"Rampant piracy" makes PSP the perfect gift in China
by Andrew Yoon 
{ Dec 7th 2006 at 1:20PM }
The Chinese video game market is a difficult one for manufacturers to deal with, simply because piracy is totally out of control in that region. Many publishers and console manufacturers avoid the market altogether. However, the Chinese market loves to play video games, and a blog called Shanghaiist is recommending the PSP for holiday gift givers this year:
"Our buying decision this holiday season has every bit to do with the PSP being a nifty gadget as it does some of the extra "resources" available to us as residents of Shanghai, or China for that matter ... rampant piracy of games. The PSP is no different. Machines for sale here are from either Europe or Japan, but with firmware downgraded/modified so that they can handle "backup" (read "pirated") games."While I'm all for sales of the PSP increasing, I'm appalled at this recommendation. Telling people to buy a system because you can easily pirate games on it is really uncool. Of course, it seems like many people on the Internet also seem to think the PSP is all about homebrew and piracy as well. What have you experienced on the web?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
anorexia @ Dec 7th 2006 1:36PM
hey, its the reason i bought it.
i've had since april of '06 and i haven't bought a game since.
Michael Anderson @ Dec 7th 2006 1:42PM
I experience rampant piracy seemingly everywhere - and most people try to shield it as high-minded 'homebrew', as if their rights to piracy are being put down by 'the man'.
I keep my firmware up to date, and buy all of my games. The fact that most PSP games are crap means I should be more careful about purchases ... not that I should pirate!
Alien @ Dec 7th 2006 1:47PM
I am totaly against piracy on the PSP , though I admit , that Sony and some other publishers ( read EA , Ubi , Capcom etc. ) schould drop the game prices down in some regions , some people cant aford those :?
Ratchet the Lombax @ Dec 7th 2006 2:21PM
@anorexia
At least your honest, I got mine when it was first launched in japan and I've only bought three games for it. They were bought before there was a way to even rip the games from the UMD. Since then I haven't bought any games either and I have almost 150 isos. Even though your are honest be ready for the upcoming comments that say you and I are ruining the PSP and we are the reason that the PSP game sales are so low. The reason the games sales for the PSP aren't good is that most of the games are not that great. I know that if I spent $40 on some of the games I have downloaded I would be mad. I think I have only played about 6 of them through to the end the rest I played for about an hour and then copied them to a dvd and deleted them from my chip. I don't know about everyone but $40 is too much for a game that only interest me for an hour. Maybe if Sony released some better games then the sales would increase, although not from me as I will never buy a PSP game again ISOs FTW HA HA
Strictly Bizness @ Dec 7th 2006 2:20PM
this article makes me sad..I hope the PSP doesn't follow the downfall of Dreamcast where no hacking knowledge needed to pirate its games. If you guys really love your PSP you'll support it by buying their games legally.
pixelator @ Dec 7th 2006 2:28PM
Not a big surprise that there's rampant piracy in China or HK... It's true for every system, always has been that way. I doubt the PSP piracy scene is any more pronounced there than GBA, PS2, etc.
>. @ Dec 7th 2006 6:25PM
I completely agree with the comment made above. There is piracy for EVERY CONSOLE every made. (not yet including the next-gen ones) Since this "benefits" consumers (free games) I don't really see it as a problem. (only to consumers, of course i know that this is a huge problem to businesses) Game piracy isn't the biggest piracy problem out there. The ones that send chills down businesses are movie and music piracy. Almost everyone i know has downloaded "free" music at least once,either directly or indirectly. movies are aompletely another topic.
>. @ Dec 7th 2006 6:24PM
o yea, i forgot, Most people in China are pretty poor, compared to other countries, say America. (the average person) I live in China and i know this. This is a major reason why many people don't buy games. Gctually, nobody buys a "real" game if there is a "pirated" game out there. Unless of course there is some kind of reason or something .(collection, sense that only real is good enough,etc)
Kade Storm @ Dec 7th 2006 3:44PM
Right on, Pixelator. The far east is like piracy haven!
Kelvin @ Dec 7th 2006 3:33PM
pixelator: yah piracy galore for every platform, but PSP is easier because the MS Duo is a pretty straightforward storage device.
