Anno 2070's Draconian DRM: Guru3D's Graphics Card Review Killed Off

[entropy13]

Why don't Ubisoft just give up? They're Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkeys FFS!

Wiki page here.

More informative, TVTropes page here.

[FreedomEclipse]

Originally Posted by silkstone

What happens to people in non-european countries or countries without a ubisoft office? International calls every time you want to re-activate? No thanks.

Not really a problem...

They could have a callcenter located in your country if not then they would most likely give you a 'local' number that redirects you to an international call center which spares you the cost....I just hope the curry isnt so strong you can smell it down the phone like most techsupport call centers when you call them up.

[SteelSix]

A CD key tied to my email address is fine. Limit how many times I can change out my hardware?? That's BS. It's a freakin game for goodness sake. I've reactivated Windows dozens of times. At least Microsoft has an automated phone reactivation process.

[WaroDaBeast]

The gaming industry should learn to understand that the easier it is to buy the game, the more people will buy it. If a game doesn't get released in my country, what do I do? Well, there's Steam and the others now, but what about before?

Besides, for DVD copies, you gotta admit that it's a pain to put the DVD in the drive and remove it afterwards. Whenever I got a game that requires the disc to be played, I use a crack. No need to go spelunking in my shelves anymore.

Originally Posted by entropy13

Why don't Ubisoft just give up? They're Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkeys FFS!

Wiki page here.

More informative, TVTropes page here.

Of course they are. That explains why England had a whole dynasty of French kings after being invaded by the Normans, and also Charlemagne's empire, and that's without even mentioning the French colonial empire either. Oh, and as pointed out by the link towards tvtropes, they also helped a certain former British colony gain independence. I guess it's too hard remembering who helped your country become one.

Anyway... The whole truth is, the French were stupid. For some reason, they thought they'd be unbeatable by building a huge wall called the Maginot Line, which was easily circumvented by the Germans, what with their Blitzkrieg technique.

Since it would've been very demoralizing for the American troops to hear that such a powerful country got defeated that easily, the higher-ups told the grunts that the French had just surrendered like that.

Of course, as people don't like thinking — it hurts their poor lil' brain too much —, that oversimplification about the French surrendering as if it were the latest trend stuck. No word on French resistance, no word on the non-Jews hiding Jewish kids in the countryside, and pretending that they're their own kids to the Nazis.

Last but not least, a decision taken unilaterally by a president (and a general) doesn't mean the whole population agrees with it. Otherwise, I could say that the French are happy with President Sarkozy's first, which was to raise his salary (along with those of the other politicians') a lot.

[Crap Daddy]

Outrageous, silly, insulting.

[silkstone]

Originally Posted by FreedomEclipse

Not really a problem...

They could have a callcenter located in your country if not then they would most likely give you a 'local' number that redirects you to an international call center which spares you the cost....I just hope the curry isnt so strong you can smell it down the phone like most techsupport call centers when you call them up.

They could, but they don't

[entropy13]

Very OT post.

Good thing there are spoiler tags.

Spoiler

Originally Posted by WaroDaBeast

Of course they are. That explains why England had a whole dynasty of French kings after being invaded by the Normans,

What? The Duke of Normandy had more in common with the King of Denmark than the King of France in 1066, considering they're both Vikings.

By your reasoning then, considering the Normans also captured Sicily and southern Italy during the Middle Ages...they are now Italians? Simply because Vikings went to Normandy, which just so happens to be in northern France, they are now French...and because they are now French, and they captured England, England is now under the French...?

Originally Posted by WaroDaBeast

and also Charlemagne's empire,

It's still kind of hazy there though, considering the "Franks" are still not that "distinct" so to speak, to the other Germanic tribes around that time. It's only when his sons "went their own ways" when "distinctions" started to arise.

Originally Posted by WaroDaBeast

and that's without even mentioning the French colonial empire either.

Well, the UK "lost" their colonies in the 20th Century relatively peacefully at least, likewise for the Netherlands. France lost Indochina in dramatic fashion however, wasting the only consistently excellent armed force they ever had (FFL) with useless commanders on the upper echelons of command. Then there's Algeria...

Originally Posted by WaroDaBeast

Oh, and as pointed out by the link towards tvtropes, they also helped a certain former British colony gain independence. I guess it's too hard remembering who helped your country become one.

It's more out of "the enemy of my enemy is my (temporary) friend" rather than any benevolent actions by France though. Considering the monarchy's approaching its death throes then. Afterwards there was the "Quasi War" between the two (although admittedly it's the French republic already)...

