John Romero wishes Sandy Petersen well, says 20M Doom players weren’t pirates

A routine nostalgia post on X turned into a major discussion point, after Sandy Petersen, the veteran designer behind Doom and Age of Empires, replied to it. The post, which simply asked, “Be honest, did you ever pirate games?”, received a lengthy reply from Petersen stating that Piracy killed off companies like Atari, Amiga, and more.

Petersen argued that 70 to 90 percent of Doom‘s players pirated the game, and that around 50 percent of Age of Empires copies were pirated, with both cutting directly into development budgets and contributing to studio closures. Alongside Atari and Amiga, Petersen also named Cinemaware, and 3D Realms as casualities, and rejected the “try before you buy” defense outright. He pointed out that Doom offered nine free levels and Age of Empires included a free battle to let players try before committing.