I would like it to be less ambiguous - Perpetual/Continuous internet connection requiredFurthermore, all they need to do is slap on a note in the PC requirements section. "Internet Connection Required".
I would like it to be less ambiguous - Perpetual/Continuous internet connection requiredFurthermore, all they need to do is slap on a note in the PC requirements section. "Internet Connection Required".
I agree. I think price DOES make a big difference.DRM is less like putting a lock on your car door and more like making the starter call chevrolet headquarters every time you turn the key to get permission for you to drive your car.... and your engine gets bad reception frequently. Whereas, the majority of people it was designed to stop (the pirates) just know to just swap out the starter.I'm on the fence about this one. On the one hand I see the point of the companies. The DRM is in DIRECT response to people thinking it's okay to pirate & steal the products they worked so hard on. On the other hand, 99% of the people harmed by these draconian tactics are not the ones who are causing the issue in the first place. In fact, I would argue that the only people this DOESN'T hurt are the very ones who are causing the problem. Pirates always find ways around the DRM anyway so it just doesn't work.
But NOT having any DRM at all doesn't make sense either. That would be like saying, "You shouldn't have any locks on your car doors because a burglar is going to get in anyway." This is short-sighted. DRM may not prevent everything, but it stops a good number of people from being able to pirate.
So while I don't like DRM I fully understand it. I just think there's got to be a better way that doesn't alienate such a large number of people.
You may understand the motivation BEHIND DRM, but you must also understand DRM is much more effective at irritating genuine customers than it is in preventing piracy.
You know what's a lot more effective at combating piracy? A reasonable pricing point. An updated business model that doesn't rely on gouging your potential customers for 60 dollars right up front for a game that has somewhere between 3 and 5 hours of content (I'm looking at you, Call of Duty franchise). Frequent expansion pack/DLC additions.
---------- Post added at 11:02 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:00 AM ----------
Slapping a "cellular connection required to drive" sticker on a car doesn't mean people won't rail about how it sucks, nor stop O'Reilly from selling replacement starters.As I said, they can fix the issue by slapping a big red "Internet Connection Required to Play" sticker on the box under PC requirements.
Grasshopper! You must re-read my post! I said this very thing already.You may understand the motivation BEHIND DRM, but you must also understand DRM is much more effective at irritating genuine customers than it is in preventing piracy.
Grasshopper! You must re-read my post! I said this very thing already.You may understand the motivation BEHIND DRM, but you must also understand DRM is much more effective at irritating genuine customers than it is in preventing piracy.
15 years from now they don't care. They aren't interested in supporting a 15 year old game, and it's quite possible that you won't be able to find a computer/OS capable of playing it without problems unless you keep the original machine you used for it.What happens if, 15 years from now, you have the sudden urge to play Left 4 Dead
This is a concern, but at this point, I'd be surprised if Valve didn't have a planned contingency plan for this of some kind.I also have an issue with steam, though. What happens if, 15 years from now, you have the sudden urge to play Left 4 Dead but don't have it installed because you've gone through 4 computers in the interim, and for some reason steam no longer exists?
Grasshopper! You must re-read my post! I said this very thing already.You may understand the motivation BEHIND DRM, but you must also understand DRM is much more effective at irritating genuine customers than it is in preventing piracy.
Valve is on record as stating that they DO have a method to deactivate the require Steam Authentication and make their games run without Steam, and have pledged that they WILL issue patches in the event that they even need to shut it down or the company goes out of business. They made this statement right after they released HL2, I believe.I also have an issue with steam, though. What happens if, 15 years from now, you have the sudden urge to play Left 4 Dead but don't have it installed because you've gone through 4 computers in the interim, and for some reason steam no longer exists?
Only if the developer so decides to, which is still an extreme rarity. Otherwise what you're describing is still just as illegal as piracy. Interplay still exists and still holds the rights to the Descent franchise... and even though the source code was released, it was released "under the terms of a non-free license."In 15 years, you'll be able to do what I did for Descent I and II. Find an emulator for Windows 7 (similar to DosBox) and download the game. Aren't the source codes for game released eventually?
Valve is on record as stating that they DO have a method to deactivate the require Steam Authentication and make their games run without Steam, and have pledged that they WILL issue patches in the event that they even need to shut it down or the company goes out of business. They made this statement right after they released HL2, I believe.[/QUOTE]I also have an issue with steam, though. What happens if, 15 years from now, you have the sudden urge to play Left 4 Dead but don't have it installed because you've gone through 4 computers in the interim, and for some reason steam no longer exists?
As much of a pain as dongles are, it's expressly legal to bypass the DRM if the software company isn't supporting the dongle anymore. If I'm no mistaken it's one of the exceptions explicitly added to the DMCA. No such exemption exists for online activation. If a company refuses to support it's online activation, you can't legally bypass that DRM; if the company won't support a dongle, you can.Would you rather see them use a dongle than an internet connection?
Eventually, the dongle will no longer work on later operating systems and hardware configurations. Further, it's a pain to deal with dongle software problems.
That's good for those games already installed, but (and this is a genuine question), are you able to "reinstall" games without steam? Like I said... 3 or 4 computers down the line, steam might not be there to first-time-authenticate your reinstallation, if such is even possible.Valve is on record as stating that they DO have a method to deactivate the require Steam Authentication and make their games run without Steam, and have pledged that they WILL issue patches in the event that they even need to shut it down or the company goes out of business. They made this statement right after they released HL2, I believe.I also have an issue with steam, though. What happens if, 15 years from now, you have the sudden urge to play Left 4 Dead but don't have it installed because you've gone through 4 computers in the interim, and for some reason steam no longer exists?
I think big publishers (since they have the resources to take a few risks), should try something along this line.Honestly, it all comes down whether you want cheap games with unobtrusive DRM you MIGHT lose access to down the line, or you demand the a physical copy and all the prices that entails. I can live with the distant chance I could lose some old games, as long as I get them cheaply.
My politics are not in conflict with my stance here. I never said the company can't do what they want, I said they were stupid for doing *this.* Never have I advocated making DRM illegal. I've simply said it's an ineffective and backward way to go about this, and that they use it to cover up an antiquated and less sustainable business practice.And Gas, your attitude on this surprises me a bit considering your politics. Those companies can do whatever they want. You have a choice to not buy it.
I back-up all the Steam games I care about, and I've installed from the back-up to save time downloading. If there is a patch for Valve games that makes retail copies playable without Steam, I'd assume it would work on back-ups as well. It's a pretty flexible system as well, it can automatically break up the back-up over multiple discs (CD, DVD, dual-layer DVD or a custom size). You can back up multiple games together, or just one at a time.3) Gas you can backup your game files and installs in steam, I've never used it though so I don't know the full extent.
At least from Bloomberg's perspective, that's exactly why they're doing it. If he could pull it off, he would ban cigarettes from NYC entirely.I thought they were taxing the hell of cigarettes in New York in an attempt to keep people from smoking them. You know, tax it until it's too expensive to keep buying them?
At least from Bloomberg's perspective, that's exactly why they're doing it. If he could pull it off, he would ban cigarettes from NYC entirely.[/QUOTE]I thought they were taxing the hell of cigarettes in New York in an attempt to keep people from smoking them. You know, tax it until it's too expensive to keep buying them?
The value is not a fixed point, everyone has different values for a given object. So you can't really say that the price has far exceeded the value, especially given that millions of customers still buy at the elevated rates in NY.it's that the price has far exceeded the value. Thus, the black cigarette market, and thus, the rampant nature of software piracy.
At least from Bloomberg's perspective, that's exactly why they're doing it. If he could pull it off, he would ban cigarettes from NYC entirely.[/QUOTE]I thought they were taxing the hell of cigarettes in New York in an attempt to keep people from smoking them. You know, tax it until it's too expensive to keep buying them?
At least from Bloomberg's perspective, that's exactly why they're doing it. If he could pull it off, he would ban cigarettes from NYC entirely.[/QUOTE]I thought they were taxing the hell of cigarettes in New York in an attempt to keep people from smoking them. You know, tax it until it's too expensive to keep buying them?
At least from Bloomberg's perspective, that's exactly why they're doing it. If he could pull it off, he would ban cigarettes from NYC entirely.[/QUOTE]I thought they were taxing the hell of cigarettes in New York in an attempt to keep people from smoking them. You know, tax it until it's too expensive to keep buying them?
That's assuredly the underlying intent, but they also wanted the tax revenue. In either case, it just shows what happens when you set your price too high.I thought they were taxing the hell of cigarettes in New York in an attempt to keep people from smoking them. You know, tax it until it's too expensive to keep buying them?
The value is not a fixed point, everyone has different values for a given object. So you can't really say that the price has far exceeded the value, especially given that millions of customers still buy at the elevated rates in NY.it's that the price has far exceeded the value. Thus, the black cigarette market, and thus, the rampant nature of software piracy.
It's making a profit, but it's myopic. They could be making more, and they could be contributing to making "buying" the default process instead of an alternative weighed equally with "pirating." Even the mighty eventually fall, if bad practices persist long enough. Also, remember that the video game industry as a whole has seen unprecedented growth, not just Ubisoft. More money was actually spent on video games this past year than on movies.I have never understood people paying full price for a game. In the last year I got the entire total war collection for like 40$, most of which was for Empire total war (which, ironically, is the worst of the games).
And yeah, Gas I get that argument. You dislike it because its a stupid business practice. I don't know if I can agree though. Consider Ubisoft. Their revenue has grown consistently over the last decade or so to ~400 mil ~2002 to >1bil in 2008. Hard to argue that their business model isn't working.
Hehehe, this part makes me lol. Countless profitable companies screwed themselves going down routes that didn't have any reasoning behind their choice, nevermind good reason. I understand your point, but this particular assemblage of words just got to me...Why would any company, change their already very profitable business model without a massive down payment of good reason?
Yea. I know that now, but that didn't help me 5 years agoYou know Chibi... if you have an original copy of Starcraft, you can just register it at Battle.net and they'll let you download as many copies of the battlechest version you want for free
At least from Bloomberg's perspective, that's exactly why they're doing it. If he could pull it off, he would ban cigarettes from NYC entirely.[/QUOTE]I thought they were taxing the hell of cigarettes in New York in an attempt to keep people from smoking them. You know, tax it until it's too expensive to keep buying them?
It is a good goal, but I'm not a smoker. I have a few friends who are. It is HARD to kick the habit (I have seen them over 10 years trying to quit) but you have to have the will do it.I don't disagree that it's silly, I'm just pointing out that Mike Bloomberg actually wants to ban cigarettes as an end goal.
Well... Marijuana has always been illegal (at least for a long while for many people) alcohol and Cigs are different story. They have been around and legal for sometimes. Taking them away is hard like removing a tax that government institute.Yeah cause the whole illegal thing really killed the Marjiuana market right?