I remember having to apply a crack to my legitimate PC copy of assassin's creed II Just so I could enjoy the privilege of playing it on my own timetable.
That is the case for me as well. I was in grade school when it was released and had to save every allowance I got to buy it only to find out that you need internet connection for it. That pissed me so much but on the bright side, that is also what introduced me to the piracy community. lol I still buy the games I really wanted to support the devs, especially now that I can afford it but if I were to choose whether to stay online just to play or pirate it so I can play it offline at anytime, I would gladly choose the latter.
For me it was AC Brotherhood. I played AC2 on console but I had a better PC when Brotherhood came out. I still didn't buy it at full price because reviews said it was not AC3 but just more of AC2. When I finally bought it on sale on Steam I was forced to make a Uplay account. Then put in my CDKey... that didn't work. It took me 2 minutes to find a crack. Then Revelation came out and it was yet again not the true AC3 so I didn't get it at launch and by the time it was on sale I just didn't care about the franchise anymore.
Not really, sadly, nowadays with the rise of Denuvo and the increasing use of this type of always online DRM, more and more games are becoming uncrackable/unpreservable for the average joe. ☹
@@TheWolfSharpwhats going to happen is we will start making our own games and leave the big companies crying about lost revenue, then they will probably get rid of the worst drm, come back and then repeat themselves because money money money 🤷♂️
Always online... Until it's not and the game is literally dead. I cannot believe we are in 2023 and still allowing companies to legally destroy games to the point that no one can play them. Kills me a little inside.
@@neoasura I don't agree with this sentiment at all; people want new experiences and whilst some of the onerous is on the consumer; the actual fault is with the American and British Legal System which is currently asleep at the wheel. Even Italy haven't hit back at this as much as they usually do and that Country is hard mode when it comes to consumer rights. We literally need just one rich guy to take this to court and set a precedent but the problem is that anyone who would have the funds to do a lawsuit that could reach the courts that actually matter; is already morally and ethically bankrupt and thus it will never happen. The only reason emulation went to court is because Nintendo took the underdog to court and lost. We need that to happen for GAAS.
@@SHADOW17018 if you mean GFWL, you could create offline account for it, maybe you mean activation from SecuROM. Honestly I don't know because cracked it. And don't forgot GTA V requires a weekly online renewal activation if you run in only on offline mode like "-scofflineonly"
@@sebastianx708pl No, I got the Rockstar version. Its a old asf single player game but I cant play it offline? Should have just got the cracked version
I have a constant online connection and have ZERO interest in things phoning home. Remember that Amazon locked a guy out of his own house for a week because a delivery driver thought he said something politically incorrect.
Three things I'd love to be made illegal, with hefty fines or jail sentences for those involved in spreading it: 1 - Selling a 'permanent licence' and then not having permanent access to the product. 2 - Selling a 'permanent licence' and then, in a EULA, saying "by buying this licence, you agree that it is worth $0 and cannot be transferred." It's your licence, you can do what you want with it, and it is worth the value you paid for it. 3 - Claiming that you cannot resell the products you buy, when there are sophisticated systems like Steam that can easily track when the products were bought, which account currently owns them, and has an entire marketplace system for buying and selling.
big rant: I'm pissed off and I think i'm done with Steam because in 190 days it will stop working on Windows 7. A lot of people don't get it and say "get with the times" "if you are so poor you can't upgrade your PC you shouldn't be buying games" "Windows 7 is obsolete", but they are missing the point. They are completly valid reasons to not want to install Windows 10, or maybe even if I wanted to, I want the Windows 7 computer to be able to run the games that were made for it and run perfectly on it. It's ridiculous and not acceptable that they are going to take away things I paid for. I'm not asking new games to run on Windows 7, I'm asking the minimum basic: to be able to keep playing the games that already work and I paid for. It's absurd that I can install Age of Empires on a Win98 computer and play it all I want, but in 190 days the Steam version won't run anymore in a more recent computer that's like 15 years newer. All they have to do is leave a Windows 7 client alone, not update it, display a "warning: new games won't work" or "you'll only be able to play what you already have but other features won't work" and that's it, but they are going out of their way to remotely block my perfectly working computer from playing games that run perfectly on it. It's frustrating it's not a big deal and people don't see the big picture or that it's not only about "get a better computer, install windows 10 or 11". THAT'S NOT THE POINT. It's like if Sony came to my place to take away my PS2 games because I didn't buy a PS5. -but I want to keep playing those! -we can't allow that, the PS2 is too old, it's not supported anymore. -I know, but mine works perfectly and I have the games, I want to keep playing them. -we can't allow that, you should buy a PS5 if you want to play games!. That's how stupid the "Steam will stop working on Windows 7" situation is, but some people don't get it. The whole concept is a nightmare for preservation, and it's an horrible anti consumer practice. I wish there was more people pissed off so some kind of legal action could be taken, but nobody cares, they all say "bro, just install windows 10, it's not a big deal". It's insane.
