I disagree with the assertion that the Hot Coffee fiasco was somehow the modding community's fault.
So do I. I don't think they blame the mod community for it either as such, that really was a mistake on their part to leave those files in their. I guess they weren't expecting the kind of media crazy that followed once those files were found. I don't think anyone would have expected it to be honest, certainly not to the extent that the game would get re-rated.
That still didn't stop them from trying to lock modding out of San Andreas after that, and since then, there's been more than a little bitterness.
Actually I think most modders would be like, "Gee Source, UE3, CryEngine all have SDKs maybe I should go make a mod for one of those games."
The thing that made modding past GTA games so appealing is that you could just plug in little bits (new cars, new buildings, new guns, whatever) to your own personal game, rather than doing this whole total conversion shit that everyone's going crazy about these days. Sandbox games (and to a lesser extent RTS games) are really great for this. I mean, just look at Morrowind/Oblivion plugins; they really did it right. FPS games not quite so much.
By the way, I'm sure a part of the new hurdles to jump for modding thing was the Hot Coffee fiasco, but another big part is the fact that the game has online multiplayer now.
So I guess Bully was a terrible port too and a lot of people asked Valve for refunds on their Steam purchases. I wonder if Valve could lean on Rockstar to patch their shit up and/or not carry their future releases because of the customer service hassel.
So I guess Bully was a terrible port too and a lot of people asked Valve for refunds on their Steam purchases. I wonder if Valve could lean on Rockstar to patch their shit up and/or not carry their future releases because of the customer service hassel.
Honestly, I doubt Rockstar are getting much from the non-retail version of a PC port to begin with. I'm not sure there'd be all that much pressure to apply. But even then, I don't think it's really Valve's place to tell other companies when their games aren't up to spec. I know, they can pick and choose what goes on there in the first place, but I'd be pretty iffy about Valve trying to moderate game releases on whether they felt the bug fixing was up to scratch.
I suppose you're right, but it's got to be irritating/expensive to deal with all those support tickets.
It's one thing when a less known developer releases a buggy game and only a few people even bought it. But when a company like Rockstar releases one of the biggest games of the year in the state it is you have a much bigger problem.
I was especially pissed that all the pre-release reviews I read said it "runs great and looks great on the PC" or something to that effect. This has not been my experience thus far. At the best of times it runs and looks OK.
I suppose you're right, but it's got to be irritating/expensive to deal with all those support tickets.
It's one thing when a less known developer releases a buggy game and only a few people even bought it. But when a company like Rockstar releases one of the biggest games of the year in the state it is you have a much bigger problem.
I was especially pissed that all the pre-release reviews I read said it "runs great and looks great on the PC" or something to that effect. This has not been my experience thus far. At the best of times it runs and looks OK.
Well that's largely the reason that Valve are offering refunds on the game for those that are having bad problems or can't run it. That's pretty rare of Valve, and if Rockstar don't sit up and take notice of THAT, then there really isn't too much more that can get their attention.
Apparently Modding is completely impossible. Damnit Rockstar.
A PC Game without a modding community will never last long.
Where'd you read that?
Neva on
SC2 Beta: Neva.ling
"Everyone who is capable of logical thought should be able to see why you shouldn't sell lifetime subscriptions to an MMO. Cell phone companies and drug dealers don't offer lifetime subscriptions either, guess why?" - Mugaaz
Attempts at getting past it's integrity check have thus far met with EYE SEARING, FROTHING AT THE MOUTH RAGE. [tiny]HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE[/tiny] On the gta forums.
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CarbonFireSee youin the countryRegistered Userregular
Apparently Modding is completely impossible. Damnit Rockstar.
A PC Game without a modding community will never last long.
Is that even remotely surprising? After how much the hot coffee incident screwed them over?
No, it's not the modder's fault, but the risk is too large in Rockstar's eyes. Just like releasing the game without an overly invasive DRM scheme would be too large a risk in their eyes, thus we get more SecureROM crap and online verification built-into the damn menu system.
Apparently Modding is completely impossible. Damnit Rockstar.
A PC Game without a modding community will never last long.
Is that even remotely surprising? After how much the hot coffee incident screwed them over?
No, it's not the modder's fault, but the risk is too large in Rockstar's eyes. Just like releasing the game without an overly invasive DRM scheme would be too large a risk in their eyes, thus we get more SecureROM crap and online verification built-into the damn menu system.
