Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!wuarchive!udel!haven!mimsy!midway!gargoyle!igloo!ddsw1!corpane!disk!specter
From: specter@disk.UUCP (Byron Max Guernsey)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Pirating CD-ROMS
Keywords: CD-ROM
Message-ID: <4751@disk.UUCP>
Date: 13 Dec 90 18:12:42 GMT
References: <1990Dec11.205920.12986@daffy.cs.wisc.edu>
Organization: The Alaskan Organization for Amiga Domination
Lines: 44

pochron@cat52.cs.wisc.edu (David Pochron) writes:

>Perhaps one of the reasons game developers are so hot on CD-ROM technology
>is it is impossible to pirate a CD-ROM - too much inforation stored there,
>even for a hard drive.

>IC ROMs can, and have been, pirated.  I suspect by 1995 (if the game industry
>doesn't go bust again) every game on the market will use a CD-ROM - 0% loss
>of sales to piracy.  Only "borrowing" can hurt sales then...

Haha I shouldn't have replied to this, cause I am sure about 5 other people
will have the same "Type" of reply, but here goes.

That is only 4 years away(1995) and that implies that we will all have CD
ROM drives in 4 years. I have no plans to buy a device that only 2 or 3
games use and several programs (such as encyclopedias, fred fishisks,etc)
use. And I am almost certain game manufacturers won't produce A LOT for
this thing until enough applications such as the encyclopedia appear that
many many people will already have one. 

My last arguement is, not to be overly fussy, but what game do you know of
that takes up an entire cd rom? The largest game I currently know of (I
am certain there are other large ones but don't flame) is Kings Quest V
for IBM (do they have it for amiga?) which is like 10 megs. Maybe 
even dragons lair! But the point is, it takes 10X the amount of time to
produce a 10 meg game than it does to produce a one 3 1/2 880k floppy
game. This means more production on the part of the software dudes, and
less income during that time of production. 

Ok, supposing they do put 880k floppies on a laserdisk, now they are not
preventing piracy..880k could be easily transferred to floppy.

My final point is, even if they put large 10 meg games on the cd, they
will will still fit on a hard drive. There just AREN'T many 3.2 gigabyte
games available for amiga!

To agree with you though, I suppose some new games could be produced which
used LOTS and LOTS and LOTS of digitized music and Images. I'm sure though
that pirates would eliminate the music playing code, and transfer what 
images they could to floppy for hard drive installation. MUSIC would
take up the most space.

Byron Guernsey
"Happiness is eating only the well seasoned doritos"