@@pelgervampireduck I have seen people use steam on XP still. Supporting legacy hardware is difficult and a security risk. The solution is to put steam into offline mode and use what you have already.
@@pelgervampireduck You're confusing what Steam is. It's a service not a product. They open themselves up to security vulnerabilities by supporting older OS'. Sony isn't going to come and get your PS2 because it's a product that doesn't connect to their servers and doesn't offer you any real time services. The reason people don't care is there are solutions. Win 10 is offered as a free upgrade, it works with Win7 product ids. The machine I'm typing on was a Win7 machine at one time. So really their service isn't supported by your machine anymore and you need to do something about it, whatever you decide to do about it is up to you.
@@oblivieon1567 No, don't go there. You're buying into the misinformation. The only thing Steam needs to do, for games you've already bought, is check what games you own. If the 'full steam application' won't be supported by previously-supported Windows versions, then they should just make a lightweight version for older OSs without the storefront, without the community tab, or without any other bells and whistles, where all it does is check the internet to say "hey do they own this game? yes? great!" and nothing more. There's no reason they can't make that to replace the 'full' Steam version that needs a newer OS.
Imagine being a game developer who pours their heart and soul into creating a masterpiece, only for their company to brutally slaughter it with tactics like this. If I became an indie dev, I probably wouldn't bother with DRM knowing that it only affects legit consumers and not the pirates who have proved that it is ineffective towards them.
You might still want to have some sort of DRM at least for a little while. I don't know how valid this thinking is but from what I've heard from people in the business many people who might pirate a game will end up paying for the game if it's a pain in the ass to pirate or takes too long to get cracked. I honestly don't know how true that is though, it may very well be the case that the people who are going to pirate games were never going to be paying customers anyway. I've heard both arguments. The safest bet would probably be to have some DRM/anti-cracking measures for the first few months then remove it later. I think a decent form of DRM would be a one time internet check that downloads a token that lets the game be played and gets rechecked maybe once a month, so long as the DRM gets removed before the servers go down and there's some logic to ensure the game remains playable in the event of DDoS attack or other downtime (maybe check some other sites to see if the computer is connected to the internet but can't connect to the validation server then extend the expiration date and keep checking/trying to validate the token, everyday for maybe 15 days before actually enforcing a lock down). Alternatively it might be possible to go back to product keys using something like a QR code (regular product keys are probably too short to effectively slow down crackers).
Just over the last weeks MGS V on PC had an issue where several players could not connect to the online service and thus were very limited in their ability to play the game because 9/10 of all in-game funds are stored online and online missions to level your squad etc. were not possible. It took Konami almost a month to fix it.
I honestly hated MGSVs online stuff. Sure FOBs and that stuff were fun, and MGO3 was an amazing mess, but locking most of my money because the server shat itself is annoying.
Stuff like this is why I almost always buy my games on GOG and other non-DRM PC gaming retailers. Having that freedom to back my games up however I want with zero strings attached is so liberating nowadays in a world full of always online nonsense and such. When I buy my games, I want to make sure I can always keep the things I own.
Steam itself is fine though, it's had an offline mode for as long as I can remember and the only real problems are when you have to stack other DRM launchers on top of steam.
@@zerorig It's still DRM at the end of the day. I prefer to just play a game without having to have a program open in the background every time. That's why I love GOG.
