How’s this for a new marketing approach: give your game away for free to pirates that would have otherwise paid nothing for it. Wait, what?

That’s exactly what 11 bit studios, makers of This War of Mine, is doing.

The game launched on November 14 and almost immediately, it was uploaded to The Pirate Bay for anyone to download and play free of charge. 11 bit studios took it one step further by offering up legit copies of the game.

In the comments section for the game’s listing on TPB, a spokesperson – Karol – from 11 bit studios said they are really happy to hear that people like their game. It proves that spending two years on it was worth it.

Karol thanked those who decided to buy the game and support them as it’ll allow them to continue to develop for This War of Mine and create even better games in the future. The studio symphonized with those that can’t buy the game, saying they know life and sometimes it’s just not possible.

And then Karol dropped the bomb by posting 10 codes for the Steam copy of the game so more people could check it out. All that she asked in return was to spread the word if they liked the game.

In a follow-up with Polygon, 11 bit studios’ Pawel Miechowski said not all pirates are the same. Sure, there are people that would pirate the game even if it only cost 10 cents but many often forget that there are other people that simply can’t afford the game because of personal reasons.

As you can imagine, the reaction on TPB is nothing short of amazing with dozens of comments in favor of the studio and plenty of promises to actually buy the game.