Ubisoft's new deal, for new games. Players must be connected to play offline...

[Igo kyu]

The story from slashdot:

http://games.slashdot.org/story/10/01/27/0625244/Future-Ubisoft-Games-To-Require-Constant-Internet-Access

Ubisoft's FAQ:
http://support.uk.ubi.com/online-services-platform/

Is there an "off-line" option?
No. The added services to the game (unlimited installs, online storage of saved games and the fact that you don’t need the game disc to play) require you to have an online connection while playing the game.


Can I play from an airport or when I'm travelling ?
Anywhere you have an internet access, you can play.


What if Ubisoft decides not run these online services in the future? Will my game stop working?
Ubisoft is committed to being a forerunner in providing new exciting online service. If any service is stopped, we will create a patch for the game so that the core game play will not be affected.

Will I need to be online the whole time when I play the game? Including for single player?
Yes. You will need to have an active Internet connection to play the game, for all game modes.

Can I resell my game?
Not at this time.

[SlipBall]

Well thank a modder

[MOH_Hirth]

This is bad, very bad... but necessary, the pirance is killing the solftware creators, years of work and dedication to build a game like SOW and how will pay the work? Is there another option?

[Igo kyu]

I just hope Ubisoft isn't publishing SoW after finding out about this.

I don't pirate, and if it comes to being subjected to this system or nothing, I shall regretfully go with "nothing".

[Modding_Monkey]

I pirate. But only to try the game.
IL2 I bought the day it came out. about 9 years ago now.
SOW I will buy twice and I'm not just saying that.

Very few games I don't buy after trying.

[nearmiss]

Won't work

Too restrictive, yet there is always some braying jackass that somehow gets a good job that is too far beyond the jackass's ability to be able to figure it out before it's too late.

Never fails, look at CFS3 for a good example.

[flyingbullseye]

yet there is always some braying jackass that somehow gets a good job that is too far beyond the jackass's ability to be able to figure it out before it's too late.


Yea, they're called management.

I fail to believe that this will stop piracy if said game is popular enough. All you need is some irritated customer to upload a crack and boom problem fixed. ROF has this, good for it. SOW will surpass its sales quite quick increasing the possibility of a crack. Unless things have changed OM said they have nothing to do with UBI anymore and doesn't like the online only so we should be good anyway.

Flyingbullseye

[Qpassa]

oh shi*

[csThor]

Bye bye Ubisoft. Don't let the door hit ya on the way out. :roll:

[Tree_UK]

Im certain that ubi are not involved with SOW anymore so i dont think this will effect it.

[Letum]

Thank goodness 1C got away in time.

[HFC_Dolphin]

Well, this limitation is still enforced with some code, so... guess what will happen.

In any case, all this piracy talk is repetitive and gets to one conclusion: People pirate only what they wouldn't buy in any case.

Proof is in everyone's home, where you can see carefully stored copies of IL-2 (or other fabulous music/games/etc.) and numerous cd/dvd copies of X-silly product being torn apart by kids, as no one cares to protect them.

[TheGrunch]

As I said on the Ubi forum...great, now I can get booted from an OFFLINE game when my wireless connection goes down. Cheers Ubisoft, that's my favourite part of gaming. :rolleyes:

[Tree_UK]

I think that in some cases software developers have themselves to blame, how many times have we all splashed out £30 - £40 on a game only to find its rubbish or full of bugs and needs patching or simply runs very badly on the PC your using. I'm not advocating piracy but i do know some of my friends will download a cracked copy of a game to try before they buy.

[TheGrunch]

I think that in some cases software developers have themselves to blame, how many times have we all splashed out £30 - £40 on a game only to find its rubbish or full of bugs and needs patching or simply runs very badly on the PC your using. I'm not advocating piracy but i do know some of my friends will download a cracked copy of a game to try before they buy.
Well, add to that that it's the only industry I can think of where you can get a quarter of a game's price for selling it second-hand and then the shop you've sold it puts it up for sale at 90% of its original price...perhaps the numbers are a slight exaggeration for most cases but you get the idea.

