Ubisoft: Our DRM will "evolve, improve"

[EarthwormJim]

The problem is though, they don't raise the cost of piracy for anyone except the pirates cracking the DRM. "Jumping through loops" to get a FREE game to work will always be better than spending $50 on a game that may not. The only thing excessive DRM does is cause headeaches for a) paying customers and b) the 3 smart guys releasing the crack. Sure, it may cut down on piracy SOME, but you're doing it at the cost of people already willing to pay. Do you think the people burned by Ubi-softs DRM are going to purchase another game from them? That is highly unlikely. Do you think because people couldn't pirate AC2 on release day they are going to go buy it? That is also highly unlikely.

If anything, they should be embracing piracy. At least then they can have a scapegoat when their crappy games sell terribly.

Cost can mean more than $$. No pirated game is free, it just doesn't cost any direct money. Some of the "costs" of pirated games are: you run the risk of a virus, which can cost you time dealing with it; you spend time implementing the cracks or researching them; you often put up with an initially buggy experience with the game; and of course you spend time downloading the game.

No pirated game is free.

A lot of gamers are relatively poor college students. But a growing number of them will no longer be poor once they are employed. Someone who works 8+ hours a day may not want to spend time farting around with a pirated game, and will instead spend their money ($50 is nothing when you make $50k+ a year) on something that works out of the box.

People are also pretty impatient, if people were willing to wait for a game the pre-order system wouldn't exist.

Look at Batman: Arkham Asylum. That game was cracked from day one however the cracked versions would leave you stranded ~40% of the way through, unable to continue.

My main issue with this DRM (Ubisoft's), is that it can very well provide an experience that is worse than the pirated version. That should never exist (if you factor in trade-offs and gains the DRM should offer).

I feel that the best DRM implementations are examples like Steam. They offer you a compelling service in exchange for their DRM. Also DRM that sabotages cracked versions of the game are a nice idea.

There's also no way a publicly traded company can embrace piracy. Their stockholders would not accept that.

 

[shortylickens]

Cost can mean more than $$. No pirated game is free, it just doesn't cost any direct money. Some of the "costs" of pirated games are: you run the risk of a virus, which can cost you time dealing with; you spend time implementing the cracks or researching them; you often put up with an initially buggy experience with the game; and of course you spend time downloading the game.

No pirated game is free.

A lot of gamers are relatively poor college students. But a growing number of them will no longer be poor once they are employed. Someone who works 8+ hours a day may not want to spend time farting around with a pirated game, and will instead spend their money ($50 is nothing when you make $50k+ a year) on something that works out of the box.

Look at Batman: Arkham Asylum. That game was cracked from day one however the cracked versions would leave you stranded ~40% of the way through, unable to continue.

Yeeeaahhhh, ummm, I hate to tell you this but......
Pirates spend LESS time farting around than legitimate users.
The Arkham Asylum "fix" actually fucked over paid customers.
And I wouldnt be surprised if some crafty bastard already introduced a new hack to fix the "fix" for pirated versions.

 

[EarthwormJim]

Yeeeaahhhh, ummm, I hate to tell you this but......
Pirates spend LESS time farting around than legitimate users.
The Arkham Asylum "fix" actually fucked over paid customers.
And I wouldnt be surprised if some crafty bastard already introduced a new hack to fix the "fix" for pirated versions.

Arkham Asylum has been fixed, it just took a couple of weeks after release for pirates to get around the glider bug and grappling hook bug. The main inconvenience is that the fix would not work for already saved game progress.

Are you sure the "fix" fucked over paying customers? I've heard that just about every single person that was complaining about major bugs had a pirated version.

I know plenty of people who try to use pirated games and through their inept knowledge of computers are not able to get them working. Even with clearly legible instructions they just cannot figure things out, or at the very least avoid getting virus ridden versions. Just look at the dumb "help me" comments on thepiratebay.

I'm sure 99% of the people on these forums are more than capable of using pirated games, but regular computer forum users are the minority of gamers.

 

[JoshGuru7]

Sure, it may cut down on piracy SOME, but you're doing it at the cost of people already willing to pay.

And so the question becomes whether benefit A outweighs cost B. The answer varies dramatically for each specific title and DRM implementation combination. More specifically, it depends directly on the demands for the product both before and after DRM which are quite difficult to estimate. As such, I don't see how you can feel comfortable saying which is larger without citing any source or data that would give you an estimate of even one of the two.

