What do you all define as "abandonware" and when is it okay to download a game?

[HOTSPUR]

Basically, the question in the title.

I read a post in another thread about someone not being able to play a game because the price has gotten insane, but I just thought, well, (insert game here) hasn't been rereleased in any capacity whatsoever by publisher and owner. Legalities aside, I don't see a single issue with downloading said game personally. In fact, emulation might be the best thing to happen to games besides the games and consoles being released in the first place imo.

As much as I wish games like Earthbound, the Persona PS1 and PSP titles, something like Pandora's Tower for Wii, even shit like Lollipop Chainsaw and Shadows of the Damned (PS3 versions anyways) weren't expensive as hell and would love to own them, the publishers just do not care about preserving their own titles in lieu of PC ports and the like.

I know some of these games are available digitally and some aren't, just using them as an example

What do yall think?

 

[The Lord of Cereal]

Well, this post is against site rules and will be removed soon, but I personally dislike piracy of retro games because very often local retro game stores will have them at semi decent prices.

Had a friend pirate Demons Souls PS3 about a year ago and like the same week I managed to pick it up from my local retro game shop for $5. Stuff like Earthbound or Mother 3 or something I can maybe see, but it's just kinda icky to me still personally

 

[J-Soul]

Scalpers and hoarders deserve all the money they make, and you should pay extravagant fees for playing old, out of print games. If people could just buy classic games digitally or pirate them, think of the money that rich game speculators would lose. Even worse, executives like Randy Pitchford and Bobby Kotick would have to compete with both old and new games for your game dollars. Please, show some pity for these people and never download a game that's out of print.

 

[L Thammy]

"Abandonware" is just kind of a term that software pirates came up with in the nineties.

Nowadays, a lot of software from that era has been released on freeware licenses anyhow.

List of commercial video games released as freeware - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[nsilvias]

if its in paradise (not the exact name of the site) and its not nintendo and not a popular game (or ip) that will most likely ever get a rerelease then i dont see an issue. that site has been around since i was a kid maybe even longer and publishers have never bothered to get the site taken down so i imagine they dont really care at the end of the day as much as they claim to hate piracy. the only sites ive seen get taking down are either because nintendo or a lack of funds to keep the site running.

 

[Tavernade]

Due to site policies on piracy it's difficult to host threads on topics like this.