Qhimm.com Forums
Off-topic forums => Completely Unrelated => Topic started by: Kudistos Megistos on 2010-03-05 23:43:29
-
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/03/04/ubisofts-notorious-u.html
For those who don't know, Ubisoft recently took DRM to a whole new level with the PC port of Assassin's Creed II. Customers who bought the game will have to be online for the whole time they play it, and if their internet connection goes down at any point, they'll lose all progress since the last save. Or so I've heard; I don't play modern PC games, so this isn't my area of expertise. God help anyone with a dodgy ISP or anything like that.
Of course, this was all necessary in order to fight piracy: you see, the way to stop people from stealing things is to punish the people who buy them legally. The more hoops you make the legal buyer jump through, the better.
Naturally, this DRM wasn't as effective as Ubisoft thought it would be, and was cracked within 24 hours of the game going on sale. Ubisoft now have to deal with the fact that gamers have a choice between paying money for crippled game and paying nothing for a superior version. If this means that sales of the game are lower than expected, Ubisoft will no doubt decide that the DRM wasn't tough enough, and will spend even more time making something even more inconvenient for the sequel. Perhaps one of their lawyers will stand there and watch as you buy the game, open the box and play, and become your shadow 24/7. And so the cycle continues...
Thank god the only modern games I play are for consoles. No fucking about with DRM; just buy the game, stick the disc in the drive, and then play.
-
I agree it is pretty sad when if you want to legally play a PC game these days you need to purchase it and then download a pirated copy of the game. What a stupid idea.
-
Ubisoft has already responded by saying "NOPE ITS NOT FULLY CRACKED WAIT AND SEE GUYZ!!"
But nobody ever reports on that part.
-
sadly if i wanted to play that game with wine i would have to crack it along with any other game that requires that kind of DRM , gnu/linux does not support it since its incompatible with the GPL
one thing that is clearly _not_ allowed by the GPL is hiding private keys in the binary. You can sign the binary that is a result of the build process, but you can _not_ make a binary that is aware of certain keys without making those keys public
and that is exactly how those kinds of drm's work...
-
Thank god the only modern games I play are for consoles. No f***ing about with DRM; just buy the game, stick the disc in the drive, and then play.
I mostly support this comment, if a PC game runs fine on my machine I may buy it as long as it has decent multiplayer, the only time I ever download anything is when it has A) Stupid DRM, [see various EA games from about 2 years ago] or B) If there is no demo to gauge if it'll run as most hardware specs are utter bullshit.
90% of the time I just buy the 360 version, like I'll be doing with the next Splinter Cell game to avoid the draconian DRM or as I have just done with BF:Bad Company 2 since the Beta/Demo ran like ass on my PC.
-
The Bus = DRM
The Car = Paying Customers
The Man = Pirates
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1kqv8RPZXI&feature=related (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1kqv8RPZXI&feature=related)
Unfortunately there's no way to win at this. If you buy it, Ubisoft will believe DRM is working and keep up with this retardedness. If you pirate it, Ubisoft will work EVEN HARDER next time to make it harder to crack and likely inconvenience paying customers even more.
-
First i refuse to buy EA games, and now i can't buy Ubisoft games? i hate game companies now... or maybe i should hate pirates
-
Both. The companies have gone insane but it's the pirates that have driven them to insanity.
-
Yes and no. They think that DRM will prevent piracy (which is a stupid opinion. Even given the fact that most pirates would have never bought the game in the first place), but more importantly DRM is used to restrict what people who legally purchase the game use it for.
-
The only form of DRM that I can accept is Steam, since it not a massive and pointless restriction, I can chat with friends, buy other games, find a server to hop in on the global server browser, join straight into a friends game and a few other features, it's DRM that works and doesn't rape you without lube if your connection drops, there's no limited installs(unless a third party demands it) and if you're not connected to the net there is an offline mode so you can still play nearly(some third party or online only games can't quite work offline) all of your games.
Some games on steam still have other DRM but I just don't buy them.
Actually you'd think that after the Starforce incidents that Ubisoft would have moved away from DRM.
EA have really loosened their DRM usage, Spore was ridiculous, My uncle bought if for my 3 cousins to play, it only let you use one account per game and only allowed 5 installs, since then it had been patched to allow mulitple accounts and unlimited installs, just not on more than about 5 different PCs I think.
In terms of overall business practices, EA has become a saint compared to a few years ago, Activision/Blizzard is the new evil, lead by the devil himself Bobby Kotick.
-
DRM is a bit of a pointless exercise, in my book. You invariably end up with some kind of 'false positive' situation, where someone loses
-
DRM is a bit of a pointless exercise, in my book. You invariably end up with some kind of 'false positive' situation, where someone loses
It's nothing complicated at all to create a quiet background app that simulates the "yes you can continue" signal it expects from the interwebz. I've considered making one myself but I don't have the original acknowledge signal to work with. What if their server goes down? NO ONE'S ALLOWED TO PLAY BECAUSE A JANITOR TRIPPED OVER THE POWER CORD!!! Too bad for everyone that legitly bought their copies; Only the pirates can play now.
