Game Activation Uproar

Tried&Tested said:
So suggest an alternative. Give in to the pirates and release games with no protection or try their hardest to make their games as protected as they can for as long as they can? The only middle ground to that is by using existing security techniques that have been proven to be ineffective.

What else can they do? They have to keep trying new ways to prevent their software being ripped off.
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Sure, keep using methods that have proven ineffective as it's better than "giving up", but why take it further and add "two-time activations" and other such measures to a system that's already been proven useless?

The message I get from 2K Games is: "We can't fight pirates, so we'll annoy customers as much as possible."
 
Zefan said:
The next person recommending piracy in this thread gets a suspension.
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:p :D

/lenght of suspension can be varied using hydrulics :p
 
Steam will solve this problem for me, but I worry about future titles. I hope this doesn't become more common.
 
Tried&Tested said:
So suggest an alternative. Give in to the pirates and release games with no protection or try their hardest to make their games as protected as they can for as long as they can? The only middle ground to that is by using existing security techniques that have been proven to be ineffective.

What else can they do? They have to keep trying new ways to prevent their software being ripped off.
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Steam is one way, not perfect but a way nontheless, have a game linked to a specific account rather than blindly denying cd keys once they have been installed
or
Restrict a cd key from only being used online once at a time, while not stopping single player will result in more people buying the game to play online



Now your turn, explain to me how putting piracy above consumer experience is going to help the consumer?
 
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bfar said:
Steam will solve this problem for me, but I worry about future titles. I hope this doesn't become more common.
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steam is not really an option for everyone though. what about those who have limited download caps per month. im sure bioshock will make then wounded. :(
 
Tried&Tested said:
Well, as far as i know they haven't done it yet. Maybe they will, maybe they won't...but each new security measure they implement is a step closer to beating them!

See my points above, the ones you've not answered...do you expect them to leave their work wide open to being pirated?!
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I think that, even with their online activation and copy-protection, their products are still wide open to piracy. As proven by there already being copies of the PC and xbox 360 versions floating around.

div0 said:
If that were true, why would they bother?

Presumably the producers / games company are paying money to this 'activation' service. Why would they do that if they didn't think it would reduce piracy and increase sales?
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Well how can you prove that an anti-piracy features has or hasn't had an effect? They probably think in the same way as your post, "if we're paying good money for these features then how can they possibly not work?"

They'll continue to use them because of the theoretical benefit even though in reality they're being shown to have no effect whatsoever (beyond the potential to irritate legitimate customers).
 
As far as i can tell 2k haven't commented on the few posts that have popped up on their forums, until they do i would advise peopel to take these so-called warnings with a pinch of salt and wait for some official news.

Does my head in - not everything that's posted on the internet is true. Just look at some of the stories that have popped up recently that developers have had to correct.
 
Tried&Tested said:
I say good on them. If it wriles up a few geeks who format their HDD every other day for the sake of protecting their months and months of effort/money that's gone in to Bioshock then so be it.
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Yes nobody ever buys new computers or installs the game onto their Laptop, or requires a reinstall due to a **** up with Vista or the game itself.

That must be it.
 
I'll be keeping an eye on this one, sounds exactly like the sort of BS that you get with Starfarce. (Not sure if it still goes on, I stopped trying after X3)
Creating a totaly ridiculous situation and making legitimate customers crack your game after they've bought it is not the way forward...
 
Tried&Tested said:
As far as i can tell 2k haven't commented on the few posts that have popped up on their forums, until they do i would advise peopel to take these so-called warnings with a pinch of salt and wait for some official news.
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Yeah, I'm waiting for an official response to this. No one has talked about using this "manual activation" option either. I suspect it's nothing worth getting worked up about.

If it is a real pita then everyone knows what to do anyway.
 
Reading the steam fourms it appears that version also has some Securom issues with it. The retail one only allows 2 activations, whereas the steam version only allows 2 activations on different hardware.
 
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