EMA Suggests Point-Of-Sale Game Activation To Fight Piracy

Gamasutra reports on a set of standards (PDF) published by the Entertainment Merchants Association to promote the use of technology that would "disable" games and DVDs until they are activated when purchased. "The effort is codenamed 'Project Lazarus,' and the EMA says it's assembled a consortium of retailers, home video companies and video game publishers to see how easily such 'benefit denial technology' could be implemented, and to evaluate possible cost-benefit analyses. The initiative is similar to security tags used in clothing retail that spill ink on garments if they're forcibly removed, thereby destroying the item. In such a situation, shoplifting is discouraged by implementing a solution that only the retailer can remove at the point of sale."

Comments

NO DRM! Can you hear us now?

[mrbcs]

These guys just don't get it do they?
Make the games good, remove the damned drm and make them affordable. How is that difficult to understand?

I will buy games after a half year or so, so that there is a good no-cd crack and the price is about half. I can't afford $60+ on a game. $20, ya no problem. I'll wait for the price drop, but drm, shit that's a deal breaker, I won't even bother with a hacked version.

Re:NO DRM! Can you hear us now?

[Corpuscavernosa]

Call me lame and perhaps not a true enthusiast to the cause, but the DRM I've encountered hasn't really bothered me. I only have one gaming rig and I have a reliable internet connection (although Steam pissed me off once when my service was down). I understand and am against DRM in principle, but I'm just saying that in my day to day gaming, DRM hasn't really affected me. Your average gamer probably hasn't encountered a huge amount of problems which is why it has continued. Also, maybe I haven't played some of the games people complain about most.

Now I do agree with your other point emphatically. STOP MAKING SHITTY GAMES for $50-60. I'll happily pay for a good game but quit fucking us with the quality.

Re:NO DRM! Can you hear us now?

[Lord Kano]

Call me lame and perhaps not a true enthusiast to the cause, but the DRM I've encountered hasn't really bothered me.

You've apparently not played any game that used StarForce.

LK

Re:NO DRM! Can you hear us now?

[pushing-robot]

To be fair, activation-requiring games haven't been around very long. You might have a different opinion in a few years when EA decides old games are past their "support date" and turns off the activation servers, or you've upgraded your PC a few times and run out of re-activations.

Many game publishers regularly shut down all online support for their games a few years after release. Services like Direct2Drive and the Microsoft Store limit your activations or remove downloads after a certain period of time. Steam is the exception in this case, as they explicitly state that they will never remove or disable your games, but many publishers insist on adding their own activation scheme on top of Steam's DRM.

Claiming that DRM hasn't bothered you reminds me of the optimist falling from the skyscraper: Every few floors he tells himself "I'm feeling fine, so far!"

Re:NO DRM! Can you hear us now?

[PC and Sony Fanboy]

activation has been around, just in different forms. think starcraft. Yeah, you could play the campaign, but to get on battle net, you needed a CD key.

Everyone I know that got a burned copy of starcraft (and used the 00110011 code) eventually bought it. Why? It was worth the price to get on battle.net

Re:NO DRM! Can you hear us now?

[Kreigaffe]

I hope you know you can run steam in offline mode, and still have full access to all your single-player content. In fact, when I recently had an interruption in service while I switched providers, all I really played was single-player games I had previously purchased via Steam.

People on slashdot CONSTANTLY complain about that, and I can't help but facepalm. Has it really gotten to the point where the vnboards are better able to understand the programs they use every day than slashdot? FACEPALM

Re:NO DRM! Can you hear us now?

[Khyber]

Or odds were that the person didn't have a specialized and very-custom computer.

Try having more than one optical drive in your system, virtual or physical. Watch whichever's the secondary end up disabled or having the firmware totally bricked (Which starforce did)

Re:NO DRM! Can you hear us now?

[SanityInAnarchy]

In short, Steam provides a DRM scheme, but it also provides enough of a benefit that it's a worthwhile trade. In fact, many of the restrictions imposed by the DRM scheme are things you would have to sacrifice anyway for the network -- for example, the need to be online all the time, the need for constant updates, and the need to run their proprietary software (a given for any game).

Contrast this to SecuROM games, or even moreso, movies -- in these cases, the DRM scheme provides no value. There is no tradeoff to make me want to deal with the DRM -- and worse, the pirated copy is a better product.

That's the essential difference, I think. A pirated Valve game is worth less than a legitimate copy. A pirated EA game is worth more than a legitimate copy.

Re:NO DRM! Can you hear us now?

[sanosuke001]

No, this is to stop people from reselling because the game companies get no $$$ from second-hand sales.

This has nothing to do with shoplifting. That's why there's those security strips in the packaging.

Re:NO DRM! Can you hear us now?

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, what this does is make it so until the DVDs are scanned through a special scanner, they won't work. Once scanned, you can easily resell. It is a purely anti shoplifting and anti-theft ont he way to store. The anti piracy side comes fromt he fact that it can't be swiped and cracked pre-release date, as it won't be activated.

It has nothing to do with installing. The only bad thing for us is if it doesn't scan properly we have to go back to the shop.

Re:NO DRM! Can you hear us now?

[harl]

What happens when you wake up one day and ask permission to use the product you purchased and no response comes back? Why do you feel it's ok to ask permission to use things you bought? Would you be ok with calling Ford/Honda to ask permission to drive to work? How is that acceptable DRM?

MMO/Online Key Use

[binarylarry]

This sounds like a solution for people who steal keys out of retail boxes.

If the key isn't activated due to a sale, it can't be used online.

I see no problems with this. I hope they don't think it will actually affect single player game piracy.