Bad decisions from the top tend to rot on the way down. :(
-
My original post was longer, but the board software cut it down. Others have reported the same thing. Why does this keep happening?
-
It's caused by a problem with the database server (probably SQL). Where's Qhimm?
-
Oh, wait a minute. He's just he-
-
Wow, it's like Candle Jack has been on the loose. People start saying something and they stop in the middle of the sen
-
::)
-
this is one of the main problems with properitary software,these companys don't care about your or your hardware,this technology will be used in the future to further restrict your devices and files.if they removed DRM the requirements for everything would be less, there is a lot of math to encrypt and decrypt content and idk about yours by my computer does not have a crypto chip to do the work, so that extra workload is given to the processor.. as for having to be online when you play , makes sence if your playing an MMO but not for ne thing else.
warning mini rant below:
the attempt to create a perfect system (reguardless of the type) is a very exhosting and pointless quest. you can never have a 100% perfect security system on any kind of hardware,its a flaw with anything digital. There is and always will be an exploit found. and the cost of there attempts is one of the reasons that games(and other software/game consoles..) cost so much. but a crack is always found, sometimes sooner then others. also making the claim that anything "uncrackable" is just in invite to hackers to crack it...and just wait till viruses and other forms of nasty maleware code start to use DRM protect themselves from removal.
[/minirant]
-
What if their server goes down? NO ONE'S ALLOWED TO PLAY BECAUSE A JANITOR TRIPPED OVER THE POWER CORD!!! Too bad for everyone that legitly bought their copies; Only the pirates can play now.
HA HA HA, OH WOW!
The janitor tripped over the power cord (http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/98927-Ubisoft-DRM-Authentication-Servers-Go-Down), and now only pirates can play. :D
This has all happened within one week of release. When was the last time someone failed so epically? ;D
-
What if their server goes down? NO ONE'S ALLOWED TO PLAY BECAUSE A JANITOR TRIPPED OVER THE POWER CORD!!! Too bad for everyone that legitly bought their copies; Only the pirates can play now.
HA HA HA, OH WOW!
The janitor tripped over the power cord (http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/98927-Ubisoft-DRM-Authentication-Servers-Go-Down), and now only pirates can play. :D
This has all happened within one week of release. When was the last time someone failed so epically? ;D
See? SEE?!!?!?!! This is an inane system. It's one thing to require you to log-in at startup like Steam, but even Steam has an "off-line" mode because it knows things won't always work as planned. Ubisoft doesn't believe this and requires you to STAY ONLINE THROUGHOUT your single-player non-interactive off-line experience. Where's the logic in that?! Their just punishing their customers! That's an unacceptable Japanese business practice. Too bad Ubisoft's French or they'd be gone by now. ;)
Let's just hope they get it right with the next few AC installments.
-
I've heard rumours (and by rumours, I mean speculation by random people on the internet) about this being a DDoS attack on the Ubisoft servers with the intention of showing them exactly what's wrong with their DRM system. One wonders whether they'll learn anything from it (hint: they won't) ;D
-
Can you give another hint? I'm not sure that I got it :lol:
-
The rumours are in fact... erm... fact.
http://kotaku.com/5488372/denial-of-service-attack-kills-ubisoft-drm-your-assassins-creed-ii-playtime
-
The rumours are in fact... erm... fact.
http://kotaku.com/5488372/denial-of-service-attack-kills-ubisoft-drm-your-assassins-creed-ii-playtime
This article (http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2008/07/ubisoft-drm-snafu-reminds-us-whats-wrong-with-pc-gaming.ars), particularly the "last updated" part and the first line of the last paragraph, provide some interesting reading.
-
This article (http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2008/07/ubisoft-drm-snafu-reminds-us-whats-wrong-with-pc-gaming.ars), particularly the "last updated" part and the first line of the last paragraph, provide some interesting reading.
So...Ubisoft actually started using a pirate's patch? :D Sorry, had to say it. ;)
Seriously though, there's never going to be a perfect DRM (although I think Steam's is pretty good). I wonder why they keep bothering making tougher and tougher restrictions to dissuade pirates that are going to break into those things anyway. That's just making better pirates.
-
This article (http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2008/07/ubisoft-drm-snafu-reminds-us-whats-wrong-with-pc-gaming.ars), particularly the "last updated" part and the first line of the last paragraph, provide some interesting reading.
So...Ubisoft actually started using a pirate's patch? :D Sorry, had to say it. ;)
It's not unheard of for companies to use patches made by fans (whether they be legitimate patches or just cracks). I actually seem to remember something being said somewhere about one of qhimm or Jedwin's patches being used by Eidos, but I'm probably just going senile. ;D
Seriously though, there's never going to be a perfect DRM (although I think Steam's is pretty good). I wonder why they keep bothering making tougher and tougher restrictions to dissuade pirates that are going to break into those things anyway. That's just making better pirates.