[Lucas_From_Hell]

When even neoqb with Rise of Flight is going to change this because it didn't work quite well, they're going to implement it?

Hell, I'd rather go with StarForce ProActive than that. Actually, I prefer even the old "Terminator" than that.

Got really pissed of with this online thing when without internet for a week... Couldn't even play to pass time.

[drafting]

I'm sad about this since I' was really looking forward to Silent Hunter V... Unfortunately, I won't be buying it till they remove that crap.

[Letum]

When even neoqb with Rise of Flight is going to change this because it didn't work quite well


Got a source for this?

[TheGrunch]

Got a source for this?
+1 Good news if it's true...might consider buying it.

[Lucas_From_Hell]

I can't find it anywhere, but I'm sure I saw it in a forum (sadly, I don't remember which one. Probably this one, Eagle Dynamics or Mission4Today)

Apparently, you'll only have to log in for multiplayer gaming - singleplayer will be offline. If I find it I'll post it here ;)

[genbrien]

I think that in some cases software developers have themselves to blame, how many times have we all splashed out £30 - £40 on a game only to find its rubbish or full of bugs and needs patching or simply runs very badly on the PC your using. I'm not advocating piracy but i do know some of my friends will download a cracked copy of a game to try before they buy.

I'm pretty sure a 99% that guy that made a game want it to be wright, but its the top guy with the $ that decide when to release the game, finished or not.....

Dont blame coders please ;)

[Letum]

Links found:

http://riseofflight.com/Forum/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=5560
http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/2920791/3.html


Great news! :grin:
I'll buy it as soon as this happens.

Your turn now Ubi.

[Avimimus]

This may be fine for the average game - but it will kill the sim industry. We rely on having stable installs without automatic patching (so that we can customise the install carefully), and the community relies on having new people be able to buy second-hand copies of games often ten years after they ceased being sold by the original distributor.

It is potentially almost as much of a disaster as the EA debacle (which almost killed the genre and took out 75% of flightsim studios).

This is one more case of the high-development cost, large studio, low replay value, consol style game industry's philosophy being misapplied by management.

This will also make it impossible to play using offline (stable) machines or in areas where dial-up connections are the only ones available.

If need be I'll forgo SoW and just send Oleg's team a cheque to show my support. I may as well not enjoy the sim if the industry is doomed anyway!

Hysterically,

-Avimimus

[tagTaken2]

I can't find it anywhere, but I'm sure I saw it in a forum (sadly, I don't remember which one. Probably this one, Eagle Dynamics or Mission4Today)

Apparently, you'll only have to log in for multiplayer gaming - singleplayer will be offline. If I find it I'll post it here ;)

One of the developers for RoF posted a comment on their forums a while ago, and one of the US distributors has confirmed it (although he fudged a little later on :)
http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/2946149/Jason_from_777_Can_you_clarify.html#Post2946149

I'm optimistic, but I'd still prefer to see an announcement from neoqb.

[MikkOwl]

Who will be publishing Storm of War mainly - 1C Publishing? I hope so.

It is not true that people ONLY pirate things they would never buy. People have various motives and values. Some think it's always ok to not give and only take because it is possible. Some think that which is illegal is always immoral no matter the actual ethics (after all, many evil things are legal). Some people would like to pay for all the things they copied and played through and enjoyed, but don't believe they can afford to do that in every case. I used to copy most things I played in the past. Then (long ago) my favourite gaming studios ever, Looking Glass, went bankrupt, and I had not paid for my favourite games ever. A wake up call. I even bought it later, even though it was already too late. Mmm the Thief Collection...

Since then, I end up buying most of the games I really enjoy playing (the rest I just abandon after trying for a short time). But one thing that I find very discouraging from buying is retarded copy protection systems. I only bought SH3 after they patched it out, and SH4 I bought to show my support but the copy protection really pissed me off, and I barely played it. I'm much happier and likely to hand over my money to the companies that won't try to make my enjoyment of the product I paid for worse.

