What if the DRM works?

Boris · 01-29-10, 03:29 AM

This is a hypothetical question:

What IF, just imagine...

If the DRM actually worked and SH5 cannot be cracked by pirates? And the only way you'll ever be able to play SH5 is buy buying it.

Wouldn't this completely justify the new DRM?

McBeck · 01-29-10, 03:39 AM

If it had an offline mode that worked
If it had an online mode that worked
If it could not be cracked

Yeah, then it would be good.

Alienfresser · 01-29-10, 03:47 AM

Don't think so. There is no real technical reason for such a complicate and error prone (I-Net is no reliable medium) solution.

And it won't solve the resale of used games, because you can create one account for every game as long as you have enough e-mail addresses. Common practice for "Account" games.
They will maybe get 5 % additional sold unit from this, but will loose 10% or 15% of their customer-base because of that system. Guess EA will be ready for a hostile "integration" of UBI when the concept is failing.

But with the competence UBI has shown in past there isn't a very high chance that the concept will work very good.

walsh2509 · 01-29-10, 03:48 AM

What is this DRM? I know little other than putting a disc into my pc loading the game and playing it.

This connected online ?

So when I go to my PC shop and buy SH5 get home and install it , I have to be connected to the internet to play it ? even with the disc in my PC.

So if servers are down or my connection goes down , I can not play it even though its on my hard drive and disc in my pc.

McBeck · 01-29-10, 03:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by walsh2509

What is this DRM? I know little other than putting a disc into my pc loading the game and playing it.

This connected online ?

So when I go to my PC shop and buy SH5 get home and install it , I have to be connected to the internet to play it ? even with the disc in my PC.

So if servers are down or my connection goes down , I can not play it even though its on my hard drive and disc in my pc.

Yup...thats pretty much the case

Boris · 01-29-10, 03:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by walsh2509

What is this DRM? I know little other than putting a disc into my pc loading the game and playing it.

This connected online ?

So when I go to my PC shop and buy SH5 get home and install it , I have to be connected to the internet to play it ? even with the disc in my PC.

So if servers are down or my connection goes down , I can not play it even though its on my hard drive and disc in my pc.

Yep, that's pretty much it. No connection, no play. But you do have one thing wrong... they're offering this awesome service where you don't need the CD in the drive to play!!!!
And your savegames are stored safely on their server!!! What a "service"

onelifecrisis · 01-29-10, 03:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Boris

This is a hypothetical question:

What IF, just imagine...

If the DRM actually worked and SH5 cannot be cracked by pirates? And the only way you'll ever be able to play SH5 is buy buying it.

Wouldn't this completely justify the new DRM?

You hit the nail on the head.
Unfortunately it won't work, and as usual it'll be the paying customers who have the hassle of the DRM while the non-paying customers don't.
Not that that will stop me paying. I have an always-on connection. Lucky me.

Letum · 01-29-10, 03:57 AM

Benjamin Franklin said:
"Those who would trade in their freedom for their protection deserve neither."

We are being made to trade a freedom for the protection of someone else (Ubisoft).

Now perhaps I am using over grandiose quotes and using them out of
context, but I think there is a point in there none the less.

onelifecrisis · 01-29-10, 04:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Letum

Now perhaps I am using over grandiose quotes and using them out of
context, but I think there is a point in there none the less.

Keep looking for it and let me know when you find it.

Nobody is having any freedoms taken away. We are all perfectly free to buy the game or not buy it. We're being fully informed about what buying it will entail (with regards to the DRM). There's no infraction here, just some pissed off would-be customers, many of whom (I have no doubt) will become actual paying customers, DRM or otherwise, if they have a stable internet connection and the game turns out to be good.

Boris · 01-29-10, 04:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Letum

Benjamin Franklin said:
"Those who would trade in their freedom for their protection deserve neither."

We are being made to trade a freedom for the protection of someone else (Ubisoft).

Now perhaps I am using over grandiose quotes and using them out of
context, but I think there is a point in there none the less.

