Ubisoft Has Windows-Style Hardware-Based DRM For Games

New submitter Man Eating Duck writes "Guru3D describes how the activation system in Ubisoft's RTS game Anno 2070 also tracks hardware changes: 'So yesterday I started working on a performance review. We know (well, at least we figured we knew), that the game key can be used on three systems. That's fair; the first activation is used on my personal game rig. The second we installed on the AMD Radeon graphics test PC and the 3rd on our NVIDIA graphics test PC. ... For the NVIDIA setup I take out the GTX 580, and insert a GTX 590. When I now startup the game, 'BAM', again an activation is required. Once again I fill out the key, and now Ubisoft is thanking me with the message that I ran out of activations.' Guru3D subsequently discovered that Ubisoft was less than helpful: 'Sorry to disappoint you — the game is indeed restricted to 3 hardware changes and there simply is no way to bypass that.' I, and many with me, will never buy games with such a draconian DRM scheme, as it's very likely that I'll swap out enough components to run into this issue. Even the Steam version includes this nice 'feature.' It's probably a good idea to let Ubisoft know why we'll pass on this title."

Comments

Three hardware changes?

[PCM2]

People bitch about Windows activation, but on the few occasions I've experienced where Windows needed to be re-activated because of a hardware change, the process was completely painless. As in, "I'm helping out my mom on Christmas Eve and dinner is going to be served in a half hour" painless.

The first couple of times I called, I spoke to an Indian man who asked me a few questions and gave me a code. More recently, it was a fully automated system. I don't think the process has ever taken as much as five minutes from beginning to end. It seems to me the for individual users, Windows Activation is more of a way to scold you than anything else: "You do know you're only allowed to use this copy of Windows on one computer... right?"

Now, if Ubisoft is really claiming that you get three activations and after that your software is useless, well, that seems like something else entirely.

Of course they do

[Brain-Fu]

Many pirates pirate because of DRM. Some also pirate out of an interest in trying the game before buying it, some because they feel entitled to their license even though the CD got scratched, some because they have no disposable income of their own (or no room in their budget for it), and some out of sheer sloth/greed.

But to say that DRM doesn't create pirates is to completely fail to grasp some of the most basic principles that drive human behavior.

Re:And they wonder why people pirate

[RMingin]

Quote: "I've never tried to crack a game on Steam, because once it's installed and has had it's activation, I've never been annoyed by any Steam game. "

Be careful. Being on Steam only guarantees it has the light layer of Steam DRM, it DOES NOT prevent the publisher from requiring other, more obnoxious forms of DRM as well. I bought that Pitch Black game on Steam (super sale, looked entertaining), but have never been able to play it because it packs in a non-64bit compatible version of SecuROM as well.

Re:And they wonder why people pirate

[NeutronCowboy]

I fully understand the used game market hurts the developers;

WRONG WRONG WRONG. I'm sorry, but you've been bamboozled. The used game market doesn't hurt the developer. The used game market is a secondary market that exists in parallel to the primary market, wherein owners exchange goods in return for money. Any time a game enters the used game market, the developer has already received money for the game. Furthermore, if it's a true used game market, the games in circulation are originals, and don't involve CD-Rs. Therefore, from the perspective of the developer, any game that is in the used game market is identical to a game that is sitting in the closet of the first buyer of the game.

The argument that the used game market hurts developers is identical to the one that people who don't buy multiple copies of a game hurt a game developer, or who don't buy the same game every 6 months, or every 3 months. It is fundamentally based on the assumption that developers have a right to your money, and that you do not have a right to the product you're buying from them.

It is absolut bullshit, and every developer who pulls this argument gets put on my personal do not buy list. Yes, I'm down to buying a few games per year, mostly from small time developers. I still buy the occasional big-budget title, but after ME3, I'm probably done for a long time.