DragonCon sacrifices

[TC]

Where he comes from most people can't afford computers.

Well then, he should give his computer away to solve the problems of his country before he complains about it. Not breaking Freespace won't give El Salvadorians computers.

Where you come from you're so wealthy that don't consider the destruction of a £30 computer game a big deal.

Someone just said they cost, like, $2 each

Where he comes from that computer game would be unatainable for many people.

And they're going to go to Chris' store in Seattle to buy them in the second hand bin?

Regardless of what it cost you, its what it would cost someone in his country.

That's stupid. Bargain bin and second hand computer games in the US have absolutely no impact on their market value in El Salvador... Refraining from breaking them wouldn't have helped El Salvador at all... In fact, it could theoretically harm them, since there would have been a slightly larger number of Tachyon: The Fringes in the world. The mere existance of this game causes great suffering.

 

[Filler]

hehe, we're going to have to move this to off topic if we're not careful

 

[Quarto]

Yeah, that's a pretty tempting thought .

 

[Filler]

would you really sacrifice all those posts in the UE forum though?

 

[Needaham45]

This is a good point... posts are a good thing.

 

[Iceblade]

I can't believe how stupid you guys acted at that D*C. Frankly I find destroying those games and calling them rip-offs was extremely juniville. Why did you destroy those games anyway?

 

[Quarto]

Eh, this forum gets plenty of relevant posts... we don't need to hang on to all this other crap just to get more posts .

 

[TyeDyeBoy]

I can't believe how stupid you guys acted at that D*C. Frankly I find destroying those games and calling them rip-offs was extremely juniville. Why did you destroy those games anyway?

Ok Sherman, lets set the Wayback machine to 1990. Right about now, a game called Wing Commander, the first truly popular 3-d space sim is selling like hotcakes (relatively speaking). WC2, shortly thereafter, breaks onto the scene and is even MORE popular given a broader storyline, better cutscenes, and voice acting. Wing Commander's franchise is off to an amazing start.

Oh, but what happens here? Dozens of other companies see WC's success and they want in on it too. A few of these stood on their own merits (X-Wing being the best example, Elite being a less notable but valid one), and sold well. Others, however, would be a crappy 3-d flightsim with a weak storyline. These didn't sell well at all, despite the fact that many of them threw a "JUST LIKE WING COMMANDER" or "ANOTHER FLIGHTSIM LIKE WC AND X-WING" on them. The copy of Star Crusader had that on there, as well as a cheap ripoff of a Dralthi on the cover. So dawned an era of wannabes and copy cats.

So there are a bunch of games that didn't sell well at all, but tried to ride on the coattails of WC's success.

Did all of those we sacrified do this? No. Tachyon, although there are many similarities, did try for a different angle. It just came out like Privateer in a shitty way. Don't get me started on Freespace.

So as a group of violent young adults who are very protective of their love for Wing Commander, we decided to have a little fun. ALL of these games came from a rack in the back of a Gamestop store in Seattle because they hadn't been sold in the three or more years they'd been sitting on the shelves. We probably wrecked $20 (at the absolute most) worth of old, unsold software in a small private ceremony for shits and giggles.

This year, we've already got even more unsold software gathered (tragically, there was a eBay auction for no less than 25 copies of Freespace 2 for $3 that we missed bidding on by just minutes). We're going to do it again, and we will next year too. This will likely become a most sacred CIC tradition.

As for calling us juvenile, well, you're welcome to your opinion. If you have such a big problem with some people having some stupid fun that doesn't actually hurt anyone, then you're a stupid poo poo head.

 

[psych]

I can't believe how stupid you guys acted at that D*C. Frankly I find destroying those games and calling them rip-offs was extremely juniville. Why did you destroy those games anyway?

Only 15 and already invoking his "free speech" rights. Get lost, shitbird.

It is my duty to inform anyone visiting this thread that we have a Code Red assclown alert.

 

[ChrisReid]

The original guy who got all pissed off just had no sense of freakin perspective on the situation. He took the whole "don't waste food, because there are people starving in third world countries" syndrome and just went crazy with it. Apparently because computer games are worth their weight in gold in El Salvador, we were evil people because we were having fun with them in a way he felt somehow hurt his people. It just didn't make any sense at all. I bought seven copies of Starlancer for $1.99 a piece. He was ranting about how the going rate for games was $80 in his country, but I told him I'd be happy to sell him one for a couple dollars including shipping.. and there was a whole industry based around that at ebay.com. He literally interpreted blowing up computer games as the same thing as throwing away primary subsistence goods, and did not understand that these luxury goods were worth little more than the plastic and paper they were made of on the open market. I mean, we spent many many thousands of dollars as a group to go vacation together in Atlanta.. $20 worth of computer games going up in smoke was about the cheapest thing we could do. No way could we go out to eat or do anything for cheaper than that. Games were made to have fun with. And our dollars to hours of enjoyment ratio was really efficient there. If he or anyone would like to call that immature or whatnot, that's their choice, but to be offended by what we did is completely inconceivable to me.

