Impossible (to beat) DRM
- Thread starter Shamus Young
- Start date
Likewise, and while I don't buy PC Gamer magazine, I have to say that they're right to decry the PC version. Ubisoft were way out of line, and it's pretty clear that piracy doesn't impact sales nearly as much as they claim they do. I think I only ever downloaded a PC game once, and it was a pretty old game that was WAY beyond any reasonable sales figures.Nurb said:
I hope gamers don't let Ubisoft forget this bullshit any time soon.
*sigh*
What we have here is a lose-lose situation.
I know, I know, how dare Ubisoft put into place this ridiculous and intrustive copy-protection scheme that punishes legitimate customers. I can't really scold anyone who buys the game and picks up the relevant crack so as not to be the prisoner of Ubisoft's servers and the dubious quality of their Internet connection.
But it's really not helping anyone to be going "Hooray, the evil game company got schooled!" (Add Nelson laugh if desired.) Yes, the DRM was stupid, but... That "evil game company" is the same one that put out the game for the PC in the first place.
And I like being able to play games on my PC.
And every time something like this happens, there's a few fewer games that get ported to the PC next year.
It's just... so... stupid. PCs shouldn't be the smallest platform; there are PCs in far more homes than there are any of the consoles. But most of the games require more horsepower than a "casual user" PC dishes out out of the box... And Intel, Microsoft, AMD and their lot can't quite seem to get their act together, and occasionally make me wonder if they're even trying. Games For Windows indeed...
And, yes, there's piracy. The PC was first to the 'net, and first to set up communities there... And the bar set on the knowledge necessary for early admission to the club, combined with the non-proprietary nature of the hardware, almost inevitably meant that at least some of the people playing would be the equals in technical know-how of the people coding the game... And the DRM.
I can't help but wonder if PCs are the sacrificial goat of the gaming industry. There's already piracy on the consoles as well. If the PC gaming market dies, or at least navigates away from the big-budget, triple-A platinum releases, will that bunch of pirates just go away? Or will they then spread out to descend on the consoles?
What we have here is a lose-lose situation.
I know, I know, how dare Ubisoft put into place this ridiculous and intrustive copy-protection scheme that punishes legitimate customers. I can't really scold anyone who buys the game and picks up the relevant crack so as not to be the prisoner of Ubisoft's servers and the dubious quality of their Internet connection.
But it's really not helping anyone to be going "Hooray, the evil game company got schooled!" (Add Nelson laugh if desired.) Yes, the DRM was stupid, but... That "evil game company" is the same one that put out the game for the PC in the first place.
And I like being able to play games on my PC.
And every time something like this happens, there's a few fewer games that get ported to the PC next year.
It's just... so... stupid. PCs shouldn't be the smallest platform; there are PCs in far more homes than there are any of the consoles. But most of the games require more horsepower than a "casual user" PC dishes out out of the box... And Intel, Microsoft, AMD and their lot can't quite seem to get their act together, and occasionally make me wonder if they're even trying. Games For Windows indeed...
And, yes, there's piracy. The PC was first to the 'net, and first to set up communities there... And the bar set on the knowledge necessary for early admission to the club, combined with the non-proprietary nature of the hardware, almost inevitably meant that at least some of the people playing would be the equals in technical know-how of the people coding the game... And the DRM.
I can't help but wonder if PCs are the sacrificial goat of the gaming industry. There's already piracy on the consoles as well. If the PC gaming market dies, or at least navigates away from the big-budget, triple-A platinum releases, will that bunch of pirates just go away? Or will they then spread out to descend on the consoles?
You make it sound like it's impossible to crack DRM when half or even all of the game is run off of a server. You seem to forget or simply not realize that MMOs have been pirated. Yes, there are private servers for practically every MMO that has a fanbase.Shamus Young said:
It may be time consuming to copy a game by emulation instead of straight bit-by-bit copying but, if an emulated copy behaves exactly like the original, how is that any real difference from taking a bit-by-bit copy of it?
If someone makes a Tic-Tac-Toe game and tries to protect it by storing all of the data on the server, that doesn't stop a person from basically writing their own game using the same graphics and sound effects and have it behave exactly the same as the other person's game. It may not be "piracy" in the traditional sense but then neither is downloading a cracked version of a game.
Personally, I call bunk on the entire copyright and patent systems. Their whole purpose is to promote creativity and innovation and the way it's being used right now does far more to hurt creativity and innovation than to help it. People are afraid to try to make their own product because you never know when you'll get sued for infringing any number of patents and copyrights. There are companies that do nothing but buy up patents to sue people over it.
Also, let us not forget how the RIAA has made a business out of suing customers. They even sue dead grandmothers. Can any sane person call this kind of utter crap a good thing?
