Vista Games Cracked to Run on XP

Next Generation is reporting that Vista PC games have been cracked to run under XP. Hacking groups who apparently wanted to play new titles like Shadowrun and Halo 2 with driver support have taken it upon themselves to open up the playing field a bit. "The news is sure to irk Microsoft who may now face an increased delay in some consumers adopting Vista at this early stage. However, it shouldn't come as a surprise. Earlier this month Falling Leaf Systems said in a press release that it believed Microsoft was deceiving consumers by stating that the titles would only work on Vista, and announced its intentions to release compatibility software to disprove the claim. 'Microsoft has, in typical Microsoft fashion, decided to launch their forced migration onslaught in full force with the release of two games that will only run on Windows Vista,' said Falling Leaf Systems CEO Brian Thomason in the press release." Relatedly, Mitch Gitelman of the (now closed) FASA Studios has taken exception to negative reviews of Shadowrun.

Comments

Nothing new under the sun

[seanadams.com]

I once bought a set of OrCad software for $13K, but even after several calls to tech support I could not get the parallel-port security dongles to work properly. I even got a replacement set of dongles from them and it still didn't work reliably. So I downloaded a crack for it, and then everything was fine.

When you have to download a pirated version just to use the software you've legitimately paid for because of artificial limitations like this, it doesn't exactly install a lot of goodwill in the customer. I never purchased anything from Cadence again, and don't intend to.

If enough of us refuse to buy software, music, or movies from companies that deliberately frustrate their paying customers, then they will either change their strategy or they will deservedly go out of business.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[danbert8]

This angers me as well, especially when the product box is wrong. For example, I bought a Streamzap PC remote which claimed to work with Windows XP (all versions), but somehow that didn't include XP x64 edition. I might add that Streamzap does not reply at all to support questions that involve XP x64.
 
This brings up an interesting question of if this hack works with XP x64.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[morgan_greywolf]

If enough of us refuse to buy software, music, or movies from companies that deliberately frustrate their paying customers, then they will either change their strategy or they will deservedly go out of business. Well, this doesn't really apply in markets where there is a monopolist running things. MSFT can do things like this and get away with it precisely because they own more than 90% of the desktop OS market. Your only other choice is to run an alternative platform, like Mac OS X or Linux, neither of which are particularly good platforms from a gamer's perspective.

IOW, the fact that Microsoft gets away with 'forced upgrades' and the like is all the proof you need that they should have been broken up following the DOJ anti-trust trial, per the orders of Judge Jackson.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[teflaime]

Max OS X and Linux would be fine platforms for gaming if 1) they wrote more games for them and 2) OpenGL were to keep pace with whatever DirectX is supposed to be offering...my disclaimer here is that I don't know if OpenGL is keeping pace or not. I was told at a con by a game developer that he didn't think OpenGL was keeping pace and thats why he didn't like programming for Macs. I hate programming, so I haven't bothered to learn if this is really true, or just lazy programmer FUD to hide their laziness.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[bigbigbison]

I can't tell you how many games I've bought that I've put in at least 3 different computers with different brands of dvd drives and none of them could read the disks because of securom copy protection. In every case I've gone p2p and found hacked versions. It is a sign of how good their "copy protection" is when someone who has bought the games can't install them but the pirates have no problem ripping them.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[another_fanboy]

have to download a pirated version just to use the software you've legitimately paid for because of artificial limitations
If enough of us refuse to buy software, music, or movies from companies that deliberately frustrate their paying customers, then they will either change their strategy or they will deservedly go out of business.
The problem is if we refuse to buy from them, they will complain to the RIAA/MPAA that we are pirating. More pirates means more DRM.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[shotgunsaint]

I'm not much of a code slinger either, but from what I understand of the subject, DirectX is much easier to develop for, while Open GL is faster performance-wise. Anyone care to prove me wrong or right?

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[Sparr0]

OpenGL is keeping *AHEAD* of Direct3D. We had Shader Model 4.0 (Geometry Shaders, aka "DX10") months before DX10. OpenGL has SM4 on WinXP, and D3D9 doesn't. That alone should provoke developers into switching. For years the argument has been about ease of programming and integration, but now OGL has concrete feature superiority over D3D on the most prevalent gaming platform in the world.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[mdarksbane]

Vertex shaders can't create new vertices.

With a geometry shader you can pass the video card one copy of a tree, and have the geometry shader turn it into a forest.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[MightyMartian]

My feeling is that where requiring an upgrade of the operating system is nothing more than if(version="VISTA","Welcome","You're FUcked") then the companies should be charged with false advertising and fined millions.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[mr_mischief]

It's not really piracy to pay for software then download a cracked copy, is it? I mean, he's just using the working copy for which he paid.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[suv4x4]

OpenGL is keeping *AHEAD* of Direct3D. We had Shader Model 4.0 (Geometry Shaders, aka "DX10") months before DX10.

The highlights of DX10 aren't the shaders. The same shaders are avasilable in 9L. It's about the rebuilt lighter API, multithreading and graphics memory swap file.

OpenGL doesn't have the latter two AFAIK.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[MightyMartian]

If it's piracy to redownload songs that I own on cassette (and still have the cassette, mind you), then yes, it's piracy to download cracked and modded versions of software that you already own.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[mpe]

This angers me as well, especially when the product box is wrong. For example, I bought a Streamzap PC remote which claimed to work with Windows XP (all versions), but somehow that didn't include XP x64 edition. I might add that Streamzap does not reply at all to support questions that involve XP x64.

Why could you not return it for a refund?

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[mrchaotica]

So, all of those things are supported without extensions? Or are they still prefixed with NV or EXT, which doesn't really count as "support?"

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[Anonymous Coward]

I fail to see how it has any superiority, when the extensions you are mentioning are all IHV unique and the implementations are different across the board. Hell, you could do a ton of things that geometry shaders allow in directx 9 (and opengl), but the algorithms are forced to run on the CPU.

