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Print E-mail del.icio.us 104 comment(s) - last by mattclary.. on Sep 22 at 1:12 PM
Pirate posts help request for "glitch" in official Edios forums ahead of games launch

PC games are some of the most pirated software out there, as players look for ways to get the game they want without having to pay the $50 asking price most new games demand.

Eidos, the publisher behind the PC version of Batman: Arkham Asylum, has introduced a deliberate glitch into the game to catch and foil pirates who try and crack the game to play without paying. One person who pirated the game, and was brazen enough to post a help request on the official Edios forums, ahead of the games actual launch mind you, has brought the glitch to the surface.

A poster going by the handle Cheshirec_the_cat posted in a thread requesting help with a problem in the game. The poster wrote, "I've got a problem when it's time to use Batman's glide in the game. When I hold , like it's said to jump from one platform to another, Batman tries to open his wings again and again instead of gliding. So he fels down in a poisoning gas. If somebody could tel me, what should I do there."

An Edios admin going by Keir responded to the thread before it was closed writing, "The problem you have encountered is a hook in the copy protection, to catch out people who try and download cracked versions of the game for free. It's not a bug in the game's code, it's a bug in your moral code."

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LOL!
By mattclary on 9/11/2009 9:58:14 AM , Rating: 5
Awesome!




RE: LOL!
By therealnickdanger on 9/11/2009 10:05:07 AM , Rating: 5
That is hilarious! Now that's DRM I can live with! LOL

But seriously, I give it a week before there's a fix.


RE: LOL!
By ImSpartacus on 9/11/2009 10:12:56 AM , Rating: 5
Yeah, this is how DRM should be done. Arrrrrrrrr, make those pirates "fels" into the poisonous gas, matey!


RE: LOL!
By an0dize on 9/11/2009 10:57:31 AM , Rating: 5
Agreed. I'm glad to see companies trying new things with DRM. I'm all for people protecting their intellectual property, but I'm vehemently opposed to using invasive and sneaky malware, etc. to do it. Companies are going to have to adapt and change to stay ahead of pirates without alienating their paying customers; that's just the reality of the situation.


RE: LOL!
By Oralen on 9/16/2009 3:46:13 AM , Rating: 2
Wacky thought: Let's re-read history...

Now that I think about it...

I think the first two versions of Windows were just DRM to prevent people from getting computers.

The crack was found only when Windows 3.11 was released.


RE: LOL!
By Kahnivorous on 9/17/2009 2:52:43 AM , Rating: 2
"So he fels down in a poisoning gas. If somebody could tel me, what should I do there."

Yep. Sounds like this idiot "fels" at a lot of things. Perhaps his parents should "tel" him he fails at the internet.


RE: LOL!
By Bender 123 on 9/11/2009 11:42:53 AM , Rating: 4
EA did this in C&C generals...AHHHHH!!!! My base imploded after 5 minutes!!!!!

Nintendo did this in a few games...Earthbound, where the enemies became so numerous you couldn't move forward.

GTA4 on PC where you were always "drunk" in the cars

I know there was an old NES game that would recheck the EPROM to validate codes before the final boss and when you engaged the it, the game locked up and wrecked your save file...


RE: LOL!
By matt0401 on 9/11/2009 3:14:09 PM , Rating: 5
LOL @ Generals

I installed the game on a bunch of computers for a LAN party with my serial code not sure if it would work. It did for 5 mins so we were just building up our bases and getting rdy to do something and then BAM everybody's base implodes. That was basically a huge "WTF" moment. lol it was hilarious


RE: LOL!
By Alexstarfire on 9/11/2009 4:43:47 PM , Rating: 2
Ummm, Earthbound is the one that checks at the final boss to see if it's the real game. It does not do numerous enemies if pirated, IIRC.

BTW, XIII had this sort of protection. Pirated games had messed up textures and lighting. Made it unplayable from the very beginning.


