I must say that beyond making great games, the folks at EGOSoft have quite possibly spearheaded a fabulous system to protect copyrighted software. I will now submit my analysis.
1) Create a Great Kick Ass game.
2) Place just enough annoyances to make people need to access a 'help' forum.
3) Lock all non legal players out of said 'help' forum using a serial number.
4) Entice people like me to buy the game first and gamble that all of those issues others are having will not occur to me... since I cannot read said 'help' forum to foresee possible problems with my configuration due to item number 5.
5) Pure evil capitalistic greed.
I must state that my vascilation in buying the game rests solely on the fact that I cannot read the help forums to grasp exactly what troubles I may run into. Not being able to compare my configuration with other users.
In my opinion, keeping information from the general public is an elitist (no pun intended) attitute and only shows a small brain behind an apparently larger corporation.
FACT: People will still pirate your game.
FACT: Information will still seep out.
FACT: When a pirated game user likes a game he WILL support it's authoring company buy buying said game.
FACT: More information concerning games and their availability is distributed by pirated copy distribution than by original, and most of the time lacking, authentic promotion.
FACT: You're being anal by keeping potential users out of your information and help loop.
I stand undecided; to buy or not to buy... this is the deal.
CHEERS EVERYONE.
Very Clever Pirate Copy Protection Scheme
Moderator: Moderators for English X Forum
Well... don't get me wrong//MiniMojo wrote:I don't agree with you about that pirated software is a 'good' thing... but yes keeping info away from possible buyers is bad.
IT'S NOT.. pirating is definitely NOT O.K.
But keeping information private... information that will help potential purchasers (LIKE ME) to buy or not to buy, is.
I've thwarted many a headache by being able to compare my system to that of others having particular troubles. But please... no one interpret this as a defense of an illegal activity... I may have, in the heat, gone a bit overboard in my plea. I apologize.
This type of copy protection is only going to become more common. Its the only way companies can have any sort of meaningful effect on piracy. The only way a pirate could get around this is if he could guess one of several thousand real cd keys, that have been printed and put into boxes, out of a possible 999,999,999,999. Thats a trillion minus 1.
Re: Very Clever Pirate Copy Protection Scheme
There is a sticky thread at the top of the public forum with a list of known issues that should provide an overview of the information you require.RazorBack wrote:...
4) Entice people like me to buy the game first and gamble that all of those issues others are having will not occur to me... since I cannot read said 'help' forum to foresee possible problems with my configuration due to item number 5.
...
In general I recommend people wait and read reviews of a game from a source they respect before they purchase them if they are not sure of the development house/previous releases. This way you will know whether the game is likely to be stable and be suited to your game preferences.
Off course some of us will go out and buy the game the day it comes out, which is great, however one must then expect that you might have a few problems to work around. This is not due necessarily to sloppy coding or testing, but due to the complexities of the modern PC.
Even if someone has the identical hardware configuration to you, it does not guarantee that the game will function 100% on your machine due to the complexities of driver versions, previous drivers installed and overwritten, in memory processes/applications, virus checkers etc.
While some people do seem to be having some (serious) issues, which should be resolved in Patch 1.1 the majority of players seem to be having a great time playing and have not encountered issues such as poor performance.
regards
Alex
Re: Very Clever Pirate Copy Protection Scheme
Thank you Alex, I'll look into that.alex hall wrote: ...There is a sticky thread at the top of the public forum with a list of known issues that should provide an overview of the information you require...
So if I buy the game, do I get a membership certificate, an ice-box magnet that reads "I Now Belong" and an engraved pen, besides the information I'm looking for?
Hmm.. makes me wonder if I was wrong about my intentions on moving to Europe... hmm.
Heck, I bought the german version of X-Tension when the english one ran out. I'll quite possibly buy this one anyhow. To tell you the truth, I haven't had any problems whatsoever with any X-title.
Re: Very Clever Pirate Copy Protection Scheme
Only Death is certain... don't preach Alex, you know I'm right.alex hall wrote:...Even if someone has the identical hardware configuration to you, it does not guarantee...
