EA Loosens Spore, Mass Effect DRM

An anonymous reader writes "In response to recent criticism, EA has decided to eliminate the periodic validation of Mass Effect and Spore. 'Specifically, EA's plan to dial in to game owner's computers every ten days to check whether they were running a legitimate version of their software has been scrapped, ShackNews reports. EA had planned to use the validation method for upcoming titles Mass Effect and Spore. EA now says that validation will now only occur when a user attempts to download new content for either game. Chief among the voices in opposition to this measure were members of the armed forces, who pointed out that they could not rely on having an internet connection every ten days.'"

Sudden outbreak...

of common sense?

Re:Sudden outbreak...

Something like that, sure.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2008/5/9/ [penny-arcade.com]

Re:Sudden outbreak... No not Really

No, more like reacting to bad publicity. Sort of like what our elected officials do. Float a trial balloon and then act according to the poll results.

Re:Sudden outbreak...

- Announce heavy-handed DRM
- "Listen" to backlash from fans
- Announce less heavy-handed DRM
- Pat yourself on the back when the fans lavish praise on you, knowing you still got your foot in the door anyway

Sudden outbreak of common sense, my foot!

Re:Sudden outbreak...

I was thinking the same thing - could they really have been serious about the 10-day DRM? It wasn't as if people's reactions were unpredictable, so I find it hard to believe that they honestly thought people wouldn't complain. As you pointed out, this seems more like a conscious "Door-in-the-face" technique [wikipedia.org] than a legitimate retraction.

Re:Sudden outbreak...

They said that one of the primary objections were from soldiers. I think looking unpatriotic/unAmerican/unSupportTheTroops would be very bad for business.
Maybe another factor was the realization that a large number of soldiers are coming home from Iraq with PTSD and good weapons handling skills and that it could be bad for more than business.

Pictured?

> EA had planned to use the validation method for upcoming titles Mass Effect and Spore (pictured).

Those games look a lot like a joystick.

Publicity

The original story on this garnered attention from quite a large crowd (even just in the scope of Slashdot). It would have been foolish on their part to plug ahead when, as was pointed out by a poster on the original thread, their customer service was already trained with what to tell people who didn't like the model: 'complain so that we don't make the same mistake with our next game release.'

Phew!

I was worried I'd have to actually buy Spore.

Re:Phew!

I don't know about everyone else, but protection like this makes me MUCH less likely to buy a game.

Re:Phew!

...after the intial install an online registration you never have to bother validating your copy of the game if you don't want to get new patches or play online... they dropped the overly silly requirement of having the CD/DVD in the drive while playing the game

Shelving the new requirement of needing a connection every few days, and then dumping the old requirement of occupying my DVD drive with a disk, is excellent news. Alcohol 120% will be out of business, but I'm glad I won't need them.

This is a win for both sides. Company saves money on non-game related development and infrastructure; customers' frustration level drops.

Re:Phew!

I was more worried I would have to boycott Spore. Checking in when I DL content is ok cause then I am connected, but if the game is going to stop working due to extended lack of access to a connection, well... fuck em.

Re:Phew!

I was worried I'd have to pirate it.

The Horror

Chief among the voices in opposition to this measure were members of the armed forces, who pointed out that they could not rely on having an internet connection every ten days.

1914/18... Trenchfoot becomes rife due to lack of access to dry footwear/socks.

1939/45... Troops freeze through the Battle of the Bulge, across Russia.

2008... Access to certain videogames sometimes limited in certain situations for a few days until net access can be resecured.

I know "Won't anybody think of the troops!" is second only to "Won't anybody think of the children!" and can thus never be questioned unless you're a terrorist as well as a paedophile.. but there comes a point where the rallying cry is used for such ludicrously trivial things that it just devalues everyone involved.

Re:The Horror

Um, what? Nobody is comparing it to trench foot or freezing in the winter because you're stuck outdoors and people are shooting at you. However there is a large class of people who go without internet connections for long periods of time, and that class of people doesn't appreciate this kind of DRM scheme. It says nothing about other bad things they may experience.

Your argument could be used to justify almost any bad treatment.

"Sarge, this stew tastes like horse meat!"

"Shut up and eat your stew, Private. Just be glad you don't have trench foot!"

Or, what the hell, I guess I shouldn't ever complain about anything, because some of my ancestors had to live through famines.

How about?

You don't like their policies or practices then don't fucking buy it. Thats the loudest thing you can say.

Uhhhhh

I think that the real reason is because military personnel are non-trivial consumers of entertainment products. When you have a bunch of young people, with a good deal of free money on their hands (if you are deployed in a combat zone you get more pay, and generally have few expenses since everything is handled), and a situation that sucks, well that's a good target for entertainment goods. I know when one of my ex roommates graduated and was getting ready to go off he got a nice laptop and plenty of games and movies. The guys who do Red vs Blue said Iraq was one of the top countries ordering their DVDs. Wasn't Iraqis ordering, it was troops.