Originally Posted by WaroDaBeast

Since it would've been very demoralizing for the American troops to hear that such a powerful country got defeated that easily, the higher-ups told the grunts that the French had just surrendered like that.

That didn't happen. You're saying the likes of Eisenhower and Montgomery would lie to their own men when LeClerc and the 2nd Armored Division are with them? You're criticizing "oversimplification" by oversimplifying?

Although admittedly, the French are still stupid and did surrender, especially with the establishment of Vichy France. The Netherlands and Belgium and Poland and Denmark and Norway didn't surrender, they got occupied. They still had their government-in-exile (and monarchy-in-exile when applicable). But in the case of the French, they surrendered.

Originally Posted by WaroDaBeast

Of course, as people don't like thinking — it hurts their poor lil' brain too much —, that oversimplification about the French surrendering as if it were the latest trend stuck. No word on French resistance, no word on the non-Jews hiding Jewish kids in the countryside, and pretending that they're their own kids to the Nazis.

The French Resistance doesn't get really talked much, admittedly. Because France were sharply divided then, the Free French on one side and Vichy France in the other. So much for their "brotherhood" eh? The French can't even decide as one whole nation which side they are on.

Originally Posted by WaroDaBeast

Last but not least, a decision taken unilaterally by a president (and a general) doesn't mean the whole population agrees with it. Otherwise, I could say that the French are happy with President Sarkozy's first, which was to raise his salary (along with those of the other politicians') a lot.

So why the f**k was that midget elected then? By "divine right of kings" and not by elections?

Well, I guess he won't be re-elected then though. But then again if the ultranationalists win...woe betide to France, and the EU too.

[FreedomEclipse]

Originally Posted by silkstone

They could, but they don't

In that case it sucks to be you. I will never buy another Ubisoft game. So I have no need to contact their support

[Prima.Vera]

Originally Posted by Liquid Cool

UbiSoft? Is this the company that ruined Far Cry?

LC

Yeah, I still think that the Far Cry 1 was THE BEST game ever made by Ubisoft. And maybe LBA (Little Big Adventure) games.

[TIGR]

I was about to buy this to benchmark for private/professional use. Thanks for the heads-up qubit and treehouse. I will not recommend Anno 2070 to gaming customers who ask for game recommendations unless/until this changes.

If you don't like a game, say so by not buying it. One of the best ways to get the message through.

[uber_cookie]

It's kind of funny since Steam sort of promotes "play your games anywhere" which DRM prevents you from accessing and playing games from other computers...

Maybe it's time they came up with something different for Steam, something like embed Steam agent code into the executable which would lock it to your account and not to the computer. PCs get replaced/upgraded more frequently, not like console which lasts 10years...

[digibucc]

settlers 7 was enough to stop me buying any more Ubisoft games on pc.

[thunderising]

Shame. The game was good.

Worked well when I used the, well, the corrected version

[ice_v]

Originally Posted by Solaris17

Man I really want to play this. it looks really sweet.

just use a corrected version like the user above, and all shall be fine

[Quantos]

Which means that if you individually change a piece of hardware more than three times in your computer, you're not allowed to play the game anymore? Wow, that's dumb!

[Mescalamba]

Im lucky that I play just BF3 and occasionaly WoW. Neither of these games will have DRM issues.. probably cause pirated copy is simply worthless.

[gorg_graggel]

the activations reset every 30 days automatically. so unless you upgrade your system 3 times every month, as consumer you should be fine.
as reviewer/benchmarker you should contact support to let them up your activations by a large margin.

in guru3d's case the dutch ubisoft office (or at least his contact) wasn't correctly briefed or just plainly stupid, as he/she should have forwarded his request to blue byte (ubisofts german branch, who are the producers) to take care of it.

i have helped hilbert to establish contact with the right person, so as of yesterday he should be fine now.

disclaimer: i am not affiliated to any of the responsible companies, i just happen to know the right person in THIS case, so i could point him to help guru3d...

[Gzero]

Originally Posted by WaroDaBeast

If a game doesn't get released in my country, what do I do? Well, there's Steam and the others now, but what about before?

Good luck with that, even the almighty Steam can't make games available to everyone, even if it was for short period it is still a huge hit on release day sales which as I'm sure everyone here knows is the most important point for games (usually used to determine what to do with the IP and game).

[Gzero]

Originally Posted by Mescalamba

Im lucky that I play just BF3 and occasionaly WoW. Neither of these games will have DRM issues.. probably cause pirated copy is simply worthless.