It may or may not (well try to), depends how they implement it. What especially grinds my gears is how they will sometimes ban your account entirely for modding your single-player game, absolutely disgusting.
Someone who gets it ;) I have Hitman 3 and Crash Team Racing on PS4, both have content locked behind online servers. Though I jailbroke my system and now have all of the content thanks to a custom save file. Other games with nasty DRM like Gran Turismo 7 also have custom saves with debug features that allows you to unlock all cars. So their always online implementations aren't going to stop people from preserving games or preserving game content.
Do you expect [Corpo] to waste time stopping people from cheating!? They have to stop people modding the Pride flags out of Spider-Man PC! Think of the ESG!
I learned a lot with this video thanks so much, i have to say this is one of my fears when it comes with having an digital copy of an game over an physical, the hack community actually is saving the games by itself i mean i have most of my consoles with custom firmware and i can play the games without any problem. When i comes to the last cycle of an console and the company behind them start giving less support until basically not is the people involved on the pirate scene who is making available to this day those games, and this practices show how little they care beside making a profit. Really good video hope seeing a continuation of it its pretty interesting and many things i didnt knew.
And the harsh reality is if we want to remove the internet/WiFi out of our lives due to financial problems, mental health problems or ("tinfoil hat on") Ai becomes a problem then you the company get out our money but we have nothing.
I set my firewall to deny outbound connections by default. It's hilarious. You learn really quickly what silently calls home and what happens when it can't. NVidia Experience, I'm looking at you. (If it can't call home it retries once per second forever)
the ubisoft DRM went a step further in being bad DRM it did not just not limit the expierence quality reduction to buying users but it also encourages free due to buying users wanting a free copy that is a playable copy. it expanded the crackers to serve the buying audience as well making cracking jobs more indemand than if the brought copy worked.
Ubisoft: We have conducted an internal investigation and after thorough review we have determined that we’ve done nothing wrong. I hate that Ubisoft and any company does this. I’m pretty sure it’s why I lost access to a bonus map in Ghost Recon: Future Soldier that I previously had access to on Xbox 360. It was an unlock with Uplay points.
Back when I played AC Brotherhood in 2021, the game still had online DRM for renovation system ("Rebuilding Rome" or something), which didn't work offline. And knowing how awful Ubisoft servers are, that feature was unavailable a lot of the time.
The first game that comes to mind where pirates enjoyed the game and legitimate buyers couldn't was EA's SPORE. I have said this many moons ago and it still hold true today. If you treat customers as pirates you create more pirates. If you treat customers as customers you get more customers. Always online DRM for single player games is ALMOST as bad as physical copies not having the full game on it and requiring a day 1 download to install the rest of the game (like Spyro Re-Ignited Trilogy for Switch) or a physical copy that is locked to a specific online profile (like Borderlands Legendary Collection also for Switch). If and when certain servers shut down you can never play the physical game ever again as you will be missing most of the game (unless you hacked your Switch, in this case) and backed up the downloaded part of the game. Single player only games should never have an always online requirement. Remember the Xbox One with its always online DRM and Kinect requirements?
I lost 10 hours of progress in AC2 on PC, because my ISP decided to randomly disable my connection for a short period. I found this experience so incredibly frustrating that I've never purchased a Ubisoft game ever since.
I may or may not have borrowed someone else’s far cry 3, my first Ubisoft game, I then paid for far cry, 4, primal, 5, and 6. Devs just need to focus on making games so good people feel bad not paying for it…
It's crazy to me that companies are even still using DRM when all it does at this point is just harm their users (Denuvo especially, yeesh). I mean, if people want to pirate your game, DRM isn't going to stop them, at most it'll slow them down for a couple weeks, but then they have the superior version of the game, seeing as their cracked version doesn't have any horrible DRM to worry with.
Their argument is that day-one (or indeed the first few weeks sales) have shown that preventing piracy at that time DOES increase sales. Not sure I believe them, but its what publishers claim.
