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

I have, although I appreciate that. My thing is, and remains, that I really just “don’t want that”.

I have concerns with how their “unique ID"s are generated that identify which owner is using these activations. If they’re using hardware profiling, I’m done at the door. If they’re not, I can use drive imaging to get around it.

I don’t like having to manually un-install stuff, especially where I might need to revert to a previous state on my PC, or I’m otherwise locked away from my drive.

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The Kidney Punch Of Legendary Peace

One sure and primary and fundamental fact is the joint existence of a subject and of its world. The one does not exist without the other. I acquire no understanding of myself except as I take account of objects, of the surroundings. I do not think unless I think of things — and there I find myself. - Bruce Lee

Actually, Patness.  Have you heard of the Bioshock Revoke Tool?  It lets you remove your activation token so you can erase and reload your copy of Bioshock without using up an activation tool.

http://www.2kgames.com/cultofrapture/revoketool.html

I’ve been playing WoW all day so all I can think of us “0wned!” and “EPIC FAIL!!!” to describe that picture.

Speaking of Bioshock - I did a look at the 2K games forums to see if there were any problems with the state of their DRM (I found out about Mass Effect and Spore via Kotaku).

Oh yeah. Tons. Like, a page full of problems just DRM- (and no-cd-crack-) related just today. So, no Bioshock for me*. Maybe I’ll convince my brother to lend me his Xbox in exchange for my PC for a while this summer.

edit: *Unless I can circumvent the DRM myself.

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The Kidney Punch Of Legendary Peace

One sure and primary and fundamental fact is the joint existence of a subject and of its world. The one does not exist without the other. I acquire no understanding of myself except as I take account of objects, of the surroundings. I do not think unless I think of things — and there I find myself. - Bruce Lee

59% Combativeness, 53% Sneakiness, 26% Intellect, 69% Spirituality

Combative, stealthy, and spiritual; you are a Ranger!
Rangers are the warriors of the woodlands. Stealthy, skilled in combat, and capable of casting spells, they are fearsome opponents and skilled hunters. Rangers are usually accompanied by an animal companion and have a tendency to either use a bow, or to wield a melee weapon in each hand.
Sneaky, aggressive, and faithful, though not overly inclined towards that “book learning,” you’re probably a pretty dangerous person when you want to be. You may be a staunch defender of the forests, but I don’t trust you.

That was fucking funny!

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Brother Spikey Mace of Patience

Unitarian Jihad Name: Get Yours
Unitarian Jihad Background

That was a bit harsh wasn’t it Last_Hussar? I mean, what did black gay Jews ever do to you?

I’m glad you find my hernia funny, Leguru.  If you are not careful I’ll break my rules, and give it to you.

Why can’t Moloch admit to himself he’s a black gay Jew.  Maybe when he is in his later teens he’ll be able to accept the fact.

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“Pickles are evil”
- K Patrick Glover, 10 June 2007

We’ll re-authenticate when a player uses online features, downloads new content or a patch for their game.

Which means it’ll definitely be more often than every five or ten days for most people.

You’ll still be able to install and play on multiple computers.

How many (and how many re-installs) is the deal breaker for me.

I agree that education is the answer. I was semi-freetarded myself until I started working at a software company and getting a paycheck for what I did.

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I will not attack your doctrines nor your creeds if they accord liberty to me. If they hold thought to be dangerous - if they aver that doubt is a crime, then I attack them one and all, because they enslave the minds of men.

-Robert G. Ingersoll

I’ve only noticed two things at work:
1) Nothing happens and everything seems fine
2) The computer goes ballistic is IE 6.0 is installed on the computer you are upgrading to SP3. BE SURE you upgrade IE before going to SP3!!

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Brother Spikey Mace of Patience

Unitarian Jihad Name: Get Yours
Unitarian Jihad Background

Or the “freetards”, who are convinced all media should be free.

Ah, the good ol’ days. If only the right country had won the wars.

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Beware the beast man, for he is the Devil’s pawn. Alone among God’s primates, he kills for sport or lust or greed. Yea, he will murder his brother to possess his brother’s land. Let him not breed in great numbers, for he will make a desert of his home, and yours. Shun him, for he is the harbinger of death.

