News Valve: "DRM damages value of games"

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/2010/03/15/valve-drm-damages-value-of-games/1

 

Good to hear Valve's on our side

 

Is Gabe trying to run for grand overlord of the gaming universe or something considering everything Valve have done in the past weeks.

 

I can think of worse grand overlords...
Anyways, when Valve can sort out their offline mode to work reliably, their DRM will be transparent, as it is I still have occasional problems. He is right in what he says though.

 

Dont you still have to be online to activate a valve game?

Ubisofts requirement to be online all the time is scandalous. What about families that dont have internet?

 

I really don't think its the always on internet connection that is the problem here.

I feel its the intrusive software sitting there constantly connected to EA or whoever just incase you decide to play the game. God forbid you do actually play the game then before you do anything it's a "Checking for updates" which then stops you getting into the game. The log in to receive the download or else is far too draconian.

I happily leave Steam running as it runs quite peacefully and updates when it needs to and doesn't hog any bandwidth.

 

I have never had any problems with offline mode. It took me a while to work out why I can't just log in as offline instead of being online to go offline, but then when I realised it could be used to share your games I found it fine.

I do find it funny that steam is very obtrusive and in your face in terms of a DRM, but because it serves as a nice platform for most or all of your games and the ability to chat with friends it has become accepted and bloody awesome.

 

Things I won't accept with DRM
1) Always on internet connection. I work offshore and play games on my laptop when I'm off shift. No internet connection for two weeks at a time there.
2) Malware that stops other programs on my PC from working. Despite what EA and the like think, there are plenty of legitimate uses for copying/cloning software. They have no right to disable it.
3) Limited number of installs. I wipe games and reinstall them on a regular basis. I've lost track of the number of times I've installed BG2 now. Always on my own PC and always for my own use.

Things I will accept
1) Internet connection to register the game (to my email address if they must)
2) CD to be in the drive while playing the game. I know that doesn't work for downloaded games, but for CD's/DVD's it's not a problem.

 

I paid £70 for Spore, and because of the DRM I can't play it anymore. I've tried contacting EA support, reinstalling doesn't change anything, it refuses to authenticate... £70 down the drain.

 

DRM's an interesting topic, frankly, I'm in favour of it (if it's done well). I can appreciate as a developer or publisher there should be some steps taken to protect your game, but there is clearly a limit to what people are willing to accept, the recent Ubisoft debacle being a case in point.

However Valve have managed it, they have done so in a way that people don't even know it's there; Good DRM. Most other implementations seem to cause grief for paying customers, with the pirates usually finding a way around it.

At the risk of suggesting a Valve monopoly, can't all future games just be released on Steam? Why don't all publishers and developers use it, are there any downsides to it for them? The future of games distribution is clearly leaning towards download based rather than Retail DVD and as it stands at the moment, Steam is king of the hill. I doubt many people use the EA or Impulse alternatives.

I wonder if there is some way to make Steam more appealing to publishers rather than them trying to implement their own form of DRM? If all games were available on Steam I bet it would help to further the regeneration of the PC Games market - most people use it, it allows for people to make impulse purchases, gives publishers greater control over pricing, eliminates physical media distribution costs and surely it would then also solve their DRM dramas by having a rights management system that just works?!

 

We've started a group on facebook regarding Ubisofts DRM, and though small at the moment, we are appealing for members. Hopefully with enough voices, we may be able to do something.

So far we've started making gentle enquiries with trading standards in the UK.

The group: http://www.facebook.com/?sk=2361831622#!/group.php?gid=357679392926

 

Bit rich these comments... coming from Valve who do not allow you to resell games you bought on Steam !
Lets face it.. we have all bought some dud's once in a while. It would be good to offload them somewhere !

 

Trouble with the second hand games market is that it doesn't make money for anyone except the reseller, so it's understandable - at least from Valve's point of view - that they haven't built that functionality in.

 

Joined ! a worthy cause if ever there was one

 

Now IF ONLY they can get their world pricing sorted out (especially for the Euro people) then Valve will be onto a sure winner....

 

Valve - these guys really rock! and now bringing Steam to MAC - even better

 

As I sat yesterday watching BFBC2 take 2 minutes to get server info then 1 minute or so to load the map I was pretty irritated. While this game requires you be online to play it my point is I'm sick and tired of the online mentality. Need an account to play your game. Need to be able to authenticate. Now, need to be online all the time. Well enough is enough. If I want to play a single player game check the CD and thats it, just like 10 years ago. Devs/publishers have control issues they need to FIX. We buy the games thier ours. Leave us alone post purchase.

Eh, I'm sick of it all. Gamers have been reiterating this issue over and over for years yet devs/publisher keep (ignoring us) trying to push different forms of DRM down our throats.

The only form I'm happy with, CD/DVD check, thats it. No other form is 100% acceptable to me. Even steam while "ok" has its issues. Some have already been mentioned but here they are.

One: the offline mode made me insane at one point. It may be better now but I haven't had the need to try it.
Two: why must I buy two copies of the same games so I can play with my kid? At least let us spawn LAN play.
Three: Can't resell, even hardcopy games you bought in the store.

Sorry I'm old school from the 90s. I've personally witness how bad gaming has become. The funny part its coming from the big name publishers. The indy devs don't give us that much headache. Its those who have made to much money from us over the years wasting it on DRM schemes instead of putting it into new exciting games that aren't sequals.

 

Technically, thats wrong. You buy the right to play the game. The game doesn't become yours, you can't then go and copy it and sell millions of copies.

I'm not for DRM though, atleast not stuff like SecuROM and the like. Steam is fine by me, extremely good system that works perfectly.
I think offline mode has just recently been updated. In one of the updates, it said "Offline mode finally fixed".


You could argue that DRM is completely pointless as it has always been bypassed by those who are determined to do it.

 

Only problem is that CD/DVD checks are woefully easy to bypass. I can admit to having pirated a couple games (how the heck am I going to buy a new copy of Age of Empires 2 anymore after losing my old one?) and know that it's just laughable as a DRM. It was only vaguely useful back in the day to prevent people just passing around one disk to install for all their friends, but now it's far too outdated.

 

Technically, it is not wrong.

You do normally buy the right to own the games. They're ours to keep.

What you don't normally buy is the right to own the actual copyright to copy and sell millions of copies

Which is what DRM is supposed to stop us from doing.