RE: LOL!
By Samus on 9/11/2009 5:32:19 PM , Rating: 2
Radiant Silvergun for Sega Saturn had similar copy protection where it couldn't start the first level. It'd load the level, even the music, but your ship would never appear and it'd just scroll along the clouds for infinity. There was later an ISO patch released to fix this problem. Somehow the game had a disc check when loading the first level to detect if it'd been swapped in order to boot.


RE: LOL!
By foolsgambit11 on 9/12/2009 12:15:25 AM , Rating: 2
In the copy of Earthbound Zero I've got it will tell you you're playing with an illegal copy and shut down at a certain point in the game. Of course, the English version of Zero was never released, so the game only comes pirated....


RE: LOL!
By MrSmurf on 9/11/2009 5:29:23 PM , Rating: 3
Regarding Generals, all C&C games will explode your based if you don't install the game correctly. Even if you have a legit version and re-install Windows and launch the game (assuming you left it on another partition) it will do this.


RE: LOL!
By artemicion on 9/11/2009 6:36:37 PM , Rating: 2
I remember when I was a wee lad, I had trouble figuring out why all the characters in Ultima 7 would go "oink oink".

Now that I think about it, I nearly called Origin customer support to ask about it too . . .


RE: LOL!
By mattclary on 9/22/2009 1:12:10 PM , Rating: 2
Adds new meaning to "All your base are belong to us".


RE: LOL!
By B3an on 9/11/2009 10:58:18 AM , Rating: 2
Theres already a fix for this, someone has uploaded a save file from right after this part of the game.

Well that lasted long.


RE: LOL!
By Mojo the Monkey on 9/11/2009 4:20:04 PM , Rating: 1
Maybe not as long as they hoped, but I bet the total man-power put into creating this bug affected more than enough people to go out and just buy the game; making it well worth their time.

I would not be surprised (or, rather, I should hope) that this glitch or something similar manifests itself a few more times during the progress of the game.

Speaking of Batman (semi-related) does anyone know if you can enable PhysX using an ATI/AMD main card, but throwing an old NV card in the second pci-x slot? The ability to see those little effects might steer me toward a pc purchase, rather than console.


RE: LOL!
By jordanclock on 9/17/2009 2:42:56 PM , Rating: 2
Unfortunately, if you have an AMD card in your system and an nVidia card, the newest drivers for the nVidia card won't allow you to enable PhysX until the AMD card is uninstalled. When such a workaround was possible, it was still not too easy to pull off.


RE: LOL!
By inperfectdarkness on 9/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: LOL!
By Lerianis on 9/12/09, Rating: 0
RE: LOL!
By MrBlastman on 9/14/2009 11:59:56 AM , Rating: 3
Oh get a life. You really think the pirates can sue them for making their games harder to play if you steal them?

Please. Please do not ever run for your state Congress. It is people like yourself who give the criminals who invade your home more rights than the homeowners.

Now, I DO agree with you about cracking the games. I've had to crack several of my own (which I bought and paid for) to get around the cd-check (I hate putting a cd in every time I have to play) and in Bioshock, I HAD to crack it in order for the framerate to be playable. Without the crack, the game would pop and stutter constantly. After the crack, it ran smooth.

I just don't agree with you on suing.

If Eidos was smart, they would take it several steps further and put MULTIPLE places in the game, say every 10 minutes or so and stored the copy protection scheme throughout the code, that would be even better--provided they don't require the CD to be in the drive in order to play. Operation Flashpoint had a unique scheme that would slowly degrade your experience over time and it worked very well. I wish more would go that route rather than rootkitting us, forcing us to be online, cd-check etc.

That or just give up on the copy protection completely. There are many of us who work for a living that realize that the developers work for a living also and need to be fed. We don't all have to pay 50.00 for a game, some of us wait until they go on sale on Steam (Weekend deal), or wait a year for the price to drop.


RE: LOL!
By JonnyDough on 9/14/2009 6:09:19 PM , Rating: 2
I think it should work the same way with cars. If I can't afford a $50K Cadillac I should be able to just "crack one" until they drop in price to $30K. Of course by then I'll have driven the car, and will forget all about buying it. I will likely then "crack" a $60K car (inflation?) and commence repeating my justifiably piratesque behaviors.

