203 réponses à ce sujet

[Ridwan]

Fact is though, DRM does nothing to prevent piracy. Every company that has touted that their games can't be cracked, got their games cracked.

[andy6915]

...

Don't mind me, I'm just missing obvious puns like a moron.

[addiction21]

andy69156915 wrote...

This is me being lazy and am pretty mch **** at breaking up quotes.

1. No it shows that you pirated the game. That's it nothing more. And really its not simple at all to say "x people pirated x game" At least in the United States that takes a court order and the corporation of your isp to divulge you external IP.
The best anyone ever does is monitor the traffic.
2. So why not just purchase the game and send them the letter anyway? They are still both getting your money and feedback.
Being spitefull (I like the spore example that comes latter in this thread) and pirating more is nothing but a destructive circle. Which also goes back to the whole "it only proves you pirated it to pirate it"
3. No it makes nothing more easy to figure out. YOu could have no qualms with the DRM at all and just be short on money. Again all it proves is somebody pirated the game not why.
4. Really? Have you paid attention? Again Spore and has that really stopped Ubisoft? No, they just push for tighter and more restrictive DRM.
5. Still gives IGN hits. Somebody still has to go there and get it not to mention most everyone I have seen includes links to the original article or review.

[Maverick827]

M25105 wrote...

Name me one singleplayer game that pirates can't crack.

But that's exactly the problem: files on your computer are infinitely vulnerable to people who know how to exploit them, so looking to single player games won't help.  This whole "always online DRM" concept comes from multiplayer games that require an active account with an authentication process, which cannot be pirated save for creating your own server.

Modifié par Maverick827, 07 avril 2013 - 02:56 .

[andy6915]

1. It still shows the pattern of more DRM=more pirated copies

2. Because I'm bypassing the publisher, bypassing the ones who put in the terrible DRM that made the game lose sales and get pirated more. But giving a check to the devs shows my support of the game they made, regardless of the DRM on the publisher's side.

3. Not if there's already a pattern that is only strengthened when games with the most DRM get the most pirated.

4. And the result? The company loses more money then if they hadn't put in the DRM. Publishers will learn that lesson eventually, giving enough time and DRM-laden games getting pirated.

5. Yeah, it gives them a single hit... And a SUBSTANTIAL loss of hits in trade. Just like a copy of a game needs purchased by at least one person for the cracking and pirating process to begin.

[addiction21]

Rawgrim wrote...


It was meant as a pun You use child porn in your example, I say that it was CHILDish.

That was a terrible pun. I mean that in the best way possible. Just wanted to put that at the top

Rawgrim wrote...


The game manuals (sometimes over 100 pages thick) served as copy protction too. You got questions in-game. Write down word 3 on line 16 on page 87 etc.

Ya nonexistent was the wrong word to use. I should of said limited and nonintrusive. There were also the serial keys and I think it started on the ps1 where the store bought discs had corrupted blocks  so they could not be so easily copied.

But pirating as we see it now came first and was around a long time before DRM. Pirating anything music, movies, games, etc... was never so wide spread and so easy before the internet.

The point? You do not buy a game that's a game not bought. You take part it pirating that's a point for DRM. Like it or not that's how it works.

[billy the squid]

addiction21 wrote...

andy69156915 wrote...

This is me being lazy and am pretty mch **** at breaking up quotes.

1. No it shows that you pirated the game. That's it nothing more. And really its not simple at all to say "x people pirated x game" At least in the United States that takes a court order and the corporation of your isp to divulge you external IP.
The best anyone ever does is monitor the traffic.
2. So why not just purchase the game and send them the letter anyway? They are still both getting your money and feedback.
Being spitefull (I like the spore example that comes latter in this thread) and pirating more is nothing but a destructive circle. Which also goes back to the whole "it only proves you pirated it to pirate it"
3. No it makes nothing more easy to figure out. YOu could have no qualms with the DRM at all and just be short on money. Again all it proves is somebody pirated the game not why.
4. Really? Have you paid attention? Again Spore and has that really stopped Ubisoft? No, they just push for tighter and more restrictive DRM.
5. Still gives IGN hits. Somebody still has to go there and get it not to mention most everyone I have seen includes links to the original article or review.

