Ubisoft's New DRM (fail)

Maximilian

skip to 3:30

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87pevh2Q0hg

also,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkTZTzsYoZs

Krieg

I feel a little bit sorry for the people who purchased

But its still ****ing hilarious

death1234567

Krieg wrote: »

I feel a little bit sorry for the people who purchased
But its still ****ing hilarious

This ^^^.
Fairly obvious that there was going to be a Denial of Service attack on their servers given the bad publicity this this DRM recieved. I understand why companies like ubisoft want to stop piracy but there has to be a better way then this. Or at least ensure your own servers are 300% fault tolerant so that if a user can't connect and play his game then you can blame the user's own ISP.

Drakar

Given that Google, Microsoft, Facebook etc can be DOSed, it's probably a little unfair to suggest their hardware could be engineered to avoid it. Seemed to happen again there, so it will be interesting to see what they do if it happens every day.

Maximilian

Ubisoft are apologizing but placing the blame squarely on the DOS hackers and I've no doubt they were responsible (who didn't expect that to happen)

Ubisoft arrogance annoys me. The hackers aren't to blame for people not being able to play their games - it's Ubisoft's fault for insisting that people need to be connected to vulnerable servers all the time.

Nate--IRL--

Maximilian wrote: »

Ubisoft are apologizing but placing the blame squarely on the DOS hackers and I've no doubt they were responsible

"Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

Nate

death1234567

Drakar wrote: »

it's probably a little unfair to suggest their hardware could be engineered to avoid it.

That was sort of my point, if they knew that their hardware is vunerable to attack then they should not have insisted on users having to be connected to the same hardware to play their game.

Coriolanus

I wonder from a legal point of view how far you'd get claiming that Ubisoft are not upholding their half of the buyer/seller contract.

Small Claims Court is only €15.... :pac:

Maximilian

Pretty amazed/disgusted to see EA are doing exactly the same with C&C4; no offline mode.

And I almost regained respect for them. Between this kind of stuff and the Great DLC Rip-Off, I'm pretty dismayed at the direction the games industry is going.

yoyo

Maximilian wrote: »

Pretty amazed/disgusted to see EA are doing exactly the same with C&C4; no offline mode.

And I almost regained respect for them. Between this kind of stuff and the Great DLC Rip-Off, I'm pretty dismayed at the direction the games industry is going.

People who baught Ass Creed 2 are also "loosing" their saved games randomly due to this crap, If I was 30+ hours into a game and it deleted my saves I would be fairly annoyed, dunno why EA are using this either, are they deliberately trying to loose pc sales? I mean if you can't trust or rely on your games saving, why would you bother purchasing it? C&C4 is also already out cracked btw, source: here

Nick

Nate--IRL--

Rumour has it that the Pirate groups had a long debate as to whether to bother cracking C&C4 at all, as it is such a poor game.

But cracked after 3 days is pretty poor. UBI did a better job in delaying the pirates.

Nate

Overheal

Maximilian wrote: »

skip to 3:30

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87pevh2Q0hg

also,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkTZTzsYoZs

The 2nd video has been taken down :rolleyes: what did I miss?

Gabe Newell was spot on, and im going to stop making jokes about his chin as a result.

marco_polo

Overheal wrote: »

The 2nd video has been taken down :rolleyes: what did I miss?

Gabe Newell was spot on, and im going to stop making jokes about his chin as a result.

Watched this a few weeks ago as I recall it was a reviewer (presumeably yanking out his network cable) demonstrating the 'features' of Ubisofts new DRM while in game. No doubt they had it pulled under a some copyright infringement complaint :rolleyes:

EDIT: Just clicked on the vid now, my inkling was correct.

The effect was enough to persuade me to never buy a Ubisoft game (on any platform) while this sh*t remains in place.

yoyo

Overheal wrote: »

The 2nd video has been taken down :rolleyes: what did I miss?

Gabe Newell was spot on, and im going to stop making jokes about his chin as a result.