Re: Very Clever Pirate Copy Protection Scheme
I think you'll find that before the T-S forum was locked there were a lot of posts that were off-topic and EgoSoft support were probably being swamped with having to read 100 off topic posts to find a support question for them to answer.RazorBack wrote:Thank you Alex, I'll look into that.alex hall wrote: ...There is a sticky thread at the top of the public forum with a list of known issues that should provide an overview of the information you require...
So if I buy the game, do I get a membership certificate, an ice-box magnet that reads "I Now Belong" and an engraved pen, besides the information I'm looking for?
Hmm.. makes me wonder if I was wrong about my intentions on moving to Europe... hmm.
Heck, I bought the german version of X-Tension when the english one ran out. I'll quite possibly buy this one anyhow. To tell you the truth, I haven't had any problems whatsoever with any X-title.
Also it became quite obvious that a number of the posters had not purchased the game.
There have already been some quite heated debates on whether the forum should be locked. My personal opinion is that I would rather it wasn't, but in the circumstances I fully understand why it is so that EgoSoft can provide much better support to those who genuinely need it and have purchased the game.
regards
Alex
OMG, only a truly deluded mind could dream up such a ridiculous conspiracy theory. Yes the purposely left bugs IN the game, to get pirates to buy it. Uh huh. It's pure, evil, capatilistic GREED for them to expect people to PAY them for the work they have done on the game. Uh huh. Oh the lunacy.
Put down the pipe son. You sound like a blithering moron.
Put down the pipe son. You sound like a blithering moron.
Last edited by Whiplash on Sat, 6. Dec 03, 12:36, edited 1 time in total.
You people are either stupid or have pirated the game and are making it painfully obvious you have done so. There's no reason to be against entering your CD key, its not your Social Security Number or anything. It only identifies you as a person who has actualy paid for the game. Theres no reason to get upset over the closed techsupport forum, unless of course you pirated the game. And if you don't have the game, you don't need tech support, known issues are listed in a sticky in this forum.
I actualy like the cdkey protection and prefer that all game publishers used it instead of ridiculous copy protections on cds. The one copy protection that is the most annoying and only cause a hindrence to customers is the cd check protections. The last game I purchased (Prior to X2) wouldn't install from my cdrom and I had to resort to a bootleg to install then use the key from my registered copy's cdkey to play the darned game! You can't imagine how ironic that felt!! And don't give me the stuff about buying a new cdrom. My cdrom IS new and publishers should either sell their games bundled with a cdrom drive that is compatible with their copy protection software or not put copy protection on it in the first place! Anyway I digress. I hope in future patches the cd protection check from X2 will be removed so I don't have to keep swapping cds around. Reward us customers for a change 
We have to register with the key to download the patches anyway so why have the excess of checking the cd as well? 
We have to register with the key to download the patches anyway so why have the excess of checking the cd as well? -
blahblahblah
- Posts: 40
- Joined: Sat, 29. Nov 03, 18:30
[quote="Stregone"]This type of copy protection is only going to become more common. Its the only way companies can have any sort of meaningful effect on piracy. The only way a pirate could get around this is if he could guess one of several thousand real cd keys, that have been printed and put into boxes, out of a possible 999,999,999,999. Thats a trillion minus 1.[\quote]
Depending on the CD key generation algorithm and the publisher's methods of recording which ones are valid, it can be relatively easy to create a CD key generator. Such a generator could be used even in these types of forum limitations. If the forums know exactly which keys from the algorithm have been published and which haven't, that's a big hamper, but it's nothing like a trillion to one.
Depending on the CD key generation algorithm and the publisher's methods of recording which ones are valid, it can be relatively easy to create a CD key generator. Such a generator could be used even in these types of forum limitations. If the forums know exactly which keys from the algorithm have been published and which haven't, that's a big hamper, but it's nothing like a trillion to one.