BTW, OpenGL 3.0 is the version that is supposed to bring opengl to par with directx10, by adding support for things like geometry shaders and refactoring of the api. If you are interested, you can read more about it at http://www.opengl.org/pipeline/article/vol002_1/. Or you can pretend like opengl is the best thing ever, and miles ahead of directx, when in reality, it has a lot of catching up to do.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[robbiethefett]

I'm currently a student of mechanical engineering with a heavy emphasis on CAD. You'd think the big companies like AutoDesk would prefer to make it easy for students to learn the software's ins and outs by offering a nice student discount, or maybe some sort of "student edition" of the program. Have you priced a Pro E solution? it's ridiculous! The thing i find insane about the whole deal is that the heavy anti-piracy measures taken are extremely frustrating to get past--however not impossible, but there is no real logical need for them in the first place. I mean, sure the per-license cost is extremely high, but the price of the software is a drop in the bucket for most shops when compared to the price of just a single machine. My school just purchased a rapid prototype machine (which is really freaking cool, btw) that cost $30k, not including the ABS material needed to use the damn thing. Basically, my point is this: no one is pirating AutoDesk software to use in a production environment. A quick torrent search shows that there are, in fact, many people pirating the software. So the question now is whom? The short answer is: students. When i graduate i plan on working as a draftsman for a while before opening up my own shop, at which point i will purchase a fully-licensed Pro E solution. How many hundreds of dollars more will i be paying for this software to offset the cost of AutoDesk paying software engineers to keep students from using it for doing homework? I'll end this little tirade with a question: if the main purpose of a software suite is to engineer and manufacture parts in a professional environment, is there any real value taken away from the makers of the software if said software is pirated and used for anything other than a production environment? Are teenagers without access to a plotter, let alone a CNC machine really eating away at profits?

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[Anonymous Coward]

You're right, but a more common example is letting the GPU hardware tesselate a curved surface or something. Your forest example sounds more like instancing.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[danbert8]

I suppose I could have, but it did work with my Ubuntu installation, so I ended up keeping it. It would have been better to have support with both operating systems though. (And people complain about the hardware compatibility in Linux, I have trouble getting things to work in Windows)

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[twistedsymphony]

I think his point was that OpenGL platforms are technically capable of playing games, it's just a matter of them actually making the games for that platform.

To use your own analogy the Mustang is already 100lbs, air tight and has fusion reactor, they just decide to not use it.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[CelticWhisper]

However, if we're already refusing to buy from them, more DRM means essentially nothing to us. In fact, it may even help in that those companies too short-sighted to see that DRM will not stop copying are just going to piss away more and more of their money on useless copy-crippling, eventually either going bankrupt or learning the hard way to play nice.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[Anonymous Coward]

OpenGL has handled the case where graphics memory use exceeds that available. I often exceed it, even on my 768mb 8800GTX. OpenGL runs fine, swapping textures in and out as needed with no noticeable performance hit. You can even set their 'residence' priority, but I've never needed to.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[rhombic]

It is piracy to hoist the Jolly Roger, run out the long 9's, and shipjack another vessel on the high seas for fun and profit. Downloading songs for which you already own the cassette would only be copyright infringement, and then only if a songs owner could convince a judge & jury to come down on you for doing so, as it hasn't been tested in the courts yet.

So no, I wouldn't say that it's clearly piracy to download a modded version of software for which you have a valid license, particularly if you did so for compatibility purposes only, were only using the exact version of the software for which you're licensed, and could document trying to get the vendor to help out & their failure to make a good-faith effort to fix your problem. Would such a defense hold up in court? Dunno, probably not, but no sane vendor would go after you in such a situation, it's not a guaranteed win for them & would be a PR disaster. Wink wink nudge nudge say no more, right?

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[Spudds]

I've fiddled with both.

In terms of usability and ease of use from a programmer's perspective, the two libraries are practically identical. It is fairly trivial to create an abstraction layer that provides common functionality between the two libraries.

However, from my experiences and (limited) knowledge of both libraries, DirectX does have more features and does develop at a quicker pace than OpenGL. DirectX is owned and developed by one single proprietary entity with greed as incentive for a quick development pace (negative tone unintentional), whereas OpenGL is an open standard with an organization body to oversee it's development, which tends to be slower (read: more calculating and cautious about what they add/keep out of the library).

That being said, OpenGL doesn't aim specifically at games (which is DirectX's primary intention), but aims to be a general Graphics Library. It's used for other things besides games, such as medical software.

The performance of the libraries depends on a huge number of different variables; OS, graphics card/driver, aptitude of the programmers to utilize the specifics of each libraries' strenghts, etc.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[MS-06FZ]

My feeling is that where requiring an upgrade of the operating system is nothing more than if(version="VISTA","Welcome","You're FUcked") then the companies should be charged with false advertising and fined millions. Here's the trick, though...

Saying a piece of software "works" under certain conditions isn't just a statement of technical possibility, it's a statement of confidence in that scenario. As in, how thoroughly was that combination of software tested.

The software companies aren't obligated to broaden their testing platform, or to allow people to run their software on platforms they didn't test for. (Regardless of disclaimers, doing things like that would cost them money, in the form of tech support calls asking how to get it working. The situation sucks from a user standpoint but it's not totally unreasonable...)

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[robbiethefett]

Well, if a small home-based business is running pirated copies of office, what's the worst case scenario? I could see maybe some unpredictable results when it comes to formatting, etc, but i don't think it's really much of a liability. You can probably run a successful graphics design shop on pirated software, but in the case of a fab shop, if they are using a pirated copy of software to control a CNC machine, there could be major ramifications if it produces unexpected results. If something goes wonky with that, you're looking at possible damage to an $80k machine with a $1000 billet of aluminum in it. These numbers are obviously open to debate, since there are different types of computer controlled machines, and different grades of material, etc. The bottom line is that mistakes cost far more than preventative maintenance in this instance. It would cost less to have the appropriate licensing for the software than it would to screw up a set of 4 wheels for a client. Think of it like this: if you print a 10 page report, and notice something needs changed, you can throw out 10 pages of 8-1/2" x 11" paper without thinking twice. But what about a 1:1 schematic of a unibody car chassis? There is also the factor of industrial espionage. If you have to make your employees sign an NDA (necessary for any govt contract) you would be a fool to use pirated software that would, in all likelihood, allow a Russian warez group full access to the data your chief engineer is not allowed to mention to his wife.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[mrchaotica]

If something is supported in a standardized and widely implemented extension, it's supported. [emphasis added]

But that's my point: if it's an extension, you don't know how "widely supported" it is, can't count on it to be there, and therefore can't [easily] code against it.

