Monument Valley Suffers High Piracy Rate On Android & iOS

Monument Valley is a mobile game that has garnered quite a lot of attention, and has appeared in many game of the year lists for 2014. Development studio Ustwo apparently created quite the hit  but the majority of players appear to have got the game for free, rather than pay the £2.49 fee on Android and iOS. In fact according to tweets from the studio 95% of Android installs were not paid for, while on iOS only 40% were paid for.

The studio also clarified that these figures did not include times when the game was available free during promotions on the Amazon App Store. Ustwo also stated that these figures didn’t mean a 95% piracy rate on Android as some of the other free installs were legitimate.

Even taking out the legitimate free copies it would still leave a really high number of installs that were pirated. Mobile gaming is a huge market now but devs will still face problems due to how easy it is to pirate content. It may take a little while longer before any permanent solution is put in place to stop it. Until then piracy will remain a huge risk.

Source: Twitter

 

6 Comments

  1. I wonder what the total percentage is.

    And if having a free demo would have helped. I know personally I’ve been eyeballing the game a while, but I don’t know if I’ll like it so I keep holding back. If there was a demo or timed trial (not some awful “free” version with IAP) then I’d check it out.

    Now I feel like buying it to help the devs out, so this marketing ploy is working. :-P

  2. It’s a cute game, but I felt the original price it was priced to hight, as the content isn’t huge in it and the replayability is none. I got it on a sale, which was a fine deal, but I’m not keen on paying full price for the new levels.

  3. I know that £2.49 is hardly anything, but I rarely buy games that are more than 99p. I think in my head, it’s too much for a mobile game, plus Google and Amazon do some great sales every now and again so if you’re ok with waiting a bit, then why not wait.

    • Yeah I’m in the same boat. I’m having a hard time paying more for mobile games, as the quality and depth of them, are rarely not worth more then a euro.

      Also having a Vita, kinda covers the more advanced mobile games.

      • I have both a Vita and 3DS, and find myself put off by the games on offer on mobile. Every time I visit the play-store I lose a little faith in humanity. Thank god for proper handhelds with production values.

  4. utter tosh who hasn’t pinched a dodgy apk here and there?

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