In the early nineties, there was this cool thing in the PC gaming space called “shareware.” It was kind of like today’s downloadable demos, but much better, because it felt like you were getting a full gaming experience rather than a mere slice.
Here’s how it worked. PC Game companies would distribute the first chunk of a larger episodic game for free, via places like their web site or bulletin board services, or handing out physical disks. Then they would encourage users to share it with each other via whatever means they’d like, whether that be through copying said disks or uploading things to the crusty ancient version of the internet. These shareware tasters were often like complete games unto themselves, containing fully developed levels, bosses, and gameplay mechanics. Sometimes they even had their own unique designs rather than just being the first part of a larger whole. Those users that wanted to buy the rest of the game would carefully read a page of in-game instructions to find an address to mail a paper check to, and some mysterious amount of time later, they’d get a hard copy of the rest of the game back in an envelope.
I think this came about in part because software piracy was already rampant in these early enthusiast PC gaming days, so why not lean in and use the behavior that you already knew was happening as a sort of…
