Bioshock DRM Fiasco (1 Viewer)

[Jeff Jacobson]

Anyone planning on purchasing the game Bioshock should read this article first:
http://www.twitchguru.com/2007/08/27...drm/index.html

 

[Chris]

Yeah, this has been an ongoing rage in forums. This is starting to voyage beyond ridiculous in game software that can kill your PC if you have the wrong other software installed (Microsoft Process Viewer for godsake?)

 

[Steve Y]

This is a shame. The software companies know DRM doesn't work. It punishes regular users but has zero effect on "teh hAck3rz". But politically speaking, the software publishers cover their butts with its inclusion, so it's lose-lose. There are FAR better ways to ensure an end to piracy:

1. Don't limit your customers' fair use of a product. The kind of people who hack/pirate software could care less about DRM limits.
2. Installing rootkits on your customers' computers will not prevent your product from being hacked/copied. It will just make your customers angry.
3. Provide a high level of software quality assurance and post-release technical support that will make your customers want to go out and purchase the product from you on release day. Make them laugh at the merest suggestion of acquiring an inferior "unofficial" copy.
4. Don't rush your product to market.

 

[Phil Florian]

5. Buy an Xbox 360. This game smokes on this system and I can "install" it as many times as I like.

 

[Don Giro]

Good point, but there are LEGIONS of us who will always prefer the keyboard/mouse method of playing games.

Guess I won't be playing "Bioshock" any time soon (I'm holding out for "Hellgate: London" anyway).

 

[Phil Florian]

I used to be that way, too, but the yearly upgrade needed for hardware to keep up with the current crop of games made that mouse and keyboard start to see a bit pricey. Actually, I now really prefer the controller. It feels more visceral than essentially pointing and clicking with a mouse. Pulling a trigger to fire a gun works better for me. But even if that weren't the case, a one-time cost of $399 that will last me a few years or more to play great games more than convinced me (and my wife, who was souring on the whole..."but I need more memory! And a graphics card! And a hard drive!" Gah!) that consoles were the way to go. That and HD graphics on a 42" screen while lounging back with my wireless controller helped, too.

That said, I think Microsoft recognizes the point and click people's needs and I am willing to be their recent acceptance of a USB keyboard (for now only to type in letters for chat or entering codes) will change this some day. I feel badly if that happens because pointing and clicking is far easier than lining up a shot with a controller so it would unbalance games, most likely. Or will it? I didn't get Shadowrun but it was supposedly the first to really mix PC and Console gamers. Was there a great difference in play level?

Who knows. But I recommend that people find a way to play Bioshock because it really is the first FPS to really hit the high water mark left by the original Half Life and that is a rare thing indeed.

 

[Don Giro]

High praise, indeed. I may end up having to play this game in some way, shape, or form after all. I'm still playing Oblivion (and that's not including the "Shivering Isles" expansion), so I'm in no hurry.

 

[Steve Y]

I would MUCH rather play Bioshock on the XBox360, due to the certainty of experiencing fluid gameplay (on a working console, anyway). Bioshock chugs like a slide-show on my (fairly) high-powered dual core laptop. But high-powered consoles have their own problems nowadays. Namely, lack of proper cooling systems for the GPU/CPU.

Remember back in the day, when game software released to market either worked or it didn't - was either good or bad? And consoles were built to last from the outset?

Some might see "console patches" as an opportunity to improve upon products that might otherwise have languished in an inferior form (hardware OR software). But patching within the software developer community is now employed as license to release a game before it is ready to meet a deadline ("we'll fix it in the patch"). It has already affected PC games, and now it's becoming a problem in the high-powered console community as well.

I see the many advantages of patches as game software becomes more complicated, but Nintendo developers (for example) still work under the idea that they have only one chance to get it right, and they must work that much harder to get the product to market.

The most recent Bioshock patch for the X360 has apparently caused the game to malfunction on some peoples' consoles. So the patch may itself need a patch...