(ironically, despite all the UMD bitching, you can argue that the PSP is the LEAST proprietary handheld platform, with the possible exception of the N-Gage)
I've pretty much accepted that piracy is everywhere, not that I'm completely out of it yet (although I've bought all my non-free software since university), but it still pisses me off that people would be so blatant about it.
Salesmunn @ Dec 7th 2006 3:35PM
The PSP's biggest problem is piracy right now. I wrote about it over at Aeropause. Unfortunately, blogs that report homebrew and indirectly promoting piracy on the system.
As I've said before, if it's easier to download games than buy them, people are going to download them. I refuse to do it but dumb kids who don't give a damn about the industry still do.
J @ Dec 7th 2006 4:50PM
I have bought all 10 games I own on the PSP 100% legitamately, but honestly, the only reason don't rip pirated games is because I haven't figured out how to exactly. The fear of viruses and bricking my system are at the forefront of my concerns with doing it, too.
I would like to think that it wouldn't hurt the "industry" if I did, but I do understand that its when so many people do, it adds up.
The truth is, as a musician, I wouldn't mind if people burned copies of my music. I would want more people to hear it and listen and chances are, they would not have done so otherwise, but I can see how that doesn't necessarily correlate with the gaming industry; however, one thing to ponder is if the psp would be selling even less if they didn't have the homebrew capabilities...
Just a thought.
colin @ Dec 7th 2006 4:28PM
Like I said:
'Devhook and firmware downgrades drive piracy.'
People gave me tons of crap, but there is just no denying it. This article is exactly what I was talking about.
-Colin
Bill T @ Dec 7th 2006 5:21PM
As long as people are able to, they will steal. That's human nature. It is justified by, I'm too poor or it's easy or Sony is rich, etc.... but it happens, is anticipated by the manufacturer and is built into the prices of the games. I personally don't steal cause I am lucky enough to make a decent salary and can afford any games I need. I also work in the software industry and support buying software as a means of paying salaries of me and my friends. Same way I feel about music as I've been in many bands and understand how broke musicians are -- even one's on a record label.
Love my psp, though. But I use it almost more as a music and video source at work. Now that Sony in it's latest firmware update added RSS support for video downloading from sites like Grouper, I dig putting fun videos temporarily on my PsP to amuse my coworkers.
Brett Johnson @ Dec 12th 2006 3:00AM
The fact that Sony is so against homebrew really hurts them. I bought a PSP because I have always wanted to run snes and nes games on the fly. The PSP offers an incredible array of homebrew games, apps, and other fun features. The fact that games are pirated on the web may seen to hurt the PSP, but I don't think it does. I don't go online to get games, but I don't buy games either. I don't like to spend 50 bucks for a game I will play for 10 hours. If I did go and get a game off the net, it doesn't hurt Sony's bottom line... The fact is, Sony is a horrible company, and deserves all the piracy they get. Dirty dirty slum company... I am glad I bought my PSP used from a friend!
pixelator @ Dec 7th 2006 5:42PM
"People gave me tons of crap, but there is just no denying it. This article is exactly what I was talking about."
What people (me) gave you 'tons' of crap about was accusing PSP Fanboy of advocating piracy by mentioning the 3.01 emulator. You deserved the response you got.
Nobody is denying that circumventing Sony's firmwares CAN lead to piracy or that piracy exists at all. The issue here is whether the PSP has more piracy than other platforms (debatable) and whether bloggers 'promote' it by linking to or even mentioning homebrew apps like devhook.
Andrew Yoon @ Dec 7th 2006 5:59PM
I just wanted to clarify that you may notice that we didn't link to an article this time around. Why? The site in question links to illegal torrent sites that provide ISO rips. Not good. We don't support piracy here at the Fanboy--but we do report on what's newsworthy from the homebrew scene, because that's news for ya.
Kade Storm @ Dec 7th 2006 8:12PM
I can tell you right now that people are more engrossed in PS2, Xbox, and Xbox 360 piracy. Out of the handhelds, however, the PSP is becoming quite the piracy-friendly toy, but this is nothing compared to the amount of piracy going on with the home consoles. Where you have one customer asking for a downgraded PSP and some bonus discs, you have at least twenty nuts wanting PS2 shite. Quite frankly, I couldn't care at this point; this has been the reality since Nintendo Famicom days, and actually reached peak with the PSone, which made it one hell of a powerful seller in Asia.
