Torrents and NS2

eoy

<div class="IPBDescription">promotion by freedom</div>Alright, many of you are probably not going to like this idea but here it goes.

Inspired by <a href="http://torrentfreak.com/producer-thanks-pirates-for-stealing-his-film-071113/" target="_blank">http://torrentfreak.com/producer-thanks-pi...is-film-071113/</a> I personaly believe that NS2 would reach a much bigger audience and get major news coverage on several sites, if the game would be released for free on torrentsites such as mininova (one of the 50 most visited sites on the web) and thepiratebay. It lies in the interest of these torrent portals to promote projects using the bitorrent techonolgy in a legal way to distribute content. For all I know, you could probably strike a deal with the admins and get the game promoted on the frontpage. I'm also positive that a lot of news sites would cover this story.

But yeah, this means that NS2 would be free of cost, which definentely offer some problems for the developers that have invested a lot of time and money, but I'm sure there's money to gain in other places than the gamesale itself, especially if it gets a lot of attention. Many other titles, not any games so far though, have used torrents to a great success, so it might just be worth looking into.

Mapster

Me i wouldn't mind the game being free, BUT; i am more than happy to purchase this game.
More than likely the reason for having being sold is because that if they made money from the game, Unknown Worlds will be able to introduce more to NS2 and be able to invent other new games which we will drool over until they are released... such as NS2 <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/wink-fix.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=";)" border="0" alt="wink-fix.gif" />

yoda

It has already been announced that the game will be available for purchase on steam i thought?

eoy

It probably has.. I'm just thinking about all the drama and hype Radiohead got when they released their newest album for free on their website, and offered users to pay "what they think it's worth, if they want to". Radiohead was toplisted on Last.FM for months, and overall got a lot of extra attention. I however read an article about that only 20% or something actually chose to pay anything at all (over the website, a few might've bought it in the store), so the concept probably works better with a bit more unknown(worlds) things. It's just a radical idea that I thought could be discussed, since the major problem with Ns1 was that it never really reached the public, but remained sort of an underground game.

invader Zim

If NS2 was released for free people may assume its a lame game. I work as an environmental consultant, if we ever give any advice for free people assume its rubbish and dont listen to us. If u ever try getting rid of old furniture by putting it out side your house with free labled on it, it would go alot faster if u put only £5.00 on it. Many people believe good stuff doesnt come for free. The problem with torrents is like steam your already limiting your market to torrent users rather than stream users. Not everyone uses torrents, and many people wont start using torrents just to get ns2. then you have to consider that NS1 was free, but it didn't break through to the main market, possibly because it was limited to owners of halflife. The thing that brought ns1 to my attention was the cover article for it on pc gamer ( i think it was pc game or some magizine my memory is hazy, but at some time ago it was on the front cover of a game magazine). The other problem with torrents is most people using them are breaking the law, theres very few legal torrents that u cant get of normal ftp servers. Does NS2 want to associate its self with illegal activity. And finally, im not sure how much cash teh devs made out of ns1 but it cant be much and they got some media attention from that. With out selling the game (and $20 or £10 is sod all for a game) they will have worked for ? number of years for peanuts.

asmodee

I think part of the key to the sucess of NS2 is the sucess of NS1, so perhaps a way to draw more attention to NS1 (aside from steam) would be to have people upload NS1 to a bunch of torrent sites.

schkorpio

business wise, it doesnt make sense to give it away for free<b> forever </b>though = it would be much better to have NS2 as free to download on steam, and you have a maximum of 10 hours or 10 rounds, only one map etc, just enough time to hook people and then after your time runs out you have to purchase to keep playing - kind of like the oldschool shareware games.

Kazbar

<!--quoteo(post=1660592:date=Nov 14 2007, 03:38 PM:name=schkorpio)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(schkorpio @ Nov 14 2007, 03:38 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1660592"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->business wise, it doesnt make sense to give it away for free<b> forever </b>though = it would be much better to have NS2 as free to download on steam, and you have a maximum of 10 hours or 10 rounds, only one map etc, just enough time to hook people and then after your time runs out you have to purchase to keep playing - kind of like the oldschool shareware games.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->

Good idea

I seem to remember some games having a free weekend on steam. This would be a good opportunity for people to test NS2.