I think online activation is something I can accept very willingly - it's so easy to find time to get online just for a moment to activate it. If they want, they can require an activation once every month even, with the IMPORTANT distinction that it does not just stop you from using it if not activated past the date, but instead will cease functioning after 2 weeks if not activated. Most people would get online that frequently at least, so it's not intrusive. Any more than that and I rapidly start getting a strongly negative opinion of the product as a whole, and don't want to encourage that sort of behaviour for any publisher doing that.

[Robert]

Jason from 777Studios is the US publisher of RoF and has commented on this in the SimHQ forum. RoF's online requirement will end for off line play. To what extent it's not determined.

http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/2946149/Jason_from_777_Can_you_clarify.html#Post2946149

[Qpassa]

How much time is going to deal Oleg with this kind of people ?

[=FPS=Salsero]

I am not trying to frighten anyone, but absolutely definitely, in no case will I buy any game that requires a constant internet connection, unless it is essential for a gameplay.
For exactly that reason I did not buy the Rise of Flight. They are quite happy with their decision, I am quite happy without their game... total satisfaction... :D

Need I post a photo of the row of Il-2 boxes (AFAIK, I do own both of them, just being away from home), jewel cases with mission packs, Platinum collection, etc. on my shelf ? ;)

[mazex]

Well, it's too bad that all the attempts of making good and non-intrusive DRM systems fail... It feels like the online authentication variant is the only one that really works in the long run, and I don't mind if games use it to get the money needed to develop niche games. Sure - thats easy saying sitting on a 100 Mbit fibre connection that is rock solid and never goes down (great telecom infrastructure in Sweden - maybe 2 hours of Internet downtime in 3 years...)

Edit - happy owner of RoF, and plays Silent Hunter III regularly with no Starforce problems... Will buy SH5 and SoW too (which probably will have some online authentication system to - at least for multiplayer).

[MikkOwl]

happy owner of RoF, and plays Silent Hunter III regularly with no Starforce problems... Will buy SH5 and SoW too (which probably will have some online authentication system to - at least for multiplayer).
I have SH3, and I bought it after the disc check (star force) was removed from what I recall, which was years ago. Soo star force shouldn't be a hassle for you with SH3 ;)

Adobe Photoshop and Corel Painter have 'licensing' (i.e. DRM) software running constantly on one's computer as 'services' if the programs are installed. Very shitty stuff.

No matter what copy protection system, everything can and does get it's DRM removed if it attracts the attention of talented software engineers, and VERY ironically it makes the user distributed versions more desirable to acquire than the publisher distributed versions. Something has gone wrong when the officially distributed version (which they want money for) is inferior to the free versions. At least with the Silent Hunter series one gets a peachy map in the DVD case (I love those things!)

[robtek]

Steel Beasts pro is protected by dongle.
The dongle is quite secure and for Software with a long lifecycle the few euros / dollars more shouldn't matter.
It seems privacy has a price nowadays.

[MikkOwl]

Dongles use a USB port do they not? I remember that "RoboCop 3" for my Amiga 500 had a dongle (which was of shitty quality and it broke, and a friend's father repaired it for me). If it uses a USB port, that is not a good thing. Having to keep track of that dongle is also unecessary annoyances for the consumer.

Dongles do 'something', don't remember what exactly, read some details of one for some audio software once. And that too could be and was cracked - some user made software interfaced and behaved just like the dongle did, enabling anyone to use the application without a dongle.

I find no moral problem with any entrepreneurs using all kinds of (legal, non evil) methods to encourage people to give them money for the software they developed. But the way some go about it is just hostile to consumers, and so consumers choose not to give them their money, which is not immoral either, especially in that circumstance.

[billswagger]

Gaming this way would make no difference to me. I usually play online where a decent connection is required anyway. I also think the industry recognizes that establishing a multiplayer online community is the the key to longevity of a game.
I can't think of a strictly offline game that i would play more than a month or two and for that reason i tend to not even buy those games.

I can't really say much about this approach, but i have no reason to bash it either.
I suppose people are turned off by the idea because it scares them that they have less control as an end user. The way i see it, if i can play a sim with less lag or bugs because it requires every user to have a connection, then i'd be all for it. I get really irritated with some games and the amount of bugs they have even with out such a system.

