CDV Officially Drops Starforce Copy Protection

simoniker writes "Publisher CDV has officially announced that it is dropping the controversial StarForce game copy protection scheme from its games, and is using the TAGES protection scheme instead, in what it calls 'response to consumer demand'. This follows Ubisoft's dropping of the scheme in April, as controversy continues about StarForce's allegedly negative effect on PCs. However, it's notable that the StarForce drivers have just passed Microsoft's 'Designed for Windows XP' certification programme, according to the company's official website."

Comments

CDV shit on your head, thank them for the hat

[grub]

Publisher CDV [...] is using the TAGES protection scheme instead, in what it calls 'response to consumer demand'

Funny, I would have assumed 'consumer demand' would demand no copy protection at all!

This is just substituting horse shit with cow shit then having a PR hack spray it with perfume to make it smell like the company is doing you a favour.

Re:CDV shit on your head, thank them for the hat

[brouski]

I'm sure "consumer demand" would entail free games and a pony.

I'll take dropping Starforce, thanks.

Re:CDV shit on your head, thank them for the hat

[NuclearDog]

Your toaster sits on your counter all the time.
You are required to constantly move CDs around because all the games require the CD to be in the drive to play.

If your toaster gets scratched or takes some slight damage, even just wear and tear, it stills works fine.
You scratch the wrong sector off of a CD, it's toast (haha punny).

It would cost them what, $20? $30?, to replace a toaster.
It probably costs a publisher $0.50 for a pressed CD. If that.

If they're going to require me to put the CD in the drive every damn time I want to use their software (it could sit safely in its case on my shelf if it weren't for the copy protection), then yes, I do expect them to replace it when it finally stops working.

ND

Thank you

[gerbalblaste]

Despite the forth coming commecnts about the desire for the absense of copy-protection this is a big step forward.

I hope many more companies see fit to follow suit.

Re:Thank you

[grub]

How is it a big step forward? The only people who ever jump through copy protection hoops are the legitimate consumers. Even then many, myself included, use a no-CD/DVD crack so the originals are kept safe in the package.

Re:Thank you

[voice_of_all_reason]

If you destroy the product somehow, it's not really unfair if you have to rebuy it.

Funny, game companies are always telling me I'm buying a "liscence" to use the game, not an actual product. Therefore, I have the right to sue for a refund if they are not holding up their end of the liscence by providing me with the software, correct?

Demand!

[Rob T Firefly]

in what it calls 'response to consumer demand'

It's funny - usually when PR types talk about "consumer demand" it's a bunch of unimportant hyperbolic nonsense.

"Due to consumer demand, we've brought back those yummy red M&Ms!"

"We now make our stylish womens' sweatpants that say 'juicy' across the bottom in sizes up to 40, thanks to overwhelming market demand!"

"Disney is releasing Lion King 8: Simba Mauls a Wildebeest because the fans demand more Hakuna Matata!"

This is one of those rare occasions when the consumers, as a whole, demand something of an industry and get it.

Re:Demand!

[Harinezumi]

Reminds me of the old Soviet catch-all justification. "In response to a flood of requests from the workers, next Saturday will be a nation-wide unpaid workday!"

Certifying crap makes it certified crap

[metoc]

Microsoft's 'Designed for Windows XP' just means that the software meets certain criteria, and does not mean well designed, well written or bug free.

One would assume that Microsoft Internet Explorer and Office Word are 'Designed for Windows XP'. I also suspect that some spyware, viruses and trojans could pass if the authors paid to have it cerified as 'Designed for Windows XP'.

TAGES

[Kadin2048]

I thought it was interesting that the one thing that the summary didn't link to was any information on the new scheme, TAGES.

A quick Google brought me to their site. It's mostly corporate PR-speak fluff, but there are some hints there:

Our main technical asset is our specific mastering process which builds up a programmable "secure area" on the disc. The secured area is used to protect useful application data sets or encryption keys. ... With TAGES(TM) there will never be a generic crack, and there will never be one-to-one copies. It is physically impossible. ... Nevertheless, we consider emulators to be a real threat and have all the necessary flexibility to be able to react immediately, with much more powerful solutions than blacklists - which are a very limited answer to emulation.

I don't buy the whole "physical impossibility" part. If you can read the data off of the disk with their special APIs and drivers, then those drivers can be reverse-engineered and someone else peel the data off and distribute a hacked version. The data is there, on the disk, they're just storing it in a way that the system can't normally access, without special code that they license out and allow software developers to integrate into their protected application. It's the same thing that game developers have done for years -- there were some old Apple II titles that did strange things with the floppy drive in order to pull off similar tricks.

