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StarDunk going to a free demo model
StarDunk is one of my most favorite apps recently, ever since I covered it back for Daily App a little while ago. It's an amusing little 2D basketball game, made even more impressive by the fact that it juggles online multiplayer across the world -- as you throw baskets, you're also playing in real-time against other users, and competing with various powerups and stunts for as many points as possible. The game was also notable for being one of the first titles integrated into Game Center, back when that service first arrived on the iPhone. But the app hasn't been doing as great as it could be, according to developer Godzilab -- first, they had some issues with piracy, and now they're saying that the game's just not selling as many copies as they'd hoped. So the game has gone free -- kind of. You can pick it up right now in the App Store for free, and play ten games without paying a single cent. Once you've played those games, then you have the option to buy the whole app via in-app purchase for $2.99. That's not exactly freemium (it's more of a demo version), but at least players will be able to get a feel for the game and how it works before laying down their three bucks. Personally, I still recommend the game -- I bought it on my own and still enjoy a quick game (even though I usually land in the middle of the rankings). But if you've been waiting for a chance to try it out, definitely take advantage of the new model.
Mac indie dev asks The Pirate Bay to keep a torrent of his software
As a software developer myself, I know how hard it is to see your product being ripped off. We have recently reported on how even $2 iPhone games (like Stardunk) or iPad games (like Aqua Globs HD) are not immune despite their low cost and closed platforms. Their developers have reported piracy rates as high as 38% and 50%, respectively. Mac developer Dmitry Chestnykh of Coding Robots recently came across a crack on The Pirate Bay for his journal keeping application Mémoires and decided to use different tactics. Out of curiosity, he downloaded the crack to see how it worked, and he did not like what he found one bit, ... but it's not for the reasons you might think. Reproduced below is a portion of the official complaint he has filed with the Pirate Bay, under the heading of "Notice of Ridiculous Activity" (keep in mind English isn't Dmitry's first language). It has come to my attention that the torrent located at [URL] is ridiculous. Not only it requires installing APE plugin, and generating keyfiles using some scary tool, it contains an [expletive] *WINDOWS* program to verify the validity of this release. The "How-to" section in the description is just incomprehensible, and won't be understood by anyone other than the writer of this description. Clearly, the "cracker" Minamoto did a lazy job and don't know how to crack software. It's an [expletive] SINGLE BOOLEAN SWITCH that validates the licence, it doesn't require any Application Enhancer tricks or whatever. I demand that you don't remove this torrent, so that people can laugh at Minamoto and CORE skills. However, I also demand the better crack to be made, so that it doesn't cripple the user experience of my beautiful program. Dmitry: for your vigorous defense of Quality, TUAW salutes you. [via torrentfreak.com]
Arrrrr. The pirates have plundered StarDunk
You'd think that an iOS game that was originally priced at $0.99 and is now selling for $1.99 wouldn't have a piracy problem. You'd be wrong. French game developer Godzilab recently tweeted that they've seen a 37.5% piracy rate for their massively mulitplayer online basketball game, StarDunk. The tweet also included a plea for help -- "37.5% of StarDunk players are using a cracked version. If anybody has a good way of detecting them, we'll take it." Mobile gaming site PocketGamer noted that in a followup, Godzilab said that the figure was calculated from the total number of copies of StarDunk that were sold in the App Store and the number of unique accounts that have been registered with the online (Plus+) server. The latter number was much larger than the former, leading to the online disclosure of the StarDunk piracy problem. Whether the solution comes from Plus+, the developer, or a combination of the two, it's certain that someone is going to find a way to stop the piracy. Perhaps releasing the game in a free, ad-supported version for the people who can't afford to spend two bucks might sink the pirate ship. Note: As the developers have noted in the comments, "We are actually counting the number of unique accounts, so if you install the game on iPad/iPod/iPhone multiple time and still use the same account we will count this as one game bought. So yes, we might count a few users who have multiple account but that should only be a few."