I don't think the sim world has much to fear with this approach being that most coders and programmers as well as video game producers are aware of the tech side of the industry.
It would only hurt their game if they limited the capacity to utilize the newest sticks, or TIR functions. I just don't see that happening.

The player that loses out is the offliner. As in, no connection. i don't see a user with a computer and no connection being PC savy to the point where gaming would be important to them. I see a lot of negative views toward this approach, but most of you do have a capable connection if you are able to post a rant that opposes it.
Given the world internet market, the 2 percent that don't buy into this idea will not hurt the gaming companies that use this. If I had to lose 5 percent of my customers to shield 30 percent of my profits from piracy then i would do it.
This may also deter other damages that can be incurred on the user end through out the life of the game as its interworkings and exploits are realized.


SOW, as i understand it, will have subsequent planes added to it which can be purchased much like RoF now. What would keep a consumer from buying a plane and disributing it to other players at no cost or lower cost?

What would be the alternative, if you hate the idea of a required connection so much?





Bill

[Letum]

SOW, as i understand it, will have subsequent planes added to it which can be purchased much like RoF now.

What gives you that idea?

[Foo'bar]

Yes please, let us know!

[Lucas_From_Hell]

If I understand it correctly, Storm of War will be just like Il-2, with the difference we won't get new planes and maps in patches.

So, just like you bought Pacific Fighters and added it to your Forgotten Battles, or played it stand-alone, you'll be able to buy your Storm of War: Korea and install it over Battle of Britain, or play it alone. This will be the way we'll get new planes and maps, nothing really new.

The difference: you won't get many maps and etc. we got on free patches and upgrades.

Did I get it right?

[billswagger]

What gives you that idea?

i read this in one of his many interviews. It was along the lines of third party development and that subsequent planes could be added to the game.

http://www.simhq.com/_air11/air_341a.html
http://www.simhq.com/_air11/air_341b.html

This also doesn't discourage the release of patches to the game that offer new maps and planes just the same.
If i'm misquoting, then forgive my ignorance. Its not something i follow word for word, nor am i holding Oleg to something he said some time ago.

This isn't really the issue i was getting at.

With out detracting from the issue of the thread any further, what would be a better alternative to protecting software from piracy or other user end abuses?

I get the impression that most people who play games on a PC also have the internet, and as mentioned before, the video game producers realize that games have longer shelf lives when they can compete in a multiplayer online game.

I urge you to read my earlier post for clarity. :)

Bill

[flyingbullseye]

what would be a better alternative to protecting software from piracy or other user end abuses?


Violent flight sim community vigilante justice.;)

Flyingbullseye

[Eldur]

Hell, I'd rather go with StarForce ProActive than that. Actually, I prefer even the old "Terminator" than that.

Oh yes... I'd prefer any StarForce to that new thing they call "sevice". And I'm really glad that neoqb removes the online necessity in the next update.

The Grunch pointed out one issue: Connection problems. Not just WLAN, but also ISP. Some people have no problems, others have lots. Not to mention the still big amount of "pre-DSL" users that still have to pay for every single minute they're online.

After all I don't want to see my personal data (=savegames) being stored on a server somewhere in the net. If I need them elsewhere, I'll take an USB pendrive anyway.

And if I buy something that I might not like... I want to be able to sell it to someone else if I can't give it back which would just be possible as goodwill gesture.

I wouldn't mind some kind of online activation (well, Win has it since XP in 2001), and maybe even something like a weekly check that just needs a connection for a minute.

+1 Good news if it's true...might consider buying it.

Just check the latest news :)

http://riseofflight.com/Blogs/default.aspx

[Blackdog_kt]

Gaming this way would make no difference to me. I usually play online where a decent connection is required anyway. I also think the industry recognizes that establishing a multiplayer online community is the the key to longevity of a game.
I can't think of a strictly offline game that i would play more than a month or two and for that reason i tend to not even buy those games.