And making piracy more attractive. FF7 didn't have any of this kind of DRM, and a lot of the time the people who have trouble with it are people who downloaded some kind of cracked version. With PC FF7, the real thing is better than the pirate version, and we can tell people with the pirate version that they won't get the same functionality out of it (without lying); with ACII, the opposite is the case.
-
FF7 didn't have any of this kind of DRM, and a lot of the time the people who have trouble with it are people who downloaded some kind of cracked version. With PC FF7, the real thing is better than the pirate version, and we can tell people with the pirate version that they won't get the same functionality out of it (without lying); with ACII, the opposite is the case.
See this is, I believe, just the pirates purposefully being malicious. I've seen plenty of cracks and keygens that plant little viruses or trojans on a users computer. I kind of feel this way about those that made the FF7 "Ultimate Edition" or whatever. I made the smallest of changes to my ff7.exe to get it to not require the CD (no, I won't tell anyone how) and it didn't require anything that would have otherwise hindered the game. Didn't they (the creators of the Ultimate Edition) attempt to delete the movies or re-encode them with a better video codec to make the game smaller? That would require a few more alterations on the executable's part I suppose.
I kinda want to get my hands on the Ultimate Edition's executable now and see what they've done differently to it to give people so many problems.
-
FF7 didn't have any of this kind of DRM, and a lot of the time the people who have trouble with it are people who downloaded some kind of cracked version. With PC FF7, the real thing is better than the pirate version, and we can tell people with the pirate version that they won't get the same functionality out of it (without lying); with ACII, the opposite is the case.
See this is, I believe, just the pirates purposefully being malicious. I've seen plenty of cracks and keygens that plant little viruses or trojans on a users computer. I kind of feel this way about those that made the FF7 "Ultimate Edition" or whatever. I made the smallest of changes to my ff7.exe to get it to not require the CD (no, I won't tell anyone how) and it didn't require anything that would have otherwise hindered the game. Didn't they (the creators of the Ultimate Edition) attempt to delete the movies or re-encode them with a better video codec to make the game smaller? That would require a few more alterations on the executable's part I suppose.
I kinda want to get my hands on the Ultimate Edition's executable now and see what they've done differently to it to give people so many problems.
Purposely malicious? I'm going to assume Hanlon's razor instead. ;D
I get the feeling, from reading the countless threads about it, that there are lots of "Ultima editions" floating around in the intertubes, some of them with much more modification than others. I'm almost certain that some of them have the movies edited (or even deleted). There are posts on these forums about the Ultima edition from the days when nearly everyone had dialup, so it wouldn't be a surprise if someone wanted to cut down on the 2.2GB of downloading they'd have to do if they wanted the ISOs.
Really, the Ultima edition should be a relic by now. Maybe in the olden days no-one could mount ISOs and it was more expensive to download the whole game than buy it, but I can't see why anything like that would be popular now. It's also like putting a big sticker on your head saying "pirate". If the forum rules and ethos were different, and we had a general tolerance of piracy, I'd still tell people off for downloading it because downloading the original of the game would save so much bother. :roll:
I apologise to any Ultima edition owners who are offended by this and think that I'm misrepresenting their beloved hack (and there's a good chance I'm factually incorrect on a few points), but you can't tell me how great your experience with it has been without admitting to downloading it, so HA! :D
-
Little thought experiment: what if a PC game ran in its own Operating System (some small Linux derived majig) that was *built* from the ground up around having some kind of online authentication system? Like, the game actually needed to go online to obtain portions of its executable.
-
Purposely malicious? I'm going to assume Hanlon's razor instead. ;D
Perhaps in the case of the FF7 Ultima Editions, yes. This was more of a generalized statement. The Ultima Editions probably do have screwed up movies which would require more modification to the executable.
Little thought experiment: what if a PC game ran in its own Operating System (some small Linux derived majig) that was *built* from the ground up around having some kind of online authentication system? Like, the game actually needed to go online to obtain portions of its executable.
You still run into the same problem of if the servers go down you can't play.
-
Moar copyright fun, this time from Viacom: ;D
http://youtube-global.blogspot.com/2010/03/broadcast-yourself.html
-
You still run into the same problem of if the servers go down you can't play.
think about people that might try the game few years from now, and the auth servers no longer support the game.
now that's evil.
-
You still run into the same problem of if the servers go down you can't play.
think about people that might try the game few years from now, and the auth servers no longer support the game.
now that's evil.
Ah, yes. The game will be unplayable.
Or maybe not, because I can see it being patched sooner or later so that it can be played offline; surely Ubisoft know that they dropped the ball with this one. They've already patched the game so that being taken offline automatically saves (or something like that), because they realised their DRM was ruining the game. Hopefully they'll know when to admit defeat (I say hopefully because it isn't anywhere near certain to happen).
There is another evil benefit to this kind of thing (I can't be bothered checking to see whether anyone else has said this :P); it kills the resale value of games. And if the game can only be played whilst it is supported, people will have to get their copies while they're hot (and expensive!).