/end sarcasm


RE: LOL!
By CascadingDarkness on 9/15/2009 9:40:51 AM , Rating: 2
Original games never FADE.


RE: LOL!
By Major HooHaa on 9/17/2009 7:14:56 AM , Rating: 2
The UK version of "IL-2 Strurmovik 1946" on the P.C.

I had bought and played the original I-L2 Russian flight sim years before (and still have it in my collection), but the 1946 version combined the original, the "Forgotten Battles" semi-sequel, the "Pacific Fighters" sequel and new content with some advanced planes that never saw combat and some that were only ever concepts.

I installed it on my Vista machine and could never get it to run. I trawled the forums and tried a few suggested fixes, all to no avail.

Apparently there is a problem with the copy protection with the game. One way to get around this is to buy the U.S. version of the game that doesn't have copy protection on it and use the .EXE file from the American game to overwrite EXE file on from British game. This would get around the copy protection problem. I really can't be bothered and so it sits on my shelf like a drinks coaster in a DVD case.


RE: LOL!
By Staples on 9/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: LOL!
By ZeeStorm on 9/11/2009 1:10:05 PM , Rating: 2
Then be sued for more than the game will make? Don't think we'll be seeing that anytime soon...


RE: LOL!
By phattyboombatty on 9/11/2009 1:35:11 PM , Rating: 5
Your idea is equivalent to a department store observing a person shoplifting a shirt, following that person home, and then burning the person's house down. Just because a person "wrongs" you doesn't give you free reign to inflict payback.


RE: LOL!
By Mojo the Monkey on 9/11/2009 4:21:13 PM , Rating: 5
Not to mention the very real possibility of mistaken piracy situations.


RE: LOL!
By jconan on 9/12/09, Rating: -1
RE: LOL!
By Master Kenobi (blog) on 9/12/2009 6:32:18 PM , Rating: 3
That professor was asking for it.


RE: LOL!
By Belard on 9/11/09, Rating: 0
RE: LOL!
By Belard on 9/11/2009 2:36:07 PM , Rating: 4
I would like to SEE more measures like this... rather than DRM that screws with peoples computer.

And better yet, put such problems here and there.

There is already a patch (it might have taken a week), but its simply a SAVE file... but what if a chunk of the game is missing because of the SAVE?

A game DEMO can sell or sink a purchase within the first 1-2 levels (10~30mins of game time). Of course, some demos are good by themselves like UT2004 an UT3 (Too bad the UT3 FULL game came with sucky maps and GUI / gameplay issues).


RE: LOL!
By bodar on 9/11/2009 4:37:26 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
There is already a patch (it might have taken a week), but its simply a SAVE file... but what if a chunk of the game is missing because of the SAVE?


From what I hear, the save is right after the glitchy part, so you've already played the parts up to that point.


RE: LOL!
By callmeroy on 9/11/2009 10:10:16 AM , Rating: 2
I agree, that rocks...LOL....


RE: LOL!
By kattanna on 9/11/2009 10:19:36 AM , Rating: 5
they should of asked for a mailing address so um.. they could send a patched CD to him.. and then show up and arrest his stealing ass.


RE: LOL!
By SublimeSimplicity on 9/11/2009 10:34:59 AM , Rating: 2
It's a good point.

Why not post a link to a "bug-fix" download that required personal information like an email address to access? Then they'd pick up on people who just searched for the answer.

I remember DirectTV foiled a bunch of hacked cards one day and just waited for people to call in that their service was out.


RE: LOL!
By zinfamous on 9/11/2009 1:05:31 PM , Rating: 2
indeed. This is how they catch all those scammers at the beginning of Sea of Love with Al Pacino.

The cops set up a bogus convention for sports collectors, to get autographs and such. The only people that show up got their invites through some illegal source (forgot the details, heh), so they just arrest all the attendees.

catch a lot more pirates this way. Exposing this from the get-go is rather worthless. Great--we caught ONE GUY!!!


