[nathanb]

That said, it seems like there are enthusiastic players who enjoy the game and who continue to play the pirated version (see the forum posts he cites in his original article).

I think this is an interesting measure, because presumably if you got far enough into the game that you saw this message you like the game reasonably well. You've gotten past the point where you're not sure if the game is worth the money (nevermind that there's already a demo exactly for that purpose) and you have chosen to continue playing the pirated version.

He didn't mention whether or not savegames from the pirated version can be loaded by the legitimate version, but if they can then pirates who then buy the game wouldn't even lose much in the way of progress.