Anno 2070's Draconian DRM: Ubisoft Loosens Restrictions. Slightly

[MikeMurphy]

Most of you are missing the point.

People shouldn't have to contact Ubisoft to be permitted to use the software they purchased. The DRM is needlessly restrictive which tells me that Ubisoft is completely out of touch with consumers.

 

[pr0n Inspector]

Most of you are missing the point.

People shouldn't have to contact Ubisoft to be permitted to use the software they purchased. The DRM is needlessly restrictive which tells me that Ubisoft is completely out of touch with consumers.

The user didn't not purchase the software. He purchased a license which allows him to use the software in a manner agreed by both parties, e.g. EULA and/or TOS.

 

[MikeMurphy]

The user didn't not purchase the software. He purchased a license which allows him to use the software in a manner agreed by both parties, e.g. EULA and/or TOS.

Thanks, give yourself a gold sticker for the needless correction.

My point is not a question of law but rather a question of business practices.

 

[Mr McC]

Moreover, EULA's are not etched in stone and a court of law may deem them to be abusive and therefore null and void.

 

[gorg_graggel]

I will help them get through to you, or try to I can assume..

We don't like it period.

Was that clear enough or?

I want to be able to change my shit in my,,, pc when ever I feel like it and not run out of activations period.

I want to be able to play my game for ever and ever for eternity if I feel a need to.

I would like you to get the f, out of my life, after I buy, the title.

I think that sums it up in a couple more ways for you sir.



Also, stop charging us for garbage add-ons if that's what you want to call them and let the community mod again like it used to be. Just make the game run correctly which is why I pay you at the beginning.

just for the record...

i'm not part of the gaming industry and i don't get why you attack me in that way...
i just answered one guys question and added some inside info, because i happen to know a few people on the inside and felt it was important to say that mistakes tend to be taken out of context to suit people's need to bitch...

 

[ypsylon]

Who the hell cares about Ubi$oft. If you are against DRM then you don't acknowledge existence of those thieves. If you want to play then there is simply no point bitching about it. Deal with it or stand against DRM mafia. It is simple choice.

Be a man/woman, don't support Ubi, Steam or any other DRM Stalinism.

 

[newtekie1]

Most of you are missing the point.

People shouldn't have to contact Ubisoft to be permitted to use the software they purchased. The DRM is needlessly restrictive which tells me that Ubisoft is completely out of touch with consumers.

Not needlessly, it serves a purpose and does it very well.

Windows users should have to either by your logic, but that is how software works. Activation limits prevent one person from giving it to all of their friends. It doesn't stop experienced pirates, and it isn't meant to, it is designed to stop casual pirates.

 

[truehighroller1]

Then make your own stuff and don't rely on anyone.
A customer is nothing more than a wallet with legs. and I'm quite confident that you are not one.

but whatever, everyone is the center of the universe and they can complain about anything and everything.

I said I pay you initially, so why the heck are you complaining?

Why did you just automatically resort to snide remarks about my character?

Shows lack of education IMO.

I'm a college Graduate and a Father of three, and a Husband. I work in the I.T. industry. I own a house a car. I pay my bills on time every month.

Don't assume anything about people you don't know. It makes you look very UN-educated.

 

[truehighroller1]

Not needlessly, it serves a purpose and does it very well.

Windows users should have to either by your logic, but that is how software works. Activation limits prevent one person from giving it to all of their friends. It doesn't stop experienced pirates, and it isn't meant to, it is designed to stop casual pirates.

Actually this is so not true. They've " Microsoft " has heard from me numerous times in the past because I do upgrade parts allot and I haven't had an activation fail me on my copy of Windows 7 64bit Ultimate once and I have activated it massive amounts at this point, massive.

I don't know if this is how it is for everyone, or just me because they see my history with upgrading all the time.. None the less I haven't had to talk to them in a long time. I can't even remember the last time.

just for the record...

i'm not part of the gaming industry and i don't get why you attack me in that way...
i just answered one guys question and added some inside info, because i happen to know a few people on the inside and felt it was important to say that mistakes tend to be taken out of context to suit people's need to bitch...

No one wants to talk to your insider " friends " at all, after paying, for the game, once!

Sorry but you acted like an industry muse so I started talking to you like one.

Also sorry about the double post, normally i would have multi-quoted.

 

[gorg_graggel]

well, if you work in the it industry it should be pretty common to to you to need to contact support...why should it be any different in the games industry?

 

[qubit]

well, if you work in the it industry it should be pretty common to to you to need to contact support...why should it be any different in the games industry?

There's quite a big difference. If your PC goes wrong, then obviously you must contact support. However, this is DRM that's being imposed on you, so it's totally different. If Ubisoft implemented their activation in the same way as Microsoft does, then I'd have much less of a problem with it. I'll second Newtekie's post that he's activated many times without having to speak to anyone. At the most, you have to do an automated activation over the phone. While it's not the most convenient and you have to enter some long numbers into the phone and the PC, a little patience pays off in you getting your activation code.

However, the most ridiculous thing about Ubisoft's DRM, is that it's implemented within the Steam framework, which is itself account-based DRM and works very well. So, what's their problem with it? They're basically saying that Steam isn't good enough for them and making the customer put up with two DRM schemes in parallel. That's not on in my book and is why I won't buy this game, regardless of how good it is.

 

[truehighroller1]

well, if you work in the it industry it should be pretty common to to you to need to contact support...why should it be any different in the games industry?

Actually this is so not true. They've " Microsoft " has heard from me numerous times in the past because I do upgrade parts allot and I haven't had an activation fail me on my copy of Windows 7 64bit Ultimate once and I have activated it massive amounts at this point, massive.

I don't know if this is how it is for everyone, or just me because they see my history with upgrading all the time.. None the less I haven't had to talk to them in a long time. I can't even remember the last time.

