I can absolutely confirm the thing about being more likely to buy a game after pirating it, at least for md. It’s why I bought games like Slay the Spire, Balatro, and Brok the InvestiGator. Didn’t have the money at the time, so I got pirated copies and eventually legit copies of all 3 games because I liked them so much.

Hell, for Brok, I even helped pitch in on funding for the 2 DLCs and have some physical merch as well. None of that would have happened without a little piracy.