When the mobile game company Madfinger lowered their newest game Dead Trigger from $1.00 to free, there was a small sense of outrage within the Android community. While it didn't bother me since it was just a buck for such an exceptional game, I can see why it would bother some early adopters to see the game become free in such a short amount of time.
Today, Madfinger released an official statement regarding the price drop via their Facebook page and fingers the blame on Androids ongoing app piracy problem as the reasoning for this sudden move. Here's their official statement after the break:
Regarding price drop. HERE is our statement. The main reason: piracy rate on Android devices, that was unbelievably high. At first we intend to make this game available for as many people as possible – that's why it was for as little as buck. – It was much less than 8$ for SHADOWGUN but on the other hand we didn't dare to provide it for free, since we hadn't got XP with free-to-play format so far. – However, even for one buck, the piracy rate is soooo giant, that we finally decided to provide DEAD TRIGGER for free. Anyway – DEAD TRIGGER is not FREEMIUM, it always was and still remains FREE-TO-PLAY, that means, all players are able to play it without IAP! We stand up for this statement, because all members of our team are playing (and enjoying) DEAD TRIGGER without IAP.
While I have my own opinions on this matter, I can definitely understand the company's point of view. I can only imagine how frustrating it is to put out a quality game such as Dead Trigger, only for it to be easily pirated by a handful of people. While the game is now free, I feel it may even give the team more chances to earn more money. The game is endorsed as “free-to-play,” but you are able to purchase items and several other things within the game that can make the gaming experience more enjoyable. The silver lining in the game being free is that it should give them plenty of new users that may provide more revenue for the company.
Do you all think app piracy in Android is really as bad as Madfinger claims it is? I can only hope that this doesn't discourage the company from continuing to provide Android with such high quality games.
source: Facebook
Have you heard? They’ve just released the IOS version for free as well. For some reason they’re not blaming that one on “piracy” …
To me Madfinger’s claims are highly questionable. It is clear when playing this game that the vast majority of revenue for this game is designed to come from in-app purchases. You DON’T charge for download when your goal is to suck people in, get them hooked on gameplay, then bilk them. You do it like a drug deal – the first hit is free.
But when it comes to hardcore gamers the early adopters love forking over cash to be first. So, they charged at release for a game they intended to be free, then needed and excuse to back track. Good ol’ piracy! The masses will believe that!
Madfinger just wants to create a bad rep for being idiots and not being able to protect their game.
500,000x 120mb = 60 terabytes of bandwith… that’s around 25-50 bucks to host.
if you host your game and make it available for in app purchase there is 0 piracy. Like Farsight did with their Pinball Sim.
But leaving out those countries that don’t support in app $$$ yet was just too much for these greedy clows, and now I’m suppsed to feel sorry for them?
Well i must admit i pirated many apps and rarely ever kept one but i think the main probleme is that not many have credit cards available for Google wallet (including me) + i think there would be many more purchases if they offered buying a game trough Paypal.
And besides their app was downloaded/bought around
100,000 – 500,000 for 1 dollar so i bet they made quite a money so i think they shouldnt complain that much and i know how hard is coding a game but still they made quite a fortune.