1) Quantity talks on it's own. 

2) Because it'll be ignored, the publisher still gets the money and carries on regardless. And it makes a point when millions of people do it, unless they just want to bury their heads in the sand.  And it works, as EA backed down on the Spore DRM.

3)The individual is entirely irrelevant, you seem to be missing that point. When your game is pirated en mass, there's usually a reason, or is the spike because everyone, suddenly became strapped for cash for just that game?

4)Yes it did actually, they've removed or reduced the level of DRM and no longer institute always online and intermitent authentification. So it did work. Eventually they got the message, that stacking heavier, and more restrictive DRM, doesn't work. Because the game still got cracked and people made a point of pirating it out of spite as much as they did because they refused to give any money to Ubisoft who stubbornly dug their heels in. 

5) It simply becomes more widespread that IGN is a shill and their reviews and news are inherrently biased, rather than attempting to block the page hits. I think most company marketing, if they're good, keep aneye on the attitude towards a major site, which when it reaches critical, they move to another site. 

Modifié par billy the squid, 07 avril 2013 - 03:10 .

[addiction21]

1. And it says nothing. Pirates pirate because they are pirates. That's all a suit is going to see that the game was pirated. They whys mean nothing other then it happened and will happen again.
2.They listened? Explain SimCity then.
3. You miss the point that they do not care about why but how to stop it.
4. No it did not because they have gone back to it. Mass pirating something just to up the numbers only gives them a reason to do it. Maybe after the fact the lax back but they already made the money. Sure maybe they could of made more but again there is a reason no one produces digital sales. The same reasons one should take pirated numbers with a grain of salt.

I know you don't want to hear it but those that actually pirated to play far outweigh those that ran bots and proxies to dl it repeatedly from multiple computers over and over again to drive the numbers up.

5. And again keep giving them the traffic and the money will keep coming in. You can think what you want but reality wants a word with you. Traffic is there, money is made, and business as usual.

[billy the squid]

addiction21 wrote...

1. And it says nothing. Pirates pirate because they are pirates. That's all a suit is going to see that the game was pirated. They whys mean nothing other then it happened and will happen again.
2.They listened? Explain SimCity then.
3. You miss the point that they do not care about why but how to stop it.
4. No it did not because they have gone back to it. Mass pirating something just to up the numbers only gives them a reason to do it. Maybe after the fact the lax back but they already made the money. Sure maybe they could of made more but again there is a reason no one produces digital sales. The same reasons one should take pirated numbers with a grain of salt.

I know you don't want to hear it but those that actually pirated to play far outweigh those that ran bots and proxies to dl it repeatedly from multiple computers over and over again to drive the numbers up.

5. And again keep giving them the traffic and the money will keep coming in. You can think what you want but reality wants a word with you. Traffic is there, money is made, and business as usual.

1) And that's why they're now saying DRM doesn't work then, are they?

2) Sim City was not DRM it was an always connected online game requirement, by connecting players. The problem was that the details said it required always online when it didn't, and players in short order simply switched it off. In short EA were dumb arses for trying to make it always online in the first place, then screwing up their servers. The got hammered over SecuRom and activations, and they've had problems with Origin, and have had to deal with those authentification issues as well and online issues as well.

3) And many of them have realised they can't, not without making every game contain an online component, which requires their servers to bear the cost, which is simply unfeasable. They've admited it. 

4)Ubisoft certainly haven't. So where you got that from I don't know, because they didn't use it for Assassin's Creed 3. Yeah, they can try to place more restrictions on it, and they'll still fail like every other time they tried. DRM isn't free, the publishers have to pay for it. And I'm sure they did make back their costs, in some cases, just as I'm sure they took losses in others or their profit margin was slight. They have produced figures, from games like Skyrim. 

I'm sure pirated to play does outweigh the number of people that pirated to simply seed the game. Still doesn't change anything, in regards to a percentage have decided to pirate it because places like ubisoft had used such a restrictive online policy.

5) Yep, because companies, will continually support an advertiser who has become stigmatised, and derided so they can be tainted by association. Bravo. 

[Allan Schumacher]

M25105 wrote...

addiction21 wrote...

