Worst DRM EVER

May 7th, 2008, 11:29pm by Geoff

Wow.  I have nothing else to say but that this must not stand.

Posted in Geoff, Idiocy |



      

12 Responses to “Worst DRM EVER”

  1. Jeff Says:
    May 8th, 2008 at 12:50 am

    I agree it’s not great, but to play devil’s advocate for a second…

    It doesn’t seem all that unreasonable. Yes, it’s annoying and yes there should (hopefully) be a way to manually “extend” the DRM so that you can ensure that you have it for as long as you need (and this should be more like 30 days rather than 10 days probably) BUT, PC gaming has basically devolved into MMOs and FPS games (which are also on consoles now). It seems like the vast majority of people playing PC games now will have an internet connection, so this kind of DRM is not the worst thing in the world, particularly if it saves you from having to keep a CD/DVD in your drive.

    Of course, why not also include this option? My guess is that it’s basically just not strong enough… people have been ripping out CD checks for years now.

    On the other hand, is it unreasonable to expect that hackers will also get around this DRM as well, hacking the software so that it can be played without the online DRM check?

    I’m not a fan of DRM overall for this very reason, but this new DRM doesn’t seem so unbelievably worse than what we already have, especially if they can tweak it just a bit so that it’s not quite as restrictive.

  2. laesperanzapaz Says:
    May 8th, 2008 at 4:18 am

    Congratulations, Jeff, cofounder of LTTF. You have just made the worst, most uninformed post in your posting career in this blog. And not just the DRM part.

    I’m taking real pains not to call you names…gotta keep the dignity, as I always do…

  3. Rob Says:
    May 8th, 2008 at 6:54 am

    I saw this yesterday. I agree with Geoff and paz, this is a terrible idea.

    The justification typically presented for these schemes is piracy. And believe me, I understand that piracy is a problem. But this isn’t the way to do it. This protection will be cracked in short order, thus ensuring both that the only people inconvenienced will be their legitimate customers and that the pirated version will actually represent a better “product,” as has happened with every other copy protection scheme.

    Also, in their haste to condemn the “phone home” element of this scheme, I think most people are forgetting just how obnoxious SecuROM is. This is the scheme that, among other things, installs itself without your permission as a shell extension and a system service, and has caused all sorts of problems.

    Every element of this decision is terrible and I will be encouraging my friends not to buy either product, Spore especially has so much buzz I suspect it’s an uphill battle. I hope to see class-action lawsuits. I want companies to absolutely hemorrhage from the wallet for pulling these stunts. It’s the only way they’ll ever understand that this is unacceptable.

  4. laesperanzapaz Says:
    May 8th, 2008 at 2:17 pm

    What’s ironic is that I and many others was really anticipating both products for the PC. I disliked Mass Effect from the screeenshots on the xbox version and its technical probs, but the hype around the forums made me want the superior PC version.

    Now, nobody wants it.

  5. Geoff Says:
    May 8th, 2008 at 4:39 pm

    Reasons this is a bad idea:

    1.) It prevents players from fully enjoying the game they supposedly purchased, since not everyone is going to - or should be expected to - have internet access all the time.

    2.) It fails to prevent piracy, since pirates will be able to crack this in no time, but simultaneously punishes legitimate purchasers.

    3.) It makes gamers purchase an additional product (not even sold by the purchaser) in order to enjoy a game.

    4.) It forces players to swap the presumption of innocence for the “privilege” of not leaving their CD in - which is already, let’s not forget, an artifact of objectionable anti-piracy tools.

    5.) It provides gamers with crippleware, since the game is non-functional without other purchases as well.

    “They could have made it even worse” is an absolutely terrible reason to support something.

  6. laesperanzapaz Says:
    May 8th, 2008 at 6:24 pm

    Hey, Geoff, could you please slap some sense to your blood brother? Like, physically? I mean, there’s “wrongheaded” and then there’s “WTF is wrong with you!?”

