Commenter: "Sure, I have an always-on net connection but what happens if I don't play for 11 days and the moment I want to play my connection is down? Are you saying I'm not going to be able to play my perfectly legitimate purchased copy of the game, even the retail version, until I get permission?"
BioShock rep: "That is correct. And I would suggest that you contact EA Support the moment this happens (once you get your internet back) to report the issue. If there are people having problems with the system as designed, then Support needs to hear about it so they can help us evaluate it for the next game title."
"Hey customers... FUCK YOU!"
I'm now not getting Spore, and I was going to.
Edited By GORDON on 1210177601
"Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid."
This will do nothing to stop piracy of course, but it will do a heck of a good job of stopping EA's new arch-enemy: people playing their single player games offline.
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
That is bullshit but it doesn't bother me as much for spore and it does mass effect.
You need the game to get online at the start and during play to get the full effect so if it wants to see if I have a real copy while I am playing the game I can live with it. I would rather it didn't but I can live with it.
Mass Effect on the other hand doesn't need to get online for any reason. I guess that is just another reason for someone to pirate or use crack codes.
Someone already posted where a customer asked (about Mass Effect) what happens if they have not played for 10+ days and don't have an internet connection available at the time they wish to play. The answer from the EA rep was "You don't get to play until you have an internet connection".
That's one of the bigger issues, but most of it is about principle and hassle.
Some of us bought a game called BioShock. It had an online activation that it didn't tell anyone about before hand. It also had a "You only get 2 activations per copy" that nobody knew about.
On launch day when people tried to activate, many got a failure due to the server load. Problem is, it failed AFTER transmitting it's unique ID. That's one of your two activations done. You try again, fail again due to server load... and you're done. You now cannot install your game legally. You must fark around with the company who made it for a week or so before they'll admit you actually did buy the game and give you another two tries to activate your game.
It was easier to download a crack... for my legally purchase game.
That's the important part. They made it so hard to use my legally purchased product legally... that it was easier to go get a pirated copy and leave my legally purchased copy sitting in a drawer.
The other thing with the "every 10 days or it doesn't run" model is that one day they're going to shut down the check server and now your game will never play again.
Which again means it'll be easier to get and use a pirate copy than a legal one.
They're encouraging pirating.
"Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid."
It has to be idiots suits that don't really have any idea what is going on bucause I can't see why the developers themselves wouldn't see this is lame.
Just like the FBI warnings at the beginning of movies or the trailers you can't skip the only people who are forced to watch them are the ones who leagaly bought the DVD the piraters edit that shit out.
& the big bizzes ask themselves why people continue to use illegal software. Cos you're forcing us to. Stop being dicks.
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
Spore was the first game in a long time I was looking forward to. I even considered prepaying for it, which is something I've never done for any game.
Glad I didn't, as I will not be buying it now. If I play it it will be because I stole it. Even if every copy came with free steaks and blowjobs for life I wouldn't buy it if I had to activate it once, much less every time I play it.
EA loses another sale.
"ATTENTION: Customers browsing porn must hold magazines with both hands at all times!"
TPRJones wrote:Even if every copy came with free steaks and blowjobs for life I wouldn't buy it if I had to activate it once, much less every time I play it.
Come on. $50 for steaks and blowjobs for life? I'd buy Deer Hunter 4 if it included that. Hell, I'd buy two. You know you're lying.
Cakedaddy wrote:Come on. $50 for steaks and blowjobs for life? I'd buy Deer Hunter 4 if it included that. Hell, I'd buy two. You know you're lying.
We never specified the condition or quality of said steaks & blowjobs.
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
I just don't get why they would put this stuff in spore. Almost everyone is going to connect to the internet each time they play the game anyway. So why not have what other online line games have and check a key or something then boot the person off if it isn't legit.
Is there really that big of a problem with people with no internet connections who are also going to be stealing spore? If you don't have the internet how do you even know about spore to begin with?
Oblivion IV had no DRM, and was the best selling PC game of... whatever year that was.
Low sales are not because of piracy, it's because a lot of games suck.
Every forum I hit on this topic is full of people saying, "I was gonna buy it, now I'm not." I wonder if EA is paying attention, and what they think about it.
"Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid."
GORDON wrote:Oblivion IV had no DRM, and was the best selling PC game of... whatever year that was.
Low sales are not because of piracy, it's because a lot of games suck.
Every forum I hit on this topic is full of people saying, "I was gonna buy it, now I'm not." I wonder if EA is paying attention, and what they think about it.
Should be some handy script written to crawl a few forum threads on various forums, collect the posts, & e-mail them to a few select addresses.
Or perhaps one that posts automatically on the EA forums at regular intervals.
Diogenes of Sinope: "It is not that I am mad, it is only that my head is different from yours."
Arnold Judas Rimmer, BSC, SSC: "Better dead than smeg."
I wouldn't be surprised to see something change. EA changed the selling extra guns in Bad Company after there was a ton of complaints. The interest in Spore is about a billion that of Bad Company so they may feel the heat.
The other thing is what is the point of rechecking? If you bought the game and everything passed why would you then start playing a stolen copy?
Periodic checks to the mothership opens the door to anything.
"We noticed that you have an unregistered install of Office 2006 on your system. Microsoft is going to give us $20 to disable Spore because of it, so too bad for you. Maybe you give us $25 and we forget this conversation ever took place."
Edited By GORDON on 1210286262
"Be bold, and mighty forces will come to your aid."
What really pisses me off is just the wording of things, honestly. If they want to rent me the game for $50 for life (or as long as they keep renewing the key), fine. Then I'll consider it. But dont' tell me your going to sell me the thing and then make me check in for permission to play it when I want to. That's bullshit.
I don't have to call up OralB every time I want to brush my teeth. It's my damn toothbrush. That's the way selling things works.
Edited By TPRJones on 1210315826
"ATTENTION: Customers browsing porn must hold magazines with both hands at all times!"
Bioware is removing the every 10 day re-authentication from Mass Effect. With Penny Arcade and every other major gaming site making fun of or bitching about this it is only a matter of time until Spore is changed too.
Now it is one time online activation and you can only install it on 3 PCs. I don't know if that is 3 total or like Bioshock where when you uninstall it you get a credit(If I understand that correctly). Still lame but not as.
Spore is now ditching it too somewhat. Now you just have to authenticate it when you first install the game and then if you use any of the online features.
Which is what they should have just done in the first place. Almost everyone who gets it is going to what to play online so why not just check if they have a legit copy before they download new content.
