http://almutawa3.jeeran.com/gamez3.htm

I wouldnt worry too much. for one, the link to ecco the dolphin takes you to some hardcore sex site.
It is annoying that these swine get away with even having these sites though. they have the cheek to put a copyright notice at the bottom of the page too.
death is clearly too good for them

What's the fuss? Of the 4 random links I clicked: one was broken, and two lead to an XXX site which kindly wanted to install god-knows-what. Only one link seemed to work but I had no intention of actually installing it to find out which of the latest worms it contains.

Do people really download the full version/cracks of these sites? It's madness to trust them. The only risk-free stuff on the site are the serial numbers for some games.

Maybe having a full version and a demo version is the way to go?

grimreaper

The Dexterity Software forums, the net's one stop shop for indie game warez.

This has come up before, but what's the alternative? The old "head in sand" routine isn't very effective.

I guess I don't see the effectiveness of it all, what good does it really do to post warez sites in the forums? People can simply go to google to see if their game is available. Should I search google for 5 minutes and post a couple dozen links to sites with the full version of Alien Shooter (for example), does that do any good? We run the chance of having people visit the Dexterity forums for their warez link fix with no effort involved.

I guess I'm surprised to see illicit content directly linked in the forums when their intended value is questionable at best. Hell, even a lot of warez forums will ban someone for directly linking to a site featuring full game downloads and/or serial keys.

I guess I don't see the effectiveness of it all, what good does it really do to post warez sites in the forums? People can simply go to google to see if their game is available. Should I search google for 5 minutes and post a couple dozen links to sites with the full version of Alien Shooter (for example), does that do any good? We run the chance of having people visit the Dexterity forums for their warez link fix with no effort involved.

Exactly. These forums are extremely effective at getting keywords into Google's top 10. Eventually someone typing "<insert indie game here> crack" will actually show up a crack thread on these forums and you'll have successfully aided pirates with these threads.

I proposed closed forums to discuss that, with access only for people known by the moderators. Nobody ever replied :(

I am surprised that the moderators are still allowing these warez sites to be posted. These posts should be deleted immediately.

What is to be achieved by posting a link to 1 warez site? If you get it shutdown, ten more will spring up in its place. The only real thing you have done is promoted the warez site before it got shutdown.

This is not the place to be posting warez links.

The forums are ranked 3rd on Google for: indie game warez

hehehe

lets have a locked forum then.
Seriously, the head in the sand business doesnt cut it.
check out listgames forums, thats a site rendered totally useless because peole here undermined it.
check out that forum2all site. Thats been shut down several times, is now heavily monitored by teh ISP and contains no warez.
Would you prefer your games were still freely downloadable on these sites?
Personally, I'm unaffected, none of the listed sites have any of my games, but It still annoys me to see peoples work being stolen by these idiots.
I think its great to have a central point of information for us to co-ordinate complaints to ISPs etc.

lets have a locked forum then.


And how would you choose who can view this special locked forum? How would you regulate access to it?

People with a track record in the indie scene? Say, at least one game published? Moderator decided? Steve decided? Initial group hand-picked by moderators/Steve and then decided by the members?

I know it may sound elitist and I hate it. But I don't see any other viable option. We need a place to talk about this, pretending the problem doesn't exist doesn't lead us anywhere. I also agree that openly posting links here isn't an excellent idea. And a private forum will allow us to talk more openly and clearly about how to fight them without them being able to read what we are saying!

The forums are ranked 3rd on Google for: indie game warez

hehehe

And #4 on "indie warez." Now that is disturbing. The mods and I are discussing this subject....

be aware that its only us who sue the term 'indie'
people who buy our games (or hack them) probably search for "dweep crack"

Re: who gets access to the locked forum or not.. Having a forum accessed by people with an account on Dexterity is enough to be secure. Since webcrawlers that gather data for Google, etc can't login to index the pages of a locked forum, there is no issue with having to try to decide who gets access or not. The issue isn't whether an "unknown" person gets access; it's whether the page is indexable by a search engine.