That'd be like saying that Apache doesn't support PHP because it requires an "extension" to make it work.

Right: Apache doesn't support PHP. An extension to Apache supports PHP. So in the system requirements for some PHP-based web system, it'll have to list "Apache, PHP extension."

Now, that's fine for something like that, because its target audience is server admins. But when you're talking about a game, you can't really say "this game requires OpenGL 2.1, foo_bar_NV, EXT_baz, etc. In fact, even requiring a particular major version is complex enough!

This is DirectX's advantage: if the system supports "DirectX 9," you know that exactly all of the features of Direct3D 9 are supported. If it supports "DirectX 10," you know that all features of Direct3D 10 are supported. You don't have to worry about writing multiple different sets of code to handle people that have NV_* vs. ATI_* vs. SGI_* vs. not having support at all, etc.

The bottom line is that, because of this, using advanced features in OpenGL becomes a pain in the ass compared to doing it in Direct3D. I really wish the OpenGL ARB would get their act together and standardize this stuff more quickly, because (as a Mac and Linux user) it really pisses me off that they've let it fall behind Direct3D.

Re:Nothing new under the sun

[modecx]

The highlights of DX10 aren't the shaders. The same shaders are avasilable in 9L. It's about the rebuilt lighter API, multithreading and graphics memory swap file.

OpenGL doesn't have the latter two AFAIK.

OpenGL apps can certainly be multi-threaded. There's probably a performance hit when you have to switch contexts between different threads. I bet DX10 abstracts this, if anything. I really can't see why this be attractive, outside of having multiple rendering windows spread across multiple monitors (or multiple buffers who's output could be further processed inside or outside the GPU?). This has probably changed substantially since the last time I messed with OpenGL (OGL v. 1.1 on an old SGI)

As far as a memory swap file... Basically, the last time I screwed around with OpenGL , you could prioritize which textures were to remain in memory, which would have priority over others, and other than this, OpenGL handled keeping the required textures in memory. With modern hard drives, I have a hard time believing that a "memory swap file" on a hard disk would be of that much benefit, unless texture sizes were plain gigantic, and the file system was terribly fragmented.

Where's The Justice Department?

[bc90021]

Doesn't falsely indicating that games only run on their new OS violate the terms of their agreement with the DOJ?

Re:Where's The Justice Department?

[Cerberus7]

The games don't run on their new OS, by design. Even if it's something as simple as "check if OSVER=Vista" or what have you, that means the game won't run on anything but Vista. It's not illegal, it's just a load of crap, as those who are working against said crap are proving.

Re:Where's The Justice Department?

[k1e0x]

Doesn't falsely indicating that games only run on their new OS violate the terms of their agreement with the DOJ? I hope so.. but Microsoft DOES now make regulare campaign contrubutions..

Re:Where's The Justice Department?

[ciroknight]

"Don't like it? Don't buy it"

What a wonderful response. I guess you completely missed the fact that about 85-90% of computers that ship have Windows pre-installed; you can't choose NOT to buy it, and you can't get a refund for it without jumping through a million hoops (or in the case of Toshiba laptops, there's a sticker on the outside that says "You will not receive a rebate for Windows, period."

So yeah, when the day comes that computer companies decouple Windows from their machines, I'd personally consider not running to the Justice Department every time they fuck up their software in a way to lock users in or make it more difficult for users to use something else. But on that day we'll also see Hell hit absolute zero, pigs will start designing interstellar spacecraft, etc.

Re:Where's The Justice Department?

[shrubya]

You ignore one small detail: Microsoft is a convicted criminal monopolist. They are not allowed to (among other things) leverage their OS dominance into coercing people or companies to buy other MS products. This example is the other way around (using DX10 games to push Vista sales) but any such behavior on Microsoft's part is questionable under their legal status.

Re:Where's The Justice Department?

[dharbee]

"you can't choose NOT to buy it"

Why can't you choose not to buy the game?

Your point is stupid. (and if you wanted to choose not to buy the OS, there's a company called Apple...)

Re:Where's The Justice Department?

[dannannan]

I was a developer for one of the cracked games in the article. I would really have enjoyed making this game available for XP and not just Vista. Believe me, it would have taken longer to finish because the test matrix would have been so much bigger, but it's so frustrating to finish a game that none of your friends can even play because they don't have the right OS and won't be getting it anytime soon. That's the thing though, at MSFT you have to drink the koolaid.

I have a hard time believing that using these games to leverage Vista was illegal. Stupid and annoying maybe, but not illegal. Believe me, us devs who actually *cared* about the game argued against this sort of product hobbling on a regular basis. Requirements like this get thrown at you constantly. If it was actually illegal we would have played that card for sure.

Re:Where's The Justice Department?

[bdjacobson]

"you can't choose NOT to buy it"

Why can't you choose not to buy the game?

Your point is stupid. (and if you wanted to choose not to buy the OS, there's a company called Apple...) I always laugh when people say "Just boycott them, don't buy it, then when enough people do it they'll have to change and all will be ok." As if that's going to make it any better.

So basically you're giving them a free chance to run the show how they like, see if it works (most likely will), but if it doesn't they'll change, then you'll buy it? Simply not buying isn't enough, you have to remove the incentive to exploit in the first place. "Not buying" is passive; you have to do something that actively makes them stop. Otherwise every single time they can they'll just try it, because they can always change later and get your money if it doesn't work, i.e. they know you'll come running back to them.