*yawn* At any rate, just more security through obscurity. Not that I care, particularly, as I don't run Windows (or, for that matter, play games), but I find the whole area interesting enough to keep an eye on.

Re:TAGES

[LiquidCoooled]

I found an article about tages which explains how it works quite nicely (infact its the discussion where the protection is essentially given an autopsy).
Theres enough info there to understand the way it works.

Have a read of it

Its all about how the disk is corrupted by having 2 index links on the disk both point at a a sector with the same identifier, but that when the disc head is travelling in one direction (as the disc rippers do) it misses completely the data hidden in the duplicated sector.
The only way to find the duplicated sector is to read the disc backwards.
Doing a diff on the 2 images will identify the hidden data.

(at least it sounds reasonable...)

No not really

[Sycraft-fu]

Condumers would LIKE no copy protection at all, but they appear to be contented with copy protection that's unbotrusive and unproblematic. However they do demand that their games work, something Starforce isn't very good at.

So no they aren't giving consumers what they want, but they are giving them what they require. I won't boycott all copyprotected games, I can live with Safedisc and such. I did, however, boycott all Starforce games because they are problematic.

Re:No not really

[SomeoneGotMyNick]

Condumers would LIKE no copy.......

Oh my, I hope you get over that cold soon....

Either that, or like me, sometimes the "fat finger" slips a bit on the keyboard.

Your right not to buy it

[SmallFurryCreature]

This is further down on the google result for TAGES and seems to show that TAGES is actually easier to defeat then the other methods.

Then again, ALL of them have been defeated so is there any point in being the one that took the most time?

Is TAGES however friendlier to the paying customer? Since none of the copy protections systems work the only thing that can be hoped for is that they inconvenience the paying customer as little as possible.

Offcourse no copy protection at all would be the easiest way not to upset paying customers but lets not get silly shall we? The paying customers must be hurt to pay for the pirates!

I say we whip all airline passengers to punish them for drug smugglers, you know it makes sense.

StarForce will be changing it's name soon...

[garylian]

The fact that several game companies, including a major studio like UbiSoft, has dropped StarForce due to CD drive problems, is a major sign that the company is in trouble.

At this point, even if they could prove beyond a shadow of doubt that their protection methods don't cause any harm, their reputation is effectively ruined. Enough game players are savvy enough to find out if the StarForce protection is on a desired game, and avoid that title if it is present. And game publishers are figuring this out.

The industry may be a multi-billion dollar one, but these guys aren't about to kiss off customers over a single protection scheme, when there are so many others out there. They will lose more revenue from potential paying customers than they will lose to customers that are soley interested in a pirated copy.

Besides, just about all games are released with enough bugs that a patch is pretty much a necessity. Look at how Stardock handled Galactic Civilizations II: Dread Lords. No copy protection, but if you want to update that game, you better enter a serial #. Any pirated CD is basically a demo, and once you patch it, it is the full version.

At this point, I'm just happy with any game that doesn't want the CD/DVD in the drive. I switch games too often.

Re:StarForce will be changing it's name soon...

[Bios_Hakr]

>>At this point, I'm just happy with any game that doesn't want the CD/DVD in the drive. I switch games too often.

That's the ultimate answer. Game companies will begin to use publishers like Valve and systems like Steam.

Now, I'm not saying Steam is perfect; no protection system ever is. Hell, I see the "full version all steam games" torrents up at TPB. Never having tried, I can't attest to their workability.

However, as a consumer, having one central app that lists games avalable along with prices is great. I can do three clicks before bed and have the game ready to play the next morning. And that's on slow DSL. I don't have to drive to the mall or wade through Wal Mart. I don't have to dispose of 5 layers of wrapping or figure out a way to store a CD and keycode.

But, as much as I love online distros, lots of companies are going to die because of it. A perfect example is rFactor. Now, I like racing sims. I'll throw them on the PC, play them a few weeks, then go on to something new. After a month of WoW, I'll go back to the racing sim to kill some time. However, even though I bought the download edition of rFactor, I only get 5 installs. I've had it under a month and I've already used two of them. I'll never get anything from that publisher agian. Limiting installs for online distros is not a step forewards; it's a huge fucking leap backwards.

Re:replacing damaged CDs

[Gel214th]

What if MathWorks went out of business? Without a backup you would not be able to use the software. You also mentioned that you had to 'convince' Mathworks to send you a replacement disc, implying that this isn't a straightforward and easy task. In addition you had to pay for the privilege of continuing to use your software. if you had been able to backup the original CD and were using that backup instead of the original you would have had none of the above problems.