Sony: PSP piracy levels are sickening

are they considering every PSP with a custom firmware as a 'pirated' machine? they don't really talk about numbers or where they came from so, it's hard to take them seriously. i had a PSP with a custom firmware and never once pirated a PSP game. i used it for emulators and ebook reading.

Doesn't seem to be the case with the DS, despite the DS having a major piracy problem.

Go DAX! :D

I find it sickening that Patapon 2 is exactly the same as Patapon, save different (essentially the same) levels and a strange levelling up system that adds nothing.

Their biggest problem is charging £30 or so for a badly-ported, out of date game. That's why piracy is so rife. The number of titles which are worth spending release prices on are miniscule.

Boogle, I'd argue that the reason the DS is doing well in terms of software sales despite the piracy is that the range of people who own DSes is far broader than those who own PSPs - and those people are the ones who are the ones doing the pirating.

Many older people and children wouldn't know it was possible to pirate, much less do it, and these are areas where the DS has sold much higher than PSP, which has predominantly sold to young, tech-savvy males - the people I would imagine were most likely to mod and pirate.

..They'd probably say the same about any piracy at all.

Of course, the PSP isn't helped by having mediocre, at best, games.

They should drop the stupid UMD platform and make games cheaper and easier to buy. They need to implement a system like the iPhone app store/Steam for the PSP and allow games to be downloaded onto the device. Charge less for the game over the digital distribution platform and you're bound to increase sales.

Originally Posted by Krikkit
Their biggest problem is charging £30 or so for a badly-ported, out of date game. That's why piracy is so rife. The number of titles which are worth spending release prices on are miniscule.

yep, just shovelware arriving for what is just a cut PS2.

To be honest the people that I do know that have one of these PoS only use it for long journeys to watch tv shows or movies, as i can do that with the DS now using DSVideo most can't see the reason for the PSP anymore.....

I can never be tired laughing at the "one (pirated) download == one lost sale" mantra...

I bought a PSP so I could play all my emulators. NES, Sega Gen & SNES.

"I think that we have to make sure from a technological perspective that it's not as easy as it is to do that."

And they still think DRM can reduce piracy. It's price/quality what matters. But they'll keep pouring money into worthless technologies instead...

If they were to release their own torrents into the wild with a bricking firmware then problem solved. If 10% of pirated software bricked your psp then would you take the chance?

Of course, Sony can't do that as they would be sued. What a strange world where the criminal has more rights than you.

Anti-piracy measures are not the solution. Piracy is not a problem, but more of a symptom. When developers start making us want to buy their games because we consider them excellent value, and when they stop pumping out **** and then blaming pirates for terrible sales, we will finally start to see piracy decline.

Just look at the Steam statistics that Valve released not long ago. The results are shocking and go against everything that every other major company keeps spewing out of their ass when it comes to sales and piracy.

i hacekd mine but that was primerily to load all the previous versions of the PSX emulation engine via POPS, yeah the psp has a lot of "meh" games but who can beat playing the original FF7 or SoulEdge whilst on the move?

I only have two games for my PSP - Lego Star Wars and Burnout somethingorother.

I don't really play it much, but I've never seen any more games that I want to get for it. Patapon looked promising, but after playing it for 30 minutes at a friends house I quickly lost interest, and never bought it.
LittleBigPlanet may get a look in, only because I haven't got a PS3. Depends on how good it is really.

I've got quite a few games for my PSP - mostly they're things like Disgaea: AOD, Final Fantasy Tactics, Valkyrie Profile Lenneth, Breath of Fire 3, Crisis Core... but I only buy them when they're cheap. I've never installed custom firmware or anything like that.

For the most part, though... I look at the games catalogue on the PSP, and am monumentally unimpressed. Every game I've tried on the PSP outside of the JRPGs has left me wishing I'd never bothered.

Originally Posted by Skiddywinks
Anti-piracy measures are not the solution. Piracy is not a problem, but more of a symptom. When developers start making us want to buy their games because we consider them excellent value, and when they stop pumping out **** and then blaming pirates for terrible sales, we will finally start to see piracy decline.

Just look at the Steam statistics that Valve released not long ago. The results are shocking and go against everything that every other major company keeps spewing out of their ass when it comes to sales and piracy.

+1

Maybe people only bought a PSP because they could pirate games.

The PSP would be a lot less appealing if you could not pirate the games, PS3 for example?

You can't pirate games on the PS3 and the sales of the console are poor. You can on an XBOX360 and sales of the console are probably double the PS3.

This ringing any bells anyone?

