Publishers "scared" to scrap DRM Comments by Robert Purchese

Its true it will never stop, but right now its too easy, that is the problem.

Technically I virus could do damage to a PC, Right now I can increase my ram and processor voltage via software... exploit that idea and you have a fried PC.

Personally DRM doesn't bother me (looks at shiny new copy of crysis warhead).

I suppose the easiest target would be go at the sites hosting the torrent files, yet again it wouldn't stop it but would make it harder.

Cheaper prices will help, yes you have the chav's who will never pay a penny, but at £10-£15 it may be enough to convince a lot of people.

While I would LOVE £10-£15 a game (dreams of £1.99 Speccy games) it may be too cheap - although in line with Hollywood (except High Street blu pricing - ridiculous!), but I'd say £20-£25 would help ten fold to reduce both piracy and 2nd hand gaming.

I'm shocked! Finally somebody who talks sense!

@IneptPercy: It's not even the price at the moment. PC games are quite reasonably priced. I actually haven't bought any games lately because of DRM - when I actually would have gone out and got them otherwise.

The activation limits don't bother you right now; but if you're anything like me, you'll burn through the activation limits in about a year and then you'll be at the mercy of EA's customer services to play a game you'd already bought.

I already ended up playing a pirated version of Half Life 2 due to network problems. This makes me wonder - how many of those downloads the DRM-using industry members constantly complain about are actually people who paid for the game getting a copy that isn't crippled?

He hit the nail on the head. make it cheap, make it easy and don't punish your paying customers.

I do fail to see how these install limits are problem, I keep updating my PC and never need to re-install everything, with that they do seem to be updating things so an uninstall resets that activation slot.

Don't get me wrong I don't agree on the install limit, but I also don't see it as a problem. With that if it ever was a problem I would happily find a crack and carry on.

Its people using DRM as an excuse for piracy which get me. If you don't agree with DRM then buy the game and then download it, then you have paid and have a 'clean' PC.

Basically I don't fully agree with it but its not half the problem some people seem to make out, and its no excuse to steal games.

@Darren

"And that is what an all-digital future would be like, i.e. puiblishers could charge anything they like for their products because you wouldn't be able to buy them from anywhere else. For me, that's the very thing that kills any enthusiam I have for downloaded content."

But surely one option available to you is to not buy the game if you think it costs too much. Price for DLC will regulate itself in the same way non-DLC costs do, because customers vote with their wallets.

Steam stinks!

I buy this game. not work. I write e-mail, they send me this:

"You may be experiencing a conflict with the copy protection software on the disk itself. Any software that places virtual drives on your system (for the purpose of disk imaging, CD burning, download managers, even some antiviruses and firewalls) WILL cause this issue. Example software would be DaemonTools, Alcohol 120, GameJack, CloneCD, GetRight, Agnitum Outpost Firewall, Panda Antivirus, or Norton Antivirus. Please uninstall these titles, or at the very least disable them in your Task Manager."

what you bastard telling me? remove all my software to be able to run 1 software?

siht fek, now I have to pirate same game i buy to able run it.

Steam stinks!

@kangarootoo - Yeah, sure, I can choose not to buy a game but then that would hurt me more than the publisher as it wouldn't be the game itself I'd be objecting to, just the price. At the moment, if I think a PC game is too expensive then I can either (a) shop around and find it cheaper elsewhere or (b) wait for the price to drop (which it usually does very quickly at places like Play.com). With digital distribution though, if you can only download it from the publisher then I lose option (a) and likely option (b) would take a lot longer to occur (if at all).

What gets me about a lot of paid downloaded content is that it actually isn't much cheaper than buying the same product on physical media. For example, why would I download the new Kate Bush album for £12.99 or a little bit less when I can buy the same thing on CD in a beautiful case for the same price? The only advantage to buying digital content as far as I can see is that you don't have discs and cases cluttering up your house but then wouldn't you back up your stuff to a blank CD/DVD anyway thus ending up with "scruffy" clutter anyway (i.e. discs with tacky scrawled labels).

Maybe I'm just old-fashioned but nothing beats the feeling of actually feeling like you own the thing you paid money for because you have the disc, case and manual... you don't get that with digital download content... it's the reason I'm fine with low-priced DLC for games and the odd MP3 song purchase but I'm loathe to fork out for full albums, or games at £30+. I wouldn't feel like I was getting value for money really.

"What gets me about a lot of paid downloaded content is that it actually isn't much cheaper than buying the same product on physical media."

I agree completely, and that is something that publishers need to get sorted out if they want to make DLC work for them. DLC is the future, and if certian publishers refuse to accomodate it in a way that suits the customer, they will get left behind. Its never too late for the mighty to fall from a position of massive power (just look at Blockbuster video rentals).


On the subject of DRM, has anyone seen the news that EA have backed down on Spore DRM. You can now install Spore as many times as you want on up to 5 computers. Its mentioned over at rPS, so I'm sure EG will have a news item on it imminently.

Steam stinks!

I buy this game. not work. I write e-mail, they send me this:

"You may be experiencing a conflict with the copy protection software on the disk itself. Any software that places virtual drives on your system (for the purpose of disk imaging, CD burning, download managers, even some antiviruses and firewalls) WILL cause this issue. Example software would be DaemonTools, Alcohol 120, GameJack, CloneCD, GetRight, Agnitum Outpost Firewall, Panda Antivirus, or Norton Antivirus. Please uninstall these titles, or at the very least disable them in your Task Manager."

what you bastard telling me? remove all my software to be able to run 1 software?

siht fek, now I have to pirate same game i buy to able run it.

Steam stinks!

----

Not just Steam. A number of people had the same experience with one of the Sims 2 expansions or suffered even worse issues, with the game's "protection" deciding it wasn't enough to stop the game from running but actually went as far as hard disabling hardware/software it didn't like.

And people wonder why I won't touch EA titles.

@Darren

"..as opposed to the protected WMA stuff of 7digital .."

Your behind the times - 7digital only sell drm free mp3 now

I installed crysis warhead last night and the DRM hasn't killed my computer, how lucky am I?