What´s the point of the new copy protection?

[krpeters]

Just putting my $0.02 in: I haven't seen this "bug", but from what I've seen described of it, it is a pretty silly method of copy protection. Bug reports damage the reputation of a game. If pirates go onto a board complaining of weird effects in their game, current users are going to fear that theirs might start acting up, and prospective buyers can get scared off. Not a good strategy.

Also keep in mind that pirates are "prospective" buyers, if they can be "scared straight". That is, you let their version work, but encourage them to buy a working version... say, by slapping horror marks on their commanders randomly every turn. Display a little message -- "Horrors have eaten 13 computer game pirating commanders". They'll get the picture,and if they still like the game, they'll buy it.

Bugs just confuse them and encourage them to walk away from the game altogether, which is not what you want to do.

[Dedas]

Come on, if Illwinter wants to try punishing people for pirating let them. It's their game after all.

However, as some pirates may get scared, annoyed, bugged to buying the game, I believe the majority of them will just wait for a new crack to come out. I mean, it is computer code after all, it can be cracked.

[PhilD]

Turin said:
1.Bad word of mouth.
People don´t know that it´s copyprotection, so people assume it´s a bug.

I tend to agree that copyprotection should be clearly marked as copyprotection, and not pose as a bug, but in this case, it's a pretty lenient protection anyway - basically, the patch comes with a list of known pirated CD keys, and checks for them. No serious effort is made to make the life of legitimate users, and this is, IMHO, the #1 thing that copy protection should ensure - and, most of the time, fails miserably.

2. Alienating semilegitimate users:

The game has a pretty functional demo. Pirating a game until your copy arrives is still pirating a game, and doesn't qualify as legitimate use (it's something I wouldn't do, anyway); I completely fail to feel sorry for the "semilegitimate users" you are describing, and, honestly, I'm not sure many really exist.

3. Wasting programming time:
I don´t know much about programming, but implementing and checking that the copyprotection works correctly must take some time.

Frankly, programming in this kind of copy protection takes negligible time. Even I could probably do it, and I don't know much about programming (I only teach it, which, believe me, doesn't mean much about my skills).

4. Not trusting customers:

It's still a completely nonintrusive copy protection. You can install the game on several computers if you like, and don't need the CD to play (something I'm pretty happy with when I go on a mission and take my laptop with me - I can still play in my MP games, even if I don't take my laptop CD drive with me). I'll repeat myself, but this copy protection doesn't hurt legitimate users in any way, so anyone who can rightly feel "not trusted" has to be an illegitimate user; again, not feeling sorry for them.

The reason I´m interested in this is that I´m a student of economics and I have focused on behavioral economics, which deals with issues like fairness/trust/reciprocity in an economic background. And given the results of the papers/experiments I have to read there regarding trust and reciprocity, I just can´t see how the new copy protection scheme makes sense.

I really don't know anything about economics (OK, I dabble in game theory), but the purpose of this kind of (half-serious) copy protection is to make life slightly harder for the pirate; no half-user-friendly scheme (that I know of) has any chance of achieving more than that. And most likely, the scheme itself is a result of Illwinter having "few" developers (like, one) and not much interest in programming anything more serious in (I mean, UI programming isn't fun, but at least you get to use the better UI after it's done; when you put in hours of work into a copy protection scheme, you're working on feature you are 100% sure you won't use personally when you use the software).

For example why don´t you put at least an errormessage like Nagot gik fel:badcdkey after the error, so that the pirates know it´s not a bug and you don´t get the bad word of mouth effect?

Here I tend to agree, but then, if the pirate can too easily identify the "problem" as coming from a "bad CD key" (which I'm pretty sure means "known pirated CD key from a finite list"), this basically tells him to find another one which isn't on the list...

[Archonsod]

This kind of copy protection is present in most games to some degree these days, usually on top of the usual disk protection or similar.

Turin said:
1.Bad word of mouth.
People don´t know that it´s copyprotection, so people assume it´s a bug. That certainly will drive people off, who are thinking about buying the game, but hearing from their pirate friends that it´s a really buggy game.

Generally, if people had 'pirate friends' I doubt they'd bother buying the game. Why spend money when your friend can give you a copy? It's the same as the "pirates might buy a game" argument - the small number of people who would fit into this description would hardly register on the sales front.
Generally, most purchasers would use reviews on websites or magazines for their 'word of mouth'. You tend to find a lot of people would put such bugs down to the difference between systems (especially if the problem somehow implies the friend's system is inferior. E-penis envy should never be underestimated!)

2. Alienating semilegitimate users:
Unless it has changed recently, it can take quite a while for the copy to arrive when ordering from some publishers. Since many people aren´t very patient, it´s pretty likely that they will use a pirated copy until the real one arrives. Now guess what happens when they find out that the 55Euro game they just ordered has strange bugs/crashes.

They've already ordered it. Presumably they'd figure it out when the legit copy arrives. If not, in the words of Johnny Rotten "We have your money". If they pre-ordered it then they may cancel, but after that the sale is made (I doubt you'd be required to refund the consumer if you could state the problem was an illegitimate key being used). The odds on them having the game prior to it's release (the point when the order is despatched or otherwise 'too late to cancel') is fairly slim.

3. Wasting programming time:

99% of requested features are always ignored anyway. It's not normally a factor to programming time, since the developer usually knows precisely what they want to add to the game from it's initial development stage, usually.
To implement this kind of protection is rarely time intensive at all (presumably it just checks the key against a blacklist). Even with more advanced types (such as those which actively scan the memory and system environment) it's not necessarily a waste of time - not only are you protecting your investment, but the methods used for the protection are often part of something else (in other words, the protection is more of a secondary feature to another bit of coding).

