Don't forget to register to vote
|
|
|
2K drops DRM on Bioshock
ANOTHER NAIL HITS THE DRM coffin today, as 2K Games announces that it's droping the DRM from its PC best-seller, Bioshock.
Released to critical acclaim last year, the only serious problem with Bioshock was the fact that the PC DRM on the disc was a real pain to deal with. Limiting users to three installations - and with problems dealing with upgrades and uninstalls - the biggest problem was the fact that the DRM activation was handled server side. With the game's huge popularity on release, the servers went down - leaving thousands of legit purchasers without the ability to play the game.
Now Bioshock has been on the market for a while, 2K has decided that the hassle of maintaining the server is more than it's worth to prevent copying - especially since there are plenty of hacks on the net available for download which bypass the activation, thus making the entire endeavour rather pointless.
No word on whether 2K plans to implement the DRM in future titles, or if this is one software annoyance we can finally label 'done'. µ
Share this:
Share
making any protection just wasting time and resources. lowering price will make everything better. why? because nobody will buy sucks games and anybody will happily buy good games they likes. I think making additional money from online game or add some light ingame advertise still a good way.
look at history... many good software company are bankrupt because they spent too much time in protection rather than improve their application. and microsoft in that path too (sadly).
Being very near to the video games industry for 25 years, i am tired to ear always exactly this same meme: "piracy kills games not DRM" and when i look at the game industry, it's now worth billions dollars. I remember earing "we will lower the game prices, we will do quality games, we will not protect and such". Look at it, we have got expensive games and loads of shit games you can't try before buying. Playing games is now an hassle. Creativity is something of the past when 80% games are remakes or bad film licensing. Please, come on! give me 21'st century Elite or Dungeon Master and i will buy (D. M. was protected, but playing awesome and protection was unobstrusive). Strangely, good game makers using more friendly schemes (ID Software...) are sucessfull. We need game quality, no PITA DRM or TV advertising.
I want to buy Bioshock. I will, if ever they remove this stupid SecuROM. Nothing will install SecuROM on my machine, and that's that. There's plenty of games available on convenient DRM, like Steam. Valve will get my money, not 2K.
Nothing is truly secure on this planet, don't fool yourself.

In 30 years of computers I've seen many schemes, and they've all been BROKEN. Dongles, bad sectors, activation, code wheels/books/rings, captcha, etc...

The next wave is coming with arbitrary code compilation/generation.
The digital universe is finite and always bounded.

Plan for when, not if a system will be compromised.

"Copy Protection"
The only winning move is not to play.
@Chris. 

You really need to wake up and smell the coffee. Steam isn't the best solution out there and i'm getting fed up of the pro-steam fanboys who don't think things through.

[Bioshock's draconian DRM was appalling. But it could have been avoided if the game needed to be associated with a Steam account though both retail and download.]

Erm... no. Steam allows any third party to run whatever schemes they want through their service - which includes DRM or anti-cheating mechanisms. Valve/Steam have no say in these things.
Bioshock was available through Steam from day 1. There was no need for 2K games to include the DRM on the Steam version but they did. 

In summary: Steam is basically an online shop - but with more restrictions. It's not great and not good. It's business and there's very little consumer protection on these services - just like with all those EULAs. Have you read the Steam EULA? Considering you could have hundreds of pounds worth of games on your Steam account, the amount of service they give is terrible. My bank would be taken to court if they dared to suggest that anyone stealing my ID and using it to spend money from my account or ruin my credit rating... but somehow Steam gets away with it.

Finally, competition is great. It's why i'm supporting both Greenhouse and Impulse. If Steam was the only option then i'm pretty sure i'd be getting out of PC gaming.
Most serious DRM providers recommend that the publisher remove the DRM after the initial sales surge has winded down, and there are some previous examples of this happening (such as X3).
They are only removing the Activation Limit. The DRM remains:

from 2k Elizabeth a 2K community Manager on the Bioshock Web site:

Our other methods of copy protection remain. You will still have to activate your copy, and you will still need to keep the disc in the drive. SecuROM has not been removed -- just the activation limits on number of installs and number of computers you can install BioShock on simultaneously.
At the end of the day Dev's are trying to protect their creations. They work hard to build and develop these games and then they are pirated.

The reason PC gaming is "apparently" dying is because more and more devs are turning away from PC as a release platform due to high levels of piracy.

Crytek recently announced that it would no longer bring exclusive games to the PC because of the piracy associated with Crysis when it was launched.
At the end of the day its their own stupid fault. If they had released crysis through a service like Steam they wouldn't have the issues of piracy they experienced. 

Steam is a great service and is a great way of removing the majority of pirates from the equation so why don't more devs release direct to steam? Or at the very least require a steam account to play?

Bioshock's draconian DRM was appalling. But it could have been avoided if the game needed to be associated with a Steam account though both retail and download. People would have to login to their Steam account to play, or play offline once you've initially associated the game. You still need an internet connection but at least there is a benefit for doing it. All your games are stored in one place, its got a great community and is simple and easy to use.

Steam is the future if you ask me and everyone should get on board.
Actually this is incorrect - and i can't blame you because many outlets have also got themselves confused.

The action that 2k have taken for Bioshock is to remove the '3-installs' limit as many legitimate customers were having to contact their support lines because the feature that was supposed to allow them to uninstall and recover one of the three licences didn't work. It was probably bothering 2k by forcing them to spend more on customer services and so they cut out the 3 install limit.

The game still requires the contact with the authentication server. The server is still up. All DRM is still intact on this game - they just took away the install limit.

I expect corrections on the article in quick fashion.. ;)
..they only removed the installation limits. You still have to activate it online and it still uses SecuROM. Now it would be great to re-write the article - or rather scrap it completely, it's very little truth in it.
Activation is still needed and SecuROM has not been removed.
So it still it still delivers a bit more pain as the other games.
I wish companies would learn things like this before releasing the title...

The only real software that benefits from server side authentication is online games ... and even most of those are subscription based.... maybe that's the real reason why MS is going towards a subscription based Office???

"especially since there are plenty of hacks on the net available for download which bypass the activation, thus making the entire endeavour rather pointless. "