With online activation systems with date restrictions, they usually either withhold some crucial element like the main executable or encrypt important parts of the data, and then don’t release those until the actual release date. They’re pretty safe, since nobody’s going to rewrite the game engine or brute-force the key before then.
They announced that on release you have to download 50MB of data. So there will be no piracy before May 17th.
Uhhh… well… ummm… so your credit card – which requires your signature – is then also a form of DRM. As is “having cash to pay for a DVD.” Requiring an account on a service to download something that you can then do whatever you want with is about as much “DRM” as those scenarios. What else should we do to remove DRM? Put the games up as regular downloads on the honor system? Download it and, please, then send us a cheque? :)
Out of curiosity, I just read through the DRM article on Wikipedia, and can honestly say that if you consider registering your game to access patches to be a form of DRM, then you’re splitting hairs by playing semantics.
There are no other restrictions on the GoG version, and that’s not even truly a restriction.
You can install/copy the GoG installer on as many systems as you want. There is no authentication check to fire up and play the game, even on the initial install completion. There is no authentication software of any kind installed to limit your ability to play the game.
They aren’t restricting your use of the media you purchased in any way. They are merely asking you to register the install in order to download further updates that have been done after the time of purchase. There is no agreement on purchase that the game publisher is required to provide you with updates to the software until it is in a state you consider to be “complete”. If there is, then I will happily concede that I’m wrong.
Nesrie
4446
We’re talking about one of few industries here who can sell a product that doesn’t work, is incomplete and somehow still thinks they’re doing the customer a favor by giving them access to something that actually makes what they sold fucntional. If someone wants to store additional content behind a server and have people register for it and call it DRM free, fine. If someone wants to take something that fixes their product and hides it behind a server with the same condition, it’s DRM. But hey, if you think otherwise, I have half a game to sell you, and you’ll get access to the other half when you’ve registered and linked up with my server… oh but don’t worry, it’s DRM free so you should be happy.
People do this all the time. It’s called multiplayer.
Nesrie
4448
We’re not talking about multiplayer games in this case… are we?
Unless private servers are an option, in which case it really is DRM. Not that it’s the kind I’ll complain very loudly about or anything.
But the half/broken/blah stuff is more conspiracy theory than DRM, methinks.
Nesrie
4450
You think? You can’t think of any game that was fairly recently released, as DRM free of course, that was so badly broken at release that without patches it was consider a “don’t buy” title? Really?
No, but your logic would label multiplayer as DRM as well. Words mean things. DRM is not what you are making it out to be.
Nesrie
4452
Exactly how much of a game can be on a server for it to be consider DRM Free? SHould companies just give of us an .exe file, host everything else and then call it DRM free because we can share the file and there is nothing preventing that? The fact that the file is useless like that doesn’t matter right because… wel it’s not Securom, can be opened without a disc in a tray. Exactly how much is okay. Words do have meaning; you are correct of course, but I don’t think you were really conversing that point.
Closest thing I can think of is EWoM, but that game has DRM (beyond the patches).
My bad, I could have sworn it used GOO. Still, it’s the only game I’m aware of that fits your criteria. And… Assuming v1.2 really does what it says on the tin (aka: game will no longer asplode in ur face), I’m guessing they would probably have released it on day 1, or very close to it, if it was some sort of underhanded DRM scheme.
How about those good old games, hmm?
Speaking of which, MotoRacer 2 is back on GoG after they apparently fixed the DRM-related glitch.
Nesrie
4457
I don’t think the DRM scheme is underhanded at all. I think it’s mislabeled and these games need to be separated from games that are actually DRM free, no strings attached, at all. I have games that are DRM free, patches and all freely available online, no registrations, no serial codes, no clients needed. There is a difference between those DRM free games and these.
Guys, stop feeding Nesrie the troll, please. This argument is just splitting hairs and is generally useless.
rezaf
4459
Maybe the term DRM doesn’t quite fit, but the important point (which I haven’t seen mentioned) is that hiding your patches behind a login achieves at least one of the main goals of the current generation of DRM.
It’s a sad truth that a majority of games these days require patches. Most of them are not broken to the point of being unplayable, but they STILL require patches to be enjoyed to their full potential.
Thus, if you hide your patches behind a login wall, this is supposed to mean a person will use their existing account with personal data to tie your game to it. Which usually means, said person can no longer re-sell the game.
It’s also supposed to prevent people with pirated copies from getting the patches in the first place, but that often doesn’t work because the patch content ends up being distributed by other means, and since there’s no ADDITIONAL DRM, this probably works, unless your game is obscure enough that nobody bothers extracting and seperately publishing the updated content.
So, maybe it’s no DRM per se, but it’s not totally apples and oranges either.
In the GOG case, though, you’re not buying a boxed copy and thus probably don’t actually have anything to re-sell, so I wouldn’t worry about it, personally.
rezaf
So, is Freespace 2 a good game? I haven’t played a good space sim in years.
I played that Microsoft one with mouse control for a while…where you’re a merc? And take missions? And fly on lame hyperspace lines around a boring galaxy? Wassat called?
Vesper
4461
That was Freelancer.
Freespace 2 is probably the best space sim ever made. Joystick highly recommended, however. Also, there’s mods to make it look really nice in high resolutions.