  7. Jeff Says:
    May 8th, 2008 at 7:30 pm

    Laesp-

    If you had actually read my comment, you’d see that I’m not a fan of DRM at all and I also say that I’m just playing “Devil’s advocate”. However, given the fact that DRM exists and is being used, with some adjustment, this doesn’t seem like it’s all that much worst than previous and current DRM schemes that are currently out there.

    Geoff-

    2 could be said about any DRM strategy (and I acknowledge that), and I think the rest of your points basically boil down to the same thing: that you need an internet connection. Unfortunately, this is how most games are actually activated now too. Buy any Valve game and you need an internet connection to activate it, meaning that the presumption is already there that people who are buying these games have an internet connection. And to be honest, PC games are becoming increasingly online oriented to begin with, the exception mostly being now console ports of single player games (like Assassin’s Creed). I agree that there’s going to be a portion of the PC gaming population that this seriously effects, but my guess is that at least 90% of PC gamers have an internet connection now.

    So yeah, would I prefer no DRM? Absolutely… I think DRM is crap. But I think that it’s an unfortunate reality of PC gaming, and there’s actually been cases of DRM in the past that were far worse than what’s being proposed here (StarForce anyone?) I think for probably 90% of the (legal) PC gaming population, the DRM presented here could actually be welcome to them (or at least, fairly transparent), considering they would no longer need CDs/DVDs in their drives to play their games (just as Steam, for instance provides now).

  8. Jeff Says:
    May 8th, 2008 at 7:35 pm

    “I hope to see class-action lawsuits.”

    I thought I’d respond to this individually…

    It’s one thing to say that it’s a terrible idea, and it’s an entirely different thing to say that this represents something illegal. Exactly what grounds would a “class-action” lawsuit be even considered? Unless it’s actually causing harm (again, see StarForce) or is poorly labeled on the packaging (and thus misleading), this is a consumer issue. If you have a problem with it, then don’t buy the product. Just because you don’t like it doesn’t mean you can sue the company for it.

  9. Geoff Says:
    May 8th, 2008 at 7:47 pm

    Sorry, Jeff, I still disagree. My problem isn’t that it requires an internet connection to work - I suspect that it’s easy enough to get or borrow a connection one time - it’s that it insists on *continuing* to check for one.

    That said, I’d argue that since DRM doesn’t do much good anyway for a committed pirate, that’s a reason to get rid of it all anyways. So I see your arguments as pointing towards the elimination of all DRM, but definitely not in defending this particular scheme. There’s no need to treat people you’ve *already verified* as legitimate with on-going suspicion.

  10. Duckk Says:
    May 8th, 2008 at 9:10 pm

    I can concede the phone home portion, though I still think it’s idiotic to phone home repeatedly. If you’ve validated once, why validate so often? As a presumably legal purchaser of said software, would my copy somehow magically turn illegal? But since we’re in the era of always on internet connection, I can grudgingly let that slip by.

    But what really grinds my gears is the install limit. I periodically reformat my computer, and I do go and install the same software onto my multitude of computers (I think I’ve installed WoW on 4 computers from the same disc so far). So why the hell should I be punished by such an asinine restriction? Frankly, I’m with the sentiment expressed elsewhere: I’m a good, legal, paying customer who is now going to pirate out of spite.

  11. Jeff Says:
    May 8th, 2008 at 10:54 pm

    Agreed on the install limits, Duckk.

    However, with that said, I’m betting that WoW has a completely different license agreement than most non-MMO games. Theoretically, for games like Mass Effect and Spore, I’m guessing you only get a single computer license. This applies to the vast majority of retail software.

  12. Rob Says:
    May 9th, 2008 at 4:23 pm

    Kotaku is claiming that Bioware has backed down on the repeated activation, although the other provisions remain intact:

    http://kotaku.com/5008452/bioware-backs-down-from-draconian-mass-effect-authentication

    Sorry, posted this in the wrong thread.

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