Name me one singleplayer game that pirates can't crack.
DRM is punishing legit buyers while the pirates get away with it.

The point, you missed it.

Oh and how so?

I was saying that regardless of DRM's actual real world efficiency at stopping piracy, if DRM is being added to combat piracy (And as Wulfram pointed it, this may not be the case), all that matters is someone thinks it does.

So yes, I think you missed the point I was trying to make.

Thing is, even working for a game studio I have limited visibility to the effacacy of DRM stopping (or not stopping) piracy.  To simply say "it does nothing" contradicts some of the criticisms that big publishers have - that they are excessively driven by data.

People always say that big publishers love money more than anything else, to the detriment of everything else.  Yet, it's somehow so simply and obvious to consumers that DRM doesn't help make more money, yet the people that love money more than anything else aren't able to see this.  I'm skeptical.

Merely not buying a game is not sending the message. The company doesn't know why
you didn't buy a game. For all they know, you was simply not interested
in the game and was thus not part of the marketbase for that game
anyway. But by pirating, you are showing the message that you was
part of the marketplace and going to be a confirmed sale, but their DRM
made them lose that sale. It's showing "I would have bought your game
if you hadn't put in DRM". Simply not buying doesn't get that point
across.

You may think it's showing that.  Yet we keep getting DRM to combat piracy.  Fact of the matter is, we don't know what precisely motivates someone into pirating a game.  There's a lot of justifications that people use, but even then there's no guarantees that they're actually being honest in their recounts.

By pirating the game, the strongest message you are sending is that you have an interest in playing the game.  What I am saying is that someone can take that data point, and for any individual person, may or may not make the correct assessment as to why they pirated that game.


Big publishers love the money right?  If they look at the data and see that their games don't even have the buzz and interest via piracy (let alone sales), while games with no DRMs start to become increasingly successful, with enough data points the information will start to show a statistical correlation that shows DRM impacts the interest level people have in games.  The most influential thing you can tell a publisher is that you don't care about a product.

Given that you've already admitted that you should not be denied the ability to play an awesome game simply because it has some DRM you don't like, it really looks like you're simply rationalizing a desire to play the game for little other reason than because you want to.

I mean, despite SimCity's online DRM, it was still the fastest selling SimCity game ever.  So while there's undoubtedly more gamers than there once was, unless they were all completely oblivious to the fact that it had an always online component, all of the piracy to show The Man seems to be somewhat lost.

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 07 avril 2013 - 04:54 .

[Rawgrim]

If SimCity, the fastest selling game ever, bugged and broken as it was, didn`t have DRM, I suspect it would have been the fastest re-sold game ever too

[Allan Schumacher]

Not purchasing it is fine, but being okay with it? Especially if it
becomes a larger trend in the gaming industry? I'm not sure I can ever
get behind that. From a customer standpoint this is nothing but a
negative because it actively locks off products you may want to buy (if
your response to always online/DRM is to not buy a product), and if you
do buy them will inevitably inflict any number of the problems that
we've actively seen these services have (especially during their launch
period). Diablo 3 and Simcity both actively showed what some of these
issues can be, and let's face it . . . Life is what happens while you're
making other plans.

What would cause something like this to become a larger trend in the gaming industry?  (answer: it has to be accepted on a large scale)

You're right that it locks you off from products you may want to buy.  And that can suck for sure.  This is not the only thing to do this.  I wanted to buy the first Spec Ops game, but I didn't have a 3dfx based chipset (old crappy Rage Pro).  I remember being unable to buy games because I didn't have a math coprocessor.  Heck, I was a "Mac Gamer" for a long time, which definitely saw me getting a raw deal.  Today, some games can only be purchased digitally, and for some people this is a line in the sand that they don't want to cross.

I have no problems with it because if other people are okay with it, then kudos to them.  If it ends up being successful and a company considers it a benefit, then kudos to them as well.

I suppose the big thing is that I really have no problems with it is that I'm okay with the idea that, if the industry heads down that path, I won't be an avid game player anymore (at least not for games where the MP/Online component isn't appealing to me).  I suppose other people may not be in that situation, but I'm definitely at a stage in my life where I feel games are a luxury.  If there's enough people like me, gaming sales will suffer and things will have to change, and my money will come back in.  If there is enough people that aren't like me, c'est la vie.

