Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins

A thread on Reddit from yesterday warned fellow readers to be very wary of buying the early access edition of Pixel Piracy in the on Steam summer sale (thanks Joao). This prompted a response from developer Alexander Poysky that was not only open to criticisms of the unfinished game, but included his encouragement to pirate it for a firsthand chance to gauge its worthiness. A follow-up post on the Steam community forums discusses his reasoning. "I remember not being able to buy games because I quite literally wouldn't be able to purchase that week's food if I did. That wasn't that long ago," Alexander explains. "This is a once in a lifetime chance for me, and I'd never squander it over the chance to cash a quick buck. I ALWAYS give anyone who doesn't have the economic means to purchase my game a copy, ALWAYS." He also describes just how successful this unusual approach turned out to be:
First of all, wow, holy cow! The flash sale was unexpected, but what was TRULY unexpected was the absolutely overwhelming influx of people purchasing the game.

When the sale started, I said I'd have a beer for every thousand sales we had. I'm not a drinker, so I soon regretted it.

https://twitter.com/alexpoysky/status/480061845454475264/photo/1

We stopped the game when we realized I would have VERY easily died.

Early into the Flash Sale, a post on Reddit quickly became popular. It was one that lended some VERY real and VERY acceptable criticism of whether or not one should be wary of purchasing our title.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/28np65/heads_up_be_very_wary_of_purchasing_pixel_piracy/

Not being one to shy away from criticism, and always attempting to be fair, I did not respond until AFTER the sale, at which point I simply stated my true feelings regarding the whole situation.

What I wasn't expecting was for the entire thread to show such unwaivering support. Mind you, this was a thread CRITICISING Pixel Piracy.

I never expected this much support. I never expected to do anything but make a game and hopefully provide a little bit of enjoyment for a few people, if only for the briefest of times.
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24 Replies. 2 pages. Viewing page 1.
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Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 24, 2014, 09:21
Dev
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Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 24, 2014, 09:21
Jun 24, 2014, 09:21
Dev
 
xXBatmanXx wrote on Jun 23, 2014, 06:45:
InBlack wrote on Jun 23, 2014, 05:40:
This guy is a riot, quote from Reddit:

Question, how many copies have they sold?

Alex:
Steam doesn't want me to say, so I can say we've sold over one hundred thousand so far

A lot of indie developers show screen shots of their sales pages - it is very cool.
Incidentally he was answering the question of how much he gets per copy when he said steam doesn't want him to say (in other words the steam cut percentage is likely covered under NDA). The number of sales is allowed to be talked about.
23.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 23, 2014, 15:20
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Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 23, 2014, 15:20
Jun 23, 2014, 15:20
 
Creston wrote on Jun 23, 2014, 13:58:
Verno wrote on Jun 23, 2014, 13:22:
That's straight from Bethesda though and they would know.

It isn't, though, right? It came from some website who claimed it came straight from Bethesda, and said website also claimed they got sales numbers from Steam. Neither of them give out sales numbers (in Bethesda's case at least not per platform.)

just being on the Steam top10 list isn't a guarantee of millions of sales or something. I think the volume level of steam sales would surprise you. We've seen a few devs up near the top who say they sold 300,000 which is nothing to scoff at but certainly not millions.

That's for a dev who leads the sales in one week. Skyrim was in the top ten for TWO YEARS. DayZ reached a million sales after being the top seller for.. what, two months?

3 million copies simply doesn't add up. Sorry, but it's my pet peeve.

(If fucking Todd Howard would just admit that PC sales of Skyrim have been fucking gargantuan, I could let this matter rest already!!!)

Are we discussing the numbers from Ars Technica?
Steam Gauge
Followup article

In that they claim based on metrics which they check against some who did give them numbers - 6M owners of Skyrim on PC.

I think during non-sale periods the sale numbers are significantly lower so I doubt we're seeing 100k sales a week for the #1 game. I mean who here really buys anything outside of Summer/Holiday sales?
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Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 23, 2014, 14:15
22.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 23, 2014, 14:15
Jun 23, 2014, 14:15
 
Creston wrote on Jun 23, 2014, 13:58:
It isn't, though, right? It came from some website who claimed it came straight from Bethesda

I'm pretty sure I read it from a Hines interview but I'll have to go source it.


