Thanks for the screen shot tip! I had a few last night that I wanted to take.

Thomen, yes, the game supports many resolutions. I have it on my 22 inch widescreen. Supporting different resolutions these days is a must in my book. Looks great on the widescreen.

Got it fixed! I do play on lower details and without AA, tho.
Are we allowed to post screenshots here? Or rather link to ours? I'd rather not post one in a forum post.. it ought to blow the post out of proportion.

Sure, start a screenshot thread:D

Done
:up:

Definitely not! I agree that small companies like SES deserve me buying their games but I don't want to "own" a game which is requiring an internet connection in order to function properly. This paranoid copy protection simply is a no-go for me and it's a pity because I've only heared and read positive feedback about the games themselves.

At least you have a presence here at subsim now Bullethead, before that it was almost impossible to make contact with your company unless you were registered at the 'official' forums - there isn't even an ordinary contact email adress listed on stormeaglestudios.com which interested non-customers could write to...

I was wondering when this subject was going to come up....

I believe you have been somewhat misinformed about how our DRM works. Jutland's version of it works like this:

Every time you start the game, it tries to phone home. If it succeeds, the game will work just fine. If it doesn't succeed, the game will still work just fine, provided it's been less than 7 days since it last made contact. However, if you go longer than 7 days without an internet connection, it will stop working. BUT ONLY until such time as you regain an internet connection. The game still keeps trying to phone home every time you run it. Once you regain contact, the game will start working again just fine, although you'll have to re-enter your license number.

The reason it's like this is actually for your protection. I know that sounds strange, but hear me out on this....

Your license is associated with the hardware of a single computer, so it will only run on 1 computer at a time. You can easily switch the license from computer to computer, or upgrade your hardware of the 1 computer, no problem. You just release the license on the machine it's on now and then put it on the other or the upgraded machine. However, you do these things deliberately and so can take care of the license beforehand.

But suppose your HD crashes, your mobo fries, or whatever. In this sort of case, obviously you hadn't released your license ahead of time. So your computer is down for however long, a few days at least. When you get it running again, the game will see it as a different computer, so your license won't work on it. HOWEVER, after the 7th day passes from whenever the game last phoned home, you can re-enter your license and it will start working again.

Say it takes you 3 days to fix your computer. Then you only have to wait 4 more at most. That's assuming you played the game the day the computer died. If you hadn't played the game for several days before the computer crashed, then you have correspondingly less time to wait once you're back up, all the way down to zero.

Basically, you've got an unlimited number of reinstalls and switches between computers when things are all working. AND if something goes wrong somewhere along the line, there's a fallback mechanism to get you going again in a reasonable amount of time.

The 7 day thing is really a pretty good compromise. The longer we make the time interval in which the game will work between calls home, the longer it will take to come back if your computer dies.

Note that this all means that after 7 days, you can put the license on ANY computer. IOW, suppose you go on a 2-week trip but forget to swap the license to your laptop before you go. After 7 days, you'll be able to put your license on your laptop without having to release it from your home computer.

Anyway, I know the whole DRM subject is a hot button to a lot of people. However, we're stuck with using one because we have to go download-only. Being a niche product, we can't get any shelf space on stores, and it's not economically feasible for us to mail-order DVDs. But we have tried VERY hard to make our DRM as benign as absolutely possible. IMHO, ours is the best one on the market today.

Thanks for the thorough explanation Bullethead. I know how your DRM works, I am not some kind of ignorant who starts criticising something he doesn't have a clue of. I did not want to start an in depth discussion of the DRM at this point. I only wanted to give a feedback about it so you know there are people who would buy Jutland or DG but won't due to the copy protection (many people stated this over at the battlefront.com forum, too). I should have done it via private message instead maybe.

No problem. We're well aware that some folks hate DRMs so much that they refuse to own anything (or so they think) with a DRM. Such folks periodically drop by our other forum to flame us about it, and some go so far as to actually lie about having bad experiences with it in an effort to turn away other customers. They also spread such tales elsewhere, which leads to much disinformation. Thus, I'm happy for the the chance you offered here to set the record straight :).

I find it humorous that the only DRMs people complain about are on games. I guess that the folks who say they refuse to buy DRM'd products don't realize just how many DRMs they have to deal with every day. Or maybe they just don't have an iPod, a cell phone, a computer, or Windows. Many of the DRMs on these things are QUITE nasty, requiring visits to the shop to solve problems with them. And yet they get on SES for the very benign DRM on our games.

Every day, the use of DRMs increases. I firmly believe that we're living in the last days of discs of all sorts. They've already been rendered obsolete by downloadable software, music, movies, and even books, each with its own DRM scheme. Thus, it's only a matter of time until physical media for all such things go the way of the flint spearhead. Economics will force it--it's WAY cheaper to just have a download server than it is to have a disc factory, printing shop, warehouse, delivery trucks, retail outlets, and the employees and utilities for all of that. Economics are already forcing download-only on us small companies, but the big boys will be next. Until that happens, though, us on the leading edge of the wave are necessarily going to take some flak.

