Word: downloaders
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...talking about an hour to download a game over a 56K modem, so it's no easy task," says Kevin Hause, a gaming analyst with tech experts IDT. "But these games are expensive. Compared with MP3, the desire to do this is greater." And the opportunity, despite the risk of felony prosecution, is growing. Illegally copied games sites are proliferating so fast that stamping them out is akin to "playing wack-a-mole at the county fair," says Kathlene Karg, one of the IDSA investigators who raided McLaughlin's operation. Case in point: the IDSA managed to shut down...
...emulator to turn your PC into a fully operational Nintendo 64. UltraHLE, or High Level Emulator, became a hot property at a time when Nintendo was starting to claw market share back from its larger rival, Sony. Now every college kid with a speedy T1 Internet connection could theoretically download all 26 megabytes of the holiday season's runaway hit, Legend of Zelda. UltraHLE, says Nintendo software manager Jim Merrick, is "like a virus--once it's out, it's everywhere...
...video games for a mere $50. Macheads snapped up a whopping $3 million worth over three weeks. Sony promptly sued Connectix, which denies any wrongdoing. Last month a judge refused to block shipment of the software while the case is pending. Though it's clearly unlawful to sell or download pirated video games, it remains unclear whether the same strictures apply to emulator software, as Sony and Nintendo claim. In the meantime, another company, Bleem, is working on a Virtual PlayStation for Windows...
...trashing their consoles in favor of a PC keyboard, the Japanese giant might make more of a profit from games licensing. Sony games, even in their pirated Internet versions, contain about five times as much digital information as Nintendo's, and are thus more difficult for illegal users to download. They must copy CDs, using special $300 drives, and install a mail-ordered $4 modifying chip--a significant psychological barrier to mass piracy. And Sony has an ace up its sleeve in the shape of the PlayStation II, set to wow its first U.S. users at the turn...
Ultimately, the only way to beat the pirates may be to join them on the Internet. Nintendo is considering making its paid-for games as easy to download as the rip-offs. Then again, as videogames.com reviews editor Jeff Gerstmann notes, "some people will always find a way to get something for nothing...