dominions copy protection

[Nerfix]

I say Illwinter makes the CPU frying copy protection system, accompanied with "I will smite thee with the powers of angry god, heathen!" message when Dom II detects it has been cracked.
Then they can sell their copy protection system on and make some $$$!

I know, it's illegal and possibly impossible to do.

[Pocus]

Originally posted by DominionsFAN:
[QB]The sad fact is, that CD-Key or not, all games are cracked, and all games have generated CD-Keys.

True, but cdkeys reported to be pirated can be put on black list (Gal Civ, or windows XP). When several Users ask for the same patch, dozen of time, it is safe to think that something is amiss with this cdkey.

The Galciv idea, that you can download a patch with a valid cdkey is not working at all.
The Galciv updates can be found on the internet...Sad but true.

False. The updates which can be found are the major patches, which are delivered with a cd key, right, but are downloadable and archivable. The incremental patches, which are installed progressively as you download them, are surely not found on the internet.
Major patches are made by Gal Civ to allow Users to archives them and reuse them as they wish, with the big drawback that they are pirated.

Now you may ask, that how the heck did they get those 'Online only' patches. Well who knows? How the heck can someone leak the Half Life 2 source code?
There are no answers. Only questions.

these are not the 'Online only' patches, but the downaloadable & archivable patches.

If you ask me, all protections are a joke, It is totally pointless, as Richard had mentioned before.

all protections can be cracked. The issue is not to have an uncrackable protection, but a scheme which will slow down sufficiently the pirated copies spread. With patches all secured thru download, you can perhaps pirate the old Version of a game, not the new ones.

[Daynarr]

Originally posted by Nerfix:
I say Illwinter makes the CPU frying copy protection system, accompanied with "I will smite thee with the powers of angry god, heathen!" message when Dom II detects it has been cracked.
Then they can sell their copy protection system on and make some $$$!

I know, it's illegal and possibly impossible to do.

Didn't you already posted this?

I do hope that you are joking because frying one's CPU, even if it were possible, is not only illegal but simply not right as well. Imagine that if Cop stops a speeder, takes a bat and smashes his car. Basically you would be much worse then him.
But of course, you are joking.

Right?

[ October 13, 2003, 15:26: Message edited by: Daynarr ]

[WraithLord]

So long as software piracy is not dealt with seriously the various protections are no sweat to the expirienced hacker.
They, however, make life more difficult for the honest buyer

[Pocus]

Originally posted by johan osterman:
Perhaps, but it is to late to implement anything else now anyway.

sure, I can understand it was not even a low order priority for IW, when you started develop Doms, but software companies more and more integrate the fact that they should spend some tenth of percents (I mean 0.1 to 0.3% or more, in case my frenchglish is garbled) of they development time in coding protections which will slow down how the soft can be pirated.

In doms I, you could have in a matter of hours have at least encrypted your serial!

[johan osterman]

Originally posted by izaqyos:
So long as software piracy is not dealt with seriously the various protections are no sweat to the expirienced hacker.
They, however, make life more difficult for the honest buyer

I do not see how a cdkey you enter once makes your life difficult, but perhaps you have no arms and is forced to type with the tip of your nose. Should you enter into a multi player game where you have the same code cd key as another player one of you will get a stale turn, but at least one of the players with the same key has an illbegotten key. If you have a valid purchased key this is unlikely to happen however. There is far more cdkeys then there is likely to be games sold, meaning that chances are that keyes that are cracked are not likely to be the particular key you posess, and the chance that you come up against a multiplayer opponent with your particular key is even more miniscule. And should it happen, against all odds, I am sure we can work something out.

[DominionsFan]

Originally posted by Pocus:
True, but cdkeys reported to be pirated can be put on black list (Gal Civ, or windows XP). When several Users ask for the same patch, dozen of time, it is safe to think that something is amiss with this cdkey.

I think it is working like this:
Someone with a valid cdkey is downloading the updates, and hes putting it up to the net.
He cannot be found or reported of course.

False. The updates which can be found are the major patches, which are delivered with a cd key, right, but are downloadable and archivable. The incremental patches, which are installed progressively as you download them, are surely not found on the internet.
Major patches are made by Gal Civ to allow Users to archives them and reuse them as they wish, with the big drawback that they are pirated.

You are very wrong again. All of the Galciv patches can be found on the net. Propably someone using the method what Ive mentioned above.



As I said protections are useless, and the cd-key to download method as well.
Someone will get those updates and put it up to the net. 100%.
Cd-Keys are only helpful in multiplayer, and only on the net. on LAN you can ALWAYS play with warez cd-keys as well.