on android then I don't mind paying.

Yeah, I'd say it's pretty reliant on a portion of its user-base making micro-transactions, but they're probably making decent coin on the 99 cent point of entry as well.

As far as trying it on Android - yeah man, nothing to spend, nothing to lose!

it's a decent time waster and if you've got a high-end Android it should play smoothly.

Get through the first day or two worth of missions before you judge the scope/variety of the levels. The early spaces are pretty cramped but it opens up a bit as the game progresses.