One of the most significant problems in the video game industry is piracy, which has been around since the medium’s early days. People would copy their games and trade or sell them, leaving the publishers out of the transaction. Piracy continues to happen today despite more complex measures implemented by video game devs. In some cases, instead of outright trying to stop piracy from happening, some developers added hilarious means or rooting pirates out, as they’d find that their games were playable up to a point. These five hilarious anti-piracy traps trolled pirates, and they’re presented in no particular order.
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1) Game Dev Tycoon
In what is probably the best-known example and the most ironic anti-piracy measure comes from Game Dev Tycoon — a game all about developing and publishing a video game via your very own studio. If you pirated the game, you could absolutely play it, but there’s a catch. Once you begin to achieve a measure of success with your newly developed game, your income falls off a cliff. This results in widespread financial difficulties, as the company loses significant revenue due to piracy. Eventually, an employee lets the player know that piracy upended their success. The result was amusing, as pirates flooded message boards asking how to avoid the in-game piracy problem, only to realize they had outed themselves in the process.
2) Mirror’s Edge
Electronic Arts, which is famous (or infamous, depending on your point of view) for creating the Origin system for digital rights management, completely trolled pirates via Mirror’s Edge. To play the game, you have to make running jumps and parkour moves across rooftops, so constantly moving about quickly is necessary. In pirated copies of Mirror’s Edge, players would lose momentum while approaching an area they needed to jump from, slowing them down to barely a walking pace. The result is an entirely unplayable game, as the first area requires a giant leap, which you can’t do from a slow walk.
3) Batman: Arkham Asylum
Batman: Arkham Asylum is a revolutionary action-adventure game that lets players take control of the Caped Crusader in the game’s namesake setting. The game features stealth, fast-paced combat mechanics, and a fun means of getting around that involves gliding via the Dark Knight’s cape. Unfortunately for pirates, the glide mechanic didn’t work, causing ole’ Bats to flap around like a chicken as he dropped to the ground. When one pirate took to the Internet to complain and ask for help, the game’s devs responded that there wasn’t anything wrong with the game, but there was something wrong with the pirate’s morals.
4) Serious Sam 3: BFE
One tactic game devs use to combat piracy is letting the player progress for a bit before yanking the rug out from under them. This is the case for Serious Sam 3: BFE, where combat is already intense and chaotic with a dash of humor added on top. In a pirated copy of the game, a gigantic scorpion pops up that’s entirely immune to damage. No matter how much lead you unload into the thing, it just keeps coming at incredible speed with melee and ranged attacks. It’s funny to watch, but for pirates, they’re left with a game they cannot complete.
5) Crysis Warhead
Usually, when a game’s developers implement an anti-piracy measure meant to troll pirates, it doesn’t turn into a hilarious meme. You can’t say that of Crysis Warhead, which trolls pirates from the beginning, as their weapons only fire one type of ammunition: live chickens. The chickens don’t injure any enemies and only stagger them, so it’s all but impossible to play the game. This hasn’t stopped people from purposefully finding pirated copies to enjoy shooting live chickens at mobs, as it’s easily one of the funniest anti-piracy measures in video games.
What’s the funniest anti-piracy measure you’ve seen? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!
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A screenshot from Call Of Duty 4: Modern Warfare.
