Yes first appeared on the Spectrum iirc - with that weird looking glass to decipher the character on screen.
Very strange idea!
M.
Old Copy Protection Methods
- Thread starter antijoke
- Start date
Yes first appeared on the Spectrum iirc - with that weird looking glass to decipher the character on screen.
Very strange idea!
M.
Soldato
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Elite 2: Frontier has just sprung to mind. If you got the letter right (page number / line number / word number) then it doubled the time before you would be asked again - if you got it wrong it halfed the time. It only accepted one keystroke so if you hit the wrong key - tough!
I owned, and still do, the original and it bugged me something rotten. Still got cracked though after all that!
M.
I owned, and still do, the original and it bugged me something rotten. Still got cracked though after all that!
M.
Here's a couple of very old ones on the ZX Spectrum:
Jet Set Willy - This had a card with a grid of various colours and you got asked for a colour at a certain grid reference, this was in the age before scanners and colour photocopiers were around.
Elite - This used something called 'Lenslock' which had you hold a little foldable plastic lens to the tv set that would unscramble a distorted two character code on the screen.
Edit: Found an image of the Lenslock
Jet Set Willy - This had a card with a grid of various colours and you got asked for a colour at a certain grid reference, this was in the age before scanners and colour photocopiers were around.
Elite - This used something called 'Lenslock' which had you hold a little foldable plastic lens to the tv set that would unscramble a distorted two character code on the screen.
Edit: Found an image of the Lenslock
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Yes i still have a copy of elite on the spectrum with said protection a little red plastic thingy
The copy protection effort I most fondly remember was the code book for Worms on the Amiga (and no doubt PC and ST), with the white pages with gloss white codes (or were they black??)on that you could only see by shining light off them.
Properly scuppered my efforts of bagging a copy from my mate.
Properly scuppered my efforts of bagging a copy from my mate.
I remember watching the little coloured blocks slowly come up on X-copy
"tick,tick,tick,tick,tick,tick,tick,tick,...small pause...BONG!!"
Ahh.....the memories.
I remember Prince of Persia had the page manual copy protection. Always had to get that right, otherwise it would be instant death if you drank the wrong posion with the incorrect page number
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The first one I remember was on the amiga, I can't remember the name but it was a futuristic point and click and it let you play for a while then at one point you got into a car and it asked for the car activation code that was in the manual (instruction booklet)
The most recent one like this that I can remember is metal gear solid, Asking for meryl's frequency on the back of the cd case
The most recent one like this that I can remember is metal gear solid, Asking for meryl's frequency on the back of the cd case
The copy protection effort I most fondly remember was the code book for Worms on the Amiga (and no doubt PC and ST), with the white pages with gloss white codes (or were they black??)on that you could only see by shining light off them.
Properly scuppered my efforts of bagging a copy from my mate.
I remember this, it was black, nostalgia is awesome
Championship Manager '93 had some thing where you had to type in football scores from the back, however if you tried 2-1 enough times you'd normally get in.
Similarly Cannon Fodder's "page x, paragraph y, word z" would often turn out to be "you".
Similarly Cannon Fodder's "page x, paragraph y, word z" would often turn out to be "you".
I remember the days of the spectrum tapes.
All the clicking and screeching on the Ultima games (Sabre Wulff, Underworld, Atic Atak, etc)
Still managed to copy them though, chap used to use an old reel-reel tape recorder and use the headphone out socket into it.
All the clicking and screeching on the Ultima games (Sabre Wulff, Underworld, Atic Atak, etc)
Still managed to copy them though, chap used to use an old reel-reel tape recorder and use the headphone out socket into it.
Was that Beyond the Steel Sky? (might not be exact name)
Associate
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I remember Quarantine 1 or 2 had the whole red text on a red background code sheet so it couldn't be photocopied. A mate at the time spent a whole double geography lesson copying the whole thing out, only for the teacher to confiscate both copies just before the end of the lesson!
