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The failure of modern copy protection and game development exemplified
Pestilencemage
Registered User new member
Registered User new member
It seems the newly releaced Assassin's Creed 3 (PC) is plagued. Random corruption of save files causes frequent destruction of all progress. Cloud seems to be mildly effective at restoreing some progress for some, but others are forced to simply start from scratch.
Developement Failures:
Clearly Ubisoft was aware of this bug prior to game launch. A bug like this does not often slip past testing phases unreported. There ARE many circumstances that demand a game be released with somewhat serious bugs, even ones I find exceptionaly serious such as the severe likelyhood of loseing all of your progress several times. What I find upsetting is that these games have never set some venue to warn users of these bugs. I know, the idea of posting a huge list of "why you shouldnt buy our game because it is broken" is not appealing to game designers as even the cleanest of games would technicly have a MASSIVE list of bugs if you posted the QA bug list. Still, I would have found this issue far more forgiveable if I had known of the issue and chosen to ignore it of my own accord (as I surely would have done). Perhapse the testers had more luck then I have on recovering some degree of the save data, this is the only acceptable explination I can construct of why Ubisoft would release such an aggrivation on us. I'm not trying to start a ragefest and single out Ubisoft as the devil, I just think there must be some happy middle ground to be found there.
Copy Protection Failures:
I immediately and without any logical reasoning, blamed the DRM and copy protection for this failure. Assassin's Creed has had some very invasive and intrudeing protection methods that cause... well... mild inconvienences to legitimate customers really. We like to yell about how horrable it is to demand I be online at all times to play a game, but that is more in prinipal then an actual inconvienence as I AM alwayse online, as are most of us now-a-days. That is not the failure I speak of here.
I wanted a way around that cursed bug, so I turned to the pirate community. Sure enough, the game was available for illegal download on launch day. Checking the comments on one, it seems they are not immune to the problems with savegame corruption and are... PROBABLY without cloud to occasionaly bail them out. The failure is that for all the money and effort they spent on copy protection, pirates were not delayed for a single molment! I didnt check times, but I think they had the game ready to steal before I managed to finish downloading my legal copy! Almost a shame they are not free from the savegame problems really, as I have no problems (moraly... not sure where legal stands) with downloading "pirate" copies of games I legitimately own if copy protection is causeing me grief. **The legal stance on that practice is dependant on the EULA and individual game company. When in doubt, assume it is illegal and/or consult the support staff**
It seems many forms of modern copy protection are excessive rather then effective. Worse yet, they are not COST effective... I assume anyway. Not only do I not see the books, but the books cannot possably count losses due to software piracy accurately even though some companies put a number in there anyway. You got a CD KEY method? that seems to be enough. Just stop the easies forms of piracy, the rest is just a fun logic puzzle for the top pirate dogs that are more then willing to share in their successful theft. I honestly think they WANT another method so they can try to be the first to render it worthless.
Developement Failures:
Clearly Ubisoft was aware of this bug prior to game launch. A bug like this does not often slip past testing phases unreported. There ARE many circumstances that demand a game be released with somewhat serious bugs, even ones I find exceptionaly serious such as the severe likelyhood of loseing all of your progress several times. What I find upsetting is that these games have never set some venue to warn users of these bugs. I know, the idea of posting a huge list of "why you shouldnt buy our game because it is broken" is not appealing to game designers as even the cleanest of games would technicly have a MASSIVE list of bugs if you posted the QA bug list. Still, I would have found this issue far more forgiveable if I had known of the issue and chosen to ignore it of my own accord (as I surely would have done). Perhapse the testers had more luck then I have on recovering some degree of the save data, this is the only acceptable explination I can construct of why Ubisoft would release such an aggrivation on us. I'm not trying to start a ragefest and single out Ubisoft as the devil, I just think there must be some happy middle ground to be found there.
Copy Protection Failures:
I immediately and without any logical reasoning, blamed the DRM and copy protection for this failure. Assassin's Creed has had some very invasive and intrudeing protection methods that cause... well... mild inconvienences to legitimate customers really. We like to yell about how horrable it is to demand I be online at all times to play a game, but that is more in prinipal then an actual inconvienence as I AM alwayse online, as are most of us now-a-days. That is not the failure I speak of here.
I wanted a way around that cursed bug, so I turned to the pirate community. Sure enough, the game was available for illegal download on launch day. Checking the comments on one, it seems they are not immune to the problems with savegame corruption and are... PROBABLY without cloud to occasionaly bail them out. The failure is that for all the money and effort they spent on copy protection, pirates were not delayed for a single molment! I didnt check times, but I think they had the game ready to steal before I managed to finish downloading my legal copy! Almost a shame they are not free from the savegame problems really, as I have no problems (moraly... not sure where legal stands) with downloading "pirate" copies of games I legitimately own if copy protection is causeing me grief. **The legal stance on that practice is dependant on the EULA and individual game company. When in doubt, assume it is illegal and/or consult the support staff**
It seems many forms of modern copy protection are excessive rather then effective. Worse yet, they are not COST effective... I assume anyway. Not only do I not see the books, but the books cannot possably count losses due to software piracy accurately even though some companies put a number in there anyway. You got a CD KEY method? that seems to be enough. Just stop the easies forms of piracy, the rest is just a fun logic puzzle for the top pirate dogs that are more then willing to share in their successful theft. I honestly think they WANT another method so they can try to be the first to render it worthless.
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It's the same thing with DRM. Without it, even the most honest customers in the world would eventually just stop paying for the games, simply because there's no real reason to. DRM provides that reason. A small reason, but for most people, it's enough. And with those for whom it isn't enough, no amount of DRM will be enough.
The argument now becomes "how much DRM is enough to get the maximum number of customers without pissing people off?" The answer is different for each game, and the publishers conduct thorough market research and cost/benefit analyses to figure it out. Of course, sometimes they get it wrong, as with the Ubisoft always-on DRM fiasco. But they don't often get it wrong, or they wouldn't be in this business.
They don't have to deal with it and it's dumb, because you increase sales by putting out an attractive product, not by punishing your customers.
An online check or whatever is like a turnstyle, what Ubisoft does is like following their customers around a store periodically searching them to make sure they haven't pocketed anything in the store
Contrary to popular belief, the pirates often do have to deal with significant inconvenience when pirating games. The biggest problem, obviously, is that they have to wait for the crack to be released. Often this happens very quickly, but sometimes this can take weeks or even months (as was the case with Assassin's Creed 2 or Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory on PC.) They also have to deal with DRM checks that are often quite pervasive throughout the game, as well as the uncertainty of not knowing whether the crack they are downloading has some other more malicious payload. Those using pirated copies also often have to wait a significant amount of time to play online multiplayer, and will suffer incomplete or broken multiplayer for at least some time.
Legit purchasers, by comparison, only have to deal with a product key and a brief online check. Annoying? Sure, but people make a much bigger deal of it than it is. If legit customers were really being so inconvenienced, the games wouldn't sell nearly as much.
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