Okay, maybe I'm overstating things. Still, you can't deny that DRM, newspeak for copy protection, is a contentious issue. Nearly everyone sits squarely on one side of the issue; either you believe that DRM is the sacred right of every game publisher who are only looking to protect their properties, or you believe that DRM is an ineffective inconvenience that only punishes paying customers and does nothing to quell piracy.
There have been a lot of requests for NoG to cover the DRM debate, but it doesn't feel like there's a lot of new ground to cover. The debate hasn't moved in the last twenty years; the arguments for and against Ubisoft's new restrictive DRM system are essentially the same as the arguments for and against code wheels in the 80s. What new could we bring to the argument?
So instead of the typical point/counterpoint discussions that have typified NoG so far, this week we're trying something different. The four of us are going to lay out our ideal DRM solution, and you're invited to submit yours! It can be serious, it can be wacky, or it can be anything in between. Who knows? Maybe between us, we can come up with the perfect DRM!
I like Gabe Newell's thoughts on piracy and DRM: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87pevh2Q0hg
ReplyDeleteThey start to talk about it at three minutes and thirty seconds in.
Perfect DRM is like what Spore did. I wasn't very much into Spore when i heard about it. I got the creature creator and still wasn't that amazed by it, it was fun but not something i was going to buy. So my friend picked it up and said that he could put it on my computer cause of three system thing it had. So he came by and put it on my computer and i actually enjoyed it. In face if they came out with a second i was going to get it.
ReplyDeleteThis would be my ideal system. I am not sure if that what you were looking doe but to me something that allows people to play a game that they may or may not have been interested in completely for a short time. I guess a demo is like that but since its so incomplete when you don't really get a real sense of the game.
This doesn't really solve the problems that the current DRM has or anything at all really i just though spore had a really good idea and it should be implemented more.
I agree to an extent with Zeo, that spore did a good job. However, the flaw in that system was that when my friend let me use it (same deal as Zeo), he then got a new harddrive because his broke, and installed it on that. Then, a month or two later, he got a new computer, and was out of installs. So I think that the installs should be limited to at any one time, but you should be able to deactivate one of the installs to put an install on another computer. That way if the situation my friend was in occurs, he could just deactivate his old installs and install a new one onto his harddrive.
ReplyDeleteHowever, this leads to the problem of having people play it, deactivate their install, and let someone else use a new one. Then it can be used by an infinite number of people in theory. Maybe the number of deactivations could be restricted to 7 or 8 or something along those lines.
The only problem Ive ever experienced was putting a product code only for it to have been used before even though i bought the game new. f**king hackers!
ReplyDeletethe new drm system from ubisoft is the reason, that their new games will be pirated more. it's a shitty system.
ReplyDeleteuntil today, i couldnt even play the game, and the support didnt know any answer, lol. but i made my desicion. no more ubisoft games for me until they change their drm system.
Spore's DRM was terrible. It was one of those that only affects people who legitimately bought the game, or at least those who bought the game and didn't want to download the crack that came out before the game was even launched.
ReplyDeleteThe best DRM is definitely Steam. Like in Requisition's comment, Steam turns DRM into a service, actually giving more convenient access to people who bought the game. Yes, you can pirate TF2 or L4D, but Valve presents their games in such a way where the legal product is the far superior one. Piracy can never be snuffed out completely, so rather than trying to do so the devs should treat it like a competing market and strive to make products that make the pirated versions pale in comparison. If they can't do that, nobody should be surprised that the game is overwhelmingly pirated.
I have a number of examples other than Steam that do this, but for brevity I won't post them here. Maybe if there was a forum thread...?
The perfect DRM is what Valve did with their games on Steam, you cannot pirate games that are on steam. However, there are pirated TF2, L4D, and L4D2. I got a choice to make when L4D come out last yet, to buy the game on steam for full price or to get the pirated version for almost free. I choose the legal version because if I go for the pirated version, I will not get the constant update for my games on Steam.
ReplyDeleteAlmost all games in the world can be pirated, it is not easy to stop people from stealing because people have been from the beginning of time. The only way to stop it is to give feature than someone who pirated the game will not get.
I have a hacked itouch.
ReplyDeleteI love my hacked itouch, i can download new themes, freeware games, and and all kinds of cool tools from ROCK.
Another controversial feature is the ability to download any of the apps from the app store for free. I've used this feature several times, and always either payed for the app afterwards if i like it or delete it in a few days. Yeah, still technically illegal, but its a great way to sample a company's wares these days since demos are few and far between.
@Esbe: You just said exactly why Steam IS the best DRM. Valve knows that you can't stop piracy, so rather than putting all their effort into doing so they make a service that makes the legal version better. Updates, full integration of online content, and other features that Steam games have are impossible with the pirated version, so there's no feasible reason to do so.
ReplyDeleteOther examples I was thinking of mentioning were The Sims 3 (simple CD check, but you buy it for the downloadabls) and Blizzard games (even WoW is easy to pirate, but the gameplay is horrid). Rather than trying to stop pirating of the actual game they deter it by including better services for legit owners.
Side note: I remember when Borderlands came out, some people on the Internet were actually upset that the game was so unprotected. "Geez, Gearbox, do you WANT me to pirate it?" I have never wanted to cyber-punch someone so bad.
It's not a game, but I would like to bring up iTunes' Store DRM. You can authorize (I think) five computers at a time to be allowed to use your account and listen your purchased music. What's even better is that you can, at anytime, de-authorize an account if you so wish, giving you a free space for a different computer.
ReplyDeleteSo far as games go, I have to agree with the above commenters that Steam is most definitely the best game DRM available.
Nobody cares about automatic updating. The only thing keeping people from pirating singleplayer games, such as STALKER or HL2, is their own conscience. Same goes for any game with unenjoyable or nonexistant multiplayer. If Steam didn't exist, people would still buy TF2/Audiosurf/whathaveyou in order to participate online. They're paying for the online game, not the wrapper it comes in.
ReplyDeleteHell, people are still buying Blizzard games as far back as Diablo 2, just because they want access to the multiplayer.
Conceded. I still like updates though. T_T
ReplyDeleteI agree with Esbe
ReplyDelete