RE: LOL!
By ArcliteHawaii on 9/11/2009 3:35:04 PM , Rating: 1
This is a great idea, but many pirates are not in Western countries. It may reduce a few cases but won't do anything for pirates in China and Russia, for example, where copyright is hardly enforced.


RE: LOL!
By mindless1 on 9/11/2009 5:22:55 PM , Rating: 2
I think you are remembering the movie wrong. What they did is compile a list of wanted men that they couldn't find/capture, sent invitations for a fake event to where they thought those men might be hiding, (not an illegal source of invites), and when everyone showed up they just blocked the doors, arrested and processed them.


RE: LOL!
By theslug on 9/11/2009 2:25:55 PM , Rating: 1
I'm no legal expert, but wouldn't that be entrapment?


RE: LOL!
By ArcliteHawaii on 9/11/2009 3:44:17 PM , Rating: 1
That's not entrapment. Entrapment would be if the police cracked Arkham Asylum, put it online, tracked the IPs of the downloaders, and then arrested them. In this case, the user has already broken the law and they're just catching them.

The more important question might be: it's definitely a crime to crack a game and to seed a game under the DMCA. However, I'm not sure if it's a crime to download one or play one.


RE: LOL!
By Mojo the Monkey on 9/11/2009 4:25:38 PM , Rating: 4
Your hypothetical situation is incorrect - that would not be entrapment and this is actually done sometimes. To make your example accurate, you would have to mention that the cops email someone and say "hey, you! guess what, i have a free copy of ____ game right here. Just click it!"

When someone is actively seeking out the game, they are assumed to already be of sufficient criminal intent. The law assumes they would have just as likely found it elsewhere.

Entrapment is about altering what the defendant would have otherwise done.


RE: LOL!
By bighairycamel on 9/11/2009 5:13:02 PM , Rating: 3
A good example is the To Catch a Predator series. Attorneys have tried to play the entrapment card, but the criminals without a doubt had the intent to commit a sex crime with a minor.

Now if they posed as an adult or made no mention of age at all, and then lured the suspect to the home only to then reveal that they were a minor, that would be entrapment.


RE: LOL!
By Penti on 9/12/2009 3:02:35 AM , Rating: 2
Actually thats the cops acting as instigators of a copyright infringement and that would be illegal in Sweden, of course all forms of entrapment is illegal here too, so no cops dressed like hookers Lol.

Normally what the copyright groups does to get people are illegal in so many ways it's silly any how. They may not sponsor ftp-sites or upload warez not even of their own works as they haven't licensed it for that. If they did license it nobody would commit a crime in downloading it any how.


RE: LOL!
By daInvincibleGama on 9/11/2009 3:46:29 PM , Rating: 3
No. Entrapment is when you tell someone to commit a crime and then arrest them for the same crime.

There's something about it that's a little sleazy though. The pirates are definitely in the wrong, but I'm not sure if that makes it OK to lie to people and ask for their personal information.


RE: LOL!
By MozeeToby on 9/11/2009 3:50:36 PM , Rating: 2
First, entrapment is something done by law enforcement agencies, not corporations. Second, entrapment is encouraging someone to do something illegal that they wouldn't have done otherwise; in this case, the illegal act was cloning the cards, which occurred well before the abusers were tricked into calling.


RE: LOL!
By superkdogg on 9/11/2009 3:53:05 PM , Rating: 2
Yep-only law enforcement can be accused of entrapment. A private citizen (or corporation or entity) is free to catch people in the act of a crime and turn the evidence over to law enforcement. They're just a witness to the fact that the chesire cat fels into the poisoning DRM.

The only question I have is whether or not "fels into the poisoning gas" is going to be the next "all your base are belong to us" or "I'm in your base XXXXX your XXXXXX".


RE: LOL!
By mindless1 on 9/11/2009 5:27:43 PM , Rating: 2
False. While a 3rd party besides the offender or police wouldn't be guilty of entrapment, they are not "free to catch", if their equivalent role compared to the police was to suggest, encourage, or facilitate the crime then they are potentially guilty of a crime themselves, a conspirator or any number of other offenses. "Just a witness" on the other hand is a passive role, the opposite of what was being suggested.