With the second video you actually missed nothing, basically what this DRM ensures is, no one can actually play the game, its a bit like no one can watch the movie of it , A great DRM actually, block both legitamite buyers, any piarates alike, and you wont have piracy problems, as no one can even use the f**cking thing

Nick

m5ex9oqjawdg2i

A thread in AH that might be of interest to some? I dunno but it's worth the read.

Link

Fnz

yoyo wrote: »

dunno why EA are using this either, are they deliberately trying to loose pc sales? I mean if you can't trust or rely on your games saving, why would you bother purchasing it?

Some podcast imagined the scene, sometime in the near future -

"We're pulling out of the PC market altogether... we weren't happy with piracy figures so we made the experience just awful for our customers... now nobody's buying games on the platform."

"What?.... what did we do?"

norrie rugger

Nick_oliveri wrote: »

And IMO, games aren't about games anymore, they are about profit. Look at EA and IW. Same with Music and media.

Of course games are about profit and they always have been, they are running a business FFS

Thinking that game companies and developers owe you anything is a very silly attitude

Nehaxak

Settlers 7 has this DRM crap in it also, no offline mode :mad:

Time to bring out the aul JE > JNE and NOP NOP NOP skills again...

m5ex9oqjawdg2i

norrie rugger wrote: »

Of course games are about profit and they always have been, they are running a business FFS

A business which gets its revenue from where exactly?

Thinking that game companies and developers owe you anything is a very silly attitude

Punishing your paying customers is a pretty stupid attitude to have. It's basic customer service. Steam have the right idea and with that idea they are going to dominate, IQ and EA, the tossers that they are, will be left behind in the dust unless they change their policies and start copping on.

They are run by accountants, not game developers or CRMs... it's sad really.

AlmightyCushion

Cole Silly Warfare wrote: »

A business which gets its revenue from where exactly?



Punishing your paying customers is a pretty stupid attitude to have. It's basic customer service. Steam have the right idea and with that idea they are going to dominate, IQ and EA, the tossers that they are, will be left behind in the dust unless they change their policies and start copping on.

They are run by accountants, not game developers or CRMs... it's sad really.

Steam are still a pain in the ass to deal with if you don't have access to the email account you signed up to it with. When trying to get my half life 2 activated on another machine (I had just built a new pc for myself and it was long since uninstalled on my parents pc) I couldn't get anywhere. Weeks of emails over and back, I even sent them a picture of the product key. All of that got me absolutely nowhere and I ended up downloading a cracked copy of a game I legally owned. So steam, while their drm isn't as bad as the shít ubisoft just tried to pull it does affect paying customers.

Nick_oliveri

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

Steam are still a pain in the ass to deal with if you don't have access to the email account you signed up to it with. When trying to get my half life 2 activated on another machine (I had just built a new pc for myself and it was long since uninstalled on my parents pc) I couldn't get anywhere. Weeks of emails over and back, I even sent them a picture of the product key. All of that got me absolutely nowhere and I ended up downloading a cracked copy of a game I legally owned. So steam, while their drm isn't as bad as the shít ubisoft just tried to pull it does affect paying customers.

I had to do the same thing recently only with a more satisfactory outcome. Steam changed their email auth policy a while back and probably fecked up a couple of accounts in doing so. I was lucky.

Cole Silly Warfare wrote: »

They are run by accountants, not game developers or CRMs... it's sad really.

I reckon all of this will change, with the right collaboration online people can completely cut out the middleman in all media. Its inevitable.

Overheal

They are run by accountants, not game developers or CRMs... it's sad really.

Valve Corporation, unlike EA and Ubisoft, is a publicly traded company and consequently are run very differently. For the real breakdown youd need to speak to a seasoned economist but alot of it breaks down into more regulations and a mandate to maximise profits for shareholders.

