A study has led to a shocking (but not so surprising) result.

Russia’s war against Ukraine has resulted in a massive loss of foreign exposure to the industry and a significant departure of the gaming industry from the country. According to a new study by the Russian game developers’ collective and school XYZ School, piracy is worsening. Seven out of ten respondents (69%) admitted to pirating at least one game in 2022, and 51% said they downloaded more games in 2022 compared to 2021. The study was conducted in June 2023, and 1500 people were surveyed. According to Emma Yusova, XYZ School’s COO, a pirated game refers mainly to games downloaded from torrent trackers.

Of those surveyed, 27% had downloaded three or more games, and 20% had downloaded at least ten. 31% did not, primarily for moral reasons, and 7% did not buy games last year. Maybe what Valve’s Gabe Newell used to say about piracy (people resort to it because of distribution problems) is not stupid. Indeed, piracy is already considered attractive if content cannot be accessed legally and easily (anything can be said here, even a foreign series that is never broadcast in this country or only broadcast years later…).

Although Steam is still operational in Russia, Russian users cannot buy with local bank cards and are not allowed to buy, but they can with tricks (gift cards, codes). According to Yegor Tomsky, CEO of Watt Studio in Moscow, gamers are used to one-click purchases on Steam. Now it’s just as easy to download the pirated version, so everyone prefers to save money.

Meanwhile, the Russian government (or just Vladimir Putin, as it’s technically just him, with the rest being his puppets) is burying its head in the sand and trying to replace foreigners with local companies. We have written before about the launch of a local replacement for Unreal Engine and Unity, the launch of a state eSports school, and moves to spread propaganda in more online games (e.g., Minecraft).

Russian President Vladimir Putin attended a meeting in the Kremlin with a funny title (Russia – a land of opportunities), where he met several industry leaders. For example, he responded to a speech by Anna Kozlova, the winner of a recent state-subsidized competition for game developers, and did not give up on the games industry. It’s all part of the Games of the Future initiative.

“I completely agree with you: videogames, what you do, is not a plaything. Firstly, this is a colossal business, we know it, multi-billion dollar. But the most important thing, the most important thing, is not money. It is that, as you correctly noted, [games] should be at the intersection of art and education. Games should help a person develop, help find himself, should help educate a person both within the framework of universal human values and within the framework of patriotism and broadly from a humanitarian point of view. As for the Games of the Future, one of the authors of this idea is present here. That is, this idea has been floating around for a long time, but it hasn’t worked out everywhere, even though it hasn’t worked out anywhere. But I think that under the [new] leadership, we will succeed,” Putin said, according to the Kremlin website.

And they just won’t give up.

Source: PCGamer