RE: LOL!
By Penti on 9/12/2009 3:07:57 AM , Rating: 2
If they encourage or instigates a crime they can be prosecuted as if they committed it themselves that also applies to all the copyright defending groups which all the time does gross violation of the copyright laws. Which they provide evidence for in the courts...


RE: LOL!
By WoWCow on 9/11/2009 10:43:29 AM , Rating: 2
Owned.

This is possibly the best solution to pirating games leaked before the official releases.

Those DRM (and STARFORCE BS) were killing me, but now I can see the light again with developers having a great sense of humor over the publisher's greed.


RE: LOL!
By BikeDude on 9/11/2009 3:12:22 PM , Rating: 5
Several years ago, I bought Settlers 3 from BlueByte.

At one point, the game became impossible. My serfs didn't want to produce weapons. My iron turned into pigs.

Guess what? The game was copy protected.

My deadly sin?

Had I copied the game? No.

Had I attached a debugger trying to circumvent the copy protection? No.

Had I applied any sort of crack? No.

Had I attempted to run this game in Windows NT4? Yes.

To be truthful, I no longer recall whether it was NT4 or Win2k, but the copy protection silently kicked its boots in. As did a couple of other games at the time, but at least they were upfront about it.

As I recall, downloading a crack actually resolved the situation.

Was I wrong to turn to the pirates for a solution after being told by the game distributor that they didn't support my operating system?

Or is it wrong of a game distributor to limit a game to a given platform? Windows did not change that much. The game obviously worked, but the copy protection scheme did not!


RE: LOL!
By mindless1 on 9/11/2009 5:32:29 PM , Rating: 2
Somewhat related, I won't buy games that require me to have the CD/DVD in the drive just to play them, I've way too many discs to juggle them around every time and plenty of HDD space.

Before any purchase I research whether I can use a disc (emulator) image loader or get a no-cd crack. If I can't, I'll wait for one or buy something else instead.


RE: LOL!
By Lerianis on 9/12/2009 9:56:13 AM , Rating: 2
That is the main reason why I crack every single game I buy as well.... because I do not want to have to have the disk in the driving, spinning around, perhaps getting scratched while it does it.


RE: LOL!
By Hieyeck on 9/14/2009 11:01:02 AM , Rating: 2
Agreed, but now I wait for it to come out on Steam.

ANNNNND.... I can't believe I just said that.


RE: LOL!
By JonnyDough on 9/14/2009 6:18:59 PM , Rating: 1
The big disadvantage of that is that they can release a patch that corrects a problem in a game AND enables a newer form of secu-rom that disables your CD emulator. But I don't know if any software companies have actually done this. It's an interesting idea though, and one that would really give quite a blow to pirates.

I can see future anti-piracy working this way:

1. Patch upon purchase to enable game.
2. Patch upon halfway poit to enable rest of game.
3. Patch upon final boss to enable rest of game. :(

That's a lot of patches, but since a lot of games will release them anyway...

It could even enable a timer that would give you a month to play before having to download another patch to play. I'm sure someone could beat that, but they'd only have a month to do so. In fact, this sounds a lot like steam, where it checks to see if you have the game in order to let you play...

I think "constant net checks" may be required for future gaming. Which is really going to suck, especially if you live way out in the boonies where you can't get decent affordable net.


RE: LOL!
By mindless1 on 9/15/2009 3:31:31 AM , Rating: 2
... except, that kills their sales to those who don't buy things the first few days they're released, which I don't, so I know ahead of time if they pull some stunt like this.

Put simply the more inconvenient they make it to play, the less likely I'll buy it instead of something else. Ironically enough in recent months I've gotten more into free flash games than ever, just don't have the time anymore to get engrossed for hours on end with video games, want something I can put down and pick up that is lighthearted fun not especially challenging.