I think it would be entirely possible to run a successful software/media/whatever business even in a world with absolutely no copyright and patent system to protect them. It's the simple thing called supply and demand. You supply something people want and they'll pay for it. No, not everyone will but that doesn't mean that it's impossible to profit from that type of business. Also, this insane notion that just because you make a product you are suddenly entitled to massive profits needs to go. There's this thing called quality to worry about. You have to actually produce something that people want. If they want it enough, they'll pay for it. If not for the convenience of having a legitimate copy, they will because not everyone is a complete immoral asshole. It's my belief that if you trust people that they will return that trust. No, it wont work out that way all of the time but it's a lot better than the crap they're doing now.
Well lets say your a game developer like Crytec, you have 100 employees on a project everything from Programmers/Animators,IT-Prof and Security Guards... Lets round it out to say on Average they make 150k/year just for argument sakes and it takes 1 year to develop a title.Irridium said:
150,000 x 100 = 1.5million for development cost
Now you need to factor in Manufacturing/Distribution cost that's done per unit shipped so lets say your going to ship at lest the number of units it takes to re-cope your development cost.
1,500,000/30.00 = 50,000 units so say it cost 10.00 in M&D that puts the price at 40.00 (39.99) if you do digital download you cute your distro down a lot. (I know i am ignoring sore markups that can pushes the price from 39.99 to 59.99) but that's money the developer never see's anyways
So really the profit margin on a decent title is relatively large, esp if you build it for the major console platforms since the dev kits make it a lot easier to devlop for the counsel systems than for PC. just to become limited on hardware, user input options and system flexibility. When you really think about it 50,000 units is a joke in todays marks when even bad games can sell 50k, and good games can sell millions not even counting special editions.
I don't even care about the DRM thing in regards to having to buy the game cause I ALWAYS buy my PC games. But this whole debacle and lack of respect for the gamers out there makes me stay away from ubisoft games as much as possible. I was thinking about getting Splinter Cell but will not get it because Ubisoft just wants to treat us PC gamers like children.
And honestly, how many of those pirates would really buy it if they couldn't get it any other way? Prob like 3. The point of pirating is getting shit for free you wouldn't otherwise buy. They need to quit crying and just stick to making games that work regardless of internet connection.
And honestly, how many of those pirates would really buy it if they couldn't get it any other way? Prob like 3. The point of pirating is getting shit for free you wouldn't otherwise buy. They need to quit crying and just stick to making games that work regardless of internet connection.
i purposely don't buy games with excessive drm, just because they are such a pain. Steam sometimes allows for the drm to be less of a pain, like for mass effect they pretty much got rid of it all
Putting yourself in a developers shoes it's easy to understand why they get mad at people stealing (yes pirating is stealing) their product.
Whine and ***** about "oh but I didn't have a demo" or other pitiful excuse. The developer is providing you THEIR product on THEIR terms. If you don't like those terms, vote with your money but that doesn't enable you to steal with good conscience. You try working 2-5 years of your life while providing for your family at a small company and than have some entitled snot tell you he "deserves" it for free.
Sorry, but this hits home for me. Some of my best friends have been layed off due to "budget cuts". Furthermore many companies have had to shut down due to rampant pirating.
The other thing that bugs me is the idiotic idea that people think "the developers are turning on us! it's them versus us". When someone is defending themselves for survival purposes they are not on the attack. It's not them versus us, it's you versus them. If you care more about getting your new toy than helping a developer you don't deserve to be in the gaming culture, period. You want DRM to stop? either you personally stop pirating or tell your friends you know that pirate to stop.
That being said, DRM does hurt paying customers. My solution to only punishing pirates is pirating should be more thoroughly persecuted by the law. If there was even a 10% more imprison/fine/community service sentence for the thieves I bet a lot more people would not pirate.
That may sound harsh but really, you want a system that ONLY punishes the criminals? that's pretty much it. Other than that, I pray for the day a band of hackers actually seeds a nasty virus disguised as a cracked game....god I pray for that day.
at the end of the day the best, and only permanent solution, is for gamers to make a stand that a true gamer does not pirate and use peer pressure to do the rest.
/flameon!
Whine and ***** about "oh but I didn't have a demo" or other pitiful excuse. The developer is providing you THEIR product on THEIR terms. If you don't like those terms, vote with your money but that doesn't enable you to steal with good conscience. You try working 2-5 years of your life while providing for your family at a small company and than have some entitled snot tell you he "deserves" it for free.
Sorry, but this hits home for me. Some of my best friends have been layed off due to "budget cuts". Furthermore many companies have had to shut down due to rampant pirating.
The other thing that bugs me is the idiotic idea that people think "the developers are turning on us! it's them versus us". When someone is defending themselves for survival purposes they are not on the attack. It's not them versus us, it's you versus them. If you care more about getting your new toy than helping a developer you don't deserve to be in the gaming culture, period. You want DRM to stop? either you personally stop pirating or tell your friends you know that pirate to stop.
