I suspect that a lot of that 40% are people who pirate it to try it out before purchasing. What ever happens to demo disks and the like? I miss that

Yup, the only two companies I can trust with game quality are Sega and Valve, all the rest either have toxic communities or had major fuckups with quality, performance or plots, and I don't trust them with $4.99 at all.

I like the rockstar approach. Have a local player game that has a story and a lot of fun mechanics, and then have an online version with fun side quests and adventures with your friends. Totally worth the $50 cost of entry.

welp, it didnt age well

But then it s not piracy anymore. I often transform a pirated game I like into a buy on Steam later that I never touch, but almost never pay again for a game I got for free legally - what matters to me (but that s just me) is the convenience and comfort of the legal offer, not the support to companies I assume have planned for my consumption behaviour. If I learn they put on torrents willingly, I ll probably swallow the lack of convenience and assume I m doing the right thing.

The only thing I feel annoyed by is that I could be buying a game I pirated at a sales price, displacing cost for something I shouldn't have been able to, but again if prices were more aligned with perceived value and risk of mismatch between marketing and realized quality, I d hesitate less sending money their way.