Re:Where's The Justice Department?

[suv4x4]

You ignore one small detail: Microsoft is a convicted criminal monopolist.

Honestly this keep popping several times in each article about Microsoft, and each time I see this, I want to twist the neck of a little sweet kitty or shoot a baby seal.

Writing it in bold makes it that much worse.

We know they are "convicted monopolist". We're not ignoring it, we're not "forgetting it", we just realize it doesn't automatically apply to everything Microsoft ever does.

By locking games to Vista they aren't using their OS monopoly to improve their games business. they are just crippling their games in attempt to make us migrate. Stupid and transparent? Sure. Illegal? No.

Re:Where's The Justice Department?

[spottedkangaroo]

Not illegal in the legislated sense, but in the statutory sense.

The were in fact convicted, but it takes a lawyer to prove it, not cops to make an arrest.

Console Emulators

[Joebert]

I can play games from every videogame console I've ever had on a PC through emulation, why wouldn't I be able to play a game that runs on the same hardware ?

Re:Console Emulators

[Aladrin]

I take this to mean that you haven't purchased a console in quite a few years. DreamCast emulation is still spotty at best, and PS2 emulation is crap. Even PS1 emulation still has issues. GBA works great, but DS? Not a chance. Nor PSP.

As for "why wouldn't I be able to play a game that runs on the same hardware", take a look at Wine. At best, playing Windows games in Linux is slower and glitchy. At worst, impossible. They're still making great strides at it, but they aren't there yet.

Re:Console Emulators

[Sparr0]

At best, playing Windows games in Linux is faster(1) and more stable(2).

1) BF1942 and World of Warcraft are two examples. Linux' superior underlying architecture (disk access, memory management, filesystem stuff, etc) more than offsets the few percent performance loss in API call translation. Myself and many others get 5-10% higher framerates and lower load times in a number of Windows games when running them in Linux.

2) I love seeing in my debug log "The game would have crashed here in Windows.", and the game keeps running just fine in wine or cedega.

Plenty of Win95 and Win98 games don't run on anything newer than Win2000. Plenty of WinXP games don't work on Vista. Every week MORE Windows games work in Linux. Continue that trend long enough and Linux is going to have better Windows compatibility than Windows does.

this is trivial

[Kuciwalker]

All you do is remove the OS check in the exe. It's no more difficult than a no-cd. And because of that, it won't be possible for any DX10-only games.

(And as I understand it, you can't just port DX10 to XP - its functionality requires the new display driver model in Vista.)

Re:this is trivial

[H3lm3t]

As I understand it, they're working on that as well:

"As a fitting start to this blog, I'm proud to release a preview of our Alky compatibility libraries for Microsoft DirectX 10 enabled games. These libraries allow the use of DirectX 10 games on platforms other than Windows Vista. No longer will you have to upgrade your OS and video card(s) to play the latest games."

Re:this is trivial

[Compholio]

I meant that it shouldn't be possible to hack MS's DX10 to run on XP, but it's probably possible to write a port from the ground up. OTOH, if there are no XP DX10 drivers, there won't be much point.

Direct3D 10 (the most important part of DirectX 10, XInput being the other significant change) is still built upon much of the technology used in Direct3D 9. So, a port of Direct3D 10 is within the grasp of the Wine project and would not require special drivers since it uses OpenGL for rendering.

WWN Issue #325:

Wine's DirectX implementation contains enough features that we can begin working on DirectX10. Part of the recent rewrite of DirectX moved 3D rendering code into a common library shared by all versions of Direct3D.

DirectX 9 Only

[IndieKid]

The hacks from the article only work because these games still support DirectX 9 and DirectX 9 is available under XP. I'm guessing it will be an entirely different challenge to get DirectX 10 running under XP, which will obviously be required when games no longer support DirectX 9.
Admittedly, it will be a while before we see games that are DirectX10-only, but I doubt Microsoft will be getting too worried yet.

Re:DirectX 9 Only

[Kuciwalker]

As I understand it, DX10 relies on features of the new display driver model in Vista for its performance enhancements, so it's a real technological barrier. Not insurmountable (after all, they're both Turing-complete) but also not just an OS check.

Test case done

[Bullfish]

All they now have to do is wait for some good games to come out for vista and they are all set to run them on XP. Really Halo 2 is a how many years old xbox game? And Shadowrun benefits from being vista-only how?

Good for the hackers. There is no compelling reason to move to vista from an existing set-up, and neither of these games would compel anyone either. Stupid that you have to go to these lengths to run software. Stupid that MS would not catch on to the notion that it takes more than gloss like aero to get people to upgrade.

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[Tridus]

This wasn't Falling Leaf, it was the crack group Razor 1911.

Falling Leaf hasn't released anything.

Why do we put up with this?

[TheWoozle]

I don't think that these cracks are helping...if anything, they are enabling people to go ahead and buy a product that is intentionally broken.

If there was a carmaker that wired a lock on the gas cap that would only open when it read a coded pulse from gas pumps at Exxon stations, the carmaker would go out of business quickly.

Yet, when it comes to software, instead of people refusing to do business with a company like Microsoft they just buy the software anyway if they can get around the restrictions.

Consumers need to grow a pair if they want things to change.

Re:Why do we put up with this?

[Dunbal]

If there was a carmaker that wired a lock on the gas cap that would only open when it read a coded pulse from gas pumps at Exxon stations, the carmaker would go out of business quickly.

      Ahh, but if the biggest car-maker had signed an agreement with the biggest gasoline distributor(s) to do this, they'd end up putting everyone ELSE out of business. Get it?

      I don't agree with it, but it's sort of the whole point of the publishers and Microsoft's DRM (and other little schemes).

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[plague3106]

So I guess software vendors don't have the right to sell their product the way they choose to, huh?

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[ChakatSanddancer]

No, they don't. Software makers have just as much right to say you can only run a program on one platform as cereal makers have a right to say you can only eat their product for breakfast.