"Jumping through loops" to get a FREE game to work will always be better...

Putting aside that there is no such thing as a free game, you simply cannot know this if you have anywhere near the same level of information that I do. On the other hand, if you have some actual data to support this claim I'd be interested in seeing something besides conjecture.

 

[Rezident]

It's too bad they had to do something like this. I played the R.U.S.E on Stream, and really enjoyed the game, but I will not buy it because I will not support DRM that will drop me out of a game in single player mode if I lose my internet connection.

Exactly. I loved Assassin's Creed but I will not buy AC2 as long as it's effectively broken for anyone with a non-perfect internet connection. It's a shame but the shame is on Ubisoft. Good job there's so many good games out that I don't have to buy anything by Ubisoft.

 

[CountZero]

Putting aside that there is no such thing as a free game, you simply cannot know this if you have anywhere near the same level of information that I do. On the other hand, if you have some actual data to support this claim I'd be interested in seeing something besides conjecture.

Ok, so the cost of one is time and the cost of the other is time + money. Every paying customer that gets hosed by the DRM spends time trying to figure out why, probably more than any person that just pirates the game as they have much more investment in it working.

You simply cannot know the opposite is true either. If you don't like conjecture you probably shouldn't come to threads about piracy/DRM since neither side has data that conclusively proves anything.

 

[GrumpyMan]

For me it would be like the NFL telling me, "You cannot watch the NFL unless you have cable, and can only watch it while the cable is hooked up, no over the air HD watching with rabbit ears." Uh.......no thanks.

 

[OCGuy]

I normally bash the kiddies that complain about every form of DRM..but Ubi is so ludicrous that there is no way to defend it. F YOU UBI!

 

[JoshGuru7]

You simply cannot know the opposite is true either.

Naturally, but knowing it may be true is very relevant to a discussion that presumes it cannot be true.

If you don't like conjecture you probably shouldn't come to threads about piracy/DRM since neither side has data that conclusively proves anything.

I think we can agree on two things. 1) Ubisoft had better information about consumer demand for AC2 than anybody in this thread, and 2) they are the ones with money on the line over this decision. As a result their decisions should generally be treated a source of information to any party less informed than they are. Companies tend to generally act in their own best interest, which is why claiming that Ubisoft's actions will be bad for Ubisoft requires substantiation and yet the inverse does not.

I'm not saying that Ubisoft is infallible, only that their actions should be viewed as a new piece to the puzzle rather than immediately dismissing them as ill-conceived as so many posters in this thread are eager to do.

 

[mindcycle]

 

[zerogear]

I did a test search just now because I was curious, seems like AC2 was cracked with a emulated offline server. If they can do that for AC2.. I don't see much of a problem with rest of ubisoft games.

 

[coloumb]

I did a test search just now because I was curious, seems like AC2 was cracked with a emulated offline server. If they can do that for AC2.. I don't see much of a problem with rest of ubisoft games.

Yep - it's just a matter of taking the time to log the correct response to a log file. Basically - UBI won the 0-day pirate war... but not the 30 day pirate war.

I suspect DRM will evolve into something like Battle.net - if you want to play the game, you'll have to register it with an online account and have to log into that account in order to start the game. Hell..I wouldn't be surprised if they added RSA encryption key before you can start the game [server sends you a key to cell phone, email, etc that you have to enter before playing the game].

 

[Powermoloch]

It's a great thing i bought AC 1 for 5 dollars last years Black friday. Not willing to pluck 50 bucks on DRM whackiness.

 

[Duwelon]

I normally bash the kiddies that complain about every form of DRM..but Ubi is so ludicrous that there is no way to defend it. F YOU UBI!

Same here. Ubisoft has gone way too far. If I buy a game off steam especially, I better not be treated like a criminal for it. Ubisoft is quickly turning into the new EA for me.

 

[Rebel44]

Idiots from Ubisoft wont get any money from me.

I have 179 games in my Steam account so its not like I have nothing else to play.

 

[Modelworks]

Ubisoft new DRM is a disaster.
Comments from paying customers on ubi forums, 64 pages of them.
http://forums.ubi.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/6061083365/m/9121044648/p/61
Small sampling.

