News BioShock copy protection to go?

hmm something even worse than starforce

in a kind of unrelated topic why do the new versions of punkbuster run all the time in the background on windows computers?

 

Woah, hold on now, I don't work for 2K.

Oh, wait... you mean this happens at MORE THAN ONE company? Damn.

Anyways, I'm basically avoiding buying any games from now on that have any more copy protection on them than Oblivion did (read: none). I've had it be problematic several times in the past, and I'm well past sick of it. It's a stupid system that's left over from the eighties that doesn't work anymore. It's easy for Joe Blow to pirate stuff now if he wants to. Some people are happy to be honest, and some want to actually support the developers so they keep producing good content. People who won't pay for whatever reason are going to find a way to make it happen; so it's best to not irritate those who will.

 

They can suck my balls if they think im buying a game with that **** on it.

 

DRM in all shapes and forms blows

Always thought that the "Rights Management" part of DRM sounded like something straight out of 1984

Unfortunately as like music, films, books and pretty much every game before it, you never own it, just license it from the entity with the copyright for it. By installing the game and accepting the EULA you are agreeing to there terms, how ever restrictive they are.

Excuse my ignorance of the specifics, but doesnt securom offer a service like M$ does with office and XP where you can request a new activation key if yours has expired through reinstallation?

I know its a pain in the ass, but we have all managed so far to deal with the hassle of software activation, does it really matter if games also start deploying this form of protection?
It seems to be the easiest form of copy protection going, imagine if you had a different hardware dongle for each peice of software you had to activate, it would for me take up about 12 usb ports just to run my sofware. if you had a system which used a single stick but allowed multiple keys to be stored, then it would never work due to differing copy protection systems and versions of the systems in use. Although it may be bypassable like all forms of software protection it provides enough of a hinderence to most to purchase legit licenses. And to be fair nothing has really ever worked to stop wholesale piracy of games. e.g. copy protection thats bypassable with marker pen, or a really old cd or dvd drive, or serial numbers. Or you have to make the game rely on central servers and online play so you can charge subscription for the games

At the end of the day i fail to understand the mentality of people who complain about having to pay for something they will enjoy. fair enough steal boring/work related software if you want, but not games

 

i just bit the bullet.....

i got a fancy new metal case, theres something in it.... it's called BioShock....

i hope some others can control their urges better than me and dont buy it though due to the stupid limitations....

 

yes you did

implies you somehow think this copy protection will stop people nicking it

also "you're"

 

How does that imply that I think it stops piracy? I was just saying that if there was something that I could do to try and stop it, I'd give it a go. For example, I made a flash game the other week. I know its going to get hacked. There isn't much I can do about it. If there are people out there that want to hack it, they will. Doesn't mean I'm going to make it easier for them.

Also: So? I make spuling mashtake in teh webernets. Go think about yor dog's testicles.

 

1 more reason consoles are quickly becoming the superior source for gaming.

 

Copy-protection doesn't work, pure and simple.
Putting copy-protection on a games that can prevent legitimate users enjoyment is completely stupid.

To put it simply:-

Games with Copy-Protection
Pros: none
Cons: Hinders legit users often driving them to virus/malware-ridden cracks, increases production costs which is passed onto legit users, doesn't prevent copying.

Games without Copy-Protection
Pros: legit users can play without issue, novices users likely to experience less issues
Cons: Makes the game easy to copy


When will they learn that annoying the paying userbase is like putting your wedding tackle in a lions mouth while simultaneously flicking his love-spuds with a wet towel?

 

Hamish - I smell a flame war brewing under your calm exterior

I'm going to speak out for the illegal portion of gamers, who seem to be ashamed. I'm not; I agree that some ***** in a tracksuit copying a game, running off two thousand copies and selling them at the high street for next-to-nothing is a serious crime. I hate it, not least because the copied products - be they games, films or music - are always inferior and less enjoyable.
That said, I don't consider it a crime on the same level if I take a copy of one of my games round to my friend's house and install it on his machine. Sorry: I just don't. It's only a crime on paper: in reality, I'm only stealing about 0.2 pence from each employee who worked on the game, and I think they'll forgive me. If not, I'll remind them how much money Value Added Tax steals from THEM every time they buy anything. (Clue: it's more than 0.2 pence.)

