Uk Spending Rises

Lockdown for all of us has been a challenge. Thankfully for those in our hobby we have plenty to entertain ourselves. Across all platforms of gaming we have seen flash sales and deals to keep our gaming cheap and plentiful. Last week I snagged ten games on the PSN market place for £20. But I am far from being the only one shelling out on virtual goodness.

Nintendo spending is up by 335% on software and hardware sales, probably due to the overwhelming success of Animal Crossing: New Horizons. Steam, Valve's platform has seen spending rise by 250%, while the Playstation Network is up at 158% and the Xbox 137%. 

While so many companies around the world are considering bankruptcy or shutting down chains of stores, the computer games industry is raking in the rewards due to people being stuck indoors. 

Online Piracy risen by nearly 60%

According to the Guardian UK Piracy has risen massively during lockdown. It is during these times of self isolation and, for many, a lack of income that options become far more tantalising. This is not just a trend within the UK but worldwide as this graph from MUSO shows.

Films and hit shows such as Contagion and Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness have been huge draws for streaming services in recent weeks, and for illegal websites that host pirated copies.

“For the last three years of data, we’ve seen film and TV [piracy] in every single territory in the world spike at the weekends,” said Andy Chatterley, Muso’s chief executive. "The company now sees even more weekday film piracy by U.S. users than it previously did on weekends," he said.

Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness

The top pirate sites in the U.S, U.K, Germany, France, Italy and Spain served 50% more ads to users in the first quarter compared with the previous quarter, according to White Bullet Solutions Ltd., a London-based company tracking the advertising that supports intellectual property theft.

While Netflix and other streaming sites are having to reduce the quality of their streams to allow for the increased demand, many pirate streaming sites are still offering high definition viewing. 

"Netflix said it added more than double the number of subscribers it forecast in the first quarter, and Walt Disney Co. said it had 50 million subscribers to its Disney+ service on April 8, from 28.6 million in early February. It had told investors last year that it expected 60 million to 90 million signups by the end of fiscal 2024." - Wall Street Journal

In response to this increase social media companies have cracked down of streaming by banning certain URLs, while Europol warned customers that black market streaming can open you up to forms of cyber attack. Meanwhile police forces worldwide have been arresting people behind the piracy. 

With an increase in piracy and peoples desperation the chances of downloading harmful software has increased along with door to door and phone scamming of the elderly and vulnerable. 

Stay smart, stay safe. 

Stay Home: Epic Gives Away 3 Free PC Games

Epic Games give away at least one game a week for PC users, this week there are three games to be downloaded. While not what most would deem VP worthy perhaps it will give you something else to do during lock down?

Gone Home is a first-person exploration video game developed and published by The Fullbright Company. It is a short but interesting romp set in 1995 where the player is in the role of a young woman trying to piece together where her family have gone and what has happened to them.

Hob is a curious small adventure game that tells a wordless story that you have to piece together yourself. While it is not hard to understand or follow the narrative it does require some work to piece together. Well worth a look its a great way to pass a few hours during lockdown.

Drawful 2 is one of many Jackbox games. It does what it says on the tin and supplies much hilarity in a simple fashion. Like Pictionary but with no undo function, it will have you drawing your prompts within 60 seconds for your party to guess what your creation is. Drawful 2 also introduces the ability to create your own game prompts, which with the right group of friends makes the game even better.

All three of these are worth a shot, especially as they are free. If you have a access to a PC these are all very low spec games and should run on most systems. 

They can be downloaded here.