So lately i'm kind of wondering what's up with the British Light Vessel AI. The moment I get into a fight with Brits, they call their light ships away from my fleet. That's all well and good, until you realize that they don't ever really *stop* running. It's happening every time, in every scenario. British Destroyers, Light Cruisers, ACs just completely abandon the dreadnoughts. Moreoever, this only happens to the British, German DDs and other assorted escorts remain in formation or nearby capital ships at all times.

This seems to have occured recently. A few patches ago it didn't happen.

Capt Hawkeye:

Others have reported the exact opposite since we made an AI pass a few updates back. If you have a saved game and campaign game file, please goto our customer support server, open up a ticket and attach your saved files.

We will look at it to see if its a problem or you are scaring the crap out of them with your billiant tactics!

SES Customer SUpport Server.
http://www.stormeaglestudios.com/rea...k/default.aspx

Brilliant!!! Windowed mode would fix the whole problem and no game adjustments would be necessary at all. But that does beg the question of why the game keeps firewall permission windows from taking the foreground when windowed mode gives you access to the entire desktop.

I do love the entire concept of your anti-piracy measures, especially the reversion to demo mode on violation. This makes the demo very promiscuous, while keeping full rights games to those willing to pay your salary. This game is worth a trip to the movies with a small family. If you won't pay and feel entitled to steal it you're pretty pitiful. I just read AVG Warhawk's review. That's enough for me. I'm convinced.

I'm afraid I'm not a programmer. I do have a script recorder, but you'd need a script that identified the firewall being used and executed the proper commands to grant the proper permission for that specific firewall. That's out of my league! I wouldn't be surprised if Firewalls weren't programmed not to allow script control anyway. The windowed mode suggestion is best.

Jutland Full Trial Build 2
 

We are testing JUtland trial build 2 (Which will also be the current version of Jutland the day we compile the release candiate.)

This version 2 of the Trial will also include all the patches and bug fixes that we have completed since relase (Currently version 1.019, that means we have issued 19 patches since release!)

We have added several additional scripts that remove the Vista permissions issues from release 1.0

We have also included a link to the website Portforward.com for Router issues.

That site may be the best place we have ever seen for gamers with Router vs. Games issues!

Becasue we access the internet from inside the game, alot of Firewalls dont like it.
Starting up in WIndowed mode will solve many, many issues, mostly with Zone Alarm and such.


The other side of the coin on the DRM is the autoupdating allows for uniform game updating and decreases the support issues resulting from having to troubleshoot multiple versions.

We always try to make the kind of games we would want to buy.:rock:

Sincerely,

Jim Rose

I gotta hand it to you guys with some of the recent patches. Destroyers finally handle like they should and night attacks are feasible now because the AI doesn't have thermal vision anymore and its cool. I've been playing Death of Pommern relentlessly because it plays like it's supposed to. Last night I finally managed to sink Konig, Pommern, and Hessen with a well managed torpedo assault on the German fleet and we got away with nary a shot fired in return. The newspapers in Germany sure won't be calling Jutland a one sided victory now. :lol:

Congrats! My cousin Capt. Stirling, who led the real attack, would be quite proud :)

Translation: people complaining about your DRM are liars. Can you back that up with facts? I.e. give links to threads where this was taking place.

I have searched a bit on the internet and i.m.o. most people have just made it clear that they will never give money for a software that will self-deactivate after seven days. Badmouthing them for just that is very bad style.

Didnt stop me from buying the game. I understand where people are coming from, but alot of games require a connection to the internet just to play it, Half Life 2 comes to mind.

Also consider you have to have an internet connection to even get the game, why would you then play it on a computer without one?

Hello Bullethead.

Ive been playing Jutland since the day after it came out. I have had no no issues with the game. the only problem ive had sofar is that I sometimes useing that end battle button, after a while the game crashes. (which is no big deal, I probably would have lost anyway.):up:

This remark is absolutely typical for this kind of discussion.

Myself I was without internet for about three years. First I lived in a flat without a telephone, then I moved to a place where the technician couldnt enter the cellar because it was litterally filled with junk. I tried UMTS but they said it's not available or much too slow where I lived. I could go online periodically with the help of wireless routers but it was never permanent and generally too slow.

During that time I used to download demos and patches from the office or from internet cafes. I was very active online and participated in several projects in the web. I downloaded and tried Distant Guns during that time. Most importantly, I could play all my games without any problems or artificial obstacles.

People who have internet connections are completely ignorant of the problem. But they will learn as soon as they intend to move, especially in countries like Germany where internet is often not available for several reasons. And outside of Europe and North America, people with internet access in their homes are still a minority.

Imagine a world where all games would use this kind of "copy protection". Would people actually have to move to another place only to be able to play games?

This system is prone to failure for many other reasons, but internet access is reason number 1 why it must not become the norm.

Huh?!?

I would say yes if you said "DSL", but if you don`t decide to live in a place without a phoneline (which should be really rare in Germany), you always have dial-up or maybe ISDN. Sure, no fun, but enough for the game to connect and letting you play. Most patches are in 1 to 2 MB range, so also possible with dial-up.