Nice thought, but what is freedom here? We're free to buy this game or not. If we do buy it, we do know what we're in for.

On a side note, as a student of political science, I can say that according to many philosophers a person is only free in a socity of rules that "protect" freedom, whereas people living in a lawless anarchist world have no absolute freedom, since personal freedoms can be undermined by others at any time.

onelifecrisis · 01-29-10, 04:17 AM

I've been thinking about how they could implement this OSP thing in the games in such a way that would really make it genuinely hard to crack, and I've come up with squat.

The game saves to the server, and loads from the server, right? If that's all it does then cracking it to save to (and load from) a local disk should be a doddle. So do UBI have something else up their sleeves? What if the server responds to a request for a saved game by encrypting it with a random key just before sending it, and then sends the encrypted file (with the key) to the client, would that make a difference? The decryption algorithm would be in the game executable but the encryption algorithm would be on the server. Without the latter, the crackers would have to find a way to load an unencrypted locally-stored save game straight into memory, bypassing the decryption process altogether, which... might be difficult? Or not? I'm not knowledgable about such things. But I do know that they'd better have something clever up their sleeves or this whole OSP thing will be a waste of their time and money.

Letum · 01-29-10, 04:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Boris

Nice thought, but what is freedom here? We're free to buy this game or not. If we do buy it, we do know what we're in for.

yes, although once we buy it, we are not free to use it, unless we
shackle our connection to Ubisoft. That is a freedom lost that would not
otherwise be.

sergbuto · 01-29-10, 04:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Boris

And your savegames are stored safely on their server!!! What a "service"

There is also a drawback to that. I remember people complained about long loading times of SH3 and that was loading from the hard drive. No loading via internet connection can be compared in speed to starting directly from the hard drive in the player's PC. This might be especially annoying for people trying to mod/working on a mod to the game since the game needs to be often restarted to check the changes made.

Mikhayl · 01-29-10, 04:35 AM

In the past many publishers thought they had come up with the ultimate copy protection, and everything failed. If Ubi's DRM is performant, then it's possible that SH5 won't be cracked. But I can't imagine a title like Assassin's Creed 2 not getting cracked at some point (~day of release).

Btw regarding the DRM itself: people (Trenken mostly) say that it's "uncrackable" because the game is entirely coded around it and it would take months to remove it entirely.
-Either it's bull**** and then the game will be cracked in a matter of hours.
-Or it's true and then Ubi is lying when they say that if online support is discontinued (to use the servers for new games) they will publish an offline patch. If Ubi decides to stop supporting a game I doubt they'll pay some coders for an extended period of time just to create that patch for a game that admitedly doesn't make money anymore.

Boris · 01-29-10, 04:54 AM

The thing that got me thinking was... can I really not buy this game? I bought all my other SH games, why not this one?
I have a stable and fast internet connection, so the DRM would not bother me too much. But I harldy approve of this DRM, and my dilemma is that I'd rather show solidarity to the community. But can I resist not having a peek at SH5? So I could not buy SH5 and play it anyway. But what if I find I have to buy SH5 to play it?

01-29-10, 03:29 AM	#1
Boris Sea Lord Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Hamburg, Germany Posts: 1,691 Downloads: 41 Uploads: 0	What if the DRM works? This is a hypothetical question: What IF, just imagine... If the DRM actually worked and SH5 cannot be cracked by pirates? And the only way you'll ever be able to play SH5 is buy buying it. Wouldn't this completely justify the new DRM?