(Having said that, I'm in the camp that doesn't think it's a big deal to have these links posted..)

be aware that its only us who sue the term 'indie'
people who buy our games (or hack them) probably search for "dweep crack"
Exactly. And if you google for "Dweep crack" (or "Trials of Werlin crack" or "Universal Soccer Manager crack" or...) right now you will actually find a crack page. :)

I like the idea of having a private forum for monitoring the pirate sites. Another idea occurs to me that it could be helpful to create pages that show up at the top of the Google list for these kinds of searches. But when crack-seekers go to them, they don't get a crack or free full-version download, of course. They get a message appealing to their conscience, (i.e. "This is stealing. I worked hard on this game, and If you want me to make more games in the future...".) with a link to the demo. Several us have sites with good Google pageranks, so if there were a collection of "conscience" pages from gamemakers, we could mirror it on different sites, and likely fill up the first page or two of a deviant Google search with anti-piracy links.

So it would then become a larger hassle to find the pirate sites, and who knows, if the messages are well-written, we might reach a few of those bored, twelve-year-old l33t warez d00dz and get them to reform their ways. When I was a kid, I was basically a decent fellow, but I copied stacks of game floppies, because it seemed like I wasn't hurting anybody, and they were all big faceless corporations with lots of money anyway, right? If I had any idea who the people were that made games and what that struggle was like, I think it would have been enough to get me to stop. For the most part, we aren't dealing with hardcore criminals here. Put a personal plea in front of would-be pirates, and I think you can convert some people to the right side.

-Erik

Re: the conscience pages:

I would say that if you go this route, please don't refer to it as "stealing" or "theft" as it technically isn't. It should be called what it is: copyright infringement.

That sounds like legal waffle to me. If someone would have bought my game, but gets a free copy off someone else. thats theft.
lawyers may reckon otherwise, buy lawyers are full of crap.
If it looks like theft, sounds like theft and acts like theft. chances are, its theft.

But it's just so not theft.

Cas :)

I'm with Cliffski. To me, theft need not involve physical objects, and "copyright infringement" merely describes a specific kind of theft. Oh well, not the sort of thing I should argue about. I promised my friends and family... no more philosophic rhetoric!

-Erik

I believe this exact discussion has been discussed to death before...

Cas :)

Yeah, I feel dumb for getting into it. :)

-Erik

:P

Cas :)

http://almutawa3.jeeran.com/gamez3.htm

First let's bring into question the shady history of the game in the first place. Let's see... the first time there was any question you said the game was an authorized remake of "King's Valley II" because you contacted Konami personally. I didn't think much of it, as we've never seen the game on this side of the globe in any shape or form, plus you claimed that you would make it different. For example like the way Lerc made Fitznik an original idea from something else. Then after more than a year, someone else brought up some good points along with some surprising links. Besides that there were never any credits given to Konami and you told us that you were still waiting for Konami to reply... yeah right. I had enough crap and that's why I pulled all my work out of the game. Steve, Lerc and Binary People get credit in my books for dropping the game from their sites. You deserve to be hacked. You never invented a single element of the game and Konami never authorized a remake.

Hydroaxe : What are you talking about?!

I did not mention my game in this thread, did I?!!!!!
I was talking about any shareware game listed there in general and not mine in particular, why do want to start this?!!!

You asked to take your work out of the game and I did replace it with better music and better levels too.

You deserve to be hacked
Thank you very much for your kind feelings


PLEASE STOP IT NOW (PLEASE!!!)

Your greed to sell a game that you never had the right to create will be your own undoing in due time... that's why I never mentioned it before. I don't have to say a thing. The truth is clear to anyone who has a brain, but if you're so worried about what I have to say then consider yourself extremely lucky, though you'll change your mind in the long run. There are many people who would have shouted loudly and righteously had they been in my position. The point is still the same: It's hypocritical to be posting about warez when you haven't licensed the rights to the remake you're selling. I even heard that Konami is going to be remaking some of their older European releases for the hand held market and publish some that we wouldn't have seen in North America. Hmmmm... I wonder what kinds of games play great on hand helds...