@@alexatkin It might help a little bit, but honestly, if someone wants to pirate a game I doubt they're going to buy the game whether it releases with DRM or not (though how popular GOG is could refute that, who knows for sure)
@@bruhtholemew That's fair, but GOG getting any sales at all is at least a good sign, and hopefully one publishers take as a reason to not put goddamn Denuvo in their games
100% I’ve pirated games I already owned since the DRM/online launcher loopholes you have to jump strictly to play offline single player games became an enormous barrier. (Bioshock PC remasters via Epic Store, who remembers launcher logins for a single series that are the only ones to use it? Doesn’t “stay signed in”. Thanks for letting me trauma dump❤)
It’s important to consider that the seemingly safer “client” DRM systems, like Steam and Ubisoft Connect. Can break just as easily. ESPECIALLY on older hardware. Ubisoft Connect has outright stopped working on Windows 7 machines thanks to a recent update, only displaying a “entry point DiscardVirtualMemory not found” error. Steam is going down on systems running that OS on January 1st 2024. And not even GOG is potentially safe, as they’re considering allowing multiplayer games that require the galaxy client. For all the advantages these clients can add, there’s a rather clear danger in how they’ve completely taken over PC gaming. I could still pull out, say, a PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series X in 40 years and still be able to run my installed games without issue. And even acquire and play (most) physical titles without an internet connection. PC has ALREADY completely lost that convinence.
@@RJARRRPCGP it's not, it's specifically a component that only exists in later versions of Windows. the full message is "entry point DiscardVirtualMemory not found in DLL KERNEL32.dll" i've heard Windows 8 MIGHT have the missing function, but that won't really change much as Steam is going to stop support on that OS as well, and most compatibility issues are usually caused by functions only on Windows 10.
I remember when Sony made a rootkit to DRM lock their stuff... fast forward, I'm watching some friends play Diablo 4 and I'm going "why do you need a login for this? Could I not just play through the story and side quests without online connectivity?" I have avoided EA and Ubisoft titles for a long time because of these issues and not wanting to make some login just to play the game.
The industry repeats the same mistakes because publishers aren't our friends. These companies will push and push until something breaks, pull back a little, then do it again. They want our money and don't care if we're enjoying something or if the teams working for them are creating anything artful or not.
I wonder if Ubisoft will rediscover why companies used to deploy "technical difficulties", etc., instead of complaining about DDoS attacks in progress: because notoriety encourages the next attacker.
Didnt it started with Half Life 2 where you didnt even cant install it without Internet Connection? And Diablo 4 is a MMO Light. So it seems logical for me its Online only. Especially for Anti Cheat.
If these companies want a persistent broadband connection, that's fine for me, most of the people complaining about it have it now & had it ten years ago, but the problem is (1) You are required to have 100% uptime, but the company isn't, and many times issues will be on their end & (2) They have no accountability when the service inevitably shutters. They need to be legally obligated to make these games available either offline or self-hosted once they no longer can reasonably provide the service themselves
Games and Software in general that's dependent on Servers ran by the publisher should either be free to purchase or the publisher should be legally bound to ensure to work past server shutdown by patches.
The sheer irony in DRM is that in attempting to stop piracy and protect sales, they guarantee piracy and loss of sales from people choosing not to buy it, or being able to crack the game anyways in just a few days
What is probably the most inexcusable though, is if they want to stop people trying to crack their games, they only would need to set up a good server to handle the load for the first 3-6 to maybe 8-9 months, and then just push an update that it no longer needed to be online to play. They get their money, the game isn't bricked at the end of it's life on the company's side, then can continue to sell the damn things after they stop supporting it and get the residual income there, and guess what, the amount of exploits against their DRM would probably be less. But maybe I just to generous, I don't know.
To be fair to M&MX:L, as someone who played it.. it was a pretty rough game and needed so much more developer work, especially on performance and polish. Removing it from sale could be argued as being a good thing. It never got down to bargain bin prices either, lowest was $7.50, which was 3x as much as anyone should've paid for it. But regardless, online only DRM (even if just for activation) is definitely still, to this day, one of the biggest burdens with gaming. I lost net service last month and couldn't play a single player game I had already activated and played previously, because the Denuvo key expired for some reason. Just awful. We shouldn't have to crack our games for better experiences. Not 20 years ago, not today.