It is surprising because modding was huge in the past GTA 3+ games, and probably the biggest draw for the PC versions of the game. It's also surprising because I don't think it's true at all. I haven't read anywhere about mods being impossible in GTA 4.
Neva on
SC2 Beta: Neva.ling
"Everyone who is capable of logical thought should be able to see why you shouldn't sell lifetime subscriptions to an MMO. Cell phone companies and drug dealers don't offer lifetime subscriptions either, guess why?" - Mugaaz
Were there even modding tools for the others? I had the impression that it was all sort of reverse engineered. I mean, fuck, they put multiplayer into San Andreas without it being in the original game.. that's.. that's just messed up.
Someone will make it work eventually if they really want to.
Yes, but the point is that it will no longer be a simple process of adding files to a folder, and booting up the game. It'll be downloading a program, editing .ini's, circumventing .exe's, and meticulously editing files. It's going to turn 90% of the potential user base off.
Were there even modding tools for the others? I had the impression that it was all sort of reverse engineered. I mean, fuck, they put multiplayer into San Andreas without it being in the original game.. that's.. that's just messed up.
Someone will make it work eventually if they really want to.
Yes, but the point is that it will no longer be a simple process of adding files to a folder, and booting up the game. It'll be downloading a program, editing .ini's, circumventing .exe's, and meticulously editing files. It's going to turn 90% of the potential user base off.
It was never adding files to a folder, you always had to fuck with archives and shit like that, and it was really easy to mess up with the result that the game would crash whenever it tried to spawn the car you added or whatever.
Someone will make it work eventually if they really want to.
Yes, but the point is that it will no longer be a simple process of adding files to a folder, and booting up the game. It'll be downloading a program, editing .ini's, circumventing .exe's, and meticulously editing files. It's going to turn 90% of the potential user base off.
But don't you think someone will develop a program that makes it easier for causal users? For instance, I have a program on my Mac that makes GUI modification really easy because it automates a lot of the 'messier' stuff.
Someone will make it work eventually if they really want to.
Yes, but the point is that it will no longer be a simple process of adding files to a folder, and booting up the game. It'll be downloading a program, editing .ini's, circumventing .exe's, and meticulously editing files. It's going to turn 90% of the potential user base off.
But don't you think someone will develop a program that makes it easier for causal users?
No, because the vast majority doesn't want to use that. Any game that's been super-moddable and successful because of it (mainly source-engine games, Oblivion, Mount & Blade, a few sims I play) makes it easy to add content, and they set the benchmark. Adding additional steps will be a turn-off.
That, and such a program most likely wont be made... at least not before everybody loses interest.
Someone will make it work eventually if they really want to.
Yes, but the point is that it will no longer be a simple process of adding files to a folder, and booting up the game. It'll be downloading a program, editing .ini's, circumventing .exe's, and meticulously editing files. It's going to turn 90% of the potential user base off.
It was never adding files to a folder, you always had to fuck with archives and shit like that, and it was really easy to mess up with the result that the game would crash whenever it tried to spawn the car you added or whatever.
It was still a hell of a lot of fun, though.
In any case, the protection system they're using here looks like it'll only be a problem for the people writing the modding tools and not for the end users plugging in cars or what have you. So either the tools will never get done, or it'll be as normal once they do.
Although I wouldn't be surprised if a hacked .exe is necessary this time around.
GTA modding was always meticulously editing files, until someone wrote a program that took people's files and installed them for you, and it didn't always work.
Someone will make it work eventually if they really want to.
Yes, but the point is that it will no longer be a simple process of adding files to a folder, and booting up the game. It'll be downloading a program, editing .ini's, circumventing .exe's, and meticulously editing files. It's going to turn 90% of the potential user base off.
But don't you think someone will develop a program that makes it easier for causal users?
No, because the vast majority doesn't want to use that. Any game that's been super-moddable and successful because of it (mainly source-engine games, Oblivion, Mount & Blade, a few sims I play) makes it easy to add content, and they set the benchmark. Adding additional steps will be a turn-off.
That, and such a program most likely wont be made... at least not before everybody loses interest.
Ah, so you are talking more about modders in the next few months. I'm usually a good year behind on games, so when I jump on most of the problems have been worked out.
I guess what I'm saying is, by the time there is a Mac version, I hope someone has made modding easier.
By the time tools get released, the game will probably have gone through a price drop, so rebuying it won't look quite so bad, and maybe I'll have a some sort of crazy future graphics card in my machine so it actually runs properly.