RE: LOL!
By UltraWide on 9/11/2009 3:57:24 PM , Rating: 2
it's pretty funny actually. Clever chaps!


RE: LOL!
By Samus on 9/11/2009 5:28:52 PM , Rating: 2
I'm gonna download the ISO just so I can compare it to my official copy. I wonder how Eidos was able to create a hook when ABGX can remove the hooks that ban you from LIVE. Sounds like MS should be talking to Eidos for copyright assistance lol.


RE: LOL!
By SSDMaster on 9/14/2009 8:35:16 AM , Rating: 2
Owned.


Idiot
By Bateluer on 9/11/2009 10:01:18 AM , Rating: 2
If you're going to pirate a game, don't post for help getting it to work on the official support boards. And especially, wait until AFTER the game's official launch.




RE: Idiot
By orgy08 on 9/11/09, Rating: 0
RE: Idiot
By Bateluer on 9/11/2009 10:37:58 AM , Rating: 5
Um, he was posting about a problem in a game on the company's own support forums before the game's release. Kinda a dead give away that he had a pirated version. If he'd waited a few days until after the game was officially released, he might have been able to play it off as a broken DRM issue. Now, he's just another Internet dumbass.


RE: Idiot
By Fracture on 9/11/2009 2:33:32 PM , Rating: 2
There's a number of evaluation copies that can go out before a game's official launch that the pirate may have been pretending to have. However, most of these copies have lengthy custom-made DRM or 'watermarks' to safeguard against copying, just as the "Batman falling" feature was an indicator of the RTM-version.

I still agree with most of the others on here, this is a brilliant future to DRM, especially if features like this were loaded right before each boss encounter.


RE: Idiot
By Belard on 9/11/2009 6:20:51 PM , Rating: 2
Oh yeah! That would be killer.

Final boss on level, after hours of killing, jumping... Your Batman only jumps into attacks, not actually punching. dead.


RE: Idiot
By SublimeSimplicity on 9/11/2009 10:23:07 AM , Rating: 5
Was Captain Obvious a Batman or Marvel character?


RE: Idiot
By FadiKelzia on 9/12/2009 2:58:50 PM , Rating: 2
At least he got the developers laughing out loud :) ... i bet they were hoping someone does post this glitch to write this wonderful sentence " It's not a bug in the game's code, it's a bug in your moral code."


sweet
By poohbear on 9/11/2009 10:41:01 AM , Rating: 5
It's not a bug in the game's code, it's a bug in your moral code."

ownage!!!!!




RE: sweet
By ksherman on 9/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: sweet
By drmo on 9/11/2009 12:20:12 PM , Rating: 2
RE: sweet
By Belard on 9/11/2009 1:51:35 PM , Rating: 2
er... no.

What "ended" was legalized slavery in the modern world.

Its underground, mostly and happens in this very country (USA) where thousands of girls "disappear" into white slavery (that means sex), being sold for hundreds or thousands of dollars. Force to take drugs (control) and being paid to be raped several times a day, while not getting a dime of it.

Also known as "human trafficking" as people are shipped to totally different countries where they don't speak the language, know the laws and are eventually broken. Kind of like that girl who was kidnapped at age 11, 18 years ago.

... kinda serious about a game anti-piracy issue.


RE: sweet
By Fritzr on 9/12/2009 2:44:54 AM , Rating: 2
Legal slavery is alive and doing quite well in the modern world.

Here is a link to an article in Scientific American giving a little more info on slavery in the 21st century.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=t...

For a long list of other sources of information about slavery in the modern world try this google search for a long list of sites related to slavery.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=opera&rl...


PWN'D
By walk2k on 9/11/2009 12:26:44 PM , Rating: 2
I believe, is the term.




RE: PWN'D
By Lerianis on 9/12/2009 9:58:01 AM , Rating: 2
Temporarily, is the right term, and if ONE person has a problem with this who has a LEGAL version of this game... HELLO LAWSUIT!

That is why these companies are STUPID for doing things like this, it just opens them up to lawsuits when the games don't work on someone's system.


Why so serious?
By Jucken on 9/11/2009 1:22:39 PM , Rating: 2
Why so serious?




RE: Why so serious?
By Omega215D on 9/11/2009 2:18:48 PM , Rating: 2
Why so glitchy? Let's fels him into the poisonous gas. =P


FTW
By mattclary on 9/11/2009 9:59:59 AM , Rating: 3
"So he fels down in a poisoning gas."

Too funny!




This seems like a good thing...
By smackababy on 9/11/2009 10:00:58 AM , Rating: 2
But I'm sure, somewhere, there is a huge flaw waiting to be exploited. And this won't foil pirates for long anyway. As I haven't purchased (or pirated) the game, I can't comment on any DRM used in it, but if little is present, this could combat piracy to a point.




Great Idea
By wempa on 9/11/2009 12:23:53 PM , Rating: 2
I read about this sort of copy protection being used a while back, but was always curious about exactly how it worked in the game. The article I read used an example of a racing game where the car would gradually get harder and harder to control. I think this is hysterical. Granted, it will still be cracked but at least they are having a little fun with this. :)




False Positive
By Gunbuster on 9/11/2009 1:51:36 PM , Rating: 2
So what happens when the copy protection f's up a false positives on a legit user?




sigh this guy is dumb
By Codeman03xx on 9/12/2009 4:47:55 AM , Rating: 2
I dunno hopefully they did this properly they don't wanna lock out legit customers from playing the game. I hope they didn't pull a spore and make a mistake like maxis did.




Awesome
By R3MF on 9/13/2009 4:27:09 PM , Rating: 2
i'm delighted to hear of this story, i have intrusive DRM, but that doesn't mean i won't celebrate every time a pirate is both foiled and publicly ridiculed.




Simple Solution?
By gamerk2 on 9/14/2009 11:57:18 AM , Rating: 2
The sad part is theres a really simple way to deal with the issue.

1: Upon startup, get the Mac Address of the user PC, and transmit that and the games CD-key to the server. [To prevent misuse, simply make all patches downloadable only from in-game, and release a horribly borked 1.0 with patch 1.1 ready for install]

2: If any Key is attached to more then [25] Mac Addresses, ban every offending address for life.

3: To protect the origional user, allow for a new CD key to be issued by sending back the game for free [CD key on disk can then be checked/matched to offending list].

4: Wait 6 months from release, and start the banning process.

Simple.




Better Late Then Never
By SpaceBall on 9/11/2009 11:03:12 AM , Rating: 2
Why so serious?

The fixed crack for the glide DRM was released on the 2nd or 3rd of September.

Pirates have long since beat the game.




RE: Better Late Then Never
By imaheadcase on 9/11/09, Rating: -1
Piracy rules
By arianara on 9/12/09, Rating: 0
RE: Piracy rules
By Lerianis on 9/12/2009 10:00:42 AM , Rating: 1
Have to agree. The main reason that games sell so well today (usually unjustified) is because of piracy years ago.

Really, I would be happier if ALL DRM was made illegal, both on consoles and on PC. I've had MANY times where I have bought a LEGAL VERSION of something and it doesn't work because of the fucking DRM... and it pisses me off every single time.

Main reason why I don't buy anything with DRM anymore or crack the game IMMEDIATELY after I buy it.


I like it
By xxsk8er101xx on 9/12/2009 12:14:43 PM , Rating: 1
I don't have a problem with this.




Ancient news
By ggordonliddy on 9/11/09, Rating: 0
Friendly correction :)
By cochy on 9/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: Friendly correction :)
By smackababy on 9/11/2009 10:45:18 AM , Rating: 2
I believe you're wrong. They are trying, and succeeding to crack the game. It could have been written better, but I believe it is still correct.


RE: Friendly correction :)
By harmaton on 9/11/2009 12:34:10 PM , Rating: 2
not sure about that if you take apart the sentence there are two independent things happening. The first is the person is trying and the second is cracking the game.

I am no English major. Although, I agree that it is wrong. So many times we hear an incorrect usage and it becomes accepted. English is tough to master.


