CrookedRain
Member
Did you read the whole thing? All this crap is in addition to the three install restriction that ME will have.maus said:
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Mass Effect PC forces draconian copy protection - UPDATE, EA relents
- Thread starter Endless
- Start date
maus said:
They bumped Bioshock up to 5 installs and with Mass Effect you also have a 3 install restriction.
But really, do you think this is hurting pirates? The pirates are the only people who won't have to deal with this protection scheme, since they'd have to disable it anyways. The only people who are going to have to deal with the 10 days without playing phone support bullshit is the people who actually pay for the game.
No not really.Doytch said:
Knowing that there's an install limit is pretty annoying. Why not just one or the other?
It seems to me most of these copy protection schemes are approaching it the wrong way. I wonder if the publishers get their money back when Securom gets cracked within 2 days. I know that Starforce took a damn while to crack but the stigma around them killed any credibility they had.
Chiggs
Gold Member
Still buying it; don't care. I love seeing all these knee-jerk reactions from people, too. Hey guys, maybe if some of your fellow pc gamers weren't such l337 scumbags, we wouldn't be having this problem now would we?
I don't care how many times it authenticates my .exe file. In the rare event that my connection is down and I want to play the game, I will then write that angry letter to EA, but I certainly won't sit here and play the "what if!" game all day long.
Piracy is rampant on the pc, and I cannot wait for the day when those worthless dregs are prosecuted in a way similar to what the RIAA does. Yeah, go ahead and call me a fascist. I don't care. People put a lot of time and energy into these games only to have some schlub rip it and send it around the net so people as equally as worthless as them can share in it.
Pirates are hurting the platform I most love, and I want them to pay and pay dearly Here's hoping for a level of severe punishment that doesn't fit the crime. Go ahead, make an example out of them.
After that you would just contact tech support. Similar to what Microsoft does with Windows.
And is Securom really that easy to crack? I'm sure there's a lot of smart pirates out there, but how about your average one? You think they can best it?
I don't care how many times it authenticates my .exe file. In the rare event that my connection is down and I want to play the game, I will then write that angry letter to EA, but I certainly won't sit here and play the "what if!" game all day long.
Piracy is rampant on the pc, and I cannot wait for the day when those worthless dregs are prosecuted in a way similar to what the RIAA does. Yeah, go ahead and call me a fascist. I don't care. People put a lot of time and energy into these games only to have some schlub rip it and send it around the net so people as equally as worthless as them can share in it.
Pirates are hurting the platform I most love, and I want them to pay and pay dearly Here's hoping for a level of severe punishment that doesn't fit the crime. Go ahead, make an example out of them.
Proc said:
After that you would just contact tech support. Similar to what Microsoft does with Windows.
And is Securom really that easy to crack? I'm sure there's a lot of smart pirates out there, but how about your average one? You think they can best it?
Technosteve
Banned
Piracy is too easy on PC, end of story. PC games with a single player only component will contiune to use restrictive DRM to counter the fact the cdkey has no future monetary value that an online component would bring to the creators. Probably the only way around PC piracy is to have hardware encryption in to the OS and MB like MS and intel's secure computing initiative
Minsc
Gold Member
Chiggs said:
If the pirates are getting the game with no hassles, what is the point of the protection? Why punish the people buying your product?
Do you think grabbing this from a torrent just like everything else before it is really beyond the typical pirate to understand? There's nothing different for the pirate between this game, or the one before it.
I hope we can agree the "protection" isn't actually doing anything except alienating a large # of
vocal forum posting
Chiggs said:
Except that you never actually have to phone Microsoft unless something is actually wrong with your activation, such as trying to activate it on new or upgraded hardware. Also, Microsoft have an automated activation system which works pretty well and has high availability. Whereas with these jokers, you have to call them after the third install even if you haven't changed any hardware, and you probably have to wait in a queue to speak to a human and explain that yes, you format your computer more often than once every two years, so pretty please can you be allowed to use the game that you legitimately purchased again.