01-29-10, 03:39 AM	#2
McBeck Admiral Join Date: Feb 2001 Location: Denmark Posts: 2,027 Downloads: 15 Uploads: 0	If it had an offline mode that worked If it had an online mode that worked If it could not be cracked Yeah, then it would be good. __________________ "I like subcommanders...they dont have time for bull**!" Proud member of the Subsim army of zombies Becks website

01-29-10, 03:47 AM	#3
Alienfresser Watch Join Date: May 2005 Location: Irgendwo Posts: 18 Downloads: 5 Uploads: 0	Don't think so. There is no real technical reason for such a complicate and error prone (I-Net is no reliable medium) solution. And it won't solve the resale of used games, because you can create one account for every game as long as you have enough e-mail addresses. Common practice for "Account" games. They will maybe get 5 % additional sold unit from this, but will loose 10% or 15% of their customer-base because of that system. Guess EA will be ready for a hostile "integration" of UBI when the concept is failing. But with the competence UBI has shown in past there isn't a very high chance that the concept will work very good. __________________ I sieg nix, i soag nix und i hoer nix. Basta

01-29-10, 03:57 AM	#8
Letum Navy Seal Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: York - UK Posts: 6,079 Downloads: 43 Uploads: 0	Benjamin Franklin said: "Those who would trade in their freedom for their protection deserve neither." We are being made to trade a freedom for the protection of someone else (Ubisoft). Now perhaps I am using over grandiose quotes and using them out of context, but I think there is a point in there none the less. __________________

01-29-10, 04:17 AM	#11
onelifecrisis Maverick Modder Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: England Posts: 3,895 Downloads: 65 Uploads: 3	I've been thinking about how they could implement this OSP thing in the games in such a way that would really make it genuinely hard to crack, and I've come up with squat. The game saves to the server, and loads from the server, right? If that's all it does then cracking it to save to (and load from) a local disk should be a doddle. So do UBI have something else up their sleeves? What if the server responds to a request for a saved game by encrypting it with a random key just before sending it, and then sends the encrypted file (with the key) to the client, would that make a difference? The decryption algorithm would be in the game executable but the encryption algorithm would be on the server. Without the latter, the crackers would have to find a way to load an unencrypted locally-stored save game straight into memory, bypassing the decryption process altogether, which... might be difficult? Or not? I'm not knowledgable about such things. But I do know that they'd better have something clever up their sleeves or this whole OSP thing will be a waste of their time and money. __________________ Freedom of speech - priceless. For everything else there's Mastercard.

01-29-10, 03:48 AM	#4
walsh2509 XO Join Date: Apr 2005 Posts: 410 Downloads: 18 Uploads: 0	What is this DRM? I know little other than putting a disc into my pc loading the game and playing it. This connected online ? So when I go to my PC shop and buy SH5 get home and install it , I have to be connected to the internet to play it ? even with the disc in my PC. So if servers are down or my connection goes down , I can not play it even though its on my hard drive and disc in my pc.

01-29-10, 04:35 AM	#14
Mikhayl Captain Join Date: Dec 2007 Posts: 485 Downloads: 64 Uploads: 0	In the past many publishers thought they had come up with the ultimate copy protection, and everything failed. If Ubi's DRM is performant, then it's possible that SH5 won't be cracked. But I can't imagine a title like Assassin's Creed 2 not getting cracked at some point (~day of release). Btw regarding the DRM itself: people (Trenken mostly) say that it's "uncrackable" because the game is entirely coded around it and it would take months to remove it entirely. -Either it's bull**** and then the game will be cracked in a matter of hours. -Or it's true and then Ubi is lying when they say that if online support is discontinued (to use the servers for new games) they will publish an offline patch. If Ubi decides to stop supporting a game I doubt they'll pay some coders for an extended period of time just to create that patch for a game that admitedly doesn't make money anymore.

01-29-10, 04:54 AM	#15
Boris Sea Lord Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: Hamburg, Germany Posts: 1,691 Downloads: 41 Uploads: 0	The thing that got me thinking was... can I really not buy this game? I bought all my other SH games, why not this one? I have a stable and fast internet connection, so the DRM would not bother me too much. But I harldy approve of this DRM, and my dilemma is that I'd rather show solidarity to the community. But can I resist not having a peek at SH5? So I could not buy SH5 and play it anyway. But what if I find I have to buy SH5 to play it?