 

[Iceblade]

What I didn't like about it was your small persecption of what a rip-off is. By your view, Warcraft is a rip-off of earlier strategy games, and Dark Riegn and C&C are rip-offs of Warcraft. Maybe there are a no. of similarities between P2 and Tachyon, but Independence War and IWar 2 are loads different from WC. Flight is much harder in this IWar2 and you are a pirate in a totally different Universe. (Frankly, I hate the game. Good story, but too damn hard to fight.)

 

[Ghost]

I really hope you sacrifice X-Wing.

 

[Bandit LOAF]

I liked C&C better when it was called Dune 2.

 

[Cpl Hades]

Okay, we have absolutely *nothing* against WC rip-offs. Lots of things are rip-offs of other things, it's no big deal. What we hate are *bad* WC rip-offs. We're talking about games which destroy the genre with their pathetic gameplay and pitiful sales. Games like those reflect badly on the whole market.

So.. rip-off #1: Freespace 2 - We'd destroy. Lousy game. Only sold less than 40,000 copies in North America too last I heard.

Rip-off #2: Freelancer - We'd leave alone. As space-sims go, it's the best we've seen since Secret Ops. Pretty much the whole CIC staff enjoyed playing it

 

[ZFGokuSSJ1]

I have a funny idea, get some more copies of whatever game they like, put it in a toilet and shit on it. Then take pictures and post on the site.

 

[TyeDyeBoy]

I have a funny idea, get some more copies of whatever game they like, put it in a toilet and shit on it. Then take pictures and post on the site.

This idea was tossed around and discarded, because it's just not violent enough.

 

[BattleDog]

Okay, you're still missing my point. The games cost you $2 each, okay.

I bought Freespace 1&2 in a bundle, it cost me $40. Is my copy better than the copies you got because it costs more? No. The Origional copies you destroyed are still worth $45 dollars, even if thats not what you payed.

So America is so rich that the games are de-valued to the price of a bag of chips (french fries, not crisps.).

So I see his point. The game would still have cost $45 atleast in El Salvador. Its not a question of sending those specific copies to a third world country. He's pissed off that you can do that without thinking about it.

As to Freespace. It's not a rip-off, it has its own storyline, the ships look totally differant and the gameplay is very different.

I really enjoyed these two games, as well as XW and XWA.

You're entitled to your own opinion but that doesn't give you the right to destroy something that other people enjoy.

 

[Viper61]

Wow, all this about how money is spent (and enjoyed) in another freakin country that has no bearing on anything whatsoever. Well, you know I'm not going to apologize for actually having money and spending it in a way I choose to. In fact I had a taco salad for lunch that I paid $5.66 for when I *gasp* had all the ingredients to make it at home that will probably get thrown out because I didn't use them. Lets see, tonight I'm going to actually go home and eat something I cook myself. Later tonight, I'm planning on going and seeing LXG (about $7) with some friends, then waiting for my fiance to get off work. Then probably we'll go to our local pub strip and spend the night (bars close about 2am here) drinking and having fun with our friends (I average about $20 bucks and she averages about $10 - we're not heavy drinkers). Average in about $10 for tips and what not tonight and I'm going to spend about 50 bucks for a day of fun. I haven't been able todo this lately because I've worked so freakin much. Alright, you know what, in the end its my money, I earned it, and I'm not going to feel bad for spending it how I see fit. If the people at D*C want to spend their $20 on video games (clones or whatever - that are then by law theirs to do with what they wish) and smash them, more power to them. Fact is I know I throw away the cash equivalent in a day of what a 3rd world country family makes in a week. But you know what, I'll write my checks to my favorite charities at the end of the month and be fine, because I've done "my part".

Sorry, had a similar conversation with a liberal friend of mine the other day and I'm still a little pissed (she actually spends more than I do on stupid stuff so I guess I could call her a liberal hypocrite, but that would almost be repetitive )

C-ya

 

[Bandit LOAF]

Erm, no, consumer goods will pretty much *never* retain their initial value -- your copy of Freespace 2 is worth whatever the going rate is... which, in 2003, is just under two bucks. You may have paid $45 for it several years ago, but there's no way that (economically speaking) its worth that amount today.

 

[KrisV]

Then probably we'll go to our local pub strip and spend the night (bars close about 2am here) drinking and having fun with our friends (I average about $20 bucks

How do you keep your strip pub expenses so low?