I can't really say much about this approach, but i have no reason to bash it either.
I suppose people are turned off by the idea because it scares them that they have less control as an end user. The way i see it, if i can play a sim with less lag or bugs because it requires every user to have a connection, then i'd be all for it. I get really irritated with some games and the amount of bugs they have even with out such a system.

I don't think the sim world has much to fear with this approach being that most coders and programmers as well as video game producers are aware of the tech side of the industry.
It would only hurt their game if they limited the capacity to utilize the newest sticks, or TIR functions. I just don't see that happening.

The player that loses out is the offliner. As in, no connection. i don't see a user with a computer and no connection being PC savy to the point where gaming would be important to them. I see a lot of negative views toward this approach, but most of you do have a capable connection if you are able to post a rant that opposes it.
Given the world internet market, the 2 percent that don't buy into this idea will not hurt the gaming companies that use this. If I had to lose 5 percent of my customers to shield 30 percent of my profits from piracy then i would do it.
This may also deter other damages that can be incurred on the user end through out the life of the game as its interworkings and exploits are realized.


SOW, as i understand it, will have subsequent planes added to it which can be purchased much like RoF now. What would keep a consumer from buying a plane and disributing it to other players at no cost or lower cost?

What would be the alternative, if you hate the idea of a required connection so much?





Bill

Well, i have had a DSL line for the past 5 years or so, starting from 384Kbps and gradually going to a (nominal, not actual) 24Mbit download/1Mbit upload ADSL line. Everything was fine and although i wasn't getting the full 24, i could routinely get 16-18Mbits of downstream. Until the local power company started doing construction work nearby and everything went to hell. Downstream varies from 1 to 9 Mbits and i get more than 30 disconnects on a bad day. On a good day it will synchronize between 9 and 11Mbits but i still get disconnects, most of the time when i'm about to press the "submit post" button, or the "check inbox" button, or generally doing something that needs to be done at that precise moment.

So for the past 5 months, my net access is stable enough (although marginally) to post a rant about online-protected games, but the fluctuations in actual speed create so much lag that i get ping-kicked out of every single IL2 server on Hypperlobby and the disconnects mean i wouldn't be able to stay on anyway. It's highly likely that i'll have to pay to have a new cable drawn to my house from the terminal box, or have the phone company dig up the roads nearby to fix my problem if it's behind the box (which is their area of responsibility to pay for).

As you can see, even in places where you do have ADSL service and a good one at that, there's just so many random things that can go wrong in a network that making it a mandatory requirement seems a bit silly to me. I'm not buying anything with such a requirement until they either lift it themselves or it's cracked, at which point i can buy a game and apply a crack to remove the things that annoy me. Of course, the irony in this is pretty strong, but since we've reached a point where the pirated games are more stable than the stock versions it's something to be expected. The more draconian DRM becomes, the more sales will be thanks to pirates who bypass DRM, instead of lost because of them.

[billswagger]

The world isn't perfect and things do go wrong on occasions, but your connection is still three times faster than mine and i have no troubles.
Much of what you described could happen to anyone i suppose, but the likelihood is rare. Your real problem sounds like your utility company, not the gaming companies.
The internet and computers is like shoes and socks, it doesn't make much sense to have one with out the other. When you mention cracks, and such, its precisely why this sort of thing is being done. I remember when online registration got you a key code for most games, but even that is not good enough anymore with the advent of torrents and such cracks.

Really all i hear is a bunch of nay saying and complaints, which might be justified, but you should recognize you are the minority on this one. Most people who play games just go along with whats required and seldom ever poke their kilobytes into a forum discussion.

I can understand why people are put off by change. I think of it as a sign of the times.
There are many other services offered through an internet connection. Banking, billpay, ebay, etc etc.

[=FPS=Salsero]

>Banking, billpay, ebay, etc etc.

And all these services require you constantly being online, eh? ;)

Anyway, developers have said:

.....we came to the conclusion that you all needed the ability to fly without a permanent internet connection (in some game modes). A network connection will still be necessary for new user account and profile creation. ...

