The Streisand Effect» Video Games

DRM propels Spore to “most-pirated” crown

admin — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 00:23:52 +0000

It’s not exactly a Streisand Effect, but it’s pretty close. Sony wanted to keep a tight leash on their new game “Spore”, so they loaded with a ton of ugly DRM. You can only have one user account per purchased copy (husband/wife, brother/sister, friend/friend — no), you can only install it three times, and many people are having issues getting it to run properly in various modes (64-bit being the worst).

As a result, the game has already been illegally downloaded over 500,000 times on BitTorrent, and the number is rising rapidly. It’s also caused Spore, well-regarded as a very good game, to receive horrible scores on Amazon.com because of the DRM. As of a few days ago, there were 2,219 reviews and 2,018 of them gave the game just one star.

The bottom line, almost Streisand-like: They wanted to keep people from pirating the game, resulting in way more illegal downloads than if they just let people play the game they paid for.

DRM propels Spore to “most-pirated” crown is a post from: The Streisand Effect

Angry feminists are promoting Sony’s Fat Princess

admin — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 19:25:30 +0000

At E3, Sony announced a new game titled Fat Princess. It’s essentially a Capture the Flag kind of game, but you’re capturing a princess instead of a flag. The hook is that you can fatten up the princess you’re holding, making it more difficult for the opposing team to rescue her.

I have no idea if the game is any good or not. However, I hadn’t even heard of it until the feminists starting yelling about it. Now I know all about it, and frankly, it sounds like it might be a rather fun game. This once again shows how the Streisand Effect so often backfires whe people loudly complain about something.

Angry feminists are promoting Sony’s Fat Princess is a post from: The Streisand Effect

Teachers are inadvertently promoting “Bully: Scholarship Edition”

admin — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 13:46:19 +0000

Have you ever heard of the game “Bully: Scholarship Edition“? We hadn’t either. However, a group of teachers is pushing hard to get the game banned, which is leading to a lot of publicity for the game.

Michael Hoechsmann, an assistant professor at McGill University, has a good take on things. He compares the attempted ban on the game to “flailing at windmills” and goes on to say that “as tempting as it may seem, I’m not so certain that banning this will somehow result in a more peaceful and more loving school population”.

The first edition of Bully, released in 2006, got an extra boost from a Florida lawyer that tried to have it banned and a school superintendent that warned parents about the game.

(via TechDirt)

Teachers are inadvertently promoting “Bully: Scholarship Edition” is a post from: The Streisand Effect

Manchester Cathedral

admin — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 02:28:41 +0000

On June 9, 2007, the Church of England threatened legal action against Sony for a PS3 game titled “Resistance: Fall of Man”. The game features a bloody shoot-out inside of the Mangester Cathedral. The Church was looking for an apology from Sony and to have the game pulled from stores.

Sony apologized, but the left the game for sale. The controversy resulted in huge publicity for the game, which has since become the best-selling PS3-exclusive game.

Manchester Cathedral is a post from: The Streisand Effect