Hell, in this day and age, you would think someone would google it.

Interestingly enough, there’s all this talk about how the Nazis were being very racist during the games. I’m sure some history teachers (if they ever got around to it) told their students that Hitler refused to shake the hand of Jesse Owens after he won four gold medals at the 1936 Olympics because he was black. Perhaps that’s true. But Jesse Owens did say that when he waved to Hitler from across the field, Hitler waved back. He didn’t get that much courtesy from his own white teammates, much less FDR. The President didn’t even send a congratulatory telegram, when at the time Presidents would invite medalists to the White House.

In fact, Owens even had to ride the freight elevator to a reception in his own honor at the Waldorf-Astoria because blacks weren’t allowed in the main elevators. This just after he’d had ordinary Germans asking for his autograph and being able to stay in the same hotel as whites, something that did not happen in this country at the time.

So, as it turns out, we here in the United States behaved in a more racist fashion than the white supremacist Nazis. That makes the guy in the picture a real dumbass, doesn’t it?

@***Dave: If only it had been.

PS: Sorry for the snippy history lesson, but people who don’t even take the time to take advantage of the extremely accessible information unprecedented even ten years ago just piss me the fuck off.

It’s so silly, it almost makes me think it’s Photoshopped.

I read the sign before reading the title and in my mind I was just thinking oh my science that guy is dumb

I remember watching a film on that Olympics and how Hitler wanted them to forever be held in Germany, except he didn’t like that the black athletes were winning…

Next thing you know, they’ll keep doing the Olympic torch relay that the Nazis started.

Oh right.

If it wasnt 4:45 am I’d have fallen off my chair laughing.  Just as well you don’t elect a president whose grandfather has been accused of colluding with the Nazi’s. Oh, hang on…

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“Pickles are evil”
- K Patrick Glover, 10 June 2007

Odd. I’ve installed it on a number of PCs running XP here without issue.

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When one reads Bibles, one is less surprised at what the Deity knows than at what He doesn’t know.
-- Mark Twain

What Elwed said. The best solution is probably education, but there’s always going to be a group of people who will pirate something if they can.

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When one reads Bibles, one is less surprised at what the Deity knows than at what He doesn’t know.
-- Mark Twain

Has anyone noticed that “truss” was misspelled on the currency? 

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“What is a good man but a bad man’s teacher?
What is a bad man but a good man’s job?
If you don’t understand this, you will get lost,
however intelligent you are.
It is the great secret.” LAO-TZU

We should keep our criminals out of the hands of our politicians. 

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“What is a good man but a bad man’s teacher?
What is a bad man but a good man’s job?
If you don’t understand this, you will get lost,
however intelligent you are.
It is the great secret.” LAO-TZU

Wrong .True faith is supported by evidence.I am sure any reasonable person will look at the evidence and see if this Jesus guy is the person who he says he was.

Please find me the “evidence” written by Jesus. (pause) OK, please find me the “evidence” written by an eye witness. (pause) OK, please find me a “reasonable person” that would actually accept ANY evidence you can produce! (looong pause) Than you. 

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“What is a good man but a bad man’s teacher?
What is a bad man but a good man’s job?
If you don’t understand this, you will get lost,
however intelligent you are.
It is the great secret.” LAO-TZU

True faith, the kind completely unsupported by evidence, is difficult to hold on to

Wrong .True faith is supported by evidence.I am sure any reasonable person will look at the evidence and see if this Jesus guy is the person who he says he was.
And your criteria for establishing the existence of Jesus are so arbitrary that it would be impossible to prove the existence of Rabbi Gamaliel ,John the Baptist or Mohammed using them

@TheJynXeD:

Not to sound like I defend DRM (I don’t), but Maxis did say they only validate on the first play of a game, and then never again if you tell it not to go online. I can only hope they mean that, but they should probably know that a lot of geeks are going to be checking on them. Besides which, it’s not likely that people without internet connections are going to be playing - but I can imagine there would be a phone method for validating, like Micro$haft does.