As far as the defense force is concerned, there are any number of normal, everyday situations where ordinary people could fall afoul of this type of DRM, but here are a couple:
1. Joe Bloggs installs Mass Effect on his home PC and on his laptop. His home PC is older than his laptop, so it doesn't run so well, so he takes it into the computer shop for an upgrade. Since it's a pretty major upgrade, Joe has to reinstall Mass Effect afterwards, but this works fine and Joe is playing it happily. Then Joe gets a virus on his PC. He takes it into the computer shop, and the techs tell him he has to have Windows reinstalled in order to completely get rid of it. Once Joe gets his computer (now virus-free) back home and tries to reinstall Mass Effect, he's treated like a pirate and told he must call a support phone line, which may be charged at premium rate and staffed by foreigners whose accent Joe can't follow, before he can resume playing the game that he legitimately paid for.
2. John Smith takes regular business trips every couple of months. Since these normally involve long boring train journeys, John decides that he'll install Mass Effect on his laptop so that he can play it while on the train. This works fine on the first trip, but the next time he comes to play it, he's told that he needs an internet connection. He's not travelling by National Express East Coast, so he doesn't have internet access on the train, and is thus relegated to staring out the window or playing Solitaire or Minesweeper instead of the game that he legitimately paid for.
No doubt the DRM defenders will claim that these scenarios are contrived, but there are an almost infinite number of variations on these themes which can occur to normal people in normal daily lives.
Now, unlike some of the others in this thread, I am not so unrealistic as to expect every publisher to go the Stardock route and drop DRM entirely, but there ARE other choices (SafeDisc is one) which would not result in these problems.
Minsc
Gold Member
Look at it this way.
Look at the people who are complaining. Pay attention to whether they are people who are potential customers planning on buying the game, or pirates.
Ok. They seem to be people wanting to buy the game.
So. Ask yourself now, why aren't the pirates complaining about this protection?
Hmmm. Maybe because they're not the fucking ones being subjected to it!
Pirates - 1
Customers - 0
Look at the people who are complaining. Pay attention to whether they are people who are potential customers planning on buying the game, or pirates.
Ok. They seem to be people wanting to buy the game.
So. Ask yourself now, why aren't the pirates complaining about this protection?
Hmmm. Maybe because they're not the fucking ones being subjected to it!
Pirates - 1
Customers - 0
Chiggs
Gold Member
Minsc said:
Here's the thing: What makes you so sure Securom isn't doing its job? How are you determining that it's not? What is your data? I know other systems have been cracked, but surely there's a reason these companies keep using them. Are they really that clueless? I find that hard to believe. I know we mock EA and all, but that is one tight ship.
Pirates already are the kinds of "1337" gamers who hate on EA as it is. Mass Effect will be a very popular game. Now they just made themselves an even bigger target than it already would've been (and it was a big target to start with).Chiggs said:
Whats worse, all the hackers who broke SecuRom for Bioshock now have a nice lead time in which to start seeing how other server checks have been defeated, and all the guys who've cracked server checks before have plenty of time to look into how Bioshock's SecuRom feature was cracked.
Or worse, for such hackers to team up and break it together.
When did the PSP really get blown open to the point where Sony was having updates cracked within days, sometimes even hours, of release? When some of the bigger hackers in the scene all got together. Hackers are a large and highly motivated group as it is. Giving them a reason to band together just makes your odds against them worse.
I really think this could all be solved by going the hardware route. Flash drives are dirt cheap, make one that uses a proprietary file structure and driver (intentionally incompatible with windows USB drive drivers). It'd take a low level coder very little time to make a new and slightly different driver and whatnot for such a device and embed it into the game, and it'd be a significant blow to piracy for a small bit of retail profit (or a slight increase in MSRP).
Would it still get hacked? Sure, but initially pirates would need to make new programs to rip the new file format and dump it onto another drive and if you tweak how it works slightly with each game they'll have to update and tweak the program basically every time. Also, you start requiring the casual pirate to jump through a lot of extra hoops, specifically formatting a usb drive or a ghost drive for each new game as well as the current piracy install, run patch exe, and play steps.