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CanadianBrit
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- Joined: Wed, 6. Nov 02, 20:31
Yes there will be a patch in 2 months, but it wasn't egosofts desire to release the software with flaws, well not too many after all not too many games get released with out em.MiniMojo wrote:Aha...
So what RazorBack is saying... makes more sense now.
Publish intentionally flawed software, to later 'FIX' it via a private and exclusive little club? Somewhere in there this sounds to me like too much manipulation on the corporate end... think about it.
Enlight and QV made the decision to release the game as was, and Koch decided to wait till some of these probs were addressed.
Of course you could argue that by releaseing the flawed software, were egosoft finally able to see wot needed fixing, but that would be the conspiricist in me talking.
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Greb Jnnayr
- Posts: 237
- Joined: Fri, 28. Feb 03, 02:14
Re: Very Clever Pirate Copy Protection Scheme
This one makes me laugh, a common misconeption. This one is not fact at all. Just his opinion. I know of 18 people who pirated software and none of them have bought any of the games they have pirated even if they thought they were the greatest games ever. And some of these 18 people are part of a largert group who share this stuff between themselves and they even mentioned that they don't know of anybody that buys the software.RazorBack wrote: FACT: When a pirated game user likes a game he WILL support it's authoring company buy buying said game.
Copyprotection is a good thing, not perfect, but it does help some. I vote for the CD Key method. Maybe they should go with that you have to go online everyonce in a while (ie, every 7,14, or 30 days) to reauthenticate your CD key. I think that would help. Down with pirates. They are just thieves and are born loosers.
There's only one thing I don't understand in this discussion:
The only thing that pirate players would really need, that the "registering CD-key"-policy would deny them from, was a patch.
Does anyone think that people that are able to download the game itself (2 CD's of data) will be unable to download an 1-10 MB patch?
Quick analysis tells me that Egosofts sole purpose of this purpose is not having their tech support staff wasting money on errors that might be due to the cracking of the game. If tech support needs to be of any help in providing the developers info to help in trouble-solving, they need to know that the problems arise from a standard version of the game.
It seems rather simple to me, really...
The only thing that pirate players would really need, that the "registering CD-key"-policy would deny them from, was a patch.
Does anyone think that people that are able to download the game itself (2 CD's of data) will be unable to download an 1-10 MB patch?
Quick analysis tells me that Egosofts sole purpose of this purpose is not having their tech support staff wasting money on errors that might be due to the cracking of the game. If tech support needs to be of any help in providing the developers info to help in trouble-solving, they need to know that the problems arise from a standard version of the game.
It seems rather simple to me, really...
"There is little difference in people, but that little difference makes a big difference. The
little difference is attitude. The big difference is whether it is positive or negative."
- W. Clement Stone
little difference is attitude. The big difference is whether it is positive or negative."
- W. Clement Stone
Why should they use an algorithm if they know exactly which keys are legit? It would only make the wouldbe pirate's chances higher at guessing a key. Just create them randomly instead.blahblahblah wrote:Depending on the CD key generation algorithm and the publisher's methods of recording which ones are valid, it can be relatively easy to create a CD key generator. Such a generator could be used even in these types of forum limitations. If the forums know exactly which keys from the algorithm have been published and which haven't, that's a big hamper, but it's nothing like a trillion to one.Stregone wrote:This type of copy protection is only going to become more common. Its the only way companies can have any sort of meaningful effect on piracy. The only way a pirate could get around this is if he could guess one of several thousand real cd keys, that have been printed and put into boxes, out of a possible 999,999,999,999. Thats a trillion minus 1.
Hmm.. let me see.. If I'm 40 and in fact your son.. what?... that makes you 60 something? Not quite an example for your advanced age is insulting people by calling them blithering morons... FOOLjvieira wrote:OMG, only a truly deluded mind ...
Put down the pipe son. You sound like a blithering moron.
PEACE.. heh.. I love a good debate.
And yes I'm a conspiracy theorist... look beyond your face, you may find air to breathe.