Sure to irk Microsoft?

[niceone]

Yeah you irk 'em. Irk 'em good.

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[Anonymous Coward]

Here is a link to their... umm... press release

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[plague3106]

Software, whether you like it or not, is licensed, unlike a ruler. Stop with stupid analogies, and discuss the topic.

If you don't want to respect their license, that's fine, but then you shouldn't expect them to respect the GPL either.

No where did anyone mention patents in this discussion either. Again, argue the topic at hand, and stop setting up stupid, inacurate strawman arguments.

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[Drachemorder]

Maybe they do, but we as consumers also have the right to call them on the carpet for it. And, for that matter, the right to modify the software to overcome those artificial limitations. (This isn't a matter of piracy --- this sort of hack has nothing to do with whether or not the game or the OS is pirated.) Just because someone has the right to do something does not mean it's right to do it. Microsoft is morally wrong here, even if their actions are legal.

Re:What about legal issues?

[HolyCrapSCOsux]

There is always a choice. In this case the choices are simple:
1. Buy vista and play game.
or
2. Don't play game.

If option 2 causes such grief and anxiety that it may become life threatening and therefore is not a choice, then don't buy Vista and let natural selection run it's course.

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[Drachemorder]

If you don't want to respect their license, that's fine, but then you shouldn't expect them to respect the GPL either.

There's an inherent difference here. Microsoft's licenses try to restrict you from doing things you would otherwise have the right to do. The GPL gives you rights to do things that you would not otherwise have. If you don't want to respect the GPL, that's fine, but you'd essentially be a software pirate if you distribute GPL software in violation of its terms. On the flip side, if you violate some of Microsoft's license terms, you might not have done anything illegal at all (running Vista in a VM, for instance). So I really do see a huge difference between the two licensing models, and therefore a difference between the nature of respect for them.

Re:What about Linux?

[IndieKid]

I'm fairly sure ID software are continuing to support games on other platforms (via OpenGL).

EA even recently stated they would be releasing a bunch of games for the Mac (http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/06/11 /1856212&from=rss), so the 'Games for Windows' strategy is hardly producing the monopoly I'm sure Microsoft are hoping for (although in the Windows domain it may help drive Vista adoption at some point for the above reasons).

It's a question of intent.

[A_Non_Moose]

or possibly lack thereof.

IIRC, NT4 maxed out at DX3 and "could not go any higher" according to the wisdom at the time, but it
was possible to graft DX5 onto it and it worked quite well as I recall.

Look at games such as "Slave Zero" (picture Carmageddon, only giant robot instead of a car) that were
so tied to Win98's directX calls that it usually did not function under other WinOS's.
Some enterprising hacker replaced the 98 DX calls with more generic functions and it worked great.

Vista exclusive games (DX10 Only) will be out sooner or later, and I'm sure that eventually it will overcome
the 5+ year's momentum that XP has, but I think it'll be very slow going.

The intent of game makers is to sell games, and locking out 90% of thier target markets is suicide.
(DX8/9 compatability at the very least will be around for a while, I'd think.)

Same with Microsoft, its intent is to sell Vista anyway it can, but unlike games you want/don't have, you
are likely running a WinOS of some stripe (gaming requirement, almost). The lack of want/need of a new
os, lack of games that won't run on XP (yet), resistance to change and XP "just working" (for the most part)
and/or just the way you like it setup makes for some heavy resistance.

The realy trick/story will be DX10 working under XP, or, DX10 game that have been changed like Slave Zero
to work under DX9 with few, if any problems.

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[ChakatSanddancer]

Virtually no other product on the planet is licensed. My books aren't licensed, my CDs aren't licensed, my shoes sure as hell aren't licensed. There are high costs to create CDs, and there's no license for those. Case law, such as Novell v. Network Trade Center, already suggests that such licensing for software is most likely unconstitutional anyways. The myth that software is somehow special is full of legal holes. Again, why should software be any different?

Almost a good arguement

[DRAGONWEEZEL]

Except that you can't read the EULA until after you buy the said software. You should not be expected to read EVERY EUALA for EVERY piece of software you might use. What is fair on the consumer end? NOTHING. Thats why you have to negotiate, and work the system to get what you want.

There is a course of action that sometimes does work though. Shareware, Trials, and Expiring Full Versions. I agree that software is difficult to produce, and thus costs $ to create requiring protection. It's just unfortunate that the current system does not allow for either protection, or consumer rights.

Remember kids, Corporations are in it for the stock holders, the stock holders are in it for the money, the money is in it because we Print and use it for legal tender for all debts public and private.

Just Goes to Show

[Nom du Keyboard]

All this just goes to show that there really is nothing special about Vista, and the only reason to upgrade to it are artificial barriers created to try and force you that way. Your software is fully capable of running just fine on XP into the foreseeable future, but Microsoft wants your money, and Hollywood wants you forced into the worst DRM infested system yet foisted on us.

Why not OpenGL?

[CarpetShark]

Why exactly did Direct3D take off, anyway? Other "standards" of MS's have failed. OpenGL was already a success, in the high-end world. Was it just too high-end 3D for the low-end-3D game devs back when D3D started out? Maybe they've gradually grown up with D3D now, and are more comfortable with it?

D3D used to have a more high-level layer than OpenGL, I think (right?), but no one used it because it was slow. Was that at least a factor in drawing people in, even if they had to move to more low-level stuff to get performance?

Or is it did hardware manufacturers go with D3D for some reason, and everyone else had to follow? It did seem like Quake was the only thing forcing gaming gfx card manufacturers to implement OpenGL for a while there. That might even be more the case now (I'm not sure; haven't used windows in a LONG time).

Is there something about OpenGL implementation that's harder? Does it make it easier to identify cards with crappy performance, or something?

Re:Why not OpenGL?

[PitaBred]

Direct3D focused on games, while OpenGL stayed in the "high-end" world like you said, catering to CAD systems and big-time rendering when gaming was in it's rapid growth stages. Not to mention I'd bet that MS paid a lot of developers to use their API. DirectX also contains a very good interface to, well, interfaces, which may have persuaded some shops to go with DX over OpenGL, which is only a graphics API.