Really, I don’t mind this form of DRM, as long as it never goes beyond this. Theoretically, it would be possible to deactivate the home-bound activation components with a patch if Maxis has to take down the servers. There are lots of other game companies who have used similar, if less sophisticated, methods that have been able to avoid this backlash. As it stands, it’s essentially a no-key version of what ID did with Quake III Arena.

And this is why I’d go and buy it, and just use the cracked .exe file. No stupid activation crap. Ever.

So, how do they plan on handling people without internet connections?

How do they plan on handling the various activation server downtime?

What do they plan on doing in two years when Mass Effect 2 and Spore 2 are released and the activation servers are changed to ME2 and Spore 2 servers?

They’ll have some very unhappy customers on their hands.

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“I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

-Mahatma Ghandi

Windows XP SP3 sends PCs into endless reboot

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Science is answers that must always be questioned.
Philosophy is questions that may never be answered.
Religion is answers that must never be questioned.
Politics is answers that lobbyists pay for.

We should keep our schooners out of the hands of criminals.

Same as getting teens to stop having sex.

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Science is answers that must always be questioned.
Philosophy is questions that may never be answered.
Religion is answers that must never be questioned.
Politics is answers that lobbyists pay for.

So whats the answer to stop piracy?

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“Pickles are evil”
- K Patrick Glover, 10 June 2007

No they don’t use SecuROM as far as I know (except for Bioshock obviously). I just mean in the realm of DRM they tend to be somewhat less intrusive comparatively. You buy a product from them, go through the motions and for the most part that is that. Not to say I like their setup but I have some acceptance if I want to play certain games. The DRM spore was originally talking about was extremely out of hand. I could not rightly buy it. If it goes to market with that scheme, buying it is essentially giving credence to that sort of thing, and I just can’t no matter how much I would like to play it.

@Some Guy:

Uh, you do know what the purpose of Steam is, don’t you? The whole thing about Steam is that you purchase games online and download them immediately. They don’t want you to have to enter a license key - they just have you sign in to the same account you purchased the game with. They also don’t tie a particular user ID to an installation. You can still have as many installations of a game as you please, but you have to have a Steam ID to play.

The DRM Steam uses isn’t about preventing you from copying your game so much as it is making sure people who own the game are the ones playing it. That, and Steam only releases games that have come out in other media, so Steam is just a network distribution and play system. Steam is not nearly so draconian a system as SecuROM.

Steam, as in Valve?  Is Valve using SecuROM protection too now?

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The protein prospector!

the louder the cries of piracy, and the more intrusive DRM will get.
-- elwedriddsche

The faster these clowns go out of business, the better. It would be my ultimate dream if they would lock down their content so tight that only the purchaser could even hear (or see) it.

Then those of us who produce media for the sheer pleasure of it would suddenly find ourselves on a playing field without the several 800-lb gorillas that are the big media companies breathing our air and using our gravity.

Steam can drop dead. I will not buy it.

I am a customer, not a crook.  If, however, they want to treat me as a crook, then I’d be happy to oblige them or pass, entirely.

I’ve seen the same ol’ same ol’ time and time again, from floppy keys (vs. Copy2PC), to some sort of dorky ‘type in the number from page 23’ to finally this garbage. Being morons, they never learn.

Here’s a thought: every game gets a unique ID in the package. You only need the ID to play on line. Want to make a gazillion copies? Go ahead; we hope your friends will find the single-player/campaign mode fun enough to want to buy a legit copy so they can play the on-line version.

This is not friggin rocket science, but then, having been in the biz for so long so as to be permanently bitter and jaded (can’t tell, huh?), I know how it really went down: some sales guy for some DRM company convinced the upper muckety-mucks that there are billions of ‘pirates’ just waiting to steal their product and sent their profits into debtor hell. Said upper mucks couldn’t tech their way out of a wet paper bag, so with a “your powerpoint and shiny brochure are reason enough for me,” they buy in.

Then their game gets cracked and distributed in the tubes anyway. Meanwhile, the DRM guys have already cashed the check and are off to the next victim. Who were the real priates, again?