Throw in some current staples, like online authentication at time of install (not a regular call home) and for any patches/updates/extra content and we'll see some progress. Piracy doesn't have a significant impact on any part of the gaming market, its when piracy is easy and convenient that it becomes an issue.
Chiggs said:
Well, as I keep mentioning, SafeDisc is one widely-used alternative. It does require you to have the disc in the drive, but in return for that there's no install limits, no CD key authentications (except for games with multiplayer components, which will typically validate the CD key when the user logs on to the multiplayer network, but personally I don't see a problem with that) and no telephone lines to call to get your game reactivated in a few years after you've formatted a few times.
Haunted
Member
I will buy this game. No easily cracked copy protection will keep me from owning the definitive version from one of this gen's best WRPGs (so far).
I know we shouldn't reward publishers doing draconian DRM like this, but the dev's hard work in creating this game needs to be appreciated. I wish there was a ways to clearly distinguish between the two so I know my money sent the right message.
I know we shouldn't reward publishers doing draconian DRM like this, but the dev's hard work in creating this game needs to be appreciated. I wish there was a ways to clearly distinguish between the two so I know my money sent the right message.
Chiggs said:
Everything's been cracked.
This is the worst part of DRM, and the part that most people forget about. DRM operates with incredible permissions, and on a busted user model OS like Windows, it just magnifies the security risks. Taking Comp Sec classes has made me paranoid about this stuff.
Chiggs said:
Well, of course it's been cracked. All the protections have been cracked. But EA is clearly a company that refuses to consider releasing a game without protection, so all things being equal, they should choose a protection that's less onerous on the legitimate customer. It'd almost certainly save them money too, as they wouldn't have to maintain costly activation servers and call centres.
EDIT: also, for people that think that taking an existing protection system and altering it slightly would be a workable solution... I'm fairly sure that recracking something that's already been cracked in the past takes less time than the original crack. Take a look at 2006's Windows Media DRM cracking "arms race" for example, with FairUse4WM. There was a huge gap between the first release of FU4WM and the previous time that WMDRM had been cracked, but once the DRM was altered it only took a few days before FU4WM was updated. Thankfully in 2007 the music industry finally started realising that music DRM was all just snake oil in the end and consumers would if given the chance be quite happy to pay for regular old MP3s. Unfortunately it seems that other digital distribution media have yet to learn from this example and are treading down the same old route.
Haunted One said:
Bet you anything it'll keep you from playing it, though! :lol
Heck, when BioShock PC came out the activation servers crumpled under the load and nobody could play it. They claim they're ready for that this time but it remains to be seen what will actually happen.
fallengorn
Bitches love smiley faces
As stupid as it may seem, the steam version uses securom as well.Bernbaum said:
bee
Member
it certainly wont bother me at all, gotta put the disc in every 10 days...wow, got it pre-ordered along with grid should be a good end of may for pc games
hope it doesn't get cracked also, contrary to what a lot of people in this thread have said a lot of games have never been cracked, a lot of the starforce 3 games like gt legends never were and newer stuff like the witcher 1.3 have no cracks, also the previous game to use this protection, bioshock, was never cracked by "teh scene" idiots
hope it doesn't get cracked also, contrary to what a lot of people in this thread have said a lot of games have never been cracked, a lot of the starforce 3 games like gt legends never were and newer stuff like the witcher 1.3 have no cracks, also the previous game to use this protection, bioshock, was never cracked by "teh scene" idiots
Stuggernaut
Grandma's Chippy
This game ever coming to PS3?
Bioshock was never cracked? Could've fooled me, what with all the pirated versions downloaded on popular torrent sites.bee said:
And The Witcher was cracked for the first two updates, 5 months since the game came out, and the new patch is only a month old. Any pirate who wanted to play the game got to play the same product at basically the same time a legitimate retail customer could have for the first several months.
Also, Starforce 3 games have been cracked, some take a while to do so however.
