Ubisoft Forgets Multiplayer Codes in Driver: San Francisco - UPDATED

[Braedan]

BHAHAHAHAHAHA.

I knew eventually (or due to hackers in Ass Creed's case) the online authentication servers would be unavailable, but FORGETTING TO PRINT THE CODES?

HAHAHAHA.

I Love DRM.

(And I know that this game didn't have the online requirement.)

 

[Asehujiko]

Microsoft occasionally checks if people are running a game that haven't been released yet, because console games are generally pirated weeks ahead of release, they can't detect it otherwise. This is also the source of the myth that the pc has more piracy, because that happens closer to release day, which is when publishers count them.

AHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHAAAAA The "myth" that the PC has more piracy? Seriously? Pirates are lazy, and pirating on the PC is piss-easy compared to pirating games on consoles. I'm not saying games aren't pirated for the 360/Wii/Ps3, but any numbers you could get would be easily dwarfed by the number of games pirated on the PC. I'm pretty sure this "myth" you speak of is about as much of a mystery as gravity.

PC piracy numbers have been repeatedly proven to be massively inflated because the activity of each tracker is counted separately, instead of one game being downloaded by 10-15 trackers at once(ubisoft), flat out lies to get attention(crytek, ubisoft) or parroting crytek's bullshit claims(epic, ea, ubisoft again). The most accurate study, using call home software(blizzard) claims there have been 2.3 million pirates in total for starcraft 2, the biggest PC release at that time, while codblops managed to get ~a million xboxes banned for playing before release date alone, with no readily apparent number of pirates who weren't stupid enough to sign into xbl prior to release, or post release piracy, which, snarky comments about the average cod player's intelligence aside, means there are a lot more of them.

Iron Lore, who bankrupted themselves with a one-two-punch of making a 100% false positive drm on titan quest and then shitting out dawn of war soulstorm, estimate that there have been 100.000 pirates for their first game in total, including users forced to pirate it because their legit copies were non-functional for a while.

Unless you support the Sony line of thinking that EULA's are legally binding documents that overrule national laws and that dragging a desktop icon around is technically a breach of contract, in that case, yes, there are 4 billion pc pirates and you are most likely one of them.

 

[DirgeNovak]

I'm actually impressed by Ubisoft's response. Gold star!

 

[Something Amyss]

Wow, 2 news articles about massive screwups on newly released games in a row! bad day to release a game.

Or an awesome day, if you're the one company that didn't screw up.

 

[McMullen]

I'm not talking about turning your game into an .iso so you can play it without the disk (or something along those lines), I'm talking about people who physically download torrents and don't pay a single cent for the game. There are far more of these people on the PC than on consoles; I know from personal experience, as I have met or been friends with a huge amount of these individuals who refuse to pay for their games. Not one single person I've come across has done it for consoles; ALL of them pirated on PC.

So, the way you show piracy being more prevalent on PC is: these individuals, whom you specify as people who physically download torrents on the PC and don't pay a single cent for the game, all pirated on the PC?

So your survey basically says that, of the people who pirate games on the PC, 100% of them pirate games on the PC?

 

[Asehujiko]

Of course PC piracy numbers are inflated. That's not the point. The point is that piracy is much more rampant on PC than it is on consoles, something you called a "myth".

I'm not talking about turning your game into an .iso so you can play it without the disk (or something along those lines), I'm talking about people who physically download torrents and don't pay a single cent for the game. There are far more of these people on the PC than on consoles; I know from personal experience, as I have met or been friends with a huge amount of these individuals who refuse to pay for their games. Not one single person I've come across has done it for consoles; ALL of them pirated on PC.

Assuming that your friends are representative of the rest of the world is a fallacy and you know it.

 

[Antari]

All I can do with this situation is laugh. Time tells all. The part I laugh hardest about though. In any other industry, the person who screwed up this big would be looking for another job. Not at Ubisoft though.