Ubisoft Drops Starforce Copy protection!
 

It's as close of an official statement we may get, but Starforce is no longer going to be on Ubisoft games.
Late yesterday evening I was indirectly confronted with questions asking me and 13thHouR what we would do if Ubisoft would drop Starforce from Heros of Might and Magic V.
Then the questions became more specific.

I answered if that happened even though HOMM V is not my type of game play I would buy it and take a picture of it.

I was asked if I would promote it and tell others. I said it would be news worthy so I would talk to the Media about this yes.

You can read all about this at www.r-force.org our web site.

If you read this thread you will begin, if your intuitive enough to see the whole picture. :rock:
http://r-force.org/modules.php?name=...iewtopic&t=141

As I said before, persistance pays off and the truth will eventually come out!

Thanks to all in the Starforce Investigation!!!!!

We will have a story posted on r-force.org soon as soon as I see an official statement from Ubisoft!



Soulcommander

I would forgive them if they released a Starforce-killer program of sorts that would disable/prevent Starforce from being installed or running at all.

From now on, games will be free of SF, but the older stuff still needs alternative .exes and what not.

So, how's the bankruptcy legislation in Russia? Do you think we could convince Putin to send them all to Siberia? Or better yet, deport them to China and get them to work on the Chinese firewall, in a few weeks Starforce will destroy the entire system and the Chinese will be free to search for Tibet RuleZ and Democracy for teh W1n, without having to go through all that proxy hassle.

Ubisoft drops Starforce :rock:
Not a good message when a top developer like ubisoft cancels it. :yep:
Aussie gaming mag PCPowerplay game reviewers always warn the reader when reviewing a game that has starforce. These guys aren't just game reviewers they specialists in Hardware and Programming.

Starforce should be worried,

now just to get codemasters to realise their mistakes and we wil be well away at getting rid of the starforce virus.

I have already asked for a patch to games like Silent Hunter III so I and many orthers can play it again with out worry.

I was without a CDRW drive until just Sunday when I reformatted my PC after my email account was broke into and all the Starforce docs I conducted with Ubi in the Starforce investigation. Much more I cant talk about...so I now have a new cdrw drive and NO SF!!
Funny how after almost a year and then this breaking news I get a new drive to replace my damaged one.
:rock:

Do you have ESP?
LOL I was just talking to someone about that.
But remember SF is not a virus.
:up:

What you missed my ugly mug in Gamepro there in the NZ? :rotfl:

no, very true. virus homepages dont have forums. ;)

just tried to spread the good news on the x3 forums, it got locked very quickly indeed.

even though i didnt say anything against starforce or even mention piracy at all.

it seems you cant posts some gaming news on gaming sites.

Why is this good news ? Why so estatic as if a war has been won ? SHIII will still have SF and SHIV will just have a different software proggie. That different software thingy will ale cause / be blamed for many problems.

For SHIV we will not have "I hate SF threads" but "I hate .... threads"

This is not a victory at all, just a reminder of how difficult it is to protect your own stuff from being stolen.

It is all of us who use illegal software who are too blame companies have to take measures like this.

Please post a link to that site please.

Your wrong. Companies don't have to take measures like this. Stardocks Galactic Civ II is a good game with no copy protection. Sold out in North America in 10 days.

If Ubi uses any other copy protection its fine by me as long as it doesn't cause issues like Starforce did.

And it is a happy Day! You are obviously not informed. I am asking for a patch to remove SF from Silent hunter 3

If we get one good, if we don't, I will not be buying the game.
Simple as that. But I am one of the lucky ones that Ubi allowed me to send in my original disc and in turn they sent me a sealed copy that I was told to take back to my retailer.
So for others thats not an option now. Ihave had people email me saying Ubi willnot do this anymore.

:damn: Frustrating for the rest of you who have the game, if they don't release an official patch.

Soul

I bet the software proggie will be Securom 7 or 8, compared to SF its safe.[/quote]

SimBin. I want back my beloved GTR. An installer so that SF never enters the holy place of my HD. Same installer for GT Legends and virtual Skipper 4 - which then I would consider to buy.

Langenscheidt-Collins Dictionary English/German came with SF. Short time later they released an alternative installer that did not only remove installed SF driver, but allowed people to install the dictionary without SF, and then copy only the books from CD - Sf never touched the HD that way. I doubt that we will see that for many older games, unfortunately.