Read the quote from my self that was right above your post.

 

[gorg_graggel]

well, i have to constantly call other companies about licensing stuff.
especially microsoft is very "special" in terms of business licensing models.
it's ridiculous how much fuss it causes to get information out of them...or even between how much people you have to be transfered on the phone until you get the answers you need...
granted, their normal home customers have much less difficulty. but ms makes most of their money in the business category. and i think it's the primary "target audience" that should be compared here. you have a limited amount of free calls and then you have to pay money to actually get an answer from them.
also ms has much more resources and can take care of automated systems much more easily.
they actually have training courses to train people in understanding their licensing model...

so long story short...ms is not the right company to make a comparison here...


edit: and to get out of this discussion...my free time is precious and because my internet connection was unstable over the weekend i couldn't spend my time in swtor. i'm gonna stop worrying about other peoples opinions, which i will now do for the rest of the evening. feel free to join me on the server "tott doneeta"...
i don't like drm, but i understand the need for it...there have been overstepped boundaries and mistakes are constantly being made. and this applies to both sides.
as long as there are people out there who don't give a shit about behaving as idealistic, as users of a tech enthusiast site unsurprinsingly do, there will be the need for drm, period...

 

[truehighroller1]

well, i have to constantly call other companies about licensing stuff.
especially microsoft is very "special" in terms of business licensing models.
it's ridiculous how much fuss it causes to get information out of them...or even between how much people you have to be transfered on the phone until you get the answers you need...
granted, their normal home customers have much less difficulty. but ms makes most of their money in the business category. and i think it's the primary "target audience" that should be compared here. you have a limited amount of free calls and then you have to pay money to actually get an answer from them.
also ms has much more resources and can take care of automated systems much more easily.

so long story short...ms is not the right company to make a comparison here...

The company that I work for is Cisco Gold certified and a Microsoft Gold partner and I don't remember ever having to reach out to them while imaging laptops for every one, or desktops or servers for that matter now I think of it. I have to talk to Cisco more.

I call shenanigans.

 

[gorg_graggel]

well surprise...different people, different experiences...

plz stop calling me a liar thank you...

edit: last comment, i promise...

 

[newtekie1]

Actually this is so not true. They've " Microsoft " has heard from me numerous times in the past because I do upgrade parts allot and I haven't had an activation fail me on my copy of Windows 7 64bit Ultimate once and I have activated it massive amounts at this point, massive.

I don't know if this is how it is for everyone, or just me because they see my history with upgrading all the time.. None the less I haven't had to talk to them in a long time. I can't even remember the last time.

Buy an OEM copy and have some fun then, because I've had a few of my Win7 OEM keys blacklisted already because I've upgraded too many times and moved it to too many computer. But that is the idea of an OEM key, it is for one computer only, retail keys don't have the restriction of limited activations and will auto reactivate after an upgrade. Though I have had to call the toll free number to do it.

The company that I work for is Cisco Gold certified and a Microsoft Gold partner and I don't remember ever having to reach out to them while imaging laptops for every one, or desktops or servers for that matter now I think of it. I have to talk to Cisco more.

I call shenanigans.

It is called Volume Licensing, look it up.

 

[truehighroller1]

Buy an OEM copy and have some fun then, because I've had a few of my Win7 OEM keys blacklisted already because I've upgraded too many times and moved it to too many computer. But that is the idea of an OEM key, it is for one computer only, retail keys don't have the restriction of limited activations and will auto reactivate after an upgrade. Though I have had to call the toll free number to do it.



It is called Volume Licensing, look it up.

Been down the oem ROAD every single time since Windows ME.

Yes it is, yes it is. I don't really need to look it up to be honest with you.

You can all take turns sticking up for the corporate masters like sheep or break with the ones that follow so to say.

 

[pr0n Inspector]

I said I pay you initially, so why the heck are you complaining?

Why did you just automatically resort to snide remarks about my character?

Shows lack of education IMO.

I'm a college Graduate and a Father of three, and a Husband. I work in the I.T. industry. I own a house a car. I pay my bills on time every month.

Don't assume anything about people you don't know. It makes you look very UN-educated.

Did you or did you not purchase an end-user license for Anno 2070?

Yes: Complain all you want, but you are still just a wallet with legs to Ubi.
No: then why are you complaining?

Why don't you open your eyes to the reality? Digital data is nothing like real world objects. The inevitable future is that everything needs to be online, are uniquely identifiable and tied to your name, which must be verified to be a real one.

oh and BTW I'm a dirty illegal immigrant from Mehico, now stealing your jobs and women in the Glorious Amerika. It's completely true.

 

[xenocide]

I've said it dozens of times and I'll keep saying it--The only people hurt by DRM are legitimate customers.

 

[ebolamonkey3]

I guess I'll just get this on Steam when they have it on sale for $5.

 

[TC-man]

Okay, what if you need to diagnose a PC problem yourself by removing ram modules, videocards, harddrives, switching soundcard/lan card to an other PCI/PCI-E slot because an irq conflict etc. vice versa? All these, I believe, will be detected as hardware changes. And now you can't use Anno 2070 to test processors (e.g. the threaded performance of different Intel or/and AMD processors in the game) or to test different brand ram and/or SSD to see how much impact they have on loading time in Anno 2070 and so on.

I wouldn't buy such game with so many restrictions for 50 Euros or USD. Now it's looks more like a rental because the DRM implemented service with intrusive restrictions and all, so the price needs to be lower, the actual rental price. After all, Ubisoft will stop the service for this game after several years, so no DLC, no support, no patches etc.; why buy a game that you probably can not play after a few years, unless Ubisoft is unlocking the games, or you will have to re-buy a DRM-free version, I guess.