Originally Posted by badders
LittleBigPlanet may get a look in, only because I haven't got a PS3. Depends on how good it is really.

S'pose it'll depend on how faithful it is to the PS3 version.

Even so, whilst LBP *looked* very pretty, it's really nothing more than a puzzle/platform game - all very 'meh' really.
Or, if you prefer, how you felt about Patapon is very much like how I felt about LBP.

All that said, I know a couple of people who absolutely love LittleBigPlanet - YMMV.

Thank god for piracy, otherwise companies would have to actually own up to the fact that maybe they make substandard products. Just blame piracy, and keep your head stuck in the sand!

Ask legitimate PSP owners who don't pirate, how often they use their machine, and what games they are excited about? Many of them would give you answers of disappointment, which have nothing to do with piracy.

The PSP is awkwardly positioned between the more powerful home consoles, and the more portable DS. With games that feel more at home on the console, often requiring you to be at home on the couch (if you're already at home, why not play a console game on the TV then?). Or lower battery performance and games that don't necessarily suit playing for 5-10minute chunks on the bus, on the move, etc.

The machine has done pretty decent all things considered, but blaming piracy is a convenient scape goat. If you really wanted to go all hyperbole on the situation, you might say that the "pirates" are the only ones using their PSPs at all ;)

Originally Posted by Jamie
They need to implement a system like the iPhone app store/Steam for the PSP and allow games to be downloaded onto the device. Charge less for the game over the digital distribution platform and you're bound to increase sales.

They do? Ive donwloaded a couple of games from the PSN store onto my PSP using its own interface or a PC.

Sony are dropping the UMD because they are going to release every PSP game on the Playstation Store.

I hate the idea of digitial distribution to become the norm. Think about it, you got steam, xbox live and PSN. Where is the compotition to bring prices down??? you can go from store to store in the highstreet and find the same game at different prices because there is competition. Digital distribution means that a £40 retail game can stay at £40 for a lot longer because you cant get it anywhere elese.

PSN have reduced prices and also increased them. Xbox live has started to do a weekly offer but it is not enough. If all games go to digital distribution, then game developers will have to expect less sales that there were at retail.

To be fair, is there any decent PSP games? imho, not really.
The only reason i havn't sold mine yet is that i play all my old PSX games on mine with custom firmware.

And also, just because people download it from torrent site's, does not mean they are pirating.
I download ISO sometimes of my own games as it can be quicker to do so, this is just inaccurate data.

Originally Posted by fodder
If they were to release their own torrents into the wild with a bricking firmware then problem solved..

That sir would be illegal, as not all users will be pirating.

Originally Posted by aggies11
Thank god for piracy, otherwise companies would have to actually own up to the fact that maybe they make substandard products. Just blame piracy, and keep your head stuck in the sand!

Plenty of good titles on PSP that are pirated and a PSP games RRP is never a reason to deride it as you can nearly always buy them at half the price online, prices are comparable to the peoples favorite the DS.

Originally Posted by aggies11
Ask legitimate PSP owners who don't pirate, how often they use their machine, and what games they are excited about? Many of them would give you answers of disappointment, which have nothing to do with piracy.

I admit mine doesn't get a lot of use as I don't travel loads and as I have a PS3 there is a lot of stuff that is the same.

That said with the release of the go and a few new titles I decided to dust it off and I've played nothing else for a couple of weeks now.

Motorstorm is quality (once you get through a few rounds and the AI levels up that is )
Gran turismo is quite nice too if your a GT fan like myself.
Soul Calibre is awesome
I also picked up a few minis for a couple of quid and have been quite happy with them Suduko, tetris (yes old but still playable) and pinball.

My only regret really is that I really got into FIFA10 whilst playing PSP and my thumb hurts, wish I got it on the PS3 instead but I never as I didn't think I'd enjoy it as much being a PES man. :eek:

Its a good bit of kit and it has good games, its problem is that a lot of people don't want to pay for them, whether they are £30 or £10, it wouldn't actually matter would it, the people who pirate will continue as they have done on all other platforms with piracy issues, price is never a factor in this case just an excuse.

Some PSN prices aren't too bad and they do have offers, when you take into account you can buy PSN cards with 22% off is not that bad at all, cheaper than Amazon for example, Some of the Sony stuff isn't badly priced but the other publisher like EA take the piss.

Biggest con I find with the PSP is the Memory Stick, sooner Sony move to SD card the better, It'd be much more convenient with 32Gb card inside what with a lot of games being over 1Gb. How much are 16gb MS duo, shocking!