I said that most of the modding would be impossible because of the high amounts of DRM protection in GTA:IV. If the game is paranoid enough to force you make a seperate windows live account just so you can save games OFFLINE, I imagine that the modding would be retardedly more difficult than previous GTA's.
I kind of want to say Hot Coffee may have sparked this over paranoia of modding from Rockstar, even if it was technically their own damn fault.
Also, apparently if you use a No-Dvd Crack with GTA:IV you get this:
I said that most of the modding would be impossible because of the high amounts of DRM protection in GTA:IV. If the game is paranoid enough to force you make a seperate windows live account just so you can save games OFFLINE, I imagine that the modding would be retardedly more difficult than previous GTA's.
Modding and DRM have nothing to do with each other.
I said that most of the modding would be impossible because of the high amounts of DRM protection in GTA:IV. If the game is paranoid enough to force you make a seperate windows live account just so you can save games OFFLINE, I imagine that the modding would be retardedly more difficult than previous GTA's.
I kind of want to say Hot Coffee may have sparked this over paranoia of modding from Rockstar, even if it was technically their own damn fault.
Also, apparently if you use a No-Dvd Crack with GTA:IV you get this:
Yeah, they basically added triggers in the game to do stuff like that if securom wasn't running and such. That's why it's not cracked properly yet. Good job, guys. Now make the game actually run for people who paid instead of being more proud of your copy protection than the actual port.
I said that most of the modding would be impossible because of the high amounts of DRM protection in GTA:IV. If the game is paranoid enough to force you make a seperate windows live account just so you can save games OFFLINE, I imagine that the modding would be retardedly more difficult than previous GTA's.
Modding and DRM have nothing to do with each other.
On the contrary, they hook into each other quite well, if the game developer wants to be a dick. Program executable checks a cryptographic signature on the data files during startup, DRM system "prevents" modder from changing the executable to remove that check (as a free bonus, really: the DRM is there to prevent people from removing the disc check, but it can do both just as easily) and you're done.
You know, until someone cracks the DRM a week later.
Yeah, they basically added triggers in the game to do stuff like that if securom wasn't running and such. That's why it's not cracked properly yet. Good job, guys. Now make the game actually run for people who paid instead of being more proud of your copy protection than the actual port.
I don't know if they've ever acted proud of it. Most of the protection is SecuROM's job anyways.
Yeah, they basically added triggers in the game to do stuff like that if securom wasn't running and such. That's why it's not cracked properly yet. Good job, guys. Now make the game actually run for people who paid instead of being more proud of your copy protection than the actual port.
I don't know if they've ever acted proud of it. Most of the protection is SecuROM's job anyways.
December 2nd, 2008 | 18:09 Don’t bother to beat our protection, guys. Think we spent 200k for you to play our game for free? Think twice!
Rockstar Upper East December 2nd, 2008 | 18:24 You really can’t crack this game believe me or not. We have done everything to stop you from playing it for freeâ€
I said that most of the modding would be impossible because of the high amounts of DRM protection in GTA:IV. If the game is paranoid enough to force you make a seperate windows live account just so you can save games OFFLINE, I imagine that the modding would be retardedly more difficult than previous GTA's.
Modding and DRM have nothing to do with each other.
In certain cases, DRM can get in the way of modding. A few mods in previous GTA incarnations were done by editing saves. I imagine this would be more of a pain in the ass to distribute edited save files.
And with SecuROM issues causing the game to crash and refusing to start the game f any of the original files are edited make modding much more troublesome.
Yeah, they basically added triggers in the game to do stuff like that if securom wasn't running and such. That's why it's not cracked properly yet. Good job, guys. Now make the game actually run for people who paid instead of being more proud of your copy protection than the actual port.
I don't know if they've ever acted proud of it. Most of the protection is SecuROM's job anyways.
December 2nd, 2008 | 18:09 Don’t bother to beat our protection, guys. Think we spent 200k for you to play our game for free? Think twice!
Rockstar Upper East December 2nd, 2008 | 18:24 You really can’t crack this game believe me or not. We have done everything to stop you from playing it for free”
Well done Rockstar. Now if only you put as much effort into your actual game, paying customers might have been able to play it.
Rockstar Upper East December 2nd, 2008 | 18:24 You really can’t crack this game believe me or not. We have done everything to stop you from playing it for freeâ€
Rockstar Upper East December 2nd, 2008 | 18:24 You really can’t crack this game believe me or not. We have done everything to stop you from playing it for free”
Let me translate this:
Buttrape me
Verily. Comments like that invite people to prove them very, very wrong.
