Long read: The beauty and drama of video games and their clouds

"It's a little bit hard to work out without knowing the altitude of that dragon..."

If you click on a link and make a purchase we may receive a small commission. Read our editorial policy.

Ubi under fire as DRM servers go down

PC gamers unable to play ACII or SHV.

Update: Ubisoft has blamed the outage on outside attacks.

Original story: Reports are emerging that the servers for Ubisoft's new digital rights management system have gone down, preventing users from accessing their games.

Ubi recently introduced the new system with Assassin's Creed II and Silent Hunter V. It requires players to remain connected to the internet at all times. But posters on the company's official forum claim an error message is being received when trying to connect to the servers.

The problems appear to have begun over the weekend. Community manager Ubi.Vigil wrote on the forum, "I don't have any clear information on what the issue is since I'm not in the office, but clearly the extended downtime and lengthy login issues are unacceptable, particularly as I've been told these servers are constantly monitored." The server issues have been attributed to "exceptional demand".

Only those who purchased a copy of ACII or SHV legally appear to be affected. Pirates playing illegally downloaded cracked versions of the game are able to play without a problem.