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Official explanation of controversial Assassin's Creed 2 DRM

@ 2010/02/19

Ubisoft has long had some controversial ideas about how DRM should be used, but when PC Gamer was given a review copy of Assassin's Creed 2 on the PC it seemed as if the reality was going to be much worse than what opponents to DRM had feared: the game requires an always-on 'Net connection and constant communication with the home server. If your connection is dropped, the game kicks you out, and you lose any progress you had made since your last save.

If you have flaky wireless in your home, it sounds like it's time to move onto a wired solution. We caught up with an Ubisoft representative to get the full story, and it may not be as bad as it sounds... but it's still certainly not good.

Comment from Kougar @ 2010/02/24

Latest news on ACTA: http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=17761

Comment from Kougar @ 2010/02/22

If they didn't think it worked, then why is it still implemented?

Here is the MPAA's current mindset for you: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/n...t-rip-dvds.ars

There are no technical reasons for not using 1080P through high-grade component cables, but the content industry has made sure you can't use them for legal 1080P content.

Because of the content industry high-end graphics cards must have integrated onboard sound in order to support their closed-loop DRM protection scheme, and you have to pay for it to be added and integrated into each GPU regardless if you have a sound card with the codec support or not.

You also pay for the right to have HDCP support in every device. Monitors, TVs, Blu-ray players, and sound receivers all have to be HDCP compliant, otherwise no HD video/audio for you. All manufacturers must annually pay DCP a licensing fee to incorporate it into their products, and every device you buy has the fee built in.

Apple used to charge a higher price for their DRM-free tracks, but that seems to be moot now that the majority of iTunes is DRM free. Or at least the music is, the shows and movies still have DRM. And even DRM-free you still can't legally use iTunes music on your other devices, just as you can't legally "backup" your DVD's in the US. If anyone had questions on Apple's real mindset on "DRM", maybe this would help: http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/20...r-lock-ins.ars

Still, DRM is far from dead. Read up on ACTA, it is frightening. There's a reason it's all behind closed doors. http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/n...ility-laws.ars

Console games, DVDs, and Blu-ray media are all still protected with regional encoding, and the content industry even made sure regional disc support was built into each Windows/OS X release. Here's a read on AACS: http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/20...-tentacles.ars

It isn't just the content industry's mindset, it's the mindset of quite a few large corporations. Stuff like this is typical with content downloads: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2...amers-sony.ars

This story might be somewhat amusing, but it shows just where ACTA and the DMCA might show up, and the lengths some companies go to use DMCA as a legal excuse: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/n...-my-garage.ars

Frankly the mindset is stronger than ever in the movie/media industry and they have made sure the tools to implement it are well locked into place and not going anywhere for the next 10 years. We're just seeing attempts by EA and other game studios to implement the same protections into their own games, but because they started after the industry was created it's too late to go against the flow. It probably won't be the last game dev or studio that will try though.

Comment from wutske @ 2010/02/22

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kougar

Look at the music industry, or movie industry, mostly worked for them...

Doubt it's going to work here though.

I don't realy think it worked for the music or movie industry. Nobody liked the DRM that was used in in music and even companies understood that DRM wasn't the solution because people wanted to download DRM-free mp3 that work on every computer and MP3 player they own.
The DRM used in DVD's didn't work at all and the DRM used in BR's isn't a great solution either (slow startup, trailers, ...).

Comment from Kougar @ 2010/02/22

Quote:

Originally Posted by Massman

Since when does 'pissing off your costumers' yield into 'more profit'?

http://www.osnews.com/story/22897/20...omponent_Video

Comment from Kougar @ 2010/02/21

It's not a yes/no or on/off thought process.

It is "did it work well enough", and they believe it works well enough to continue justifying doing it. They apparently do because they still do it.

Comment from Massman @ 2010/02/21

That logic I don't understand?

It works => they continue
It doesn't work => they ? continue?

Comment from Kougar @ 2010/02/21

In their opinion it's worked well enough to continue to do it, which is the problem.

Comment from Massman @ 2010/02/20

It didn't work as well as they thought i'd work ... people are still downloading both music and movies.

Comment from Kougar @ 2010/02/20

Quote:

Originally Posted by Massman

Since when does 'pissing off your costumers' yield into 'more profit'?

Look at the music industry, or movie industry, mostly worked for them...

Doubt it's going to work here though.

Comment from Massman @ 2010/02/20

Since when does 'pissing off your costumers' yield into 'more profit'?

Comment from Kougar @ 2010/02/19

Sounds like even legit owners are going to seek game cracks for this one...

Comment from jmke @ 2010/02/19

problem is that Ubisoft doesn't really need PC sales of AC2 for it to make money, the console sales are taking care of that.

Settlers on the other hand is not enjoyable on console (RTS is for PC), so if that title fails because of this lame DRM, they'll hopefully get the "message".

Comment from thorgal @ 2010/02/19

I hope the game community will skip this game and make clear this is ludicrous. Probably idle hope.

Comment from jmke @ 2010/02/19

Quote:

We were assured that only happens if the disconnection is lengthy. If you're cut off for just a second or two, the game simply pauses and continues on.

so a SINGLE PLAYER game PAUSES because of FLAKY INTERNET connection? W T F

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