Re:Why not OpenGL?

[GreggBz]

There are pros and cons to both. DirectX is not a bad API, in fact, it's rather good.

I think the integration of DirectDraw, DirectSound, the input, etc.. helped. All in one is good when developing games. It allows you to focus on the game, not any technology or compatibility hurdles. Also, it's now much easier to develop in. Very easy actually. Say what you will about Microsoft, but their development tools, particularly those associated with DirectX have been very good.

Also, while Direct3d and OpenGL accomplish the same things, they are very different. OpenGL is a state machine, with a standard API. Direct3D directly bangs the hardware with a minimal driver, maintained by the manufacturer. You could argue that it's faster, in practice, sometimes it is and sometimes it is not.

OpenGL is more abstract, and has a set of functions that can be used through it's API, and it is then up to the hardware manufacturer to create a layer of communication (the driver) between the hardware and the OpenGL state machine. OpenGL drivers are more portable, but harder to make efficient. I think this is overall a little more robust. Functionality wise, they are both very close. I consider this almost irrelevant, because there are so many features in both, that game programmers have a hard time keeping up, and particularly are weary of using the bleeding edge. I've learned to program in DirectX and only a little in OpenGL. I can't say I have a clear favorite though.

Re:Why not OpenGL?

[Targon]

There is a large difference between supporting an API and having it accelerated by the hardware. This is a big reason why Intel GPUs have been shown to be so bad when it comes to games. Without hardware acceleration, the drivers need to do more to allow the API to talk to the video card(s). At this point, I am not sure how much acceleration there is for OpenGL on the video cards produced by AMD/ATI and NVIDIA.

This issue is why there is a lot of confusion on the part of many people out there. They install DirectX 9 for example, but their video card only handles DirectX 8 in hardware. They don't understand that to get decent performance, you need the video card to be able to handle DirectX 9 in hardware to get the performance and in many cases the features that games have to offer today.

As for why companies went with DirectX, from what I have read, when DirectX first came out, Windows itself was a HORRIBLE platform for games. At that point, you had the option to write DOS apps(and support the video cards yourself, needing different drivers for each one), or you could go for a native Windows application, where DirectX was a HUGE improvement in many ways. As time went on, and Windows native applications became more and more appropriate, programming for Windows performance was more important.

Once a company was working with DirectX, future projects went DirectX as well, just because the API was known. Even when OpenGL started to catch on, for a Windows-only application, why go OpenGL at that point? Linux wasn't really on the radar, and MacOS had more issues than just the graphics API as a reason not to be concerned with the Mac environment.

As a side effect of this, ATI had never come up with a great OpenGL driver for their cards, and there was never much pressure to do so for most of the user base(CAD and a handful of other applications the only exception). So, if your ATI users will encounter lower performance, and there is no serious benefit to making your application multi-platform, then why NOT go DirectX?

To make an application that is multi-platform, aside from the graphics angle, the company needs to consider the following question: Will the number of sales from each additional platform compensate for the additional development costs for that platform?

Linux users, due to the free nature of the operating system, tend to look for other free applications. Paying money for an application would be seen as unusual, and is even frowned on by those who are into the whole "Open Source" movement. This implies that even if there were 10,000,000 Linux users out there(not installed machines worth), there might be only 10,000 of them who might BUY a game. Not everyone enjoys the same types of games, so you now have the problem of how many copies will be sold. This is why the emulators you see for Linux and MacOS have gained the popularity they have, because unless your application is a high end/expensive application, there is very little to be gained from making a multi-platform application. $60/copy just won't cover the cost of development of new ports.

Re:Why not OpenGL?

[powerlord]

OpenGL was actually in the lead, and then got hamstrung by MicroSoft.

MS, SGi, and HP designed a standard called Fahrenheit for a new low level API that OpenGL and DirectX would plug into, where they would both write to a "Low Level API". And then applications would just right to whatever they wanted, making the OpenGL/DirectX war a moot point.

MS screwed SGI (surprise), and released DX7, were drastically late on releasing the low level API, finely released it as an "unsupported component" and never released an update.

Re:Why not OpenGL?

[jellomizer]

It was during the 90's where people didn't care about CrAzY things like software source portability, strong security, stability. They wanted the best performance no matter what. Hense Direct X. Which is an API that Bypasses most of Windows offering highest performance with minimun overhead. No honest and moral developer would try to make an API that bypasses so much of the OS, because of Risk of breaking things badly, as well problems of moving from one version of the OS to the Next. Microsoft could get away with it because they knew what will break and when because they had the source for Windows. So they didn't need to follow the same rules. Just like integrating the web browser into the OS. Everyone though it would be great because the browser would have a lower level access to the equiptment, not thinking (I did say it was a bad idea at the time by the way) that if there was any security hole the attacker would have full control of the system. Performance is not the end goal of a good application the end goal is good performance, stability, security, and does what it needs to do.

Re:Why not OpenGL?

[Hal_Porter]

Incidentally I found a remarkably candid article about DirectX

http://www.shacknews.com/extras/2007/032907_alexst john1_2.x
Alex St John I actually attribute my reasons for being successful there to listening carefully to the game developers. My strategy was very simple--I go to them and ask, "What kind of crack would you get addicted to?" They'd tell me, and I'd go back to Microsoft and say, "If we make this crack, those developers will buy it." Very simple. Direct X was essentially the crack they asked me to make. That's the way you hook somebody--ask them what they'll pay money for, then go make it.

Fair enough.