Thus it would be dumb for EA to shut out a large market. Especially since both of these games have strong single player components, and thus are of interest when you aren't going to have net access.

It isn't being used as a rallying cry, it is that the soldiers were honestly concerned they wouldn't be able to get their game on.

Um, there's a problem with this.

EA now says that validation will now only occur when a user attempts to download new content for either game. Spore is built on downloadable content. Throughout the game, the creatures you encounter, the worlds you visit, the buildings you see--they are all player-created objects and will all be downloaded in the background while the game is running. Spore is a game that only works well with downloadable content, and if I have to enter a validation code every time the game decides to download a creature or a planet, I'm not sure the promising gameplay will be worth the hassle.

Re:Um, there's a problem with this.

Except that by definition, if you're downloading new content, you have an active net connection. The 10 day thing was arbitrary. A user might be without net connection at that time, at which point they wouldn't be accessing such content but would still be barred from playing the single player game.

Life goes on

There probably isn't a lot of love for EA around here (or many parts of the internet in general) but you do have to admit that they responded fairly well to the situation. From what I've read the approach that they're planning to take now is actually pretty good, if not better than what most of us are probably used to dealing with. The fact that I don't need to have the CD in the drive while playing the game [kotaku.com] is a nice touch, especially for anyone who likes to switch between games frequently.

The only thing that you could really complain about is the necessity of an internet connection to validate on install. The only other time it bothers to validate is if you're downloading an update or using some other online feature which means you're already connected to the internet.

As someone who was a little put off by the overly encumbering DRM that was originally planned to be included, I'd like to tip my hat to EA for listening to their customers and making a wise decision.

More to worry about than that

The only thing that you could really complain about is the necessity of an internet connection to validate on install.

As with any complicated software system (especially one acting over the internet), there's a lot that can go wrong. If it doesn't work for any reason, they'll have spent a lot of money turning happy customers into angry returners.

A wise decision would be to forgo the DRM altogether, and apply the savings to reducing the retail price of the games. I guarantee that will have a far greater effect on sales than any DRM scheme ever would.

I DID IT! IT'S ALL ME!

In a drunk fit last night I actually sent a rant to them about it, I don't remember what I said exactly but I pointed out that DRM has actually driven me to download games instead of pay for them and if I couldn't expect to defeat the copy protection bullshit then I just wouldn't play the game.

Nothing no one's thought or said before, but I'm sure if enough gaming curmudgeons drank enough smirnoff ice at the same time while listening to EBM then there would surely be a rival to the mass mailing botnets that don't actually have anything useful to tell anyone.

It's freaking hot in here and Qwerty pisses me off. I'm going to drink some vinegar and go to bed.

It's still bad, even if it's a little better

One of the things about being god awful bad at something is you can improve a lot and still stink.

The DRM still only allows three total installs for the lifetime of the game (although you can call EA tech support and ask for more, no guarantee though). I have many games that have existed on more than three of my personal computers. Just glancing at my shelf I see 1830, Star Fleet Command, Transport Tycoon, Starcraft, Rome Total War and the list goes on. I don't want to have to beg tech support every time I upgrade my game machine, many of these companies don't even exist anymore.

The fact of the matter is that DRM that limits the total number of times you can install the game is unacceptable. They may have fixed other problems with the DRM, but this issue remains.

Re:I've said it before, I'll say it again.

I don't want to come of as pro-DRM, but I have a simple question for you?

Do you plan to purchase or play this game?

Considering that it's a heavily anticipated game and generally recognized as being one of the more creative and innovative titles to come in in a while, it's probably reasonable for me to expect that you want to play Spore. Your stated hate for DRM leads me to believe that you couldn't bring yourself to actually pay for any product that comes with any type of DRM. Assuming that you both want to play this game and don't want to deal with the DRM, would you pirate it?

If so, you're contributing to the reason why these companies think they need to have DRM. I can understand why people will pirate things when cost is a factor since I did it myself once upon a time, but if you pirate this game simply to spite the paid version which has DRM you're probably not doing the cause any help.

I appologize in advance for potentially mislabeling you or constructing a situation involving you from so little information, but I have a feeling that there are a few people who will pirate the game just because they dislike the notion of DRM despite the fact that they're going to play the hell out of it and had the money to easily purchase it.

This is blowing my mind

Assuming that you both want to play this game and don't want to deal with the DRM, would you pirate it?

The DRM is meant to prevent people from pirating the game, but he's going to pirate the game to avoid the DRM, which justifies EA's use of DRM, even though without the DRM he would buy the game.

Actually, you know, that's probably exactly how the execs over at EA think.