RE: Friendly correction :)
By ClownPuncher on 9/11/2009 1:13:31 PM , Rating: 5
Clearly, in the case of the guy posting in the forums before the games launch, the correct wording would be

quote:
people who try crack


RE: Friendly correction :)
By adiposity on 9/11/2009 12:44:41 PM , Rating: 3
Well, if you are going to write it the second way, methinks you need to lose the comma.

The first way, while perhaps not what the poster meant, is correct english, but also should probably lose the comma.

-Dan


RE: Friendly correction :)
By PrezWeezy on 9/11/2009 1:16:36 PM , Rating: 2
If it had read who try, and crack, the game it would be correct.


RE: Friendly correction :)
By Belard on 9/11/2009 1:56:22 PM , Rating: 2
The Speeling police are already bad enough...

But when YOU are wrong, it makes it worse so.

Your error has already been pointed out to you.

This would have worked better:
"the pirate who tries to crack the game"

But some pirates "try", others will do it.


RE: Friendly correction :)
By cochy on 9/11/2009 3:11:54 PM , Rating: 4
By the fact that my post is rated -1 and from the replies it's quite obvious that this incorrect form of English is as rampant as I suspect.

To the one person who posted that I should remove the comma, sorry I forgot to do that.

It's quite simple.

Try and crack a game is not English.
Try to crack a game is English.

Thanks for the comments!


RE: Friendly correction :)
By invidious on 9/11/2009 3:53:11 PM , Rating: 2
You were probably voted you down for derailing the thread, not for your gramatical stance.


RE: Friendly correction :)
By cochy on 9/11/2009 4:10:07 PM , Rating: 2
It was off-topic, but it's becoming a big problem. Seemed like a good opportunity to do some good :)


RE: Friendly correction :)
By Mortando on 9/11/2009 5:12:22 PM , Rating: 2
You know the old saying: no good deed goes undownrated...


RE: Friendly correction :)
By Fritzr on 9/12/2009 2:54:57 AM , Rating: 2
Regardless of what your English teacher may say, 'Try and do' is common usage. It usually means the speaker doubts you will succeed. As in "You may try and crack the game" instead of the grammatically acceptable "You may try to crack the game".

Usage trumps the rules every time. This is why said rhymes with red instead of with paid. pay->pays->paid, lay->lays->laid, say->says->said. One of these is not like the others...Common usage is often rwong. When this happens you simply add a new rule that says the mistake is correct and move on.


RE: Friendly correction :)
By Schrag4 on 9/14/2009 1:24:30 PM , Rating: 2
"[common] Usage trumps the rules every time."

I have mixed feelings about this. I'm well aware that there are plenty of things that were not generally accepted grammar 100 years ago that were considered 'correct' 30 years ago, so obviously the rules change. However, I think it's ok (and preferred IMO) to point out when someone is using poor grammar in hopes that it doesn't BECOME mainstream.

If I've made grammatical mistakes, please let me know. I'd rather be corrected by someone anonymously on the 'net instead of someone I know in RL (who then would think of me as an idiot because I have poor grammer).


Im gunna call shens
By sadffffff on 9/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: Im gunna call shens
By adiposity on 9/11/09, Rating: -1
RE: Im gunna call shens
By sadffffff on 9/11/09, Rating: 0
RE: Im gunna call shens
By mindless1 on 9/11/2009 6:07:29 PM , Rating: 2
Or equally plausible would be that a pirate did post the issue wanting to know what was up, by posting found out what was up, so they quit spending time trying to do it with a broken cracked version.

It's kind of dumb that so many people think the pirate was "owned", that pirate found out what s/he wanted to know which is what was happening with the game glitch.

I'm not condoning piracy, just pointing out that the pirate had nothing to lose by asking (so long as their tracks were covered) and received information s/he wanted to know, it benefited others too, brought out useful info that others can use to stop wasting time on this glitch and buy the game if they want a working version.


"If you mod me down, I will become more insightful than you can possibly imagine." -- Slashdot









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