That's OK. When they will roll this patch out - I am going down this link (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Rise-Of-Flight-PC-DVD/dp/B002JCS5J0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1265643042&sr=8-1).

No earlier, though.

Thanks, Eldur.

[zakkandrachoff]

Will I need to be online the whole time when I play the game? Including for single player?
Yes. You will need to have an active Internet connection to play the game, for all game modes.
.


This is a very stupid idea.

The best proposition is that the people that download Storm of War battle of Britain from internet and parched that, cannot actualizing when Korea theatre release. And other series to. SOW will continue to more than 2030. Never can they parch everything series.

I have so many problems for play whit internet connection. I live in the rural and have so many crashes on the line of internet and the service CIUDAD FLASH is not good too.

At least, only require internet to open Storm Of War. And play offline without internet connection.

I don’t buy Rise Of Flight because is only constantly connected playing. when have a crash in the modem or in the line (all the time), crash my single player game. So stupid. very.

[Blackdog_kt]

The world isn't perfect and things do go wrong on occasions, but your connection is still three times faster than mine and i have no troubles.
Much of what you described could happen to anyone i suppose, but the likelihood is rare. Your real problem sounds like your utility company, not the gaming companies.
The internet and computers is like shoes and socks, it doesn't make much sense to have one with out the other. When you mention cracks, and such, its precisely why this sort of thing is being done. I remember when online registration got you a key code for most games, but even that is not good enough anymore with the advent of torrents and such cracks.

Really all i hear is a bunch of nay saying and complaints, which might be justified, but you should recognize you are the minority on this one. Most people who play games just go along with whats required and seldom ever poke their kilobytes into a forum discussion.

I can understand why people are put off by change. I think of it as a sign of the times.
There are many other services offered through an internet connection. Banking, billpay, ebay, etc etc.

Small correction, my connection is 3 times faster than yours when it works. The bandwidth is there, but the delay in getting anything to start transmitting is such that i can't do much more than browse websites. Servers i used to fly on in Hypperlobby are totally out of reach because i might have enough bandwidth to transmit the needed data, but it lags as much as 2 seconds behind what is actually happening at that time, result is ping-kick.
In such a case, how would i be able to play a game that not only authenticates (which is a minimal amount of data), but also streams a good chunk of data back and forth? In Ubi's new deal they say that even the saved games are stored remotely and in new games, these could be anything from a few KB to quite a few MB in size. In Dragon Age origins for example, saves are close to 10MB each.
Now let's move away from my personal example and take a look at the big picture, geographically large countries like Australia, Canada and even the US, where a big part of the population lives in areas that broadband is not yet feasible or too expensive. I was surprised to read it, but someone pointed out that 30% of internet users in the US are still on dial-up.

I don't know, but i think that these measures have a good change of losing them more sales due to the inability of willing customers to meet the requirements, than they would lose if they used something that's easier to pirate but also easier to live with if you are a legitimate buyer.

I think the people who object to this are far from the minority, especially among the flight sim crowd. Look at Rise of Flight, how many copies do you think they have sold and why are they now lifting the online requirement? I don't know exactly myself, but i have a suspicion. Maybe it's because their protection system turned away so many people that they had sold a measly 40000 copies a full 6 months after game release (deduced from a survey they e-mailed to their customers, registered users on their forums and demo users, that's where the number comes from).

People who just go along with everything they are servred without questioning the internal workings of the deal are usually late-comers to the PC gaming scene, they belong to a different gaming background like consoles, or they came to the PC from consoles. To this part of the gamer demographic tweaking and configuring is respectively unknown because they are late adopters, not needed and impossible because they play on consoles, or unkown because they come from consoles and didn't need or even couldn't take a look under the hood up till now.

On the other hand, people who have for a couple of decades been given the option to tweak things on their own and are interested in the technical side of things will always question what goes on under the hood. I think that someone with a keen interest in aircraft is more likely to belong to this second category and not the first one, so the sales will be shaped accordingly.