Nothing has kept hackers out. the more popular the game the more hackers work to break it.
JasonUresti
Member
Thats my question, doesn't placing such a DRM scheme on your software, one that causes such a fuss and generates so much attention, have the same effect as placing a large target over the game's heart inviting pirates to give it their best effort to defeat? Doing a scheme like this, I would think, would cause pirates to crack it and distribute it as quickly and as widely as possible.
I've seen some argue that its just to delay it for a few days, to make people who can't wait buy it, who would have pirated it. Is there any hard data for this, outside of word of mouth/developer wishful thinking/marketing voodoo analysis? It also strikes me as treating PC titles the same as console titles, where most of the sales are in the first week, where as a PC titles generally seller slower at start but more steadily for several months. Crysis notably started slow, selling less than 100k in North America the first month, yet check back a couple months later and it went over one million. A console title starting out at 100k in its first month would be lucky to reach 200k in its lifetime.
I've seen some argue that its just to delay it for a few days, to make people who can't wait buy it, who would have pirated it. Is there any hard data for this, outside of word of mouth/developer wishful thinking/marketing voodoo analysis? It also strikes me as treating PC titles the same as console titles, where most of the sales are in the first week, where as a PC titles generally seller slower at start but more steadily for several months. Crysis notably started slow, selling less than 100k in North America the first month, yet check back a couple months later and it went over one million. A console title starting out at 100k in its first month would be lucky to reach 200k in its lifetime.
bee
Member
Drek said:
bioshock wasn't cracked by the usual groups just some random nobody is what i was meaning
starforce 3 for all its bad points and obvious bad publicity did actually work, yes as you say some did get cracked, but the majority of games using the full force version of starforce 3 remain uncracked years after release and those that did get cracked took 6 months or more by which time i'm sure the publishers were more than happy with its performance
not saying i want to go back to that, not at all, but i really cant see another way forward for big budget pc games other than hardcore drm or blanket lawsuits of ip addresses on torrent trackers
Icomeinpeace
Banned
rhfb said:
What about the Bleemcast's? They were never cracked or bootlegged, from the posts I've read by the author it was a really strong protection.
BobsRevenge
I do not avoid women, GAF, but I do deny them my essence.
I feel like this sort of thing doesn't help the game sell more at all. This will get cracked within a week of release just like what happened with Bioshock. Piracy is bad but copy protection like this isn't the way to fix it at all.
Sins of a Solar Empire was a breath of fresh air on this front. I'm really glad I bought it. I don't even have to pop the disk in to play it.
Sins of a Solar Empire was a breath of fresh air on this front. I'm really glad I bought it. I don't even have to pop the disk in to play it.
BolognaOni
Member
Well, this kind of crap does yank my crank a bit. Sure, piracy is a problem, but copy-protection schemes are pain in the behind. Has anyone ever been convinced not to pirate something because of them? I imagine licensing the security features are not cheap either, why bother?
I don't have a lot of sympathy for companies that put all this stuff out. That said, I will buy ME, and will probably crack it, although if you don't have to have the CD in the drive I most likely won't care. If I ever have a problem with the copy protection, I figure I can count on the pirates to help me out, since tech support is mostly worthless.
I don't have a lot of sympathy for companies that put all this stuff out. That said, I will buy ME, and will probably crack it, although if you don't have to have the CD in the drive I most likely won't care. If I ever have a problem with the copy protection, I figure I can count on the pirates to help me out, since tech support is mostly worthless.
platypotamus
Member
Game politics is claiming that Spore is going to have this shit as well:
http://gamepolitics.com/2008/05/08/pc-gamers-angered-by-eas-new-copy-protection-system/
Fucking Securom is the new Starforce and I don't want this shit in my games.
http://gamepolitics.com/2008/05/08/pc-gamers-angered-by-eas-new-copy-protection-system/
Fucking Securom is the new Starforce and I don't want this shit in my games.
platypotamus
Member
Penny Arcade Weighs In:
