Ubi PC Titles To Require Online Authentication

[CR6]

I agree, this is a huge mistake that should have been shouted down long before the public had a chance to get wind of it. While industry leaders (i.e. itunes etc etc) are removing DRM and reaping the benefits, Ubisoft have shunned any idea of forward thinking and remain committed to steadfastly beating a dead horse! Meanwhile, oh so predictably, pirates have now practically got tunnel vision for Ubisoft DRM and will crack it days after retail hits the shelves, or even earlier!

Ubisoft have dropped the ball on this one big time. You really get the impression that the powers that be are sitting oblivious in ivory towers on this one.

Yes, plenty of people are being critical on this subject, but rightly so - it's because we all want GRFS to be a success!

+1

I was just looking through some old news tonight, and was reminded of something that should be mentioned here to be fair to Ubisoft.

Ubisoft did actually release a major AAA game in Dec 2008 without DRM for the PC: Prince of Persia.

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2008/12...-its-a-trap.ars

So I think we should do a bit of research here (scour Ubi financial statements etc). Ubi took a risk as they knew the PoP would hit the torrents as soon as it was released, so how much money did they actually make from the PC version? How much did they estimate they lost using their no DRM approach? How many PC copies were sold of PoP vs. console and does having DRM actually make a significant difference? If so by how much percent etc. etc.

[=warcloud=]

[Removing DRM at a later stage, IMO, is too late. Lost sales not recoverable.

qft.

I do not condone piracy.

Here here chap. Kudos to skid-row though for getting through.

[Rocky]

Ubisoft did actually release a major AAA game in Dec 2008 without DRM for the PC: Prince of Persia.

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2008/12...-its-a-trap.ars

So I think we should do a bit of research here

One of the forum regs did in another thread a few months ago, not got the link handy though, will track it down later..

[Big]

I was reading some forums and people say that it's not fully cracked.

Some say the briefings are got while connected to play so being offline u have no briefing nor some marks, ....

Edited March 4, 2010 by Big

[Sup]

Also, cracks are not all created equally. There's 'unzip and play' style cracking and then there's 'do a ridiculous rain dance involving blank dvds, changing file names around, and editing registry entries' kind of cracking. One, obviously, leads to more pirated copies than the other.

Snagging the readme for the crack out of curiosity to see which kind this is.

Also, i mean, while this is totally foolish and not getting anywhere, whoever made this drm -- inhouse or out of ubi -- pretty much sold the higher ups snake oil. They're out of touch for believing a system like this would be hard to crack, but not crazy for wanting to protect their product. Ubi loses a ton of sales in the PC market to piracy, while they lose very few sales in the console market. This was a (misguided) attempt to push back into the PC platform, which i would have thought the posters here would appreciate.

I mean, it was a completely, ridiculously stupid idea, but they were trying to do what you all have been demanding of them. Make PC games that they can devote big budgets to.

update: unpack, copy folder, play. normal, easy pirating, ubisoft's drm does not work at all.

[Tinker]

I was reading some forums and people say that it's not fully cracked.

Some say the briefings are got while connected to play so being offline u have no briefing nor some marks, ....

The pirates can play the tutorial of SH5, but after that, when it's time to choose a mission; selection is disabled and they are stuck. In other words, although the game thinks it's connected and valid, it hasn't received data to progress from that point.

Effectively the DRM is working in a sense at present.

[thales100]

Yes, it seems that in AC2 the Animus "lock" was cracked, but there are (many?) extra triggers, the game wasnt fully cracked.

Edited March 4, 2010 by thales100

[firefly2442]

http://games.slashdot.org/story/10/03/05/0...cked-In-One-Day

Even Slashdot picked up the story.

[Sup]

update: unpack, copy folder, play. normal, easy pirating, ubisoft's drm does not work at all.

I take that back. This is cool:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2010/03/05...all/#more-26477

draconian and unfair as this may be, it's at least an interesting angle on DRM.