So once again the legit customer is screwed over

[afidel]

So basically the pirates will have a version that has nothing to trip people up but the legit customer who happens to not get activated by the minimum wage clerk is screwed and must wait AND waste gas to take it back? Yeah, please video game industry, make it easier and easier to justify piracy. I have plenty of money and like to support the people who make games I enjoy but it's really easier to just pirate this stuff since the game industry is more and more anti-consumer all the time.

Bad analogy

[subreality]

The initiative is similar to security tags used in clothing retail that spill ink on garments if they're forcibly removed, thereby destroying the item. In such a situation, shoplifting is discouraged by implementing a solution that only the retailer can remove at the point of sale.

But it's not similar at all. Similar would be putting an acetone-filled tag through the hole in the CD that only the retailer can remove, to destroy it if it's shoplifted.

The reason the difference is important is this scheme isn't to fight shoplifting, the theft of a physical item. This is to fight copyright infringement, and it's like fighting people who make cheap knockoffs of designer clothes. Admittedly, this is much easier to do on a large scale than copying a physical item, but the scale of it does not magically make it become theft.

And the other part of where the analogy breaks down? I don't need an internet connection to put on my clothes after the retailer takes off the tag.

A solution in search of a problem...

[mlts]

I know a number of retailers stop this problem by using locking DVD cases that set off the door alarms. Usually the ones that have another alarm if someone stomps the case open. Shopperinc.com, the first site I hit on Google offers plenty of low cost ways to ensure that either a would-be shoplifter is going to have to be good at sneaking in the key equipment needed, or be able to run through the exit with security guards hot on their trail (and risk robbery charges as well as larceny).

Since effective technological measures are in place for this, why bother with screwing around with CD keys?

It is a *lot* harder to shoplift successfully media in one of these cases than it is to hit the usual sites, download a patch or a torrent. This is the old security adage of why add layers of protection to a door when the burglar can just enter through the window?

Re:So once again the legit customer is screwed ove

[Nazlfrag]

How is it aimed at all at piracy? Pirates don't use activation keys, they use cracks. It's a shoplifting measure at most, and retailers already keep games and keys behind the counter with empty boxes on the shelves. It's a solution to a non-existent problem that will just cause more hassle for the legitimate consumer and be bypassed as usual by pirates.

Re:awesome idea

[hedwards]

It's pointless, pirate buys one copy breaks the protection than uploads that to the web. Congrats EA, you've managed one additional sale at the expense of many dozens of sales to people who now are unable to run the software.

I foresee a day when

[Travoltus]

All games have to be played online. There won't be single player games anymore, there'll just be web based games or virtual worlds you can play single player-style or massively multiplayer style, but in either case the data for the game world will only be on the server.

Then there'll be web based word processors where you can only store your data online, and you have to pay for it. No method to download it to your hard drive, but you can email it to people and they have to pay to use the app you need to read the document. If you need to move your data around in other ways, you probably are a pirate (in their mind).

The RIAA and MPAA then pull all their content and make it available only online. For a fee. You'll never touch that data again without the authorization of the server. (I actually see this coming first.)

In short, I could see companies making sure all of their copyrighted data is only available on their servers.

Re:Like all DRM, I give it about 2 weeks...

[cliffski]

*HEAVY SIGH*

This is NOT DRM The story is NOT ABOUT DRM. DRM is not the issue.
This is about preventing shoplifting.

Is it not possible for there to be ANY story ANYWHERE on-line about games, without people gushing about how they hate DRM, even when the story is NOTHING to do with it?

Shoplifting is a solved problem.

[argent]

This is about preventing shoplifting.

You prevent shoplifting by putting the games behind the counter and putting the empty boxes on the shelf. It's low tech, reliable, and not a lot more manual than activation.

Provide the dealer with a printed card the size of the jewelbox they can put on the shelf without having to open the game and put the CD into storage like they do now. Problem solved, cheaply.

I hereby donate this idea to the public domain.

Re:In Soviet Russia...

[drachenstern]

Post whoring on the back of a frist psot...

So what they're suggesting is that the game dev put something on your computer which will render the game unplayable until you activate it with the game dev? At which point some bits will be flipped on your computer, making the game playable?

How will this not be cracked in like three days?

Who's got the checklist? We need to mail one off pronto to the head of the EMA and tell him that this simply will not work any better than current DRM...

Perhaps they should rename this

[Moryath]

Perhaps they should rename it "Project Assfuck" - after all, that's what it's doing to the consumer.

The initiative is similar to security tags used in clothing retail that spill ink on garments if they're forcibly removed, thereby destroying the item.

Uhm... those tags come off if you get a rare earth magnet (say, from an old hard drive or something) anywhere near them.

Not that we're supposed to know how things work... after all, knowledge is evil, the almighty corporations want us to be dumb and stupid and drink Brawndo.

Seriously, now. This will not only be cracked damn quick, but it'll fail the first time someone has a non-'net-connected home box (dvd player, console, etc) and they'll get up in arms about it. Plus, it's already been tried once, remember Circuit City and Divx?

Re:If you're a game maker

[Aladrin]

"paying heavily for your does of nostalgia."

That's exactly it. I -do- mind. I bought a copy a long time ago and lost it in a move. If I had backups, they would have been kept separately and I would still have it.

"your kids learning"

Kids will be kids. They aren't born trained. If you never trust them with anything, they'll never learn to take care of it. That doesn't mean I should have to buy a new copy of the game to teach -them- that lesson, though. It's -my- game, not theirs.

Kids aren't the only way discs get destroyed. Animals, accidents, fire, flood... There are inumerable ways to destroy that disc and most aren't covered on your home owner's insurance... If you have any.

Whether you like it or not, backups are legitimate.