In one of Oleg's simHQ interviews i somehow got the idea that he's not really keen on these methods. I could live with a one-time online activation that i can transfer to a new PC/OS at my leisure, something that's tied to a gmail account for example.
However, limited activations/deactivations and constant connectivity is a no go for me. There are quite a few titles i didn't buy because of this, as well as some that I wait until they are cracked first and then i buy them.
Silent Hunter 5 for example. I didn't buy it, but now that it's cracked and i can play at my own leisure, i'm thinking of picking it up. Aside from the irony however (if people need cracks before they buy the game, it's like pirates making them money), it's obvious what that does for the title's success. By the time i get SH5 its price will probably have dropped from 50 to 30 Euros, maybe even less. Not to mention it's unfinished state at release made me think "i'll wait 6 months for mods and patches", by which time i could be occupied with something else and skip it completely.
Similarly, RoF i could have been suckered into buying if it wasn't for the always online thing. By the time it got dropped (partially dropped actually), the rest of the game's shortcomings had been so well documented that i decided i'm not going to buy it regardless of copy protection. Chalk up one more lost sale thanks to DRM. It gave me reason to pause and a chance to see beyond the protection and into all the other things i equally disliked about its game design decisions. Essentially, that's killing off impulse buying. With Starcraft 2 and SoW around the corner, i have no use for RoF.
These so called protection schemes only present challenges for hackers (they do it out of competition between hacker groups most of the times), they make the game unplayable for a few days/weeks for people who will not buy it anyway (aka they are not lost sales if the DRM can't force them to buy it), and to top it all off they make it a hindrance for legitimate buyers, who will hold off on their purchase until it's in the bargain bin. And here lies the million dollar question. Is it worth it turning away the people who want to give you money, just to spite the ones who will never give you any money anyway, for a few weeks tops?
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