True, but it still has an effect even if you choose not to purchase it.
Let's say all future Bioware games were always online, and I'm not
saying that will happen. Let's just say it were to happen. All the
series I've loved from Bioware over the years would, presumably,
continue. And I could never experience that.

This is true.  But I'd respect you 1000 times over for having the conviction to stand up for what you believe in.  If all our games ended up requiring always online and the online component is interesting to me, I'd also have to reevaluate my continued employment.  I like working at BioWare because they make games I want to play.  If they start making games I don't want to play, that complicates things, especially since I'd likely be less effective as an employee anyways.


Going back to my point, widespread always online for single player exclusive experiences can only happen if there is widespread acceptance.  If we keep getting Diablo 3s and SimCitys over and over and over, this will undermine the widespread acceptance.  The only way widespread acceptance can occur is if the online service becomes acceptable on a widespread level.  Which means any company doing an always online experience better damn well make sure they're releasing something that won't blow up in their face.

[Allan Schumacher]

3)The individual is entirely irrelevant, you seem to be missing that point. When your game is pirated en mass, there's usually a reason, or is the spike because everyone, suddenly became strapped for cash for just that game?

The #1 reason for a game being pirated en masse, however, is because the game is popular (this goes for anything being pirated, really)

Furthermore, is there actually an up to date reference for Spore's piracy numbers?

The only ones I found are from 2008, and they actually undermine their own headline when they literally state that the Sims 2 is the record holder for most pirated game in the same article. This article shows the numbers for the past 5 years (in 2011) and Spore doesn't make the Top 10 actually.

[billy the squid]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Big publishers love the money right?  If they look at the data and see that their games don't even have the buzz and interest via piracy (let alone sales), while games with no DRMs start to become increasingly successful, with enough data points the information will start to show a statistical correlation that shows DRM impacts the interest level people have in games.  The most influential thing you can tell a publisher is that you don't care about a product.

Not quite. The point has always been one of proportionality.

Make it prohibitive for people to play and people will pirate in droves out of spite, in that they are denied access to a product (like the server systems at ubisoft when they were changed to a third party, it locked everyone out) or they are fed up with being saddled with restrictive DRM, so they simply decide to take the game anyway. And then you have the section who will always pirate and steal no matter what DRM or no, there will always be a group like that. 

What we have seen is a combination, refusal of people to buy those games, piracy continues unabated, and spiking on new releases as soon as a cracked copy appears on the net. Publishers already  know, that excessive DRM has impacted their sales and uptake and has made little impact in the uptake of piracy, frankly in the most oppresive casses it's been shown to increase it. I think the message is more, there is an interest in the product, but people aren't willing to put up with that lvl of DRM, don't use it, or everyone will just bypass it soon enough.

Look at Steam, it has it's own system of DRM. and yet there are millions and millions of digital  downloads via steam. It's all about proportionality. How much am I willing to put up with, before I think "hell with it, I'm going to pirate it" as it's easier and I get a better experience than getting booted from the game everytime the internet gets a bit twitchy.

[Allan Schumacher]

Look at Steam, it has it's own system of DRM. and yet there are millions and millions of digital downloads via steam. It's all about proportionality. How much am I willing to put up with, before I think "hell with it, I'm going to pirate it" as it's easier and I get a better experience than getting booted from the game everytime the internet gets a bit twitchy.

You're right, Steam has certainly made DRM convenient. Steam's biggest advantage is that it can competes with the convenience of piracy. I have several anecdotes of friends that stopped pirating because Steam was more convenient (though they were typically pirates that pirated because they could). Although Steam had to endure the **** storm of forcibly including it in their games. I remember the rage when Counterstrike had to use it, I was there as people said "Steam is a steaming pile of ****." I actually ran into authentication issues with Half-Life 2 as well, one of the few games I preordered because I just had to play it ASAP. Valve wasn't dumb, and the mandatory Steam requirements for their games (which were very popular) helped drive acceptance of Steam and its DRM.

To follow up on your second point, excessive DRM also impacts developers because they spend a large amount of time following up on false positives (I have had to directly deal with this myself).