Kelvin @ Dec 7th 2006 7:22PM
To > :
Yah there's a lot of poor people in China, but most of those are the people who couldn't afford a PSP in the first place. PSP consumers are the same the world over: spoiled middle class kids who bought it with their parents' money.
To Brett:
You ever buy gasoline without paying for it? Because I assure you that oil companies are way more evil than Sony, and you'd be doing cosmic karma a way bigger favour by stealing petroleum products than PSP games.
I'm not sure if the PSP is a loss leader, but if so, I'd say buying a PSP and then using it solely as an emulator would, yes, hurt Sony's bottom line.
JohnIV @ Dec 7th 2006 8:30PM
I sincerely hope that Sony eventually just halts all game production and support for the PSP. Just kill the PSP outright. what's the point of making games if nobody will buy them, and instead just steal them?
then Homebrewers can have the Overpriced Nintendo Emulator that they've always wanted.
and this comes from someone who loves his PSP.
Plastikloser @ Dec 7th 2006 8:49PM
Sigh...something just dont change. People who pirate complain its their right and that most of the games there getting suck anway and are not worth full price. Maybe im just that much of an old timer, but back in my day of nintendo and sega cartrige games we rented. You see, it was awful hard to be mom and dad to cough up 60 to 80 bucks (games would cost that much so dont complain about $40 now) we would get them to go down to local video store and have a night of awsome gaming for a cheap price on a game worth one play through. Whats that you say, we cant rent them at our local video stores? Well last time i heard gamefly.com would let you rent most any new game for most any new console. You pay a couple bucks play it through and ship it back, you dont even get off your ass. The game worth no more than a hour or two gets just that, and the people who made or a great game perhaps get money down the line for it. Ow but wait, im thinking about how to be responisble and fair to those who PROVIDE games for us to play.
takagawa @ Dec 7th 2006 10:11PM
Just to play Devil's Advocate here, but does anyone remember the main reason why the original Playstation was so popular, such that it brought Sony on the video game world stage above the then incumbent Nintendo?
The original Playstation had revolutionary games yes, but to the consumer, all it meant to them was they can get their console modded and play copied, nay pirated games
I bet Sony would hate (read: never) admit this but for this main reason they were able to dominate the scene, which lead the way for the next-gen Playstation 2.
I'm not going to say ripping PSP games to ISOs and then playing and/or pirating them is right. What I'm saying is, doing it is far from 'hurting' Sony. And if I was Sony, I'd continue to do half-assed measures to try and prevent hacking and homebrew to appease their third party publishers, while silently provide consumer momentum by allowing the current status quo with homebrew developers to continue.
J @ Dec 7th 2006 11:39PM
From what I have read on Shanghaiist, on and off for some time now, I can see that writing for them is more about your abilities to carouse than to actually write. Don't take the 'article' so seriously. My $.02
Walkir @ Dec 8th 2006 3:52AM
The reason that I use ISO:s instead of UMD is because of the horrible UMD format. They are slow, bulky and drains the battery. By using ISO:s I can have all the games on memory stick without having to fill my backpack with UMD:s. They also load faster and don't drain the battery as fast.
I bought all the games I play frequently for my Nintendo DS for the same reason. They are small, fast loading and easy to store in my DS case.
But... I will never buy another PSP game unless it comes with hardware (like TalkMan).
phlyzik @ Dec 8th 2006 12:22PM
some people are really stupid. piracy isnt "killing" anything. yes im a pirate, im proud of it. i paid $200 for my psp, sony got their money. even if a few (or a lot of) people run ISOs the game designers (xcept for the guy that made platypus) get millions of dollars for their hard work from the UMDs that do sell (for $40+ which ,with my salary is FAR too much for a handheld game or any video game). as long as there is technology there will be piracy, information will always be free somehow. k well im about to go softmod my xbox so i can download games and play them on that too, FOR FREE! wheeeeee!
and i agree w/ kelvin, oil companies are evil (possibly more evil than sony). theres a WAR going on right now, who cares about stealing software when our boys are dying in iraq?
piracy is just as harmless as pot, its never killed anyone.
Marty @ Dec 9th 2006 12:38PM
I love people that get mad at others for pirating, and then go out and buy a used game. If you really want to 'support the industry' then you would have to buy new games all the time. Other wise, you're just supporting EB and Gamestop.
I'm not supporting piracy, but I'm just making a point that everyone rips everyone off all the time.