Archive for March 30th, 2010

This past weekend a gamer was caught trying to download the code for the XBLA game Breach onto his laptop during PAX East. When asked by the staff why he was plugged into the Atomic Games network, he said flat out that he was copying the game so he could play it at home and share it with his friends.

The guy had also also previously had his gamertag banned from Xbox Live for stealing Forza 3 and playing it early. The weird thing is that he asked the XBox Live Director of Policy and Enforcement to unban him during a panel at PAX East.

So, how do you explain this guy? Is he a true believer in digital freedom, willing to defy The Man because data and fun want to be free, or is he just slow to absorb the idea that companies want you to buy their products and don’t like it when you steal them?

GamingBolt article with more detail and video of the suspect here.

Some people have observed a lonely or sterile atmosphere at PAX East this past weekend. At first, I attributed it to PAX East’s immense size, but in retrospect maybe it’s as simple as this: when you go to a scifi or anime or comic book convention, you collectively share your love of the subject at hand in a kind of group worship which forces you to reach out and connect. At an event like PAX, almost everyone is at a console or sitting with their DS, which draws their attention inward and away from the masses around them. I found that that liveliest and most social rooms at PAX’s free play areas were the board game, RPG, and card areas. The console free play areas were significantly lonelier feeling, even though they were larger and better attended.

The group interaction of more traditional board games or media consumption lends itself more easily to social connections that portable or console play.