...And it occurs to me that discussing the latest in drm mutilation schemes invites the spontaneous generation of hammers to the ninth power. Are we at least allowed to cheer when these words of Rockstar's are made to blend?
Basil on
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ArminasStudent of LifeSF, CARegistered Userregular
edited December 2008
While I commend them for clever anti-piracy programming, I think that their resources could have been better spent making a decent PC edition of this game. When they would rather spend the time delaying those would pirate the game anyways instead of ensuring a decent experience for me, a paying customer, I think I might just ask Valve for a refund. Thanks for making my experience as a customer that much more difficult, R*.
Though, I'm taking the video at face value, I don't know if it's true that they did this or not. I've wasted enough time futzing around with the settings as it is.
I can't believe Rockstar are more interested in challenging pirates to beat their game than giving paying customers a working game with non-invasive DRM. The pirates will beat it, you idiots, gloating at them is just going to make them redouble their efforts. I'll bet that by the end of next week the game will have been fully cracked. And all the people who'll have paid will have to go through their shitty anti-piracy measures and suffer every time they start the game.
...and I thought of how all those people died, and what a good death that is. That nobody can blame you for it, because everyone else died along with you, and it is the fault of none, save those who did the killing.
Yeah, they basically added triggers in the game to do stuff like that if securom wasn't running and such. That's why it's not cracked properly yet. Good job, guys. Now make the game actually run for people who paid instead of being more proud of your copy protection than the actual port.
I don't know if they've ever acted proud of it. Most of the protection is SecuROM's job anyways.
December 2nd, 2008 | 18:09 Don’t bother to beat our protection, guys. Think we spent 200k for you to play our game for free? Think twice!
Rockstar Upper East December 2nd, 2008 | 18:24 You really can’t crack this game believe me or not. We have done everything to stop you from playing it for free”
I think the same thing was said about Bioshock, didn't take them long to crack that. Mass Effect got cracked -and- the cracks included bugfixes because the first patch to fix those issues took forever to come out.
There is a very good chance they wasted 200k, because SecuROM has been obliterated over and over again. They were probably better off keeping quiet. Also, you know, being proud of a badly handled port that people are already demanding refunds for, a few days after release. If the issues in Bully for PC had been a bit worse we would have heard about this back when that came out.
Posts
edit: lol subedii, posted at the same time.
So do I. I don't think they blame the mod community for it either as such, that really was a mistake on their part to leave those files in their. I guess they weren't expecting the kind of media crazy that followed once those files were found. I don't think anyone would have expected it to be honest, certainly not to the extent that the game would get re-rated.
That still didn't stop them from trying to lock modding out of San Andreas after that, and since then, there's been more than a little bitterness.
The thing that made modding past GTA games so appealing is that you could just plug in little bits (new cars, new buildings, new guns, whatever) to your own personal game, rather than doing this whole total conversion shit that everyone's going crazy about these days. Sandbox games (and to a lesser extent RTS games) are really great for this. I mean, just look at Morrowind/Oblivion plugins; they really did it right. FPS games not quite so much.
By the way, I'm sure a part of the new hurdles to jump for modding thing was the Hot Coffee fiasco, but another big part is the fact that the game has online multiplayer now.
Honestly, I doubt Rockstar are getting much from the non-retail version of a PC port to begin with. I'm not sure there'd be all that much pressure to apply. But even then, I don't think it's really Valve's place to tell other companies when their games aren't up to spec. I know, they can pick and choose what goes on there in the first place, but I'd be pretty iffy about Valve trying to moderate game releases on whether they felt the bug fixing was up to scratch.
It's one thing when a less known developer releases a buggy game and only a few people even bought it. But when a company like Rockstar releases one of the biggest games of the year in the state it is you have a much bigger problem.
I was especially pissed that all the pre-release reviews I read said it "runs great and looks great on the PC" or something to that effect. This has not been my experience thus far. At the best of times it runs and looks OK.
It's kind of funny that Kieron Gillen who did the Eurogamer review is having all kinds of problems running the retail version. Kinda sad really.
Well that's largely the reason that Valve are offering refunds on the game for those that are having bad problems or can't run it. That's pretty rare of Valve, and if Rockstar don't sit up and take notice of THAT, then there really isn't too much more that can get their attention.
Where'd you read that?
"Everyone who is capable of logical thought should be able to see why you shouldn't sell lifetime subscriptions to an MMO. Cell phone companies and drug dealers don't offer lifetime subscriptions either, guess why?" - Mugaaz
Is that even remotely surprising? After how much the hot coffee incident screwed them over?