EA did what it set out to do - become a giant. But of course now its owned by greed. And frankly the same is true of Activision-Blizzard in some cases; though not nearly as frequently as EA which is known personally by me as a constant source of disappointment; poor customer service and for the worlds largest games publisher they couldnt even but the C&C First Decade together onto a DVD properly - HOW DID YOU FCUK THAT UP? SERIOUSLY! :mad::rolleyes:

Cuddlesworth

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

Steam are still a pain in the ass to deal with if you don't have access to the email account you signed up to it with. When trying to get my half life 2 activated on another machine (I had just built a new pc for myself and it was long since uninstalled on my parents pc) I couldn't get anywhere. Weeks of emails over and back, I even sent them a picture of the product key. All of that got me absolutely nowhere and I ended up downloading a cracked copy of a game I legally owned. So steam, while their drm isn't as bad as the shít ubisoft just tried to pull it does affect paying customers.

So you lost your password to your steam account, and lost your password to your email account and valve\steam are to blame?

EA are still a pain in the ass to deal with if you don't have access to the product key you bought the game with. When trying to get my Battlefiled 2 activated on another machine (I had just built a new pc for myself and it was long since uninstalled on my parents pc) I couldn't get anywhere. Weeks of emails over and back, I even sent them a picture of the box. All of that got me absolutely nowhere and I ended up downloading a cracked copy of a game I legally owned. So EA, while their drm isn't as bad as the shít ubisoft just tried to pull it does affect paying customers.

Fnz

Overheal wrote: »

Valve Corporation, unlike EA and Ubisoft, is a publicly traded company and consequently are run very differently.

'Privately held company'?

Overheal

Fnz wrote: »

'Privately held company'?

EA are still a pain in the ass to deal with if you don't have access to the product key you bought the game with.

Uhm, even when you do have Keys, and a legitimate problem.

I spent Days getting them to help me out and all I got out of it Ever was an automated suggestion to uninstall and reinstall my game files as the "cure-all"

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=58181543&postcount=4

Kiith

Overheal wrote: »

EA did what it set out to do - become a giant. But of course now its owned by greed. And frankly the same is true of Activision-Blizzard in some cases; though not nearly as frequently as EA which is known personally by me as a constant source of disappointment; poor customer service and for the worlds largest games publisher they couldnt even but the C&C First Decade together onto a DVD properly - HOW DID YOU FCUK THAT UP? SERIOUSLY! :mad::rolleyes:

I'd say that Activision are the worst of the bunch at the moment. EA at least have been trying to increase their public image, whereas Activision just dont give a ****.

Stev_o

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

So you lost your password to your steam account, and lost your password to your email account and valve\steam are to blame?

EA are still a pain in the ass to deal with if you don't have access to the product key you bought the game with. When trying to get my Battlefiled 2 activated on another machine (I had just built a new pc for myself and it was long since uninstalled on my parents pc) I couldn't get anywhere. Weeks of emails over and back, I even sent them a picture of the box. All of that got me absolutely nowhere and I ended up downloading a cracked copy of a game I legally owned. So EA, while their drm isn't as bad as the shít ubisoft just tried to pull it does affect paying customers.

Im 100% sure that EA holds onto your serial key on your online profile. I remember loosing my BF2 manual and having to desperately search around to find a way of finding a serial key. Your right though that customer support is useless but to be honest the only customer support iv ever been pleased with was a publisher who sold gold games (Bought Operation Flashpoint had no manual so no serial key emailed them and within a day they had sent me a serial key)

Sorry i know thats not what you were gettting at it's just iv actually had that experince

Genghiz Cohen

Stev_o wrote: »

Im 100% sure that EA holds onto your serial key on your online profile.

leenk

Coriolanus

Slight tangent but what happened to emailing yourself your cd keys? :P

Overheal

Nevore wrote: »

Slight tangent but what happened to emailing yourself your cd keys? :P

Thats why my email password is an algorithm derived from one of the first string of pairs of my DNA

(its not really. but that would be cool)