"Always On" DRM Idea gets more publishers.

[Kreij]

True, but at least you get to play with your nothing whenever you want.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

As always with digital distribution, the ball is in their court. Their EULAs allow them to disallow you from playing any games for whatever reason they deem suitable. That's the huge hazard with all digital distribution services and exactly why publishers love it. It grants them more control than serial keys alone do.

 

[digibucc]

truthfully i don't worry about that.

i buy digital for ease - ease of acquisition and to ease my moral conscience. i do not give anyone my info and never cheat hack or otherwise do anything wrong with my purchases. if for any reason the company/distributor says that my legally purchased copy is no longer valid, i will sue them.

i will sue the shit out of them , and then proceed to pirate any game i have previously purchased if that is what becomes required to play it. i do not care about the law in this regard, i care about right and wrong. it's very obviously wrong of them to have even put me in that situation.

 

[Kreij]

Impulse is different. You do not need an internet connection to play a single player game, only to download, activate and update them.

Updates are not mandatory, either. So if you have the game installed and activated, you can play it forever without a connection to Impulse.

If my craptastic satellite connection is down, I can still play Impulse games without any issues.

 

[mdsx1950]

no matter what the DRM is, piracy always wins. Even steam got pirated. with an uber secure(crappy) DRM, you could only delay the piracy.

customers are the ones who are really getting hurt by this DRM crap

The customer doesn't get hurt my friend. When the DRM strikes, the "customer" tells em to shove it up their fucking asses and downloads the game.

(Well that's what i did)

 

[niko084]

What I love is how people think they are making a statement by buying the console version!

Guys, do what I did, give up on gaming and buy a motorcycle, besides the motorcycle often leads to an unlimited supply of women.

 

[Mr McC]

What I love is how people think they are making a statement by buying the console version!

Guys, do what I did, give up on gaming and buy a motorcycle, besides the motorcycle often leads to an unlimited supply of women.

I have clearly been riding in the wrong areas.

 

[newconroer]

Plenty fine with me.

I buy my games, and I have no problems.
And if the authentication server does go down now and again..[in the words of special hipster internet children around the world] OOH NOEZ!!!!

 

[caleb]

Not everyone in the world have internet access all the time you know. And if you play through online, your ping gets to ~100ms. In LAN, ping averages lower than 20ms.

Not my point that you need a super latency to play just to be able to consantly get information from the game provider. Doesnt mean the gameplay is going to be online. The topic here was DRM and I think we should all agree that quality games SHOULD be payed and it is my idea that the security should be done via online game content modifications.

 

[Mr McC]

Plenty fine with me.

I buy my games, and I have no problems.
And if the authentication server does go down now and again..[in the words of special hipster internet children around the world] OOH NOEZ!!!!

I just try my best to avoid draconian DRM, insofar as this is possible: it will undoubtedly become increasingly difficult to avoid as more companies adopt these kinds of measures. I think customer complacency and a general willingness to put up with such company practices, albeit unhappily, is detrimental to our collective interests as gamers. I dislike being treated like an idiot, particularly when I am exchanging €50 for the pleasure: if they piss me off too much, I simply take my custom elsewhere.

 

[ShogoXT]

I like systems like Impulse and Steam. Always buy my games on them if available.

I WAS looking forward to games like Assassins creed 2, but I dont buy games that betray PC gaming in more ways than 1. Any game with always on DRM goes on the list, MW2, Supreme Commander 2 (wow sooo disapointed, il just play the original).

You can blame people all you want, but the fact doesnt change: DRM doesnt work on anyone, but the buying customers.

 

[Mr McC]

I like systems like Impulse and Steam. Always buy my games on them if available.

I WAS looking forward to games like Assassins creed 2, but I dont buy games that betray PC gaming in more ways than 1. Any game with always on DRM goes on the list, MW2, Supreme Commander 2 (wow sooo disapointed, il just play the original).

You can blame people all you want, but the fact doesnt change: DRM doesnt work on anyone, but the buying customers.

I am learning to live with Steam, it seems like the best of a series of bad options. What I dislike is that it often includes games with third-party DRM, such as Securom, without disclosing this information. I don't know whether responsibility for removing this "extra" DRM lies with the developer or with Valve, but Steam already provides enough protection and customers should, at the very least, be informed that certain Steam releases also include the DRM present on the physical release.

 

[lyndonguitar]

truthfully i don't worry about that.

i buy digital for ease - ease of acquisition and to ease my moral conscience. i do not give anyone my info and never cheat hack or otherwise do anything wrong with my purchases. if for any reason the company/distributor says that my legally purchased copy is no longer valid, i will sue them.

i will sue the shit out of them , and then proceed to pirate any game i have previously purchased if that is what becomes required to play it. i do not care about the law in this regard, i care about right and wrong. it's very obviously wrong of them to have even put me in that situation.

good answer. hahaha

 

[crazy pyro]

Guys, they are going to continue screwing us with DRM, the only way I can see out of this is to give them an idea of how best to go about making DRM. They have plenty of alternatives just they have nothing like the creativity required to come up with a system that solves all of the problems.

 

[TheMailMan78]

Anti-trust is good but it doesn't do the job it needs to 99% of the time as it has to be horrible before they do anything and it has nothing to do with DRM. Oil companies get together and decide in collusion what the price will be like OPEC. Also technically commodity traders too. #2 on the the fortune 500 is Exxon which payed no US federal income taxes last year. Tell me they don't call the shots. )

First of all OPEC is a league of nations not corperation. Anti-Trust laws do not apply to nations. Only corporations. Second OPEC lost its teeth when the Saudis bailed on them about a year ago.

I know the latest boogie man for people are major corporations I mean the "Evil Russia" is gone now. However what EXXON is doing is not illegal and I bet you anything oil companies are not exclusive to reporting losses in the U.S. and gains in countries that tax less. After all in that very same article you posted the U.S. taxes more than just about anyone. Fair? Not really but hey we need to "distribute the wealth" right?

But it's the tax benefit of overseas operations that is the biggest reason why multinationals end up with lower tax rates than the rest of us. It only makes sense that multinationals "put costs in high-tax countries and profits in low-tax countries," says Scott Hodge, president of the Tax Foundation. Those low-tax countries are almost anywhere but the U.S. "When you add in state taxes, the U.S. has the highest tax burden among industrialized countries," says Hodge. In contrast, China's rate is just 25%; Ireland's is 12.5%.

Yes but stipulations must be discussed or explained before the purchase or it is a bad business practice. Most wouldn't know and lets all agree we don't read 100% of the writing on everything we buy. If you do you are OCD and that doesn't need to be considered as it is a mental disorder beyond the scope of this discussion.

Its not anyones fault but yours if you buy something, eat something, drink something before you buy or consume it. Everything you need to know is on the box. If you can pirate then you can read.

We are not saying copyrights shouldn't be protected. But if the art you sell needs an internet connection to be viewed at any time you would have to tell the buyer before the purchase because it isn't common place for that restriction yet(same goes for video games).

Game publishers already do. It on the damn box!

Correct, no one is forcing me to buy the game, which is why I choose to pirate it instead.

I see this statement alot, at least twice in this thread so far and I only did a quick skim of it, I think I even skipped an entire page. It doesn't make any sense, and it makes the anti-pirate argument looks stupid. Here, I'll help your side out a little bit here.

I think the word you are looking for is "play" not "buy". No one is forcing me to play the game. See doesn't that make more sense? If you use "buy", obviously I'm not buying the game, I'm pirating it, so it makes no sense to say no one is forcing me to do something I'm not doing.

Now, lets assume you said "No one is forcing you to play the game." A far better argument indeed. You are right, no one is forcing me to play the game. So, if the game sucks, I don't play it. Yes, I downloaded it illegally. But if I download it illegally, play it for an hour and realize it sucks, uninstall it, and delete the downloaded content, is it still piracy?!

You sound like an ambulance chaser when you try and use semantics to justify your wrong doing. If you downloaded a copy of the game through non-legal channels then it is pirating end of story. Ill even give you a simple example. Just because you steal someones car, test drive it and then return it to them still makes you a thief. Granted games are not tangible like a car but its still infringing on someone else's right to protect their property via law. Plus its just disrespectful but since these are "big nasty corporations" you feel like a little Robbin Hood sticking it to the man. Problem is "The man" pays guys like me that just want a decent life for their family. Every time you steal something you ain't hurting the corporations. You are hurting the villagers oh brave Robin Hood.

Yes, to the game publishers and developers it certainly is! Why? Becuase they didn't make any money off me. See if I didn't pirate the game, I would have had to actually buy it to try it.

Poor excuse. I have bought VERY few games that I thought were bad because like all my purchase I do research. Games like movies are good in the eye of the beholder. In todays market with youtube, meta critic and the like there is no reason you should be buying a game you are not 100% sure on. If you question the quality after all that then just wait for it to go on sale like I do. But by your reasoning you just steal because you don't feel like researching. Thats no excuse and is just lazy.

I remember before that policy, returning several games within the 14 day period for the simple reason that they sucked. That used to be acceptable, the store would take the game back, and you would get your money back. And guess what, Publishers actually had to put out games that didn't suck. Not anymore though, the publishers won't take games back from the stores if they've been openned, so now the consumer is stuck with shit games that they've wasted their money on. I feel sorry for kids today, I actually really do. I remember saving and saving, mowing lawns and doing chores for people around the neighborhood when I was 12, so I could go to Software Etc.(yes, I'm dating myself here.) and buy a game. I also remember getting home and finding out that game sucked, packing it back up, and taking it back. You can't do that anymore..

Publishers have always made games that sucked. Store returns have never changed that. ET for the Atari anyone? Anyway I am with you on this one. Stores return policies are out dated when it comes to software and needs to be revised.

Ok, now I know the next argument will be "well they do have demos". Yes, they do. But more often then not, the demo is an extremely small section of the game, usually the best part of the game, that doesn't give a real idea of how the real game will be. And it seems to be even more popular then ever for Publishers and Developers to not release a demo at all. There are some really great exceptions to this. Steam free weekends, where they just let you play the game, the complete game, for an entire weekend free. That is a great idea, and I applaud Steam for implementing it. However, it is far too rare, and usually not with brand new games. Now, if game developers and publishers released demos, that were the full game, but time limitted to say 4 hours of gametime before shutting off and requiring purchase, I probably wouldn't pirate a single game. The 4 hours of play would be more than enough for me to figure out if I liked the game or not, and if I was going to buy it or not.

The whole 4 hour thing is a good idea. CoJ2 had a 45 minute trial and a lot of people bought it. I think you may be on to something.

Oh, and on a different note. I'd like to point out that piracy is not theft. A handy guide to explain:
http://www.gameproducer.net/images/piracyisnottheft.jpg

Anyone that says piracy if theft should be out in front of their local library with picket signs, because they freely allow people, even aid them in, taking books to the copier and photocopying pages! Hell some librarys even have litte kiosks that you you scan pages directly onto a flash drive!.

Anti-pirate people like to make the argument "You wouldn't walk into a store and steal a stick of RAM, but you would steal software." No you idiots, I wouldn't walk into Target and steal a book, but I would walk into a library and make a photocopy of every page I needed, or even better scan every page of the book onto a flash drive!

Books and games are two entirely different entities and so are the laws that protect them. Also I dare you to go to a library and photocopy Moby Dick. Piracy is theft. Its not "borrowing" its not "extended demos" and you damn sure ain't hurting anyone but yourselves in the long run by pirating. Think not? What happens when games become unprofitable? What do you think the corporations will do? Yeah thats what I thought.

Anyway this is my idea for DRM. You buy a game from store with no key for say about 10 bucks? Just the disk, box and any other goodies the developer may include. When you get home and install it the game gives you two options. Call for a key or get a key online. Both would require a credit card. Much like Photoshop or Windows. Once you buy the key its yours forever. However the disk would not be tied to it. This would solve a few things.

1. You would have a hard copy you could trade/sell later
2. No installed DRM. Everything would be done via an activation service.
3. This would be a great DRM and wouldn't inconvenience the consumer.

Would it stop piracy? Nope. But it would stop people from using DRM as an excuse to steal and it would keep the average users happy while still offering some protection to investors.

 

[Kreij]

What you desribed, MM, is pretty close to the way Impulse handles their games.
They even allow refunds (under certain conditions).

 

[DannibusX]

1. You would have a hard copy you could trade/sell later
2. No installed DRM. Everything would be done via an activation service.
3. This would be a great DRM and wouldn't inconvenience the consumer.

This could work so well, and if you could get the pubs to put up an activation hotline line Microsoft for Windows, you could activate the game over the phone.

What you desribed, MM, is pretty close to the way Impulse handles their games.
They even allow refunds (under certain conditions).

I may have to look into Impulse.

 

[Kreij]

If you go to the Impulse (Stardock) forums, you will see some eye opening things.
Like Stardock asking people if they will buy an expansion for a game if they do certain things. They are all about user input and the only company I know of that is doing all it can to balance the DRM with what they call "gamer's rights".

Stardock hates piracy, but they are not going to castrate their user base to stop it. They are even taking input on how to make things more appealing/easy so people will buy the games and not pirate them.

When they released GalCiv II with no DRM, I bought 2 copies just to support their efforts.

As for Ubisoft? ... they can just kiss my ass.

 

[newtekie1]

You sound like an ambulance chaser when you try and use semantics to justify your wrong doing. If you downloaded a copy of the game through non-legal channels then it is pirating end of story. Ill even give you a simple example. Just because you steal someones car, test drive it and then return it to them still makes you a thief. Granted games are not tangible like a car but its still infringing on someone else's right to protect their property via law. Plus its just disrespectful but since these are "big nasty corporations" you feel like a little Robbin Hood sticking it to the man. Problem is "The man" pays guys like me that just want a decent life for their family. Every time you steal something you ain't hurting the corporations. You are hurting the villagers oh brave Robin Hood.

There is no use of semantics at all there. It isn't two phrases that mean the same thing, or even close to meaning the same thing. Buy and Play are to totally different things with two totally different meanings.

Again, if I stole the car, no one else would be able to drive it, right? If I pirate a game, others can still use the original, right? Piracy is piracy, theft is theft, stop trying to make piracy theft, it isn't. Does piracy not being theft make piracy any better? No, certainly not, but the publishers don't care, they want piracy to sound as bad as possible.

Poor excuse. I have bought VERY few games that I thought were bad because like all my purchase I do research. Games like movies are good in the eye of the beholder. In todays market with youtube, meta critic and the like there is no reason you should be buying a game you are not 100% sure on. If you question the quality after all that then just wait for it to go on sale like I do. But by your reasoning you just steal because you don't feel like researching. Thats no excuse and is just lazy.

Watching youtube videos and reading reviews doesn't tell me if I'll like a game or not. Oh cool, I get to watch all the spoilers of the game on youtube, that is a great way to know if I'll like the game...of course after seeing every plot twist and spoiler, there isn't much point in my buying the game any more is there...

Books and games are two entirely different entities and so are the laws that protect them. Also I dare you to go to a library and photocopy Moby Dick. Piracy is theft. Its not "borrowing" its not "extended demos" and you damn sure ain't hurting anyone but yourselves in the long run by pirating. Think not? What happens when games become unprofitable? What do you think the corporations will do? Yeah thats what I thought.

For a game to be profitable, at least where I'm considers as a customer, it just has to be good. Again, if it is good, I buy it. If it is bad, I don't even play the copy I downloaded. So your argument here doesn't apply to me, it might to others, but not to me.

Would it stop piracy? Nope. But it would stop people from using DRM as an excuse to steal and it would keep the average users happy while still offering some protection to investors.

I'm with you on idiots using DRM as a reason to pirate. I think it is totally idiotic in most cases to say "it has DRM, so I'm going to pirate it". And if you look, there are several instances where I've said that I don't mind DRM, even understand why it is needed. here and here

 

[El_Mayo]

Piracy is wrong.
That doesn't mean I'm going to stop though.

 

[Kreij]

Piracy is wrong.
That doesn't mean I'm going to stop though.

Of course not. Why would you let your ethics get in the way of your desires.

 

[El_Mayo]

Of course not. Why would you let your ethics get in the way of your desires.

My morals/priorities are rather... "off".
When I get a job then I'll buy (multiplayer) games. Honest

 

[DannibusX]

My morals/priorities are rather... "off".
When I get a job then I'll buy (multiplayer) games. Honest

Might be too busy paying fines or manufacturing license plates to buy games at that point in time.

 

[TheMailMan78]

Just to let you know newtek none of my comments were directed directly at you. Everything was toward your argument and not you personally.

Anyway I think we kinda see it the same way but some things we will just disagree on. Mainly because my experience vs. yours. Lets just leave this where it stands. I'm very tierd of this argument and until more people have this happen to them personally there will always be inaccurate justifications for wrong doing. For me (and the law) piracy is theft. For you its not (and many others). I think I'm done with this......for now

 

[El_Mayo]

Might be too busy paying fines or manufacturing license plates to buy games at that point in time.

hahahaha :')
I always thought I'd look nice in a jumpsuit.