Lucky Frame’s Android Game Bought 8 Times, Pirated Over 2,400 Times

Edinburgh developer Lucky Frame’s latest Android game – Gentlemen! – has been bought legally 8 times, and pirated over 2,400 times in the three day period since it was launched. That’s according to their official Twitter feed, which made the claim this lunch time.

Gentlemen! is a “Victorian era head-to-head arcade battle” which pits two players against each other on the same device. “Take on your friends in this frantically paced duel game,” apparently. “Knives, bombs, homing pigeons – choose your weapon wisely, and master the art of the gravity flip.”

“An honorable duel, a dapper delight – GENTLEMEN!”

The game can be bought from Google Play here. It costs £2.99.

22 Comments

  1. Thats badder than bad. In future I’ll respect any dev that only puts paid for apps on iOS, where the piracy rate is surely much lower?

    A demo/lite version is often the best way to combat privacy, it removes the need for people to pirate just to try a game.

    • Dunno, the jailbreak community is pretty vibrant both for all the positive reasons for jailbreaking and then of course the door it leaves wide open to ‘sideload’ or whatever it’s called on iOS

      Google just announced 50 billions app downloads over the Play Store (they were at 48bn when Apple hit it’s 50 billionth a couple of moths ago) and that Google has already paid out more in the first half of 2013 to developers than it did in the whole of 2012, so there’s plenty of money to be made with phenomenal growth through legit channels.

      An app with just 8 Android tablet downloads & 156 iOS iPad downloads suggests other things may be wrong rather than just piracy, which has actually provided them a great opportunity to actually get their game talked about when previously no one may have heard of it.

  2. Wow, okay, maybe it’s something to do with blocking all devices they haven’t tested it on. I have eight devices linked to my account, not obscure ones, and it says they’re all incompatible. I physically can’t buy this.

    • That definitely might drive people into sideloading the app.
      I did this before with free apps.

      • Not saying that’s a valid reason to pirate a game, but I have to admit it can be quite difficult finding quality apps through Google Play. Just searching for Gentlemen! brings up dozens of PSY (the Korean music artist) apps but not this game. :/

    • Same here, says its not compatible with either of the 2 android devices I own. Hardly surprising then.

    • That will definitely cause piracy to shoot up. Availability is still one of the biggest reason people pirate.

      I’d be interested to see their numbers broken down by device.

  3. Just checked the android store on a SGS3 and can’t find it listed. Of course, I’ve had to wade through pages of Psy shit so it could be there, just really poorly ranked.

    • Yeah, that’s what I experienced when looking for the app.
      However, the App IS compatible with my Nexus 10.

  4. Still no excuse for piracy, maybe they should get it running on a Vita?

  5. I could only find it by clicking on the link even putting the ! in Gentleman brings up a shed load of Psy stuff.

    When you create a game maybe name check it on the store first to see what other dross will come up, I’m no business genius but I’ve got a grain of common sense.

    It’s also incompatible with all of my devices one of them being a pretty new model phone. I also see it’s been rated with 1 five star. , hardly a glowing review. Get a demo out there and build up your reputation before making people pay 3 quid or knock it down to attract more buyers. I bet the 8 people that bought it are the devs and their friends.

    • In fairness to them they said the name was decided before PSY released his song.

  6. Make a better game that’s worth buying.

  7. To be fair, this is a tablet oriented game with local multiplayer in mind. The mechanics wouldn’t work on a normal phone so unless you have a tablet, the “it’s not compatible with my phone” comments are useless. For reference, it is compatible with my Nexus 10.

    • I agree it’s not a phone orientated game but neither of my tablets are compatible, but the are 7 and 8 inchers so perhaps it’s still only designed for the big boys.

  8. Yep it’s not compatible with any of the phones linked to my account, but is with my tablets.

    Piracy is wrong, but this boils down to a few things; firstly that the tablet scene on Android is still maturing and there is little in the way to classify an app as tablet-only, hence those that cannot find it by searching.

    Then there is the nature of pirates in that wherever the apk for this has been posted, people will download it to give it a go regardless of having seen a video or screen shot….just that it is there is enough for people to download and install it.

    This is exacerbated by the price, which is unfortunately high. The numbers of legit purchases illustrate this, with so little purchases.

    I’d be most interested to know the page view stats on the Play Store before the tweet was sent, I’d imagine it was a relatively small number.

  9. Sounds like the launch of the game has been handled incredibly badly. The mention that so many devices haven’t been catered for is utterly insane!

  10. It appears they havent sold any because the game only works on a couple of tablets and they havent publicised it.

    The iOS version has sold 154 copies so not exactly stella either.

    • Are you suggesting this might be a lame publicity stunt tho get attention and the sixth axis have fallen for it hook line and sinker?

      • I have a lot of time for Yann & he’s an absolute diamond of a gentleman.

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