Both have been pirated... you get wow private servers, and BF3 was in the top10 most downloaded stats.

[qubit]

Originally Posted by gorg_graggel

the activations reset every 30 days automatically. so unless you upgrade your system 3 times every month, as consumer you should be fine.
as reviewer/benchmarker you should contact support to let them up your activations by a large margin.

in guru3d's case the dutch ubisoft office (or at least his contact) wasn't correctly briefed or just plainly stupid, as he/she should have forwarded his request to blue byte (ubisofts german branch, who are the producers) to take care of it.

i have helped hilbert to establish contact with the right person, so as of yesterday he should be fine now.

disclaimer: i am not affiliated to any of the responsible companies, i just happen to know the right person in THIS case, so i could point him to help guru3d...

The FAQ doesn't say anything about activations resetting every 30 days, so how do you know this? More importantly, how is the customer, such as guru3d, supposed to know this? And why would Ubisoft increase their activation limits? Normally these corporate policies are set in stone.

If you've been in contact with Hilbert, then we can expect an updated article from him? His was only published yesterday, so we should see an update in the next day or so. I have a feeling we won't though. We'll see.

[Aleksander]

Anno 2070? Seriously, same game from my pentium II?

[Vancha]

Originally Posted by Aleksander Dishnica

Anno 2070? Seriously, same game from my pentium II?

Anno 2070 was released last year.

[gorg_graggel]

you got pm regarding the "how do you know"...

actually the customer doesn't need to know this, because as i said, no one changes his config 3 times a month, except he is doing a review/benchmark. people who do this, contact support and should be ok, hence it's no priority to update the faq, i guess...

it was a fuck up on the dutch ubisoft office side of things.

[keling]

I have the retail version of DCS A-10C and have used up 4 out of 10 activations. Shouldn't have installed the game just before a major PC upgrade. I'm torn between getting a crack/keygen or stay the course. This limited activation stuff is one of the reasons why I held off from getting the KA-50 Black Shark and LOMAC Flaming Cliffs 2.

Recently I installed a GTX 570 and now I'm afraid to start up the game. I have a legally bought game that I'm afraid to play and it's not even a horror survival game.

Even I'm afraid for my copy of OEM Windows 7 should the motherboard decided to die on me. I'm not from the US so not really sure of my chances of my begging for another cd key via the phone line.

[newtekie1]

Originally Posted by qubit

Ok, it seemed like you owned it, from your previous reply.

Yes, you have a point about the phone activation. However, if you go to the Ubisoft support page linked to in the English language FAQ, you notice two things:

1 It's in German! (well, it's not English, put it that way )

2 There doesn't appear to be a phone number or email address

This is hardly hassle-free and this very much gives the impression of a company that doesn't care about its customers.

Also, silkstone makes a very good point:

Why does where it links to matter? The phone number you are supposed to call is in the manual. If you bought it on Steam the number is wrong, but then you just look up Ubisoft's number on their contact page here.

And if you live in a country that doesn't have a phone number(I'm surprised Germany doesn't), then you email them and wait. Yes a hassle, but one that should rarely affect 99% of users.

Originally Posted by keling

I have the retail version of DCS A-10C and have used up 4 out of 10 activations. Shouldn't have installed the game just before a major PC upgrade. I'm torn between getting a crack/keygen or stay the course. This limited activation stuff is one of the reasons why I held off from getting the KA-50 Black Shark and LOMAC Flaming Cliffs 2.

Recently I installed a GTX 570 and now I'm afraid to start up the game. I have a legally bought game that I'm afraid to play and it's not even a horror survival game.

Even I'm afraid for my copy of OEM Windows 7 should the motherboard decided to die on me. I'm not from the US so not really sure of my chances of my begging for another cd key via the phone line.

Microsoft's re-activation process is simple, and a great example of how the activation limit should be handled. OEM copies say they only have 1 activation, but really can be activated 5+ times without problems, and when you finally do have problems you call the automated toll free number 24/7/365 and it re-activates. This is the ideal way to handle activation limits. As I said in the previous thread about this DRM by Ubisoft. It seems like they had the intention of implementing a similar system, but fumbled it. But then again, that was before I realized the original author of the article did nothing more than fire off an email to tech support when he didn't receive a response in 24 hours went on a rant instead of trying to contact tech support in a better manner. I would like to know how fast they handle the activation issue when you call tech support. Yes, they are only open Mon-Fri 9-9, and I would like to see 24/7/365 with an automated system.