The problem with DRM is that it's near-impossible to get right. Steam's has been one of the best ones PCs always had the issues that came with an open platform (with both advantages and disadvantes), especially in the MS-DOS games where we got a ton of really bad video games.
there should be the law that for any software with server based DRM that when it reaches EOL that company is REQUIRED BY LAW to issue an update or have a manual patch available on their website that removes the server check, so only local DRM like a CD key is active (if anything, up to them to completely disable it and make it freeware). and to prevent companies from just saying oh this 20-year-old piece of software isn't EOL even though we haven't updated it in 15 years, after 10 years of no meaningful updates (a bug fix every 2 years is not meaningful) or 5 years after an obvious successor is released (like the next entry in a game or major version of a program), the law will kick in and after a specified period of time if they fail to comply and they receive double the fine they would have gotten otherwise.
Great video. Though I must admit I enjoy these better with the music backdrop, even if it's only a couple of different songs most of the time. It adds charm.
One of those anti-consumer topics that has me foaming at the mouth and getting the pitchforks out, but as I get older I realize that hardly anyone cares, hence companies not only get away with it but are being allowed to constantly ramp up these kind of "Features". All I can do is stay clear of such companies and products, which has me almost exclusively playing indie games and whatever else can be found on GoG.
In the future we will have big gaps in game history because of this type of stuff. Games being sold only digitally with DRM. Some point we will only have our older systems to play and many of the digital only ones like PS5 and Series S will become paperweights when the servers shut off.
You forgot mention that because Ubisoft completely removed the online DRM in their games like Assassins Creed, many unlockables cannot be accessed anymore like extra levels, armor sets, weapons etc. The only way to get those are by cracked DLCs
*correction, it doesnt stop cheater, it has no functionality to do so, also cant be modified server side, that would make it hella easy to remove, it can be updated.
It should be law that software should be preserved. If developers/publishers enforce a server client architecture for their games; they should absolutely be required to publish the source code for the game server once they decide to cease operations. The same goes for games which can no longer be purchased; it should be legal for people to obtain those games by any means if there are no official ways to continue buying or playing them.
Always online DRM can be defeated with two things: Wireshark and a developer team to develop a server This is to trick the game that it is connected to a central server but its just really a locally hosted server
With trying to enjoy the handheld gaming pc on the go experience, the always online single player game thing became more inconvenient than ever I am having to downloac cracked games I own and give up on playing certain games on the go if you fly a lot you're screwed.
I exactly remember the AC crack. It opened a CMD wich has to stay open while playing. Never had any issues with that. Also: Who remembers SteamDown/V2? This was pure cancer for Valve. Good old days i say.
Analogue and Evercade should do a console together, with exclusive games, which you OWN PHYSICALLY! Just to find some game studios or devs to be on-board, and crush the giants! I don’t think i will ever buy a PS5 or SeriesX. Maybe on a garage sale in 2065, haha
I remember making it almost all the way through AC2 on a legitimate purchased version of the game back in the day, and then an issue with UPLAY happened which wiped my entire save. I haven't played an AC game since.
Archiving things is always ethical. Such archives should not be released while a DRM-free product is on sale. Unless the publisher supports nonces or something.
My mind is always boggled why people bitch about Diablo games for this discussion. Yes, when you're playing solo, you *should* be able to play offline, but it's not really a game that is meant to be played by yourself, especially w/ 4. At least you brought up games where it's actually an issue.
Joke's on the publishers: I've never once paid to play a single-player game that required online DRM. I didn't pirate or crack them either....I just chose to play different games. Turns out there are lots of quality games out there published by -- you guessed it -- quality publishers.
Based I always found it weird how someone could say they hate a company and their games but then have played like 10+ of their games. Like sure you didn't pay for it but time is a way more valuable resource than money and they spent tons of hours playing games they hate supposedly. Doesn't really make any sense to me but that might just be me.
This is a serious problem.. I simply stop buying games (digital or disc based) that require constant internet connection. If I buy a game for 50-100 usd/eur, I want to play with them, on day one, and many years later... So, I decided dont buy useless pile of digital scrap. Simply is that is..