The proof is right before our eyes again. If simmers didn't question and dislike such measures, why would RoF not surpass the 50k mark in sales a full 6 months after release? Don't tell me it's an niche-within-a-niche product, it is, but IL2 expansions sold like crazy, the original IL2 also sold well and it was a niche-within-a-niche product too.
Had anyone ever done anything about the eastern front up till then? Nah, but there had been previous titles dealing with WWI. In a sense, what Maddox and company risked and managed to pull off with their choice of theater was even harder than what RoF does. WWI is not as popular as WWII for a sim setting, but it's definitely more popular than eastern front WWII.

In any case, voting is done with the wallet mainly and as long as we are strong-willed enough to stay away from games that punish you for buying them, it will start becoming very costly for the companies to keep producing, maintaining and bundlig a bunch of artificial fiery loopholes along with the real piece of software. The only 100% sure defence against piracy is a happy, dedicated and enthusiastic customer that respects your work, the rest is just wishful thinking and money-sinks that fail to stem the tide of piracy while aggravating the legitimate customers.

[billswagger]

I dont think RoF sales figures have much to do with the connection requirement.
I seem to remember reading that the first release was as much a beta release by the opinion of the users. Remember hearing of high load times, and lots of stutters?
Needless to say, RoF has probably had a slow start but it still lives up to what i think most people can expect from a newer game engine. Its a popular game amongst the sim world and many people admit to putting more time into it than they might Il2, except one thing.
The most common downside i read about concerning RoF was the lack of online (multiplayer) services, which like i've previously mentioned seems to indicate how well a game does. I also haven't been following RoF as closely, so maybe this is an area they have also improved upon.
Do you know if they are lifting a connection requirement, or was that just speculation?

It might be better to look at services like Steam which require a connection for all their game downloads. It seems they are doing well and still i hear a lot of nay saying against steam. If it were that much of an issue they would be out of business. Fact is, you are the minority, its just the 2 percent who are against these services tend to have the louder voices. Generally, people don't hop on a forum to praise a service. People are 20 times more likely to cast something in a negative shadow because they are unhappy.

I'm not really advocating for this service with SoW, but i would like to play a decent hack free game. I know you and I both might appreciate the game and its creators, but what keeps the next guy from wanting it for free or even worse giving himself a slight advantage in the multiplayer world? Is that not bad for the game?
what would be a better alternative to a required connection?

[Blackdog_kt]

RoF had a lot of things that needed patching, but the most cause for gnashing of teeth was given by the DRM used, with the pay-per-plane add-on system coming second. So, how did the DRM work out bad for them? Very simple, many people can and will live with a half-complete game until it's patched to a satisfactory standard, as long as it's easy to use. Heck, one might even get suckered into it without paying too much attention to the unfinished bits if it doesn't stray from one fundamental axiom: games are meant to be entertainment and that means you get to use it at your own discretion. If you institute things like a mandatory 300 megabyte update that happens to be on my day off, well you've just ruined my gaming evening and lost yourself a customer.

The moment you use restrictive systems like these is the moment you lost a large chunk of your impulse buyers. Not only that, but if you give the cranky, high maintenance flight-sim crowd (there's no use denying it, we're a demanding audience compared to other kinds of games) reason to pause with your DRM, then they'll have enough time to thorougly dissect your game and find everything that's faulty with it. Now i'm not advocating that companies should sucker the consumer into buying an unfinished game, but this discussion is meant to be an example of how heavy-handed DRM can look bad even from the developer's and publisher's point of view.

Oh and yes, they have confirmed it themselves that they are doing away with it on their blog, so it's already strike one for DRM in the simulator world. The next big showdown will be silent hunter 5, the last in a long line of games that sold very well. When a simulator series (about submarines none the less) manages to sell a couple million copies or more it's definitely a success. With UBI's new system, SH5 falls under the constant connection deal. I'm waiting to see how well or badly it sells. I'm guessing that it will be much like RoF, the guys who are really hardcore about their sub-genre within the simulator genre will buy it, defend it and say it's no big deal in order to convince the rest to chip in and keep it from selling badly, while the rest of the crowd who's interested in more kinds of simulators than just the particular sub-genre will pass it by until the company caves in. So yes, i expect it to sell worse than SH3 or SH4 did.