Server Unavailable for me now.. havn't played in days :-/

You Fecks have wasted nearly a month of ours and anywhere from $50 - $100 of peoples money and Not even a FEKKEN EXPLANATION, bar the "I just got back from spending all your money on a holiday" (Which you are rightly Deserving ONCE THE FEKKEN GAME IS OUT AND FEKKEN WORKING).PC Gaming isn't Dying, ****S like UBISOFT and companies like them are killing it.

1 ****ing month on, Hundreds if not more people can not play the game and a the reason is known (A ****ING LOGIN ISSUE WITH THE CUSTOMERS ACCOUNT) and still nothing is done, except pointless replies of Telling you to stand on one ****ing leg, face south and sing "Don't worry Be happy" while Juggling Carrots. That is if you are lucky enough to get a reply.

I don't want any stinking support anymore - I just want my money back now. Looping support site bah. You people are bloody useless.

Ugh, they should really get rid of this ridiculous DRM, it's the second time I was disconnected while getting a good strategy together for the map I was playing.

get the message while starting everything (excepte skirmish mode)
"Server Error / Cant Create New Session!"

 

[shortylickens]

Thats one of the most delightful rants I have ever seen!
:awe:

 

[mmntech]

Ubisoft is now saying their DRM scheme is vital to "creative and innovative" PC games.
http://kotaku.com/5519523/ubisoft-drm-vital-to-creative-and-innovative-pc-games

Notice how they're not calling it DRM or copy-protection anymore. It's an "online services platform". ^_^ Ironically, the US Government Accounting Office just came out with a report saying it's impossible to peg the number of dollars lost to piracy. The whole $750 billion/year turned out to be an arbitrary figure. Nobody could figure out where they got it from.

The best thing to do about Ubisoft is to ignore their games. Don't buy them, don't pirate them, don't play them. You're not missing much anyway.

 

[Dorkenstein]

I don't know why I bother owning a PC if I can play the same game on a console and get the exact same experience, such as assassin's creed 2, and not have to put up with asinine drm. Ubisoft is everything that's wrong with gaming and I hope that other companies do not follow suit.

 

[Modelworks]

The DRM protection on AC2, Settlers 7 has been defeated via server emulator. Settlers 7 was the holdout but that one has been beaten now too as of today. It was a nice try Ubisoft but all they managed to do was alienate legitimate customers. It might have gained them a few sales because some people did give up on the protection being defeated but I doubt it was more than those who were completely turned off by the protection system.

 

[shortylickens]

Ironically, the US Government Accounting Office just came out with a report saying it's impossible to peg the number of dollars lost to piracy. The whole $750 billion/year turned out to be an arbitrary figure. Nobody could figure out where they got it from.

Thats not ironic, thats deliberate bad information. When people use bad info to make decisions it pretty much ensures bad decisions.
And they didnt need to do the study, I could have told them that.
And I already knew the number was bullshit cuz theres no way in hells they could have counted it.

The whole problem with blaming piracy is there is absolutely, POSITIVELY, no way to tell how many people would have bought the game in the first place. And a 2nd lesser issue is they really cant tell for sure how many people and how many copies are actually being pirated, they just have round estimates.
I suspect if every game, and I mean EVERY game had a proper demo that worked just like the full version, then companies might actually see piracy start to drop.
But that makes sense to the consumer, so obviously it is bad for the company. Therefore, it will not happen.

On the flip side, absolutely no DRM made has ever stopped piracy. At best it slows it down for a few days or maybe a week. Thats it. So far it seems likes theres only one sure method to help reduce piracy, and thats making quality games at a reasonable price.
Again, that makes sense to the consumer so the companies probably dont like it.

(Let us not bring Starcraft 2 into this thread. We already have several official threads concerning it.)

 

[Continuity28]

What's an ubisoft?

(Message from the future)

 

[StrangerGuy]

We all know the best DRM makes all pirates magically run out to buy a legit copy so that now they will need to deal with all the DRM amirite?

 

[lsquare]

They can do what they want and evolve it however they want. It still won't change the way I feel and I won't be buying any games from them any more.

I definitely agree with you here. I rather pirate the game than reward companies like Ubisoft for policies like this.

 

[EarthwormJim]

I definitely agree with you here. I rather pirate the game than reward companies like Ubisoft for policies like this.

They're not wronging you in a criminal fashion. Why respond by stealing?

If you're going to pirate, then pirate. But don't try to justify it like that.