That being said, DRM does hurt paying customers. My solution to only punishing pirates is pirating should be more thoroughly persecuted by the law. If there was even a 10% more imprison/fine/community service sentence for the thieves I bet a lot more people would not pirate.
That may sound harsh but really, you want a system that ONLY punishes the criminals? that's pretty much it. Other than that, I pray for the day a band of hackers actually seeds a nasty virus disguised as a cracked game....god I pray for that day.
at the end of the day the best, and only permanent solution, is for gamers to make a stand that a true gamer does not pirate and use peer pressure to do the rest.
/flameon!
If they just made the games better people would buy them and they wouldn't have to waste the money on these stupid DRMs. Look at Blizzard, they made millions off Diablo, Warcraft (not counting WoW as MMOs are in a different league) and Starcraft. The only security measures they use are a CD key and a good online matchmaking system (battle.net is still the best matchmaking system in use today imho).
Starcraft has the fourth highest game sales of all time. The only games to beat it are WoW (made by the same damn company), The Sims and The Sims 2. The last two are even debatable as many estimates include the expansions/bundles.
Starcraft has the fourth highest game sales of all time. The only games to beat it are WoW (made by the same damn company), The Sims and The Sims 2. The last two are even debatable as many estimates include the expansions/bundles.
How do you think an MMO works? Nearly all of the data is server side and you're just watching it play out on your client. This is essentially what always online DRM is trying to copy. I was saying that even an MMO, a game where everything is already server side, can be "pirated" and that there's no such thing as a perfect DRM or even anything close.MR T3D said:
If it can be made, it can be copied. This is an inevitable and undeniable fact.
Points:
The reason most games are cracked within 1-2 days is because of the 6-18 months of work that went into legitimately cracking each new DRM system (securom, tages, starforce). The games were still playable with lesser circumvention methods (emulation, custom exes, etc) but now those systems are completely cracked and each new version only lasts a few hours, as only so much can change.
MMOs are pirateable. Theres no uniform method of farming out the server responses, but doing so isn't difficult. Just time consuming. Usually private servers are multiple versions behind the current, but that doesn't bother many people.
The server emulators that farted around the last few weeks are half-assed measures, subject to being rendered irrelevant by ubisoft changing one or two characters in each of the "server" events. The "scene" as its known rejects these types of measures on those grounds.
Skidrow modified a grand total of one file to crack AC2. A single file under 700kb. They did not emulate the DRM server, they completely removed the DRM, as it was located primary in a single small file.
Increasing the amount of communication between the client and the DRM servers would only make the DRM easier to crack. The sparseness of the communication between ubisoft's DRM servers and the game is what allowed this DRM to last as long as it did. Once you indicate what bits of code are interacting with the server, the crackers know exactly where to devote their time, and no amount of encryption on either end can even slow them down. The reason securom, starforce, and tages took so long is because the crackers had to go through each line of compiled, encrypted code one by one to determine exactly where the weakest bits of code were ("if fail, goto fuckyouscreen," "if succeed, goto game") then trial and error how to, basically, hotwire them.
So... yea... do some research occasionally.
The reason most games are cracked within 1-2 days is because of the 6-18 months of work that went into legitimately cracking each new DRM system (securom, tages, starforce). The games were still playable with lesser circumvention methods (emulation, custom exes, etc) but now those systems are completely cracked and each new version only lasts a few hours, as only so much can change.
MMOs are pirateable. Theres no uniform method of farming out the server responses, but doing so isn't difficult. Just time consuming. Usually private servers are multiple versions behind the current, but that doesn't bother many people.
The server emulators that farted around the last few weeks are half-assed measures, subject to being rendered irrelevant by ubisoft changing one or two characters in each of the "server" events. The "scene" as its known rejects these types of measures on those grounds.
Skidrow modified a grand total of one file to crack AC2. A single file under 700kb. They did not emulate the DRM server, they completely removed the DRM, as it was located primary in a single small file.
Increasing the amount of communication between the client and the DRM servers would only make the DRM easier to crack. The sparseness of the communication between ubisoft's DRM servers and the game is what allowed this DRM to last as long as it did. Once you indicate what bits of code are interacting with the server, the crackers know exactly where to devote their time, and no amount of encryption on either end can even slow them down. The reason securom, starforce, and tages took so long is because the crackers had to go through each line of compiled, encrypted code one by one to determine exactly where the weakest bits of code were ("if fail, goto fuckyouscreen," "if succeed, goto game") then trial and error how to, basically, hotwire them.
So... yea... do some research occasionally.
Your statement is purely and utterly wrong. Copying is not stealing. Copying can be copyright infringement. As much as the corporations like to demonize copying, it is a legitimate function of daily life. Copying is probably the most important way to learn and we are all guilty of it. Copyright law may make it illegal to copy a copyrighted work but it is by definition not stealing. To steal, something has to be taken away and no such thing occurs when you copy something.Jinxey said: