Playing games on Duckstation it just clicked with me that I only ever see this screen on bootup in the few PAL roms I keep around when I remember seeing it in most PS1 games as a kid. (Being a dumb kid I thought PIRACY in all caps was some kind of sinister organisation) The spellings of "offence" and "unauthorised" definitely point to this being something coming from Sony's UK branch.

I wonder why only PAL games have a warning like this and whether it had something to do with the UK and Europe having a pre-existing thriving culture of copying, downloading and cracking games thanks to the popularity of computer gaming where those things were trivial to do.

Imagine calling Sony's Customer Service in 1998 to tell them that you suspect that the copy of Metal Gear Solid that's a CD-R with METALL GER SOLID CD 1 scribbled on it you got off your classmate isn't genuine

have any other information about pirate product

miyazaki-laugh

  • plinky [he/him]
    ·
    6 months ago

    Good thing i don't view them as legitimate developers.

    Also the word likely doing some heavy lifting here

    • doublepepperoni [none/use name]
      ·
      6 months ago

      Also the word likely doing some heavy lifting here

      lmao, just noticed that. They couldn't even muster a meaty threat

      • BelieveRevolt [he/him]
        ·
        6 months ago

        I wouldn't be surprised if it was because in some European countries software piracy wasn't even a crime yet, I've heard that in 90s Italy for example pirated software was being sold in regular stores because it wasn't illegal.