Simple don’t buy those games and also go to the company forums and say you’re not buying them because of this stupid copy protection. Then point them to Star Dock and tell them that Star Dock is trying to make consumers happy not drive them away with crap copy protection which will be broke in about an hour after release by the hackers anyway. I did not buy Bioware because of the crap they put in there new games I stopped buying anything valve because of the crap they did to there games via copy protection. I buy Star Dock and Paradox games without question as they are simple and don’t bug you with the copy protection. I do believe many companies want there games to fail to get rid of PC games and go all consoles IMO.

Boycott any games that have bad copy protection and go to there forums and post about not buying there games. Make them feel it in the pocket and let everyone know to not buy them until they change the copy protection.

Real physical items are finite and have a cost associated with them. If you steal a physical item money has been lost, the store is out of the product to sell. Downloads, however, are infinite and have no cost associated with them (they just pay off developement cost). Therefore stealing digital items is different from physical items.

If a pirate steals a digital copy, and was never going to buy a copy, then the company hasn't lost a sale or any item of value.

There have been occasions where people have pirated digital contents and decided to buy them. My brother downloaded The Simpsons Movie, which I later bought. A better example is when he downloaded Idiocracy, a movie I would probably never have watched, which I bought because I liked it.

I believe stealing is wrong, that piracy is stealing, and that it shouldn't be done even if you were never going to buy the digital item. I have never illegally downloaded anything. I do believe that DRM just hurts the consumer since pirates will just break it anyway.

sigh this is turning into another one of those "pirates are mean evil thieves who steal from others"

i find this 10 day thing to be retarded. What if you travel around a lot and you don't have internet?? What about those people who aren't very good with computers, thier firewall or router wont allow it to connect to the internet and they will have no idea what to do about it.

tired of hearing people spamming pirates are to blame when people get turned away from buying thier products because of retarded systems like these

yeah pretty lame will make me think twice about getting these two games

I was contemplating Spore, but now I saw let the Chinese have it!

Great post dude

I would just like to point out that I, in fact, did purchase GalCiv2 because it has no anti-piracy in it.

The only reason I ever heard about this place was because StarForce decided to throw a tantrum and posted links to GalCiv warez after Stardock rejected their DRM scheme. I read about it on Slashdot, then followed the links to this site and thought, "Hey, I like these guys. They know which way the money flows, so they don't make you put up with all the annoying crap everyone else is pushing. I wonder if their game is any good?"

Since then, I've purchased the GalCiv2/Dread Lords Gold Edition, pre-ordered the Twilight expansion, and convinced others to purchase their own copies of the game. All this is because StarForce is a bunch of vindictive crybabies and Stardock had the courage to stand up to them. So please forgive me if I find it credible that Stardock largely owes its success to its anti-DRM stance, and the pro-customer mentality that spawned it.

Some people don't like spyware on their systems. Many nanny programs are spyware. Go read about EA's 2142 system. It's not the end of the world, but if I buy a game (or license for a game), I want to be able to play it. What if I go away on a trip? What if I don't have internet at home, and only use it at school? I can't play these games until the crack comes out.

I also download the CD cracks for EVERY game I Legally buy. Why? Because it's annoying to hunt through all my cd's, I want to start the game without digging through a shelf of titles. There are 3 things I look for in a game. The 1st is if the game interests me (Mass Effect does), the 2nd is if it requires the CD, and the 3rd is how retarded the copy protection will make it for me to play the game I purchased. I won't get mass effect or spore because it will annoy me having to prove I own it legally every ten days. I've never pirated a game, ever. I believe in purchasing what I have, but I'm not a fan of being punished for something I don't do, so I abstain by not buying games that do punish me or treat me like I need to be controlled. A favorite quote of mine is (not verbatim) "Those that sacrifice liberty for safety, deserve neither."


Sure, it's easy to say Pirates are to blame, and in some degree, that's true, but you're assuming that people who pirate all of their games, would have actually bought that game. Something I do pirate is music, and if there is an album I want, I go buy it. But I just get bored and DL random things until I find something I like, if I like more of that particular music, I go buy it. I would never purchase 99% of the things I've downloaded. I think that attitude is fairly common among those who aren't comfortable in the arms of big brother.

There are idiots on both sides of the issue, but consider what if the server went down for a month and no one could play their game? EA is many things, and they do help make some good games, but they are rarely reliable, and their customer service/game support/patch updates/post game release neglect is universally secure as horrible. I'll buy the games when the get cracked, if they don't, I'll never buy them. EA will keep getting richer and I'll keep my self respect by requiring a basic level of respect from anyone who I deal with. Seems fair to me.

Trying to understand how anyone could possibly think that's a good idea is just... *facepalm*

Ugh...

I dealt with SecuROM on Bioshock because i made the mistake of playing the demo and finding out it was a really good game.

I'm thinking i could live without Mass Effect despite really wanting to play it.

Spore was shaping up to be one of those games that would appeal to everybody (like The Sims), but i have a feeling the excessive copy protection is going to really annoy both hardcore gamers and casual gamers...

It must collect something. From what I understand of what I've read on the BioWare forums, if you make too radical a change to your hardware, the game will force you to reactivate (and you only get 3 reactivations).

I think it's it's control freaks that thought up that idea. I think it's fear mongers and crafty marketers who did a bad job and decided to blame others that got copy protection in general use.

Am I missing something? Where in that link does it say anything about Spore having that copy protection? It seems exclusively for bioshock.

Anyway, it is doubtful that spore will have that sort of copy protection. One of the demostrational speeches indicated that spore would be able to be played fully offline for those without internet connections. Spore will be one of those flagship games for EA that will hit the broadest audience possible (releasing on all platforms possible) and therefore (if they are smart.. which I have my doubts as it is EA we are talking about) they will limit the copy protection. It would make sense that they would learn their lesson with as much trouble as casual gamers have getting The Sims2 to run. Spore will need to be light on the copy protection system in order to truly be a success.

Anyway, enough of my rambling. I just want to know where the forum post says anything about spore. Thanks.

*sigh* where's an edit when you need it? My above was supposed to quote Kyro.

Testify, brother! I also bought GalCiv Gold Edition. And I haven't even played it yet. Why did I buy it? Because of no DRM. Oh, I'll definitely play it, but the reason I bought it was no DRM and because I wanted to support Stardock's great stance on the issue. And I'll be buying Twilight of the Arnor as well.