Topic: 3DS Hacking

[UncleBob]

For those not in the know, over the weekend, an individual hacker has brought forth claims that he's managed to get unsigned code to run on the 3DS.  This could open the door for homebrew, region unlocking and, yes, piracy.

Today, my twitter feed popped up with an interesting article/rant by the creator of the wonderful game Mutant Mudds.

http://t.co/Ry0RqVNv

In this article/rant, Jools says that if the 3DS is opened to piracy, he might consider dropping development for the 3DS.

As Jools tweeted "The number of people justifying illegal activity on the 3DS is astonishing. The comments section is a fun read"

Meanwhile, Mutant Mudds - a wonderful game (did I say that already) is available to download on the (currently) piracy-free 3DS eShop for $9.

Or on the iOS platform, where there is plenty of Piracy, for a mere ninety-nine cents.

Or straight from Renegade Kid's website as a PC download for $4.99.  No piracy on the PC, right?

So, here's the rubbbbbbbb... Why would a developer come out and trash the 3DS platform based on the *possibility* of piracy all while sabotaging their releases on that platform by re-releasing the game (at a fraction of the cost) on other, competing platforms that already suffer from piracy?

[azeke]

So, here's the rubbbbbbbb... Why would a developer come out and trash the 3DS platform based on the *possibility* of piracy all while sabotaging their releases on that platform by re-releasing the game (at a fraction of the cost) on other, competing platforms that already suffer from piracy?

It's not about one platform vs another platform.
That PC version sale is 100% profit for developer who doesn't have to pay squat as a royalty.
Also saying that PC port is competition to anyone is a stretch ;p Especially when it's not on Steam. All thanks to glorious Greenlight and Gabe, saviors of indies ;p
iOS version is a special case i guess.

I still am pretty sure 3DS and Wii U are making the bulk of profits for Renegade Kid.

[ejamer]

Regarding Mutant Mudds on different platforms, there are a few important questions that should be addressed before getting to caught up in pricing discussions. Which platform was the game created for initially?  What are the potential install bases being reached on each platform? What are the average prices for successful games on each platform? How much profit is made per game sold on each platform, and how much direct control does Renegade Kid have on pricing?  Are there any outside factors (such as rating boards) that affect pricing?


I don't like seeing the same game having such wildly different pricing across different platforms either, but there are a lot of factors that play into those decisions. Doing a straight comparison isn't always fair or helpful.




As for the hacking news, that's disappointing to hear. Leaving any moral or legal discussion aside, hacking almost always leads to emulation and piracy. Emulation and piracy change how developers and publishers support a system. That doesn't mean disaster for 3DS, but it doesn't do anything to help the (already unimpressive) market either.

[UncleBob]

I don't like seeing the same game having such wildly different pricing across different platforms either, but there are a lot of factors that play into those decisions. Doing a straight comparison isn't always fair or helpful.

When the average consumer buys a product, do you think they care about things like royalties, server costs, etc?  No.  What is it, How can I use it and How much is it?  That's all they care about.  Period.

Jools (and I don't mean to pick on him, but I fear that a lot of folks in the industry are seeing and saying similar things) tweeted this: "Releasing Mutant Mudds on iOS is more about marketing than sales. Plus, it was a port of a game that already met its ROI."

So, you made your bread and butter on the 3DS and are now releasing the product cheap on the iOS.  Does ANYONE see an issue with that?

I'd love to see how well this would work the other way around - if they had released MM on the iOS first, if they would have been able to recoup their development costs.

And this opens a whole new can of worms.  Let's say that, a year from now, the 3DS is cracked wide open and Renegade Kid releases Mutant Mudds 2.  How many people bought the $9 3DS version of MMI are going to look at this and say "naw.  I'll wait for the 99 cent version."?

Then, when the game doesn't sell, Renegade Kid gets to blame piracy for the lack of sales.

That makes no sense.  And that's why pricing discrepancy between markets *DOES* make a difference.  Period.  This is why you see Nintendo putting their retail games up digitally at the same price.  Face it, any publisher would give their left testicle to be able to release a game, sell 26 million copies of it, and still sell it for $50 three years later.  Or sell 29 Million copies of a game and still sell it for the full price of $30 six years later.  You don't see Nintendo selling their games as ninety-nine cent downloads for a reason and you see them selling multi-millions of copies for a reason.

Now, I'm not delusional and I don't think Mutant Mudds would support selling 29 million copies at $30 each.  Something tells me that Jools would be happy to sell a couple million copies at $9 each.  But when folks see that you can buy it cheaper, elsewhere, the vast majority of the people are just going to get that.  It devalues the product (oh, this is just a crappy iPhone port) on top of everything.

Hey, Jools - you want to do some marketing?  Lower the price of MM to $1.99 on the eShop.  I wouldn't be surprised if it would sell more - additional - copies than has been sold on the iOS platform.

[ejamer]

Gamers pay early adopter premiums all the time, and are happy doing so even when it regularly means paying more for the same content. People also pay different prices for different formats quite often - especially when there are meaningful differences in the experience provided, ie: actual buttons and 3D graphics. In both cases, you could argue that the initial 3DS release deserved it's higher price point. In both cases you can also see that some gamers do care about more than just getting the best price.