Finally, let's take a moment to ask ourselves how did we live before mandatory connections and how did a lot of succesful companies manage to thrive despite piracy? Of course there are the studios that had to close because of piracy, but there's an equal or greater amount of game designers than overcame the obstacles and they didn't really have much in the way of copy protection going for them.

This includes giants like Blizzard, with games like Diablo and Starcraft being top-sellers and propelling the company to greatness despite the fact that they were both heavily pirated. Why? Because they took care of their legitimate customers and they even let non-customers have a taste of their product. You could play Starcraft on LAN with your buddy with just one copy of the game, as long as you installed a specially modified, stripped down version of the game. Then you could host a session and he could join in. He couldn't host himself, play on the internet match-making service or play the single player campaigns, but he could play all the races and units in the game if he had a friend to host LAN sessions for him, without even paying a cent. This didn't come with limited installation, activations or any other redundant and useless artificial hurdles, it just had a serial number when you installed the game and you could install the light version on as many of your buddies' PCs as you wanted. That is good marketing right there, we had ONE guy in our group that bought it and after he started handing out the "light" version to the rest of us and playing some sessions on LAN, we all ended up buying the game as well. Contrast this system that served them so well, with the upcoming Starcraft 2 title where you won't even be able to play on LAN but only through their proprietary service and it will ship in three parts, with every 1/3 of the game priced as a full stand-alone title, and something becomes clear...it's no more about survival, but about the ability to run market analysis on customer demographics by collecting data from them, control how your customer uses the product in accordance your liking and not his and in some cases, plain greed.

Better yet another question, how has DRM and mandatory connection requirements stopped piracy? The answer is they haven't. Black Shark is pirated. ArmA2 was pirated before they lifted the DRM. Grand Theft Auto IV with its online authentication and release date restrictions? Ditto, just set your system clock 5 days forward, apply crack and play 5 days before the game is even on the shelves. Empire Total War, a game that even its boxed version requires a Steam account? Yup, it was leacked days prior to release, a friend of mine was using it as a demo and was half-way through the campaign before the original versions showed up in the stores and he actually bought it. The latest Need for Speed Shift also had connection requirements and guess what? Yup, it didn't prevent people from pirating it, it even runs with your router turned on but it doesn't connect to EA's servers. What about Warhammer 40000: Dawn of War 2, which i think requires both a Steam account and a Games for Windows Live account? You guessed right, that one is circulating freely among pirates too.

So, my question is, since they can't prevent these people from stealing their games no matter what they do, why are they trying to contain the phenomenon with means that are not only ineffective but also p*ss off their legitimate customers? Are they such masochists that they want to further hurt their sales by turning away their fans as well? Or are these decisions made not by the developers, but by a bunch of accountants who have absolutely no connection with the demographics and culture of the PC gamer crowd and think that we'll buy any half-baked, unfinished game they throw at us that requires you to jump through fiery hoops while fighting a polar bear with one arm tied behind your back before it even lets you see the introduction screen?

I'm betting on the latter and if you do some digging around on the internet you'll see that many developers are trying to self-publish their work and not have to deal with dedicated publishers anymore for this simple reason alone. They have no freedom whatsoever to decide how their own creation will be shaped, distributed and marketed if they end up working with a big publisher. Some companies use simple copy protection like serials and disk checks, some other use light versions of DRM and some use nothing at all, but the truth remains that some of the most succesful and certain low-key but highly specialized developer studios are doing just fine on their own without imposing ridiculous requirements on their customers and that is for a very simple reason. They make games that none of the big studios care about and even though their market share might be small, their audiences are small, dedicated communities that will buy their work out of mutual respect alone. That, gentlemen is how you defeat piracy, by showing the guy who's giving you cash the necessary respect so that he will feel pampered and well treated and continue buying your stuff. Just my 2 cents as usual :cool:

[flyingbullseye]

+1, well said Blackdog_kt.

Flyingbullseye