Actually, reports are still pretty mixed. It's possible someone just leaked a broken version of the game on torrent sites, or that some users suck at reading instructions. I'd snag it and try myself, but i havent got the hard drive space or patience to pirate a game for science.

[WhiteKnight77]

There is a link on the Slashdot page that goes to the instructions included with the files needed to play SH5 offline. Ubi is trying to do damage control by stating that it hasn't been bypassed and yet, posters around the net are stating just the opposite. Ubi must have some clogged up noses as they can't smell what they are shoveling from the looks of things.

[Sup]

There is a link on the Slashdot page that goes to the instructions included with the files needed to play SH5 offline. Ubi is trying to do damage control by stating that it hasn't been bypassed and yet, posters around the net are stating just the opposite. Ubi must have some clogged up noses as they can't smell what they are shoveling from the looks of things.

Wk, i don't mean any offense by this, but don't make assumptions about groups and cultures and activities you know nothing about. It is quite common in piracy circles for a cracking team to claim the game works perfectly and be completely wrong, through lack of testing/using a copy they'd already been experimenting with. It's unheard of for a publisher to spread false information to try and pretend a crack doesnt work.

What's MOST likely/most commonly the case is that the crack functions but only under a specific course or order of action, that either is or is not included in the instructions (perhaps followed by chance by the cracking team) or is not understood by a decent % of the people trying to apply toe crack (perhaps because they need to rtfm).

<deleted>

Edited March 6, 2010 by Rocky

[WhiteKnight77]

While I can't state that this guy is a hacker or not, he seems to have his stuff straight.

ubi’s claims are bogus. I saw footage of the last missions played on a cracked version and I reached mission 4. I also have AC2 legally sitting on my steam account and can attest that there IS a version working proper and without any need for elaborate emulators, redirections or numerous steps to install.

I did some hash/md5 runs over the files and they are identical. I analysed nettraffic and hd-access and while it does touch upon a myriad of files it does NOT change them at all during play.

Source

Other comments run the gammut of missing files to some need to read the included instructions for the "patch" to work properly and not let the launcher access the internet.

And no, I will not be pirating any Ubi game. If I will not buy from Ubi, why would I pirate their games? And yes, I am now in a total boycott of all Ubi games, SHIII from Steam is the last Ubi purchase I will ever make pending a reversal of the need for a constant internet connection and games that take steps backwards.

[WhiteKnight77]

Ubi's new DRM and it being cracked has even made it to ZDnet with an article by Adrian Kingsley-Hughes. The article is called 'Uncrackable' DRM lasts 24 hours and the comments echo the sentiments made by many when the announcement was first made and since.

[CR6]

And yes, I am now in a total boycott of all Ubi games, SHIII from Steam is the last Ubi purchase I will ever make pending a reversal of the need for a constant internet connection and games that take steps backwards.

Well, so far no one has got stats on the number of copies of Prince of Persia PC with no DRM sold last year?

Anyways, the best chance we have for Ubi to drop this new DRM is if these new titles sell less copies than their no DRM experiment last year.

With most of the negative feedback we seem to be seeing, that appears to be a good possibility.

[Sup]

Interesting article on a small indie developer's blog:

http://blog.wolfire.com/2010/03/DRM-can-be-effective

Immediate piracy of AAA games is not always a given, as I learned from Martin in the comments. The best example is Splinter Cell 3: Chaos Theory, which is, by all definitions, a AAA blockbuster game. It used the controversial StarForce 3.0 DRM and took 422 days to be cracked, well beyond the game's shelf life. StarForce 3.0 used a plethora of controversial methods to achieve this, most notably, it secretly installed mandatory device drivers. This obviously was highly controversial and there were many reports of new security vulnerabilities, performance degredation, incompatibilities, system instability, and other issues. As an aside, StarForce actually threatened to sue BoingBoing and CNET for reporting on these issues.

Massive consumer issues aside, it worked. 422 days with relatively small amounts of piracy is unprecedented. Despite this amazing win against piracy, after it was cracked, Ubisoft dropped it, promising never to use it again. At the time, it seemed that they were listening to customer complaints, but in hindsight, it seems like they were just waiting for an even more invasive solution, which makes StarForce look welcome.