It's what I call sociable piracy, and I'm all in favour. Even if a thousand people do it, the profit margins still have these companies covered by thousands and thousands of pounds. Securom will eventually stop me committing sociable piracy, but - and here's the thing - it will NOT stop the tracksuited ***** on the market stall. Hence, I am against it.

 

The two install instance limit is perfectly fine. As long as we don't get another Starforce optical drive incompatibility nightmare all over again.

 

The games companys will never learn. When has anything ever failed to be cracked? Microsoft tooted their horn with vista and they are a BILLION dollar company that have spent years creating this piece of software....BANG...its cracked in less than a month, i think even less than a week?!

Stupidity. They honestly think they can use securom to stop pirates. These guys are good, they are determined and with enough of them working on a product like this, its just a matter of time.
The problem now is i would have actually bought a legit copy of the game, it seems amazing but seeing how much hassle i could go through if i did that - im more tempted to pirate it because i dont want what happened to the guy on pcgamer.com to happen to me where i spend hard earned cash on a game that wont even work.

 

I could care less about the copy protection, the widescreen issues, whatever. I just want the game to play at a reasonable framerate without dropping into the teens.
I think I'll go cry in a corner now.

 

Punkbuser A and B service

vista is why its there now

when you use punkbuster it had to have full admin rights so it can check for cheats so if you started the game in vista and not give it admin you get kicked from an server Punkbuster A Allways runs unless you set it to manual service start as it should be any way

your going to start seening alot more programs that need admin rights do this more offen

------------ on topic -------------
surcrom v7 sucks not even going to buy the game untill its removed the activation should be done After the game has been installed as well what happens if company goes bust (probly unlikey) whow are we going to install it as we cant patch the game to remove it so(that allso goes for World in Conflict as well if thay have it in there unless theres an no cd as well)

 

i never had any issues with starforce .... and for as bad as people said it was, i never actually cared ...
but securom is really done a good act here (note the sarcasm)
so, they think that by overdoing the copy protection is going to prevent piracy ???
wow .... good logic there (note more sarcasm)
Instead, of me actually purchasing the retail game, i will opt for a p*rated copy which im almost
sure will have no issues being reinstalled over and over .....

GREAT JOB SECUROM

 

When secureROM started being bundled with game demos I stopped downloading them. Then Ubisoft thought it was being funny by adding secureROM to a couple of their retail games and not removing the rootkit after the game was uninstalled. They now can burn in eternal hell for for the three days I spent trying to remove the accursed rootkit from my computer.

Until recently my plans were to make another computer with Vista 64bit, 4GB of memory and 8800 GTX but now that secureROM officially makes Bioshock unusable for the PC the old Pentium 4 is looking like it will stay around for a couple more years. SecureROM is a vicious parasite and if you use it on your games and your not getting any of my money to support your company.

 

Watch me care.

 

ooo dunno about that, but its pretty bad

BTW, did you know
a) you cant completely uninstall securom ? (at least without extreme difficulty, and its not official either)
b) the bioshock demo comes with securom

Come on 2K - way to fck up a good game <_<
I'm still not buying it till this crap is removed, even then, this whole ordeal just leaves a bad taste in my mouth, i don't know if i want to support such a bunch of a*******

 

I'm all for stopping piracy and getting quality games in return but it is frustrating when new technology sort of works and creates so many problems. I haven't bought my copy of the game yet as I'm currently bulding my dream PC (don't think it will run on my X800 card) but this will be one of my first purchases once its up and running.
I supose it will all be resolved by then but its just damned annoying at this stage, its a good job that most PC users have been accustomed to having to patch games straight out of the box these days and I reckon that the only way that 2K will get away with this is because they have such a special game on their hands. if it was anything less than stunning them they might have a real problem if the gaming community shunned the game because of the Securom issues.

 

Greetings!

Reported here how to uninstall SecureROM rootkit:
http://forums.2kgames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6948

Truly a pity 2K decided to go this route. Bioshock could have been the 2007 GOTY.