I am glad to hear this. I still think they are just covering and plan on some fairly harsh DRM methods, just in softer English. Either way, as long as they do not “offer” irrelevant download content every few days just to accomplish the same goal, I will be a happy camper.

I will give the benefit of the doubt… for now. It is to bad EA had to get their grubby paws on this. Yes, yes I hate EA. Let us be honest though, of the few great titles they have put out, they have a tendency to put a taint on things.

Looks like Bioware got the message as well. The 10 day reauthentication has been removed from the upcoming Mass Effect as well replaced with the “only when downloading new content” form.

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When one reads Bibles, one is less surprised at what the Deity knows than at what He doesn’t know.
-- Mark Twain

This does not sound nearly as bad. Granted I still do not like it. As long as it only checks when you actively seek something out as opposed to a set time each week, I might live with it, I want this game.

The system they announced (prior to this announcement, which remains to be seen if it is not actually the same) it was checking every 10 days, well every 5 days up until 10. Not to be the “little black helicopters everywhere” type but… that did/does smack of gathering marketing data to sell. Why on earth would something need to check every 10 days? If you bought it legitimately and registered it ala Steam, what is going to change?

The only single excuse for it is to make sure no one else is using your key. But what are the gains for the company involved? There must be easier ways to check keys than updating key/system information constantly to the company.

I love this guy. I remember a long time ago Les posting a review(one of these) of something, don’t remember what, a valve game maybe? After that I was hooked, I had to watch pretty much everything this guy came out with. I kind of fell out of habit, as always, and just now this revived my love for this (British?) bastard.

Very good, very Kermodian.  However makes the common “Fair Use” cock-up when he pirates the music.

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“Pickles are evil”
- K Patrick Glover, 10 June 2007

Webs, thanks for hint about Rockbox.

Ryan, the less the market tolerates intrusive DRM, the more sales figures will drop, the louder the cries of piracy, and the more intrusive DRM will get.

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Science is answers that must always be questioned.
Philosophy is questions that may never be answered.
Religion is answers that must never be questioned.
Politics is answers that lobbyists pay for.

Wow. Color me unsurprised and underwhelmed! Micro$haft goes for the big bucks without a conscience or good business sense and NBC acts like a bunch of money-grubbing assholes in an otherwise clearly-defined market.

I would really like to know when these douchebags are going to join the real world and realize the market doesn’t tolerate this crap very well anymore?

Ditto Elwed.

But no matter what MP3 player you buy, don’t waste your time using the crappy interface it comes with. Put RockBox on that MOFO!

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Brother Spikey Mace of Patience

Unitarian Jihad Name: Get Yours
Unitarian Jihad Background

Fucking funny!

For the record I played SSBB and it seemed liked a rehashed copy of the GameCube version. Not what I really look for in a game. It appears Nintendo thinks they can integrate fun and cool ways to control the user experience of games and that is all that’s needed for a great game. While it’s cool to play SSBB using two hands, there needs to be more to it than that.

One big complaint I have with Wii games is poor multiplayer and Internet integration. For example, I think it would be cool to be able to buy items for games from the Internet, maybe like new levels or characters. Maybe even win new items by beating people online. Shit like that. Maybe all the consoles are not doing this kind of stuff yet and I should stop whining. But it seems Nintendo has never really understood how to make use of the network capabilities of their console. Thankfully Nintendo seems to be picking up on the importance of multiplayer experience with Mario Kart, which is pretty decent and fun.

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Brother Spikey Mace of Patience

Unitarian Jihad Name: Get Yours
Unitarian Jihad Background

Zune is a M$ product. ‘Nuff said.

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Science is answers that must always be questioned.
Philosophy is questions that may never be answered.
Religion is answers that must never be questioned.
Politics is answers that lobbyists pay for.

Hi Neil:  I didn’t say it was getting shorter THIS year, just that when it does occur in the winter, fasting is for a shorter period of time.

SG

I found myself getting out of breath in sympathy, though.  Does he EVER breathe?

Love snarky Brits.  Just love them.

I love nopunctuation!!!

I think I’ve watched all of his videos at least twice, not for the games, but just for his humor and amazing insults.