[WhiteKnight77]

I don't think the fact that Starforce was cracked that made Ubi stop using it, but the $5 million class action lawsuit that did it.

[[NH]4x]

Well,......the poo is hitting the fan over in the UBI AC2 and SHV forums. Seems that what I and others predicted about UBI servers being unstable, is hampering people from playing their SINGLE PLAYER games and there are some unhappy campers. Typical UBI response............"We're looking into it"

( Backs out of here,wondering how long UBI will defend their user unfriendly DRM )

[Sup]

I don't think the fact that Starforce was cracked that made Ubi stop using it,

He didnt suggest it was. It's interesting, though, i wasn't aware of quite how effective it actually turned out to be. Certainly less invasive than this system, and it lasted for a year longer.

I doubt the financial ramifications of the lawsuit had anything to do with it (ubisoft did not stand to lose anything there, only starforce, and even then weren't in any real danger,) but it was a rare instance of ubisoft paying attention to fan backlash.

[WhiteKnight77]

Ubi was the target of the lawsuit for using Starforce. $5M Class Action Lawsuit Against Ubisoft for Starforce

[krise madsen]

This is the Q&A on the new DRM from a little over a month ago:

How many players can the server system support?

There is no limit to how many players can play at the same time. For each title, we carefully study the demand and allocate servers accordingly. We will also of course allocate back-up servers in order to be able to respond to fluctuations in demand. Ubisoft provides 24/7 monitoring of its servers.

This is today:

Due to exceptional demand, we are currently experiencing difficulties with the Online Service Platform. This does not affect customers who are currently playing, but customers attempting to start a game may experience difficulty in accessing our servers. We are currently working to resolve this issue and apologize for any inconvenience.

(Source: Ubisoft Forums)

[

Edited March 8, 2010 by krise madsen

[Rocky]

So potential issues that will prevent you from playing your game.

Your internet goes down.

The Ubi Servers crash.

The Ubi Servers go offline for maintenance.

Quite a bit of scope there for issues.

Damn I missed one.

• Ubi servers can't cope with demand
  

[WhiteKnight77]

From what I have been reading around the net, Ubi is claiming that the cracked games are not complete. I have one question, is that to mean that parts of the games are missing parts to it? Is this why the need for a constant internet connection is needed? Do missions or levels get downloaded only after one is completed? If so, why does one have to pay $60 for a game that isn't complete? Is Ubi giving away DLC? Charging a premium price for half a game is outrageous if true.

Postings at Amazon run the gammut of complaints of the game not connecting to the servers to CTDs from the servers to more of not buying the game until said DRM is removed. I wonder how stock brokers will take the news of many gamers not buying Ubi games and what will happen to Ubi stock when they find out no one is buying any new games from them.

[thales100]

From what I have been reading around the net, Ubi is claiming that the cracked games are not complete. I have one question, is that to mean that parts of the games are missing parts to it? Is this why the need for a constant internet connection is needed?

AC2 wanst cracked, understand this as no "scene" release - you cant play missions with a pirate version, cant save games, just walk around the city, just like a zombie in a forced demo.

There is a cracked version of SH5 in the net, but with many limitations too.

Edited March 8, 2010 by thales100

[=warcloud=]

Ubi servers can't cope with demand

I wonder how stock brokers will take the news of many gamers not buying Ubi games.

"Due to exceptional demand"... tells me Ubisoft games are popular and they must be selling well too ?.

[Sgt. Atoa]

I knew that was going to happen, you can't trust UBI or any other company with this type of DRM period, it's quite funny when people said " I don't mind the online DRM because in this day and age Internet is everywhere" and never accounted for UBI servers going down LoL...even if is for 30 min for me is unnacceptable that I can't play my game because of server issues but since I'm smart to the ones that got those games I have a few words " I TOLD YOU SO"

Edited March 8, 2010 by Sgt. Atoa