A plea for a different form of Copy Protection.

[Leprechaune]

Like many who are waiting for the arival of Civ4 I've pulled out the old Civ3 discs to keep me entertained in the mean time.

As I mentioned in another thread, I have a copy of Civ3 Gold at home and a copy of Civ3 with PTW at work. This is because I DONT bring my disc with me to and from work. WELL... Low and behold... I'm playing away here at work and CRACK! the drive did a disc check and the disc shattered inside my relatively new LG drive. This game is the ONLY piece of software I own today that requires disc verification. If it were not for this antiquated system of copy protection, I wouldn't have to replace my CD ROM drive! I'm pissed right now as I'm sure anyone could tell.

But if other software goes without this pain in the ass system of copy protection, then why don't they!?

It's time that sofware developers realize that there is a population who WILL pay for their product even if they can get it hacked for free... And those who will not pay WILL get it hacked for free no matter what they try to do to prevent it! You're in the same boat as the music industry... Don't continue to hurt your paying customers with this nuisance.

 

[warpstorm]

In general, the developer has very little say on the type of protection used. That is typically a decision made by the publisher.

 

[Leprechaune]

Perhaps the plea can be passed on to 2K Games...

 

[Alistic]

Its too bad that the pirates ruin it for the rest of us. I hope they use cd-key validation for multi this year. They could just drop the cd check all together and use a prevalidated key.

So many companies are doing this now. Its really the best way.

They should take it a step further and when someone trys to get online with a non-validated key, say one from a keygen, then they could record the IP address, and write the ISP a letter to get the record from the router of who was logged into that ip at that time and issue a warrent.

In the US they already do this for movie and music pirates.

 

[joethreeblah]

Its too bad that the pirates ruin it for the rest of us. I hope they use cd-key validation for multi this year. They could just drop the cd check all together and use a prevalidated key.

So many companies are doing this now. Its really the best way.

They should take it a step further and when someone trys to get online with a non-validated key, say one from a keygen, then they could record the IP address, and write the ISP a letter to get the record from the router of who was logged into that ip at that time and issue a warrent.

In the US they already do this for movie and music pirates.

I've bought Civ III 3 times in the past 6 months from sitting on disks, etc. because of bringing them back and forth. It seems even my copy wouldn't work that I made for backup!

Although I'm sure they would have to replace it since the backup doesnt work, I don't have the time.

I'm sure they have to go an extra step for multiplayer games as well.

Anyways, so much for me trying to convince them to not use the cd check.

 

[Alistic]

You must have missed the part where I said.

They could just drop the cd check all together and use a prevalidated key.

Or you could just stop sitting on disks? Maybe im just lucky but i've been using cd's and dvd's for over 10 years now and never sat on and broke a single one. Im actually trying to break one now by sitting on it and its just bending. I cant even bend it in half to break it. Im a pretty strong guy too even using both hands i cant get the disk to snap it just bends. (im using a blank disk BTW)

 

[Padma]

I *really* hope that 2K doesn't use the gawdawful CD check like Atari did. It makes it a royal pain in Linux - I either have to pay for Cedega (a tool that lets me run many Windows games) or use a cracked version. (The *free* version of Cedega doesn't include the proprietary libraries for handling CD copy-protection.)

 

[Alistic]

I *really* hope that 2K doesn't use the gawdawful CD check like Atari did. It makes it a royal pain in Linux - I either have to pay for Cedega (a tool that lets me run many Windows games) or use a cracked version. (The *free* version of Cedega doesn't include the proprietary libraries for handling CD copy-protection.)

Now thats valid reasoning.

Aside from that I hate swapping disks too, its such a pain, besides the fact that any cd check is going to be broken anyways. Why spend extra $$ on the CP software in the 1st place.

 

[Akka]

The most simple way is to buy the game, look at the nice box, put it on the top of a shelve, and use a downloaded and cracked version for the rest of your life.

Not only protections don't deter anyone from pirating, they actually irritate many people, which end up not buying the game out of spite.

 

[strhopper]

there is program that allow u to to make a virtual drive and copy the part of the auto play of the disc so you can with no disc in the actual drive.............The catch is the program cost $30.............the web site is Farstone.com

 

[Leprechaune]

Or you could just stop sitting on disks? Maybe im just lucky but i've been using cd's and dvd's for over 10 years now and never sat on and broke a single one. Im actually trying to break one now by sitting on it and its just bending. I cant even bend it in half to break it. Im a pretty strong guy too even using both hands i cant get the disk to snap it just bends. (im using a blank disk BTW)

It seems the oddest of times when they break... Possibly old plastic becomes more brittle when the laser is actually reading... But I can't believe what it did to my drive. It quite literally shattered like it was brittle glass and hundreds of shards are strewn inside the drive itself.

