The victims of PC gaming DRM: one soldier's story

DRM, all the rage these days...? I can tell you guys that this is just the beginning. To combat piracy and protect their digital property, companies will employ the use of the most secure DRM for PC's, consoles...Maybe...
Cloud computing will save PC gaming as such, as you would pay to play a game located on a server, and would not have the game physically(on you're C:\), therefore the only way to "pirate" the game would be to hack the server, and it has 7 proxies...:)
 
It's not only Ubisoft who is heading towards software-as-a-service platform. The latest victim of DRM are C&C:4 fans who can't even play the game that they payed $50 for. I don't really understand these companies. I mean, they have some great games that have freemium business models that are thriving by literally giving them away. And yet they don't see pirated games as demos and low cost marketing expense. Besides, those who will buy the game will buy it and those who can't will not buy it no matter what. DRMs are just punishing those legit users who are actually supporting them. Besides, with the advent of multi-player centered games, who wants to play pirated single player anymore? ^^ All the fun is in the multi-player aspect which gives players hundred of hours of gameplay compared to single player which could at the least provide several hours of fun.
 
iPcc said:
All the fun is in the multi-player aspect which gives players hundred of hours of gameplay compared to single player which could at the least provide several hours of fun.
Click to expand...

You made some good points but I disagree with this one. How could you say that single player only offers a minimum amount of gameplay? Look at Dragon Age, Mass Effect 2, Fallout 3. Any good RPG offers a solid +50 hours of gameplay. Games with multiplayer and singleplayer have a skimped down singleplayer, so please don't use that as a comparison. Single-player only games offer loads more.
 
Besides, those who will buy the game will buy it and those who can't will not buy it no matter what.
Click to expand...
Partially true; there are those that will buy it and there are those that would rather try get it for free before resorting to buy it.

HL2 was a prime example: there were many people who bought it, because they could not pirate it before release. Quite a stark contrast to Doom3 which was pirated before it was released. How many of those people who pirated it, went to buy it? Many finished the game before it was even available to buy, so why bother buying it?

Is AC2 fully cracked yet? Does anyone know a "friend of a friend" who has finished the game on the cracked version? Last I heard, they couldn't because DRM was injected in several places causing them to lose their save games etc. Meaning they would still need to download several versions of the crack, before they will eventually finish the game.

If that is the case, then I'd say:
Ubisoft 1
Pirates 0
 
Well, if they don't stop pirates, they'll definitely stop their sales. Either one of the two if you ask me.
 
Neo said:
Well, if they don't stop pirates, they'll definitely stop their sales. Either one of the two if you ask me.
Click to expand...

general feeling i get. heard from a few friends now that they wont be supporting them in anyway from AC2 onwards as long as that shitty copy protection exists. some of them are considering even moving over to consoles...
 
That's the main reason I bought AC2 on the XBOX 360. I have AC2 for the PC now as well but that's purely for collector's value. I get the idea more and more that companies like UBISOFT are actually pushing towards a console-only market. If that's what they want to do then fine, let them do that. But they need to come to a point where they STOP annoying PC gamers and simply try and milk them for their money.

Honestly. This whole piracy shield that PC developers are using all the time these days is really getting old. If they have issues in making games for PC's then they need to move the heck away from the platform and on to something else where they feel "comfortable" in making products which are actually worth the money they're asking.
 
Neo said:
Honestly. This whole piracy shield that PC developers are using all the time these days is really getting old. If they have issues in making games for PC's then they need to move the heck away from the platform and on to something else where they feel "comfortable" in making products which are actually worth the money they're asking.
Click to expand...

There's way too much money in the PC industry to just abandon it... which is why Ubisoft resorted to this. Whether it was the right decision, that's a different question.

Gladiator said:
Ubisoft might go down in history as the company that stopped pirates.
Click to expand...

Not even facepalm is enough to describe the fail of that statement.
 
Necuno said:
general feeling i get. heard from a few friends now that they wont be supporting them in anyway from AC2 onwards as long as that shitty copy protection exists. some of them are considering even moving over to consoles...
Click to expand...

Objective Achieved......
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top