Interesting. I've often thought that money is going to flow from movies and music into gaming, because games can be made harder to pirate thru having an online/multi-player/network aspect. Did you notice of these games whether they're mostly singleplayer/offline games? What's the deal when a game has an online component --- people pay up, even if the CD was a cheap copy?

Hei (traveller) Dan,

> Did you notice of these games whether they're mostly singleplayer/offline games? What's the deal when a game has an online component --- people pay up, even if the CD was a cheap copy?

I haven't ever done a formal study of internet cafes, though have used them in China, Nepal, Vietnam etc.

With these limitations in mind I've observed significant single player use and local area network gaming in cafes where internet bandwidth speeds were an issue.

China has a pretty simple and usable top-up system for paying for credits for online games. See: http://www.janchipchase.com/blog/archives/2006/01/post_33.html

Rule of thumb is: if it costs and there is a good enough free alternative, people in highly price sensitive markets will choose the free.

I'll keep a look out for hacks supplying access to online games though.