Earlier around the time of Mafia's release there were much more prevalent demos on sites like Fileshack and Fileplanet and others so pirating games wasn't necessary to just try them really. My internet was poor at the time too, so I did not engage in it myself directly until a few years later when broadband finally starting kicking in, and that originally was focused on newer games. This led to understanding piracy as an actual way to obtain games, illegitimate, but possible and the most economic way at the time. Took me forever to get it from him, as it was the only way I was going to be able to play the game, did not have my own money and typically did not get many games from my parents (relative to now, which is an unreasonable context to frame it in because I sometimes buy a lot of games). The first game I engaged in piracy was in early high school with Mafia 1 that some dude was giving people CDs for. Same goes for, and other preservation organizations. I want Night Dive to be able to do their jobs, and not be held up by ridiculous red tape. I have no hope for reformation of copyright law, as chances are it will continue to be extended longer and longer until copyright eventually lasts 300 years past the author's death and Disney owns every company and intellectual property. A bill was considered a decade ago that didn't really understand what orphaned works are, but it'll eventually make a return to the legislative branch. The US government is going to have to address the topic of orphaned works eventually. A game like No One Lives Forever not being able to be re-released because no one knows who owns the rights AND NO ONE IS BOTHERED TO LOOK is such a microcosm of the failure of copyright law in its original intention. It was hijacked from being about promoting growth of the arts to being a few giant companies owning everything and sitting on it forever. I also want to make it clear, copyright law is GARBAGE. I want to make it clear, two wrongs don't make a right. But without preservation, so many games will just be.

I don't think piracy is okay for 'I want to try a game' or 'I don't have money' or 'This company does bad things' reasons.

While has a DMCA exemption for video games for historical preservation, there are gaps and spaces in their catalog (no Nintendo systems for example). I'm an advocate of abandonware, though I haven't partaken in years.

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