That's for a dev who leads the sales in one week. Skyrim was in the top ten for TWO YEARS. DayZ reached a million sales after being the top seller for.. what, two months?

Right but being at the top doesn't mean anything in terms of units sold, there are games in the top 10 that sold less than a million too. The actual number of sales fluctuates greatly from week to week and the list itself is by revenue anyway. I don't know how DLC interacts with that too. Top 10 Steam on a slow week might mean 35k sales, there are certainly many slow periods for console sales as well and they have very high attach rates at greater prices. I would love to believe Skyrim did like 5 mil on the consoles but I would be shocked if lifetime sales were more than 3ish mil. Other big games and franchises have been on the list too and not moved the volume you're suggesting. Units sold doesn't denote prices sold at either, the profit margin is pretty important too.

Being at the top of Steam is unfortunately a pretty meaningless metric without more information that Valve won't let people easily disclose.

Anyways I've derailed this enough for one day Let's just say I hope you're right because my roots are in the PC but I suspect otherwise.
Avatar 51617
21.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 23, 2014, 13:58
21.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 23, 2014, 13:58
Jun 23, 2014, 13:58
 
Verno wrote on Jun 23, 2014, 13:22:
That's straight from Bethesda though and they would know.

It isn't, though, right? It came from some website who claimed it came straight from Bethesda, and said website also claimed they got sales numbers from Steam. Neither of them give out sales numbers (in Bethesda's case at least not per platform.)

just being on the Steam top10 list isn't a guarantee of millions of sales or something. I think the volume level of steam sales would surprise you. We've seen a few devs up near the top who say they sold 300,000 which is nothing to scoff at but certainly not millions.

That's for a dev who leads the sales in one week. Skyrim was in the top ten for TWO YEARS. DayZ reached a million sales after being the top seller for.. what, two months?

3 million copies simply doesn't add up. Sorry, but it's my pet peeve.

(If fucking Todd Howard would just admit that PC sales of Skyrim have been fucking gargantuan, I could let this matter rest already!!!)
Avatar 15604
20.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 23, 2014, 13:23
20.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 23, 2014, 13:23
Jun 23, 2014, 13:23
 
Verno wrote on Jun 23, 2014, 13:22:
Creston wrote on Jun 23, 2014, 12:59:
And he's not in the top 10 in sales. That's why I keep saying that the belief that Skyrim only sold a few million copies on the PC is ridiculous, because the top sellers on Steam are selling hundreds of thousands of copies per polling interval (a week, I believe?)

That's straight from Bethesda though and they would know. The AAA base on the PC is considerably smaller than consoles and the consoles have a very good attach rate at $60, PC games tend to be more long tail sellers and at cheaper prices.

I bet its up to 3mil at this point but just being on the Steam top10 list isn't a guarantee of millions of sales or something. I think the volume level of steam sales would surprise you. We've seen a few devs up near the top who say they sold 300,000 which is nothing to scoff at but certainly not millions.

I mean, this guy sold 100,000 during a Steam Sale.
I can't recall, were steam top 10s measured in revenue or units? Revenue, right?

In any case, what do we suspect is the jump in revenue during a sale? 2x? 10x? I'd guess even more than that.
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Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 23, 2014, 13:22
19.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 23, 2014, 13:22
Jun 23, 2014, 13:22
 
Creston wrote on Jun 23, 2014, 12:59:
And he's not in the top 10 in sales. That's why I keep saying that the belief that Skyrim only sold a few million copies on the PC is ridiculous, because the top sellers on Steam are selling hundreds of thousands of copies per polling interval (a week, I believe?)

That's straight from Bethesda though and they would know. The AAA base on the PC is considerably smaller than consoles and the consoles have a very good attach rate at $60, PC games tend to be more long tail sellers and at cheaper prices. Skyrim was also heavily marketed towards the console side of things, both Sony and Microsoft had campaigns for it.

I bet its up to 3mil at this point but just being on the Steam top10 list isn't a guarantee of millions of sales or something. I think the volume level of steam sales would surprise you. We've seen a few devs up near the top who say they sold 300,000 which is nothing to scoff at but certainly not millions.
Avatar 51617
18.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 23, 2014, 12:59
18.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 23, 2014, 12:59
Jun 23, 2014, 12:59
 
InBlack wrote on Jun 23, 2014, 05:40:
This guy is a riot, quote from Reddit:

Question, how many copies have they sold?

