[Jack Simth]

Originally posted by geoschmo:
But your point about piracy is certainly a factor I am sure. Think about what happens if you are at your buddies house and try this great new console game he bought. What do you do? You go buy one yourself. But if it's a great new PC game instead? "Hey man, great game. Burn me a copy will ya?"

Actually, it is just as difficult/easy to burn a copy of a DVD/CD game for your PS2 as it is to burn a copy of a DVD/CD game for your PC, and you can always build a simulator for the console that runs on your PC, if you know how, and distribute it (sometimes illegally) for free.

What really makes such things difficult are cartriges, which you can't copy or read without equipment specialized for each specific platform. This equipment can be reverse-engineered, so it is possible to copy games from cartriges or read them into your PC. However, that takes hardware manipulation and know-how, not a simple driver or program you can just download off the net, making it considerably more expensive and complex. For now, console gaming companies don't seem to be going the cartrige route, for the most part. Nintendo still does (I think), but as far as I know, they are the only ones doing so.