What's remarkable is the other quotes :

Alex St John: You'll never hear this from anybody else because they probably don't know. The original codename for Direct X was "the Manhattan Project," because strategically it was an effort to displace Japanese game consoles with PCs and ultimately the Xbox. We called it "The Manhattan Project" because that was the codename for the program developing the nuclear bomb. We had a glowing radiation logo for the prototype for Direct X, and of course as soon as that got out and the press covered it, it caused a scandal. Microsoft PR said, "You have got to change that. You cannot be using a radiation symbol and calling this thing 'The Manhattan Project'." So we renamed it Direct X but we said, "Everybody loves the radiation symbol, so what we'll do is add legs to it to make it an 'X'." There are probably 3 people in the entire world that know how that came about. Microsoft was very funny when the Xbox launch, they said, "Oh, well, some artist made the green thing, and we thought it was cool," and I just said, "Oh stop, that was the color scheme for the Direct X logo from the very beginning."

Clearly not a man afraid of saying the wrong thing in an interview.

Here's what he said about Vista for gaming.

Alex St John I don't think Microsoft did anything to help the PC as a gaming platform with Vista, and that's a tremendous frustration because I take it very personally. If I would've been there, I would have made much more aggressive efforts to make sure Vista stayed out of the way of games. What you see with Microsoft is, without people at Microsoft who realize that the operating system does not add value to gaming, it gets in the way, they think they can add more value by adding in more shit that only gets in the way of making a good game. Unfortunately, Vista does that. Microsoft added more shit that impedes game development. It's certainly possible to make great games in Vista, it's just more of a pain in the ass than it needs to be. I think Vista is a missed opportunity for Microsoft to have done a better job in supporting PC gaming.

Ouch. And about Microsoft's culture

Alex St John I came in to do my presentation, and I got about three slides into it before I was interrupted by one of the executives saying, "This is all great stuff, you have a perfect plan. Developers who are reasonable should all support it, but what do you do if none of this works." "What do you mean?" "What if in spite of your best efforts, your best arguments, you best relationships, you can't get them to support them. How do you force the industry to support Microsoft anyway?" "Force them? Well, I don't know." "Come back when you have a plan that answers that question."

That perplexed me for a long time. I'm thinking, "What the hell does he mean, force them? I can't hold a gun to their head, so how do I put all these companies in a position where, regardless of what they see is in their best interest, they have to adopt your technology?" That experience had a major impact on my thinking. I realized that a major part of my job was to figure out how to use technology control to create economic force, or leverage, such that money and business flowed in Microsoft's direction, and people had to go [to them]. That, ultimately, is when I became a "Microsoft guy," when I got that concept.

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[plague3106]

Copyright largely governs what you can and cannot do with software; clickwrap extensions trying to enforce post-sale contractual obligations are much less certain.

They seem pretty certain to me, being as no one has ever challenged one. You'd think by now some company would take it all the way, get the legality of them thrown out and now be able to use as many copies of the software they choose.

Nevermind that the box does state that there are terms inside to which you must agree to use the product, and you can return the item for a refund. In other words, you know there's a license when you buy it, and you are given an oppurtunity to review the licnese before you use the software. Pretty clear cut to me.

The GPL doesnt extend beyond copyright law, the GPL grants rights the user does not _have_ under copyright law. It's a copyright license, falling back on copyright law. Without the GPL the distributor has no rights to distribute at all.

Being subject to copyright does not exclude the licensing of software. The GPL does go beyond copyright through, because even a substansial rewrite or addition of functionality to code ends up being covered by the license. I could modify GPL code substantally (enough that copyright would protect my work) and yet still be under the licnese of the GPL.

Software clickwrap licenses restrict the user beyond what copyright law does, and try to take away rights the user normally has. Such licenses fall back on contract law, and are in their nature vastly different in their enforcability (the contract has to be found valid at all, the clauses have to be deemed acceptable, etc), and if it isnt found enforcable then the user has all the rights copyright grants them (ie, to use the product any way they deem fit).

Yes, because its valid to license software. Again, if its so shakely legally, why has not a single company attempted to invalidate them? Whether or not something is copyrightable has nothing to do with whether it can also be licensed or not, and we're not talking about copyright, we're talking about licenes (which the GPL is).

Re:Vista is dying

[Control-Z]

Doesn't matter if Vista is "dying" or not, try to go buy a new computer without Vista. Vista will gradually be adopted as people upgrade their spyware and virus infested machines.

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[75th Trombone]

My books aren't licensed,

The text in them is, via copyright law.

my CDs aren't licensed,

The music on them is, via copyright law.

my shoes sure as hell aren't licensed.

The design of them is, via copyright law.

And the physical media you buy software on isn't licensed, but the software itself is, via copyright law.

You do not have the right to other people's creations on your own terms.

.Huh?

[Vexorian]

So I guess what's "news" is that apparently some people were not expecting it to happen?

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[PitaBred]

Repeat after me: The GPL is not a usage license, it's a redistribution license. Completely different balls of wax. Anyway, why would a company with the legal coffers to invalidate an EULA actually go to invalidate an EULA that it doesn't read or pay attention to? No one tries to enforce it except against small-time users, so there's no reason to invalidate one. EULA's being "solid" benefits all the big players to be able to make a one-sided contract, and the little players don't have enough clout to fight it, so it's in their best interests to not challenge clickwrap usage licenses.

I could modify GPL code substantally (enough that copyright would protect my work) and yet still be under the licnese of the GPL.

You could modify the code as much as you wanted, and you could use it for whatever you wanted, but you just couldn't redistribute it unless you agreed to the GPL. The GPL only covers copies of the software you distribute, not how you modify it or use is personally.

Re:Bah

[Laur]

What this means is that it will always be slower than DX10 on Vista...Another problem is the increased overhead, so you'll need to spend much more on hardware to get a similar experience that a slower system gets in Vista.

You make this assertion with absolutely no proof to back it up. If you haven't noticed, generally speaking Vista is noticeably slower than XP at doing the same tasks (surely you've heard of the differences in their hardware requirements?). Therefore, it is by no means certain that XP + some performance overhead will be slower than Vista with it's already increased performance overhead.

and that it will be dependent on the quality of OpenGL drivers on WinXP.

These are provided by the card manufacturers, and from what I know are excellent.

Then there's the question if OpenGL even has anything comparable to geometry shaders yet

They do.