 

[SonicX]

If Civ IV would use StarForce 3, I WON'T buy the game, that's for sure.

 

[Urederra]

It seems the oddest of times when they break... Possibly old plastic becomes more brittle when the laser is actually reading... But I can't believe what it did to my drive. It quite literally shattered like it was brittle glass and hundreds of shards are strewn inside the drive itself.

It happened to me as well, not with the actual CIV III but It was another comercial one that came with my video card. I stepped over it and it broke. I had to buy a replacement for around ten bucks. Not a big deal but it broke. Maybe they are made with a different kind of plastic.

 

[oldStatesman]

Its too bad that the pirates ruin it for the rest of us. I hope they use cd-key validation for multi this year. They could just drop the cd check all together and use a prevalidated key.

So many companies are doing this now. Its really the best way.

They should take it a step further and when someone trys to get online with a non-validated key, say one from a keygen, then they could record the IP address, and write the ISP a letter to get the record from the router of who was logged into that ip at that time and issue a warrent.

In the US they already do this for movie and music pirates.

Pirates exist because it is economically viable for them to exist. Take away the economic reason for a black market and the black market will dry up.

Any form of copy protection will create an environment that is economically good for a pirate to operate in. There will always be a few hardcore groups, mostly small in numbers that will pirate anything; the key is to make the product so attractive to the mainstream that they will not bother with the black market. Low price, really functional demos that are readily available, on demand downloadable software without the CD or documnetation...these are things that will make it less viable for a piratical market. You must address the root cause, not bandaid the symptoms with complicated anti-piracy measures that turn off a large percentage of your potential market, thus driving them to the percieved ease of cracked software. Believe it or not most people are honest and will pay for the stuff they use if you give them a reason too.

Until the marketing companies understand the 21st century marketplace, we all will have to suffer - not because of the pirates, but because of the staid, ultra-conservative dinosaurs on the business side.

 

[Hellfire]

A little known fact is that many company's have a hotline where you can call and request a replacement CD. All that's required is for you to ship the CD pieces back to the publisher.

Now, Leprechaune has reported a rather interesting "spin" (pun intended ) on the broken CD issue. However, perhaps the publisher will accept a broken CD drive with the pieces in it. A shattered CD should still be relatively easy to identify even in small pieces.

Some publishers make this replacement process difficult, and some insist they don't do it at all but if I push hard enough I've found that I can get a CD from even the most stubborn publishers.

 

[Goombaz]

Perhaps the arguments FOR copy protection would make more sense if they deterred pirates with even a tiny iota of determination. The problem as I see it is one of "mechanical advantage". Simply put, cracking a game is a few orders of magnitude easier than preventing a crack, and downloading a crack someone else made is a few orders of magnitude easier than that!

The real issue is the only copy protection schemes worth using, are super painful to legit customers. Steam is kind of on the right track, but if you look around even it didn't work.

Copy protection is far more effective at preventing multiplayer use of a game, but lan use and single player use are still pretty much sitting ducks.

I'm not against copy protection on any moral level, it's just a practical issue I think.

 

[Alistic]

It seems the oddest of times when they break... Possibly old plastic becomes more brittle when the laser is actually reading... But I can't believe what it did to my drive. It quite literally shattered like it was brittle glass and hundreds of shards are strewn inside the drive itself.

I think you are right, or maybe older cd's may use a different material. I remember a disk breaking in my drive once way back. Shattering in to about 10 sharp pieces.

 

[Herr Doktor]

You should be thankful if they'll choose to remain on Safedisk protection type. Starforce it's even worse, and your will be scratched as never before.

 

[Padma]

there is program that allow u to to make a virtual drive and copy the part of the auto play of the disc so you can with no disc in the actual drive.............The catch is the program cost $30.............the web site is Farstone.com

And Conquests (at least, maybe PTW also) checks to see if you have any "virtual drive" software on your system, and will refuse to run if any even exist, not just if you are using it to play Civ.

Right now, I can't even play Conquests, because it complains it has found a "debugger", and refuses to start. I still haven't figured out what it is seeing ...

 

[Commander Bello]

And Conquests (at least, maybe PTW also) checks to see if you have any "virtual drive" software on your system, and will refuse to run if any even exist, not just if you are using it to play Civ.

Right now, I can't even play Conquests, because it complains it has found a "debugger", and refuses to start. I still haven't figured out what it is seeing ...

Even worse, the copy protection of PTW (European English version) tried to write something into the master record of your hard disk.
If you had disabled this in the setup menu of your PC, no installation. If you enabled it, your virus scanner thought it had found a virus...

To make it even better, no indication was given in the handbook or any readme file.
Was really a good idea... very customer-friendly, indeed.