No, it's not the modder's fault, but the risk is too large in Rockstar's eyes. Just like releasing the game without an overly invasive DRM scheme would be too large a risk in their eyes, thus we get more SecureROM crap and online verification built-into the damn menu system.
It is surprising because modding was huge in the past GTA 3+ games, and probably the biggest draw for the PC versions of the game. It's also surprising because I don't think it's true at all. I haven't read anywhere about mods being impossible in GTA 4.
"Everyone who is capable of logical thought should be able to see why you shouldn't sell lifetime subscriptions to an MMO. Cell phone companies and drug dealers don't offer lifetime subscriptions either, guess why?" - Mugaaz
Yes, but the point is that it will no longer be a simple process of adding files to a folder, and booting up the game. It'll be downloading a program, editing .ini's, circumventing .exe's, and meticulously editing files. It's going to turn 90% of the potential user base off.
GTA3 and VC too.
It was never adding files to a folder, you always had to fuck with archives and shit like that, and it was really easy to mess up with the result that the game would crash whenever it tried to spawn the car you added or whatever.
But don't you think someone will develop a program that makes it easier for causal users? For instance, I have a program on my Mac that makes GUI modification really easy because it automates a lot of the 'messier' stuff.
No, because the vast majority doesn't want to use that. Any game that's been super-moddable and successful because of it (mainly source-engine games, Oblivion, Mount & Blade, a few sims I play) makes it easy to add content, and they set the benchmark. Adding additional steps will be a turn-off.
That, and such a program most likely wont be made... at least not before everybody loses interest.
It was still a hell of a lot of fun, though.
In any case, the protection system they're using here looks like it'll only be a problem for the people writing the modding tools and not for the end users plugging in cars or what have you. So either the tools will never get done, or it'll be as normal once they do.
Although I wouldn't be surprised if a hacked .exe is necessary this time around.
Ah, so you are talking more about modders in the next few months. I'm usually a good year behind on games, so when I jump on most of the problems have been worked out.
I guess what I'm saying is, by the time there is a Mac version, I hope someone has made modding easier.
So hey, I guess it's not all that bad.
I kind of want to say Hot Coffee may have sparked this over paranoia of modding from Rockstar, even if it was technically their own damn fault.
Also, apparently if you use a No-Dvd Crack with GTA:IV you get this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnscK2kGS2o
Atleast it's more playable *drum rim crash*.
Modding and DRM have nothing to do with each other.
Yeah, they basically added triggers in the game to do stuff like that if securom wasn't running and such. That's why it's not cracked properly yet. Good job, guys. Now make the game actually run for people who paid instead of being more proud of your copy protection than the actual port.
On the contrary, they hook into each other quite well, if the game developer wants to be a dick. Program executable checks a cryptographic signature on the data files during startup, DRM system "prevents" modder from changing the executable to remove that check (as a free bonus, really: the DRM is there to prevent people from removing the disc check, but it can do both just as easily) and you're done.
You know, until someone cracks the DRM a week later.
I don't know if they've ever acted proud of it. Most of the protection is SecuROM's job anyways.
I was wrong. That video is evil and made my eyes water.
In certain cases, DRM can get in the way of modding. A few mods in previous GTA incarnations were done by editing saves. I imagine this would be more of a pain in the ass to distribute edited save files.
And with SecuROM issues causing the game to crash and refusing to start the game f any of the original files are edited make modding much more troublesome.
Well done Rockstar. Now if only you put as much effort into your actual game, paying customers might have been able to play it.
Verily. Comments like that invite people to prove them very, very wrong.
...And it occurs to me that discussing the latest in drm mutilation schemes invites the spontaneous generation of hammers to the ninth power. Are we at least allowed to cheer when these words of Rockstar's are made to blend?
Though, I'm taking the video at face value, I don't know if it's true that they did this or not. I've wasted enough time futzing around with the settings as it is.
You freaking 'tards, Rockstar.
Nothing's forgotten, nothing is ever forgotten
I think the same thing was said about Bioshock, didn't take them long to crack that. Mass Effect got cracked -and- the cracks included bugfixes because the first patch to fix those issues took forever to come out.
There is a very good chance they wasted 200k, because SecuROM has been obliterated over and over again. They were probably better off keeping quiet. Also, you know, being proud of a badly handled port that people are already demanding refunds for, a few days after release. If the issues in Bully for PC had been a bit worse we would have heard about this back when that came out.