What do you think the reaction to always online DRM would be like today if Diablo 3's and SimCity's launches were flawless victories?

[andy6915]

I have to say, Steam is fighting piracy in a way that actually WORKS and in a way that doesn't screw over non-pirates. I'd bet money that people would be far less bothered if the next Xbox was rumored to use a Steam-like format instead of the format it's actually rumored to have. Seriously game makers, your current anti-piracy methods are not the way to do it, Steam IS. Take notes, because they know how to do it and might teach the rest of you guys how to fight piracy the right way if you pay attention.

Modifié par andy69156915, 07 avril 2013 - 05:07 .

[Allan Schumacher]

Take note that Steam is a form of DRM.

[billy the squid]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

3)The individual is entirely irrelevant, you seem to be missing that point. When your game is pirated en mass, there's usually a reason, or is the spike because everyone, suddenly became strapped for cash for just that game?

The #1 reason for a game being pirated en masse, however, is because the game is popular (this goes for anything being pirated, really)

Furthermore, is there actually an up to date reference for Spore's piracy numbers?

The only ones I found are from 2008, and they actually undermine their own headline when they literally state that the Sims 2 is the record holder for most pirated game in the same article. This article shows the numbers for the past 5 years (in 2011) and Spore doesn't make the Top 10 actually.

Spore was the most pirated game for 2008. The exact numbers  seem to vary due to the various streams and torrents where people can get it. One article says it was half a million from BitTorrent alone. 

Yeah, piracy because the game is popular is certainly a reason that it increases, but it doesn't equate to the idea that the number of people who pirate increases irrespective of the lvl of DRM used. For instance, would the lvl of piracy found in Assassin's Creed 2, From Dust reach the lvl where Ubisoft stated that 95% of their users pirate the games on PC (I'm paraphrasing here), if it hadn't have implemented such a restrictive DRM backed up with a stubborn policy of retrenching themselves?

[andy6915]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Take note that Steam is a form of DRM.

I know. Yet, it's a form of it that doesn't punish paying customers... Totally unlike the SimCity format. It's a DRM that doesn't feel like a slap in the face, and doesn't possibly turn your games into a paper weight because of bad luck.

It's DRM, but it's DRM done right.

[billy the squid]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Look at Steam, it has it's own system of DRM. and yet there are millions and millions of digital downloads via steam. It's all about proportionality. How much am I willing to put up with, before I think "hell with it, I'm going to pirate it" as it's easier and I get a better experience than getting booted from the game everytime the internet gets a bit twitchy.

You're right, Steam has certainly made DRM convenient. Steam's biggest advantage is that it can competes with the convenience of piracy. I have several anecdotes of friends that stopped pirating because Steam was more convenient (though they were typically pirates that pirated because they could). Although Steam had to endure the **** storm of forcibly including it in their games. I remember the rage when Counterstrike had to use it, I was there as people said "Steam is a steaming pile of ****." I actually ran into authentication issues with Half-Life 2 as well, one of the few games I preordered because I just had to play it ASAP. Valve wasn't dumb, and the mandatory Steam requirements for their games (which were very popular) helped drive acceptance of Steam and its DRM.

To follow up on your second point, excessive DRM also impacts developers because they spend a large amount of time following up on false positives (I have had to directly deal with this myself).

What do you think the reaction to always online DRM would be like today if Diablo 3's and SimCity's launches were flawless victories?

I remember the issues when steam first started as well, there was a lot of naysaying and problems with Steam. It's come a long way since then and it has made a big effort to, make it convenient, more so that piracy, that's why it seems to have been so successful.

The sales deals, the ability to run things in offline mode, if I wan't as well as general online stability and now the recent addition to trade licenses digitally on steam.

The issues with Diablo 3 and SimCity is that it's not a form of DRM, perhaps in a cynical roundabout way it is, because it's designed to always be online. Diablo 3 got that sorted out, it's impossible to pirate it, to my knowledge. SimCity, the higher ups in the company said that the online requirement was necessary, like Diablo 3, except it was found out not to be, that playing it offline is possible.

There is a difference between the two. But, I think Diablo3 and Sim City would have been recieved  a lot better had the servers been up to stuff. Perhaps you can answer this though, if games like Diablo 3 are becoming the accepted norm, as part of the game is run on the company side, if I understand it correctly, is it actually feasable to do that with multiple games, each with seperate servers. 