Alex:
Steam doesn't want me to say, so I can say we've sold over one hundred thousand so far

And he's not in the top 10 in sales. That's why I keep saying that the belief that Skyrim only sold a few million copies on the PC is ridiculous, because the top sellers on Steam are selling hundreds of thousands of copies per polling interval (a week, I believe?)

Sorry, kind of a tangent there, but in any case, this guys is awesome.
Avatar 15604
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Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 23, 2014, 09:02
17.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 23, 2014, 09:02
Jun 23, 2014, 09:02
 
This is the kind of reputation these game designers need, I mean its bad enough their trying to milk us for the money in the first place, at least they realize its 2014.
16.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 23, 2014, 06:45
16.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 23, 2014, 06:45
Jun 23, 2014, 06:45
 
InBlack wrote on Jun 23, 2014, 05:40:
This guy is a riot, quote from Reddit:

Question, how many copies have they sold?

Alex:
Steam doesn't want me to say, so I can say we've sold over one hundred thousand so far

A lot of indie developers show screen shots of their sales pages - it is very cool.
15.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 23, 2014, 05:40
15.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 23, 2014, 05:40
Jun 23, 2014, 05:40
 
This guy is a riot, quote from Reddit:

Question, how many copies have they sold?

Alex:
Steam doesn't want me to say, so I can say we've sold over one hundred thousand so far
I have a nifty blue line!
Avatar 46994
14.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 23, 2014, 05:36
14.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 23, 2014, 05:36
Jun 23, 2014, 05:36
 
This guy is fucking awesome, a developer who NEEDS criticism???!!! Did hell just freeze over?? This guy will succeed because his attitude is everything it needs to be and he obviously cares about his project. Fucking awesome indeed!
I have a nifty blue line!
Avatar 46994
13.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 23, 2014, 01:28
13.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 23, 2014, 01:28
Jun 23, 2014, 01:28
 
Good for this Alexander Poysky guy! Although I think I'll wait until Assassin's Creed: Black Flag is under 10 bucks and buy that, for my high seas combat fix.
Avatar 54863
12.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 22, 2014, 23:08
12.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 22, 2014, 23:08
Jun 22, 2014, 23:08
 
I am willing to buy it just because he told people to go pirate it then buy it if you like it.

+1
11.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 22, 2014, 19:36
11.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 22, 2014, 19:36
Jun 22, 2014, 19:36
 
It's a cute little game with a fair amount of depth, and worth looking into at least...
Avatar 55108
10.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 22, 2014, 19:04
10.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 22, 2014, 19:04
Jun 22, 2014, 19:04
 
Personally I can't stand this 16 bit pixel retro crap but good for him.

Like Officer Albrect said, "At least he didn't do that walkin' against the wind shit. I hate that."
"The horse I bet on was so slow, the jockey kept a diary of the trip." - Henny Youngman
9.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 22, 2014, 18:57
9.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 22, 2014, 18:57
Jun 22, 2014, 18:57
 
Think I'll buy it also because the guy seems like a decent human being. Watched a bit of it on YouTube, could be fun.
8.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 22, 2014, 18:47
8.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 22, 2014, 18:47
Jun 22, 2014, 18:47
 
The Torchlight people did this about their first game... and we all know how much it hurt them, right? ;-)
7.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 22, 2014, 16:54
7.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 22, 2014, 16:54
Jun 22, 2014, 16:54
 
Thats pretty cool, if i wasnt strapped because of steam's sale already i'd get this. Going on the wishlist for the future.
Avatar 46370
6.
 
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 22, 2014, 15:39
6.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 22, 2014, 15:39
Jun 22, 2014, 15:39
 
I wonder how he'd feel about piracy if he was a greedy asshole sociopath ?
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Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins
Jun 22, 2014, 15:04
5.
Re: Pixel Piracy Dev Suggests Piracy, Wins Jun 22, 2014, 15:04
Jun 22, 2014, 15:04
 
Elf Shot The Food wrote on Jun 22, 2014, 13:19:
I wonder how he'd feel about piracy if the game was selling for $60?

How does the price of the product correlate at all with the creator's desire to be open and generous?
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