(How much control Jools has over changes to the initial 3DS price isn't clear to me, and why 3DS eShop pricing doesn't drop over time are more problematic questions.)



I understand your arguments and even agree with many of them. But I still don't think that it's fair to look at pricing across different platforms in a vacuum.

[ymeegod]

Nintendo's shouldn't had region lock==most likely I'm going have my 3DS hacked just because Sqaure's fooking me over on Bravely Default, which is like half the reason why I purchased an 3ds to begin with.

And privacy itself isn't anything new but Nintendo has to be more agressive compared to last generation.  Nintendo did state they were more than willing to "brick" systems if it detected privated versions now we have to wait and see.

[BranDonk Kong]

I'm all for the 3DS getting actual homebrew, but of course piracy would be bad. I agree with UB on the pricing front, or at least they shouldn't be that disparate.

It should be noted that Dementium and Dementium 2 were released after the DS was hacked.

[Shaymin]

And although the first one was released when it was still a minor thing, the second one came out in 2010 by which point the brakes were broken on the piracy train.

[broodwars]

Well, the Renegade Kids developer has good reason to be concerned about piracy, considering after putting Mutant Mudds up for $1 on the App Store he's already gotten demands that he give it away for free.

That said, I don't think he should be issuing blanket statements on pulling support from the 3DS eShop until we know the extent of the potential unsigned software, the ease of install, and the likely size of the user base for such a thing.

For instance, I have the Homebrew Channel installed on both my Wii and my Wii U, but I only use it to remove the region-locking so I can play my legally-purchased Wii games that Reggie refused to sell to me.  I don't use it for piracy and I don't want to, and I haven't heard about a massive wave of piracy on the Wii because of the homebrew channel's existence.  If the same happened with the 3DS, I don't think Renegade Kids has anything to be concerned about.

On the other hand, if we have hard evidence that the same Entitled people that felt they had a right to Mutant Mudds for free start pirating en masse on 3DS once the handheld is hacked, I wouldn't blame Renegade Kid from stepping away from the platform. The hack itself is innocuous and could have a great deal of positive potential.  We also don't know how difficult it could be for the average user to install.  It all depends on how this hypothetical unsigned software would be used, and right now I don't think anyone can guarantee it would cause statistically-notable piracy on the 3DS.

[UncleBob]

http://joolswatsham.blogspot.com/2012/12/why-is-mutant-mudds-1-on-app-store.html

This is an earlier post from Jools on his blog.  It's an interesting article to read.

[Pixelated Pixies]

If it allows me to remove the region restriction on my 3DS I'm totally on board.

[Ceric]

On the price parity issue.  I don't own Batman or Darksiders on the WiiU because, I can get them for a fraction of the price.  I now won't buy Mutant Mudds because the developer is telling me this is actually a game worth 99 cents.  I'm not going to pay 9 times that.  Not going to do it.

If I know that I will eventually be able to get a game in a reasonable time frame for an 8th of the price initially asked I can't in good conscious justify getting the game immediately in most cases.  Most of the time I'll just totally forget about the game and that's a lost sale.  Doesn't happen w/ Nintendo games I want because I know it will be a long time coming for sales.  That being said I've skipped Nintendo games I found a little interesting because they were priced too high.

Renegade Kids I'll now be wary of because I simply don't like when games are ported from the 3/DS to iP*

[pokepal148]

an 8 dollar price difference is pretty ridiculous imo

[leahsdad]

Okay, everyone's upset about the $8 price difference.  But then again, we're talking about the IPHONE, which would quite possibly be the worst way to play Mutant Mudds.  I've had the game since launch, and I STILL haven't beaten it because it's just too darn hard.   Who the hell is going to look at both versions and say "Oh, well, I'll save 8 bucks and buy the version of the game that has a VASTLY inferior control interface."

Now, if we were talking about a different game..like, let's say...Art of Balance Touch.  Or Shinen's mini-golf game.  I could imagine IOS versions of that which would be only somewhat inferior.   I might pass on the 3DS versions of those because of the price difference.  But then again, I LOVE 3D, I crank that sucker all the time.

But Mutant Mudds?  Seriously, if MM2 is simultaneously released on 3DS and IOS, and let's say on IOS it's free, then I would still pay 9 dollars for the 3DS version.

If you want to talk about horribly unbalanced price platforms, let's talk about Steam vs. IOS.  Hmm...pay $19 for FF Dimensions or....buy four 9-month old AAA games for the same price.  Or like 6 indie games that look WAY better. 

I think Jools is overreacting and wrongly reacting, though.   The 3DS is pretty darn secure and patchable, so I wouldn't worry too much about whether it will be cracked or...how long that crack would even be operable.

[pokepal148]

the people who hacked it said that this exploit could be patched(something that most sites reporting on it conveniently forgot.)

[UncleBob]

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=509260

This is an amazingly detailed post giving official sales information for Gunman Clive across all the "major" platforms - 3DS, iOS, Google Play (Android), Amazon, PC and Mac.  The game has, mostly, had the same pricing across all platforms (was featured via Amazon as a free-app-of-the-day thing, but as you can see by the pie chart, that meant virtually nothing).