It is a victory indeed, but sure, they will come with more sick stuff like that. Blue Ray for Playstation 3 - so problematic that it delayed the release. HardDrive-Videorecorders - and manufacturers choosing copy protections and standards that produce more and more incompatabilities. Incompatabilities with copy protections for Audio-CD, Sony it was. HD-TV, again with hidden intricacies and traps most people do not know about. The future surely holds sweet promises.

Nevertheless the massive anti-SF-campaign illustrates that if only enough customers vote with their wallets, something can be moved. Concenring the even worse intricacies that are laying ahead of us, and not only limited to the field of PCs, this is somethign weorth to be remembered.Since longer time DVD-videorecorders are laying like lead on the shelves, although they have become acceptable in price - too much incompatability troubles. I forsee the same, on a worse scale, with HD-videorecorders. And with HD-TV. I intend not to buy any of these for as long as technologically possible. I have a DVD-video-player, a VHS-recorder, and a standard TV, which eventually will get replaced this year, widescreen yes, but not HD, maybe even not LCD. No troubles that way, I will remain a happy man by reducing chances for trouble.

Having something new is all nice and well, but when the "new" things come in shorter and shorter intervals, they turn into a stress factor and a constant source of anger. Concerning copy protection (PC, music, movies), I think the industry has gone crazy, somehow. I think it is more and more about pushing through manufactural technological standards, to make customers stick to one's own products, and hiunder them to buy those of the other companies. In other words, it is about monopolizing, and control and power over consumers. Governments do not dare anymore to confront this. That'S why in Germany we have a perverted law situation saying nthat - like in my school days - the copying of music is allowed in family and friends-circle (!), even if the music CD is copy protected. The illegal thing is not to copy it, but to bypass the copy protection scheme. at the same time the GEMA-fees, that are included in every single price a customer pays, still compensate the industry for losses due to copying, like in the 60s, 70s, and 80s.

Maybe companies are overfishing their own pools of customers? Maybe "more" is not always "better". Why spending ressources on producing crap? turn on the radio and you immediately know what I mean. Quality has become sparse.

I'm straying off. I apologize. Put the blame of the second glass of wine that I just had. :)

what i mean is just this: did we win the war? no, it will go on. did we win a battle? Yes. So give us some time to celebrate and take a deep breath, before we take on the next enemy.

It's great news because StarForce is especially insidious and if you visit their forums they're quite arrogant. I'd rather not give them any of my money by proxy.

StarForce, like other protection rackets, never effectively prevents software copying. Professional software pirates, those that use industrial processes to mass duplicate games, are rarely effected. It's generally the honest consumer that is screwed by copy prevention schemes.

So, yes, this is definitely positive news for would-be purchasers of UBI games.

Frankly, I am not aware of any other copy protection scheme that has faced opposition on a scale even close to Starforce. They're annoying sometimes, but nothing of this sort :hmm:

If SF had actually worked while others failed to keep their games from being cracked that might be different Herr Drebbelmaker :rotfl:

SH3 was quickly cracked but still sold well enough to justify SH4. Most use the crack to get rid of SF. After SF removal, like magic, I did a new install of the OC and never had a problem again.

SF was damaging. They, any of them, do not have the right to play Russian roulette with our computers.

I am sure we are all pro copy protection to insure future product. But not one that opens your PC to problems.

I have had many games and this one is the only copy protection that directly affected the performance of my PC. No other copy protection did that, nada, null!!!

This is a small victory that hopefully causes devs to demand protection that does not attack their loyal customer base.

Wulfmann

Just for the record, Drebbel, it's not copy-protection I object to, but bad copy protection. Why should those who purchase software legally be made to pay the penalty for those who aren't affected by poor copy protection because they aren't using legal copies to begin with? It's the outlaws who should be punished, not the people who are law-abiding to begin with. That's just stupid. The only ones who should be sorry about this are those who have been making a killing by selling cracked Starforce-free copies of whatever.

I have no objection to protecting property, or intellectual property, or creative work, but I have a serious problem when Company A forces something on me that totally craps up my work or something Company B made. I don't make my yard look clean by trashing my neighbor's.

As long as Ubi's choice of copy protection doesn't cause a SNAFU on my PC - as long as it doesn't operate in an invasive way like Starforce - I don't care what they use.

Now, all that said, while I consider this announcement good news, to me it's good news in the sense that something I consider to be a problem is going to get fixed. I do agree with you that it's wise not to celebrate by rioting in the streets. I'm just thankful they've apparently made the decision to drop Starforce, and hope that their next choice for copy protection turns out better.