Even if you wanted to solve this by throwing more powerful hardware in your rig, it would only be possible for a year or so, as NVIDIA/AMD will not be interested in providing driver support for XP in future GPUs.

XP has been around for six years, and has a massive installed base. Furthermore, the shift to Vista is not happening at all quickly. XP support will be around for a good long while. From what I've heard, Vista is the one with driver issues.

Re:How about XP only games on 2000?

[elFarto the 2nd]

For Supreme Commander you can use my handy-dandy patch.

Regards
elFarto

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[General Wesc]

IANAL, but the law is not morality. A promise is a promise, whether it's a legally enforced contract or a legally ignored license. When you agree to a license, you're making a promise. If it's a sucky promise you don't want to make, don't make it.

Re:No Online Play

[Reapman]

You mean the 7 year old system that until less then a year ago was their newest version of this product line? The one ours and some other straggling companies are just now switching to (literaly)? Obviously this is a gaming related thing but just saying that they should'nt be suprised that even home users still haven't all made the switch yet. Really, if you have a 1 year old computer that runs great, and you want to play one of these games, your adding $100+ to the cost for really no good reason other then to drive their bottom line. Not illegal, but sure as hell not nice.

If we were talking Windows 2000 or 98 I would see your point, but we ain't, so I don't.

Age of Empires III's false XP requirement

[lymeca]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned the extremely relevant precedent set by Age of Empires III. Although I exclusively run GNU/Linux now, at the time of Age of Empires III's release in November of 2005 I was running Windows 2000 Pro with no intention of ever using Windows XP. This isn't the time or place to discuss why I refused to use XP, but suffice to say that my experience getting AoE III to work foreshadowed what was to come in any Microsoft published game.

Being a fan of the earlier Age of Empires games, I acquired a copy of the newly released AoE III which turned out to list Windows XP as the only supported operating system. To my extreme (albeit momentary) dismay, running the setup.exe on the first game disc produced an error requiring an upgrade to Windows XP before installing the game. I simply refused to believe it, seeing as how 2000 and XP are extremely similar operating systems and that there's no technical reason this game would require one and not work on the other.

Five minutes of Googling later, I ran the setup.exe from the command prompt, passing the "/n" command line switch to the executable. This switch runs the game setup in network install mode: the setup program believes it is installing the game over a network, so it doesn't check the operating system version! Needless to say I just pointed the installer to a local directory and it installed without a hitch.

Even better is that the main game executable didn't require any patching. Directly after installation, the game ran perfectly under Windows 2000! Only the setup.exe on the game disc had the farse "XP-only" restriction, and a simple trick, built-in to the executable no less, proved that the operating system requirement was merely a shallow marketing decision by Microsoft to force people on to Windows XP.

This anecdote might be interesting for those who haven't played AoE III (or haven't tried getting it to run on another OS besides XP). It has taught me to never trust a game published by Microsoft, and because of my experience, as soon as I heard that Halo 2 PC was going to be Vista-only many months ago I instantly knew that it would be a superficial hack akin to the OS check on the AoE III setup.exe.


Of course there are going to be people who relish in being able to break this superficial and shallow marketing decision, but I'd like to send a big THANK YOU out to those who actually put the time and effort into doing so.

DirectX 9 uniformity?

[DragonHawk]

That is is DirectX's advantage: if the system supports "DirectX 9," you know that exactly all of the features of Direct3D 9 are supported.

Hmmm, one of the features I saw touted for DirectX 10 was that it is a single, uniform, all-or-nothing platform. Microsoft's ad copy said that DirectX 9 has something called "capability bits", or "cap bits". Games were supposed to check the cap bits to find out what DX9 features a system supported. That would seem to indicate that DX9 wasn't a uniform platform, no? And so while that might mean DX10 has an advantage, it would seem to make that argument invalid about past DirectX releases, yes?

Re:Way to go Falling Leaf...

[Quantam]

That is a beautiful piece of logic you have there. If you violate the terms of MS' license, you're okay, because they were artificial and arbitrary restrictions, anyway. If you violate the GPL's equally artificial and arbitrary limitations, you're a pirate and a lawbreaker, because you've violated the terms of the license. See how absurd it is?

Now, I'm a programmer. I've recently been working on releasing a couple of my programs as open source, so I've had to take a good look at the various licenses, and see which one is closest to my ideals. Just about anything but the BSD license (and arguably even that, though that would almost be splitting hairs) is indistinguishable from DRM, save for one exception: most open-source licenses attempt to achieve maximal collective benefit (rights), while DRM seeks nothing more than to maximize the benefit (profit) of the creators. That is, DRM and source licenses both prevent you from doing things with the code/media that you would otherwise be able to do; if you think differently, you surely have given up the term "DRM" in favor of "consumer enablement" (which it actually looks like you have, from your post).

The CDDL, the license closest to my ideals, is based on a single restriction: that if you modify the open code, you have to keep the CDDL for your changes, keeping the work open; so long as this rule is followed, you can use the code in any way, in any project. This is an arbitrary restriction on the ability of other people to use my code. However, I justify this restriction with the reasoning that I want as many people as possible to be able to make use of my code (and thus any advances to it). I'm sacrificing the ability of individuals to use my code in an unrestricted manner for the calculated benefit of the whole programming community.

While the GPL does this as well, it does something else that I consider uselessly arbitrary (that is, it limits the freedom of users without contributing significantly to the common good) and, for that reason, particularly obnoxious. Anyone who's read the GPL knows what I'm referring to: the requirement that any project which so much as uses GPL code must itself be GPL in its entirety. This is a political rather than practical requirement: the GPL serves to promote free software, and will restrict the freedom of users to attempt to increase the amount of free code available in total. I'd imagine the reasoning is that if all software were free and open, the world would be a better place; but I can't really agree with the sentiment or the means used to achieve it. The LGPL is better, but not as close as CDDL to my ideals (if you want more info on the topic, I wrote a several-page justification of my choice of license on my blog).