Aside from the fact that I'm honestly and truly surprised to see such sales data published (Amazon App Store - you suck), it's interesting to see how a game, designed for iOS and ported to the 3DS can manage to completely surpass the iOS sales when the two are offered at a similar price point - and can do so in less than half the time.

[Do_What]

Not just half the time, but with a much much smaller market. I know the apple app store is crowded and all, but everyone with a device has probably been to the app store at least once and I know that a lot of people with 3DS haven't been to the eshop.

[broodwars]

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=509260

This is an amazingly detailed post giving official sales information for Gunman Clive across all the "major" platforms - 3DS, iOS, Google Play (Android), Amazon, PC and Mac.  The game has, mostly, had the same pricing across all platforms (was featured via Amazon as a free-app-of-the-day thing, but as you can see by the pie chart, that meant virtually nothing).

Aside from the fact that I'm honestly and truly surprised to see such sales data published (Amazon App Store - you suck), it's interesting to see how a game, designed for iOS and ported to the 3DS can manage to completely surpass the iOS sales when the two are offered at a similar price point - and can do so in less than half the time.

In an odd way, though, you're kind of reaffirming the "need" for Nintendo to drop its prices to be competitive with the App Store.  When Gunman Clive was offered at a similar price point to the iOS version, it out-sold it.

[UncleBob]

No, I'm reaffirming the need for equal pricing across platforms.  None of this 99 cents on iOS and $5.99 on eShop crap.  Price it at 99 cents or $5.99 - I don't care... just price it equal.

"But if I price it at $5.99, it won't sell on iTunes!"  Gee... then, perhaps, you shouldn't release it on iTunes if you made a game worth $5.99.

[TJ Spyke]

This is Apple's fault, they set no ground floor for pricing. So people kept dropping their prices to beat others. Now you have some real idiots on the Internet who actually complain if a game on iOS is above 99 cents (saying it's overpriced). Even when the game is free and the studio sell bonus stuff (like The Simpsons: Tapped Out), people complain. iOS gamers have become spoiled brats.

[UncleBob]

I wouldn't say it's Apple's fault.  I prefer a digital ecosystem where the developers get to set the pricing.

The problem is that the developers are very short-term focused.  "Hey, if I set my price to 99 cents, I can sell a billion copies, get on the top charts, get my name out there." - all without making much money (covering their development costs, if they're lucky).  They figure they'll make the profit when they release their next title.  Except they just marketed towards a group of people who don't care about the logo at the start of the screen - they care about cheap and in-your-face.  They *think* they're creating brand-loyalty, but they're simply not doing that.  So, when the next game comes along, it's either price it at 99 cents, sell a million and make no profit or price it at $5.99, sell three and make no profit.

There are plenty of developer interviews out there that rehash all of this, but what it comes down to - unless you're insanely lucky (i.e.: Angry Birds) or are a big-time development studio (EA) - there's just not much money in iOS development.  It's pretty much the equivalent of the California Gold Rush - everyone's jumping in, thinking *they* know the secret and no one's getting rich.

[Louieturkey]

So now I'm tempted to get Gunman Clive for iOS since I don't have a 3DS.  Although now I have even more games I can easily get for 3DS when I finally break down and get one.   

And I agree UB, companies should release games at the same price point on the separate systems (unless they do a special edition for one of them to make it worth charging more).  I like that Nintendo allows for $2 games though.

[noname2200]

The problem is that the developers are very short-term focused.  "Hey, if I set my price to 99 cents, I can sell a billion copies, get on the top charts, get my name out there." - all without making much money (covering their development costs, if they're lucky).  They figure they'll make the profit when they release their next title. 

I'm not so sure this is the thinking going on. I believe it comes down more to the fact that exposure of your game (or other app) is very difficult to come by unless you're on the "Top X sellers" list. I've read interviews with indies to that effect, anyways, and heavens knows they have few other affordable ("affordable"?) ways to get the word out to more than a handful of people.

This is not going against your general thesis, by the way: I agree, and have been arguing for years, that the mobile sector primarily offers fool's gold. The fact that this practice is believed to be viable only reinforces that idea.

[TJ Spyke]

I believe it comes down more to the fact that exposure of your game (or other app) is very difficult to come by unless you're on the "Top X sellers" list.

Sometimes this is true. The developer of Gunman Clive said that sales of the game on Android shot up 10,000% when it was made a Featured App by Google, and that 75% of the LTD sales on the Android version came during the 2 weeks it was a Featured App.

[noname2200]

I believe it comes down more to the fact that exposure of your game (or other app) is very difficult to come by unless you're on the "Top X sellers" list.

Sometimes this is true. The developer of Gunman Clive said that sales of the game on Android shot up 10,000% when it was made a Featured App by Google, and that 75% of the LTD sales on the Android version came during the 2 weeks it was a Featured App.

Yeah, I was thinking of that statement too. And I've heard similar things from other indie developers. It seems like a "rich get richer" for most digital releases, especially on those shops where there are dozens of new releases each week.