I've always voted with my wallet and not supported always online DRM games. It pained my soul to not be able to buy/play Gran Turismo 7 but such is the price I pay for the games I play :p
Sony and Polyphony Digital decided to treat their customers as Holstein cows. Same with Turn 10 and Forza Motorsport. No thanks, there are already alternatives that can be enjoyed with any DRM hassles.
"UPDATE: Ubisoft says single-player block an 'unexpected issue'." oh, that IS priceless. man. you imagine either 1. lying straight up to try and cover what's been embarrassingly revealed as your corporation's bloated, rotting ass or 2. being SO short-sighted and stupid and cynical to actually not plan or even think about the fact that not everyone in the entire world has got solid internet in 2009 OR your own servers won't be able to handle the load or are simply run ineptly as well. it just astounds how good their games could still BE in those days. I was playing _Assassin's Creed Syndicate" for the first time just today and was gobsmacked at how rich and detailed and wonderful that game's London is. especially when you consider it was made eight years ago. and yet the corporate division was even by 2009 making absolutely absurd, anti-costumer practices strict regiment for all their most sought-after products. if _Assassin's Creed Mirage_ is anything BUT absolutely wonderful, they're really in some trouble, here. (I hold almost no faith it's going to be anything beyond "fine, I guess")
I will never play a game that requires a constant online connection. If that's how all games will be in the near future, then I will just play the many older games I have in the backlog.
Diablo 3 was the first PC game I encountered that had an always online requirement that was clearly only DRM. This was proven when they launched a year later on consoles with no such requirement. Never bought that game. D4 is different though. I still don't like that it has no offline mode but at least the game's design is centered around the idea that you're going to be playing it online.
Still most importan thing in this failure story is we need some Law that make Online games or that need server to work, have offfline version made before they get officaly killed by the company. Like what if i want to play Diablo 3, or something in next 30 years later from this time ?
I recently bought Red Dead Redemption 2. I returned it 20 minutes later after trying to connect to broken servers to play single player. Once I feel like playing it in the future I will pirate it and I am not ashamed of it in the slightest. I have spent thousands of dollars on computer games but I will never ever buy one requiring always online for single player ever again.
"The industry is making the same mistake" that's the problem. It isn't, it's the people who are rewarding this practice by buying the game. Clearly Diablo fans have forgotten what has happened with Diablo 3. I havent bought 4 because of the always online requirement.
All these online buying of games, is basically renting at a high price. You don't own the game. And like Nintendo. Once certain time has passed, and they shutdown services.. all your games are bye-bye. Physical copies are a must IMO! Too bad can't buy PC games in physical format that often. Thank you for this video !
EA's games does the same thing requiring users to be online when launching any title on pc, but the EAp App stops me (idk if its isolated or not) when launching NFS Heat or Unbound or other Ea title. If thr DRM is able to be removed then playing online or offline shouldnt be an issues but overall EA doesnt really pay attention to its user base as far as to my knowledge.
I had so much trouble playing my copy of Settlers 7, in single player, that I blacklisted Ubisoft. I refuse to buy single player games that require I be online to play.
retired server leads to bricked games not necessarily. the communication protocol can be reverse engineered and emulated by software. in fact remember replay tv the dvr? hackers reverse engineered the protocols and emulated them so the dvr could connect to your pc or a raspberry pi or something so it can be used as a hard drive based vcr because the replay tv had video inputs so it could record from other sources. maybe game developers should be more worried about the release window rather than the residuals always online drm is dangerous because if some script kiddy wants to wreak havoc on the gaming community they just have to launch a denial of service attack on the servers. the servers are responding to the attack and cant talk to the game.
I'm at a point in my life where I have more money than needed. Unreasonable DRM means that I won't part with it to play their games. I spend it elsewhere.
I didn’t bought a ubisoft title since rayman legends just because they really have no value. They always getting ported (even with backwards compatible consoles) and stuck with bad drm and sometimes fucked up with dlc that’s required you to sign to uplay (scott pilgrim vs the world completed edition situation) and also they always on sales or just on bargains on retailers (every assassin creed title since 2) I just glad i have playstation plus extra because I don’t have to buy and own those games.
Remember to always fight DRM, no one benefits. Teach the industry a lesson we don’t tolerate it. I should probably say fight for offline modes to truly be offline.