I think there will always, for several years, be an underlying mistrust of always online authentification, simply due to the issue that, there is a greater loss of control over your use of the product. Prima facie, I'd expect resistance to decline, but I can't forsee what other eventualities may pop up.

Modifié par billy the squid, 07 avril 2013 - 05:28 .

[Brockololly]

andy69156915 wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Take note that Steam is a form of DRM.

I know. Yet, it's a form of it that doesn't punish paying customers... Totally unlike the SimCity format. It's a DRM that doesn't feel like a slap in the face, and doesn't possibly turn your games into a paper weight because of bad luck.

It's DRM, but it's DRM done right.

Right- Steam has DRM functionality but it also adds an incredible amount of value to your experience. To the extent that all of the extras associated with being on Steam can outweigh possible inconvenience of the DRM. Not for everyone, but for many.

The same can't be said with something like SimCity. Even if you want to say that its not actually DRM, then you'd have to look at what kind of value are the Always Online features adding to one's game experience. When the Always Online aspect of the game can cause it to be impossible to even get in the game or online features end up having to be turned off to make the game work, then I think you have some major problems where its not only that the Always Online features aren't adding any value to a player's experience but they're becoming a burden and a negative to the experience.

Same with a lot of the Ubisoft games that use some form of their DRM- when you end up getting kicked from a single player game like Assassin's Creed because your internet connection dropped, how is that adding value to the player's experience? How is that making it better? Its not. And in instances like that, somebody that pirates or goes out and gets the crack for that game is having the better experience.

Allan Schumacher wrote...
What do you think
the reaction to always online DRM would be like today if Diablo 3's and
SimCity's launches were flawless victories?

Thats a good question. In both of those cases, Blizzard and Maxis/EA had claimed left and right that they weren't DRM but that they were using Always Online features to enrich people's game experience. And I think in both cases, even when working right, its questionable whether whatever resources it took to implement those features was worth it, or that they added a significant amount of value to the consumer. I recall Blizzard saying that playing solo was the "clear choice" amongst gamers. I'd be curious to know how many people are trying to play solo in SimCity.

And what makes the Diablo case more ironic is that Blizzard is having the PS3 version of Diablo work offline. Same with SimCity how people have been able to figure out how to make it work offline.

Certainly some games would make more sense to be always online- any big MP game like Battlefield makes sense. But trying to force multiplayer functionality or online "features" into a single player experience where the SP experience only works while being online will always face backlash. Even if it works right- which I can almost guarantee it never will.

billy the squid wrote...

I think there will always, for several years, be an underlying mistrust  of always online authentification, simply due to the issue that, there  is a greater loss of control over your use of the product. Prima facie,  I'd expect resistance to decline, but I can't forsee what other  eventualities may pop up.

Thats the entire core issue of digital distribution really- trust. I trust Valve not to completely screw up. And if they did, I trust they'd make things right. Other companies? Not so much. You have to earn trust. Having a ****ty launch of an always online game that was previously single player focused? Not doing much to earn my trust. Especially with games like SimCity or Diablo 3 that require servers to play at all, do I trust that the company will have those servers running in a year or 2? What about when the sequel comes out? Will they turn the servers for the old game off?

Modifié par Brockololly, 07 avril 2013 - 05:59 .

[LinksOcarina]

andy69156915 wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Take note that Steam is a form of DRM.

I know. Yet, it's a form of it that doesn't punish paying customers... Totally unlike the SimCity format. It's a DRM that doesn't feel like a slap in the face, and doesn't possibly turn your games into a paper weight because of bad luck.

It's DRM, but it's DRM done right.

Well, now it is at least. It took a few years before Steam was any good.

And I still can't get the ****ing thing to run on my computer properly. 

[Allan Schumacher]

I know. Yet, it's a form of it that doesn't punish paying customers... Totally unlike the SimCity format. It's a DRM that doesn't feel like a slap in the face, and doesn't possibly turn your games into a paper weight because of bad luck.

It's DRM, but it's DRM done right.

There are very vocal groups that loathe Steam for its DRM as well though (as well as other reasons).