Spore suffers backlash for draconian anti-piracy measures.
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more from Culture:
http://gamernode.com/news/7410-piracy-rampant-on-spore-drm-fails/inde...
Ironies of ironies. It seems that Spore has been downloaded, illegally, over an estimated 500,000 times on BitTorrent, which puts Spore on track as becoming the most illegally downloaded game in history.
We pause as everyone catches their breath from laughing and making rude noises.
EA decided to put SecuROM, an anti-pirating routine, on Spore in an attempt to prevent illegal copying. Immediate reaction from gamers was overwhelming at Amazon.com, where the game received 2,016 1-star ratings (the lowest score) out of 2,216 reviews. Among other things, gamers balked at the 3-limit installation of the game on their PCs.
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simplecj
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What can companies do??
For PC gamers, they could require that a secure USB key is inserted before allowing access to the game. I know that that is fairly effective as the heavily encrypted USB keys are alot harder to duplicate than it is to rip a disk.
Many companies with expensive design and analysis software are using them. The give away the installation discs basically for free, but you have to buy the USB key to use it.
With newer game consoles adopting the USB ports it would seem they could implement this for those systems as well.
- 1 year ago
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simplecj
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NotAJamacianMon
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I think the greatest example of thwarting piracy was Apple. In the face of Napster in high gear, Apple came up with a way that made it simple and easy to buy your music.
While other record companies were suing 13 year olds in a terrible PR move, Apple created iTunes. Kids could still get their music for free - but chose to pay.
As for computer games, I think it may be possible as well. There are a few options, maybe have instruction booklets or neat extras that come in the box that will make people want to buy the games. ( Remember all the goodies that came with Infocom games? ).
Have some online extras that you can only get if you properly register the game online, but don't make this a requirement. Many games now have a Campaign (single player mode), and Multiplayer. A lot of games (like Halo 3) have a great multiplayer, the game wouldn't be the same without it.
- 1 year ago
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NotAJamacianMon
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LarzNero
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What can be done to prevent piracy? Not a lot. People consider it a right now to copy something, if you try to fight it - as in this case, the people rebel. Like it or not, some media is more easily duplicated.
- 1 year ago
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LarzNero
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NotAJamacianMon
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This anti-piracy scheme had a backlash at first, then in the end caused more people to pirate the game.
Here's my question:
What can companies do to prevent piracy? What would be the best method that would prevent piracy and not needlessly hassle legitimate customers?
- 1 year ago
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NotAJamacianMon
