Piracy has always been related to theft, but literally so in this case, as HookedGamers is claiming that an Alabama man has stolen Xbox 360 copies of the new Call of Duty: Black Ops from the actual printing press, and was – last night at least – planning to leak it to the internet.
The man took the copies for “associates”, one of whom is reportedly “Ungodly Leaker”, “a member of an underground hacking forum” who purchased the stolen disk and posted images of it on his forum.  This morally sound chap apparently did the same with Halo: Reach some time before its release.
HookedGamers says that Treyarch’s community manager tried to join the hacking forum and “negotiate” with the people involved, but was subsequently banned.
However, he did manage to get in touch with one guy from the forum, 97SIRHB, via Twitter. Some back and forth messaging resulted in the member 97SIRHB revealing all on the forum, saying that if the game was leaked the site would be shut down.
The game is out for the rest of us on the 9th of November.
tonycawley
Arseholes!
Liberi Fatali
Yup, I agree
Nathanuc
Sounds like something a typical CoD fan would do lol….
BrendanCalls
Rather an unnecessary generalisation don’t you think?
I’m not a nob but I enjoy CoD as do many of my non-nob friends.
Hope your future comments aren’t as sweepingly offensive
Liberi Fatali
I don’t see the amazingness of Cod and why its needs to be bought every year…. but why ruin everyones experience and make the industry lose cash due to copies?
Juelz345
@Nathanuc
“Sounds like something a typical CoD fan would do lol….”
Sounds like something a typical dick would say lol…
Rocket_345
I’m a typical COD fan and so are many of my mates but we don’t pirate games. All of my mates actually bought the game and most off them are the biggest COD fans that i know.
Liberi Fatali
That isn’t a surprise :(
bunimomike
Ah, when you have to bypass all this hacking nonsense why not just steal it instead. Ugh. Security needs to be stepped up at the printing press.
Jisonga
Is there no limits to just how low these guys will go to spoil for all us legit gamers.
zide
And how this affects on you?
cc_star
The removal of Other OS, the constant firmware updates, potentially the delaying of one the year’s biggest PS3 releases, and that’s off the top of my head whilst I’m eating a cheese sandwich without thinking about it.
Bilbo_bobbins
mmmmm cheese and ham for me today, with mayo
Klart
How about this: the more games are illegally dowloaded and the less they are legally bought, the less gaming companies will be willing to invest a lot of time/effort/money in making fantastic games
paxpacis
@Klart
This reminds me, Shell said last year or so they need to lay off people, the estimated to have a 6 Billion profit and they only got 5.6…
So yes I agree pirating hurts but I think the companies should lower the price of a game to stop people from pirating instead of make them higher to compensate..
zide
Other OS support has been already taken off so that doesnt matter and even if it wasnt this particular incident is about the Xbox version of the game so your argument doesnt make sense.
@Klart, you really think a company like Activison stops putting huge ammounts of money on CoD series because stuff like this? What youre saying is that gaming companies think “Hey, lets stop putting effort in our games and make shitty games instead, so no one will pirate it!”.
Liberi Fatali
Just generic ham and Cheese with a spread of butter…. at these you can’t pirate cows….. and pigs
iAvernus
@zide…even if it doesn’t affect anyone here directly, which it does mind you, as a gamer you should know not to support piracy, and support the developers who made the game by buying the actual game. You’re arguing with people who are against piracy?? Pirate much?
Juelz345
@zide
Seriously, not only do you not see the numerous affects that piracy has on gamers but you bitching at people who don’t condone it?
Reason why piracy are a problem for gamers:
Developers/publishers implement strict DRM that can be a real pain in some cases.
All the basterds playing a game weeks before the general population have an obvious and unfair advantage over the rest of us come release day.
Less money for developers means less money to maintain studios and make good games. How many Studios have closed down on the last 18 months due to money trouble?
As CC said, Other OS was removed due to the potential for piracy.
More negative press for an industry that has more than it’s fair share.
If you are at all passionate about games, then any one of these issues would be enough for you. If you’re not, then why take the time to create an account and comment.
It’s quite apparent that you take part in piracy by the way you defend it. Don’t try to justify your actions by trying to convince others that it’s no big deal.
I hope everyone who plays a pirated version of this game (and any other game for that matter) gets their console and ID banned and loose a finger in a horrible accident involving vodka and a nail file.
Armonster9000
The price of games now surely have something to do with piracy.
N12K
To be fair CD and DVD prices have dropped ever since piracy become such a problem for those industries, in my opinion.
I’m not agreeing with pirating games and certainly won’t be wasting my money on hacking my PS3. Besides I like to have the original CD case and game with the knowledge I can play online, get the latest updates and not be in fear of having my console banned.
JokerSavage
Wouldn’t happen on the PS3, yes 3.41 is still about and people are using “backed up” games but the key part of this is online and that unlike the xbox that can not be played without the current version of firmware which has closed the hole. Xbox = hackbox = glad mine broke.
Juelz345
Someone stealing and leaking a 360 games makes you happy that your broke? Well that’s sound logic right there.
Hopefully the people playing the illegal copies get permanently banned, as was the case with MW2.
I had a friend, who despite my warning, had his box modded to play pirated games, got MW2 early (with the intentions of purchasing the disk when it was officially released or so he said) and was banned a few weeks later. Then had to go and buy a new 360, a copy of MW2 and lost his 20k gamer score. I laughed at him til I nearly passed out.
Juelz345
And as far as it not being possible on PS3, did you read this:
http://www.thesixthaxis.com/2010/10/19/medal-of-honor-pirated-working-on-3-41/
tonycawley
But it isn’t possible, or at least playing it online isn’t, and that’s what he was getting at.
BIGAL-1992
They really need to patch up the hull of the ship, don’t they?
kjkg
Wonder how easy it is to actually nab a copy off the printing press thingymagig. I’m sure they aren’t going to have a crapload of security, but it must have a counter of what they expect to make and what was made in units. I must be hungry, I can’t work out if that actually made sense.
Liberi Fatali
Looks like the poor Cod’s been illegally caught…..
Kennykazey
That man is a douchebag, and must be shot. With soft pellets. Until death. By natural causes.
3shirts
Woah, calm down there :)
Juelz345
Nah, I’m with Kenny. The softer the better.
iAvernus
I remember a while back seeing a guy putting a Black Ops cd into his XBOX and got all the way to the main menu. It seemed legit, so I don’t think this is an isolated case. This guy just wants fame…and he’s getting it.
PriceKitty
Eh…This is not that big of a deal, considering the fact that they probably can’t play online and get ahead of everyone. I’m sure the servers won’t be running and all. Plus, I only have Ps3 so, heh.
I just hope the game has better protection than the other CoD games, as far as hackers go.