4. Not trusting customers:

Not really an issue. It's like saying manufacturer's should stop using car alarms because it will alienate car thieves : a legitimate user should never encounter the security feature, while illegitimate users (i.e. those who haven't paid for your product) are prevented from using it. You have a small percentage of false positives, but this is comparable to the small percentage of problems any feature would cause to people with particular system configurations.

1. The developers can get the feeling of satisfaction that no pirate is enjoying their hard work.

Not really, unless Illwinter issue a patch everytime someone produces a keygen or key then it's never going to be up to date. What you can do is make it just that little bit harder for the game to be pirated, which generally reduces the amount of people who use a pirated copy.

For example why don´t you put at least an errormessage like Nagot gik fel:badcdkey after the error, so that the pirates know it´s not a bug and you don´t get the bad word of mouth effect?

The main problem with this is you're telling the real pirates (those who produce the keygens/cracks) precisely what the problem is, making their job easier. I guess the idea is that these guys get fed up with the buggy game, and decide not to bother.
There's also a secondary purpose, though I only know of one company which has ever used it. If someone reports the problem, then you can usually identify them (for example, their IP address from a forum post) and take legal action.

[Actuarian]

I remember that at least one game (Master of Orion?) had a copy protection scheme that turned the difficulty level up to completely impossible after a certain number of turns if you played with a pirated copy.

[Velusion]

Archonsod said:
The main problem with this is you're telling the real pirates (those who produce the keygens/cracks) precisely what the problem is, making their job easier. I guess the idea is that these guys get fed up with the buggy game, and decide not to bother.

While I agree with most everything you said previously, I can't see how this makes sense from a business perspective.

Games sell based on a number of factors... one of them is hype. This copyright protection causes negative hype - because it isn't easliy identifable. What you have is lots of pirates flooding the boards (both here and all the other game sites) with messages like "this game is buggy and broken." This hurts business directly when legitimate demo players assume that the game has bugs. It also confuses other players who might have somewhat simliar video issues.

Being fairly familiar with the pirate scene (hacker culture and all) I can say this really will have no effect because, quite franky, Dom3 just isn't popular enough to crack more than once. I.E. if Ilwinter implemented a different copy write protection for every patch in all likelyhood the crackers wouldn't bother because the title is so obscure. Whatever group cracked the game got the credit already, which is all they care about.

The only real effect this has is to annoy some pirate users (which is a laudable enough goal) but the downside is negative hype about the stability of the game.

[Archonsod]

Velusion said:
Games sell based on a number of factors... one of them is hype. This copyright protection causes negative hype - because it isn't easliy identifable. What you have is lots of pirates flooding the boards (both here and all the other game sites) with messages like "this game is buggy and broken."

Unlikely. Pretty much every mainstream game since 2000 has incorporated similar protection, and this hasn't really happened yet. I doubt you'd see this sort of thing happening, most pirates I know would simply delete the game once they encountered the bugs rather than go complaining on the forum.

The only real effect this has is to annoy some pirate users (which is a laudable enough goal) but the downside is negative hype about the stability of the game.

One would hope that the amount of legitimate users would far outnumber those of pirate users on any mainstream forum. In other words, the main negative hype would likely be on pirate sites themselves, which one could rationalise by the fact that you wouldn't be losing paying customers. Thing is, I'd expect that anyone familiar with this kind of thing would be able to figure out precisely what was happening from this.

If it wasn´t for Tombom´s explanation people would assume that dominions 3 is a cool, but buggy game. I can´t see how that helps sales.

In this specific instance then it might not, but then Illwinter have always stated they're not that bothered about sales. With a mainstream title, then you always have a legitimate fanbase who'll usually point out that the reported bug isn't affecting them (in greater numbers than the pirates one would hope).

You also presume that the customers find out that their problems are due to an illegal cd-key or bother using their legit one after the game is already installed.

Given that they'd have potential problems with multiplayer otherwise one would expect they'd switch keys as soon as they had the legit one in this case. I guess you could also assume that legit users in this situation would either find out themselves (by looking for users with similar problems) or else contact support and be told why they're having the problem.

Well I certainly don´t know if the copyprotection is part of anything else which is useful.

In this case probably not, but it's not a complicated mechanism.
In an example I gave with a more complicated mechanism (the memory/environment scan) it can detect hacks and similar cheat methods too. If you had an online game, then you'd want to implement this kind of thing as a fair play measure anyway, so it doesn't take too much (if any) modification to apply it to looking for game cracks. Similarly, back in the olden days when video or similar content needed to run from the CD while the game was being played, it doesn't take too much more effort to check the CD being played is legit.

But there have been quite a lot of reports of the bug appearing even with legit keys, so I guess the developers should have spent more time testing the code.

Depends on why it's being triggered. If your checking against a list of known suspect keys, then those people with legitimate keys who are being flagged have either had their key stolen or else have made it available to the public (breaching their EULA). Since I don't know what exactly Illwinter has implemented I can't say for sure why or what they are going to do about it. I know with other companies employing similar protection they're usually happy to issue a new key or similar if you can prove ownership.

It really makes no sense not to have a logical errormessage that tells the error is due to a bad cd-key. If you tell people that anyway via the forum, then the pirates can certainly figure it out.

Most would probably figure it out without the error message to be honest. I guess it's purely down to the preference of the authors. I suppose one thing which you would avoid is someone trying to break the protection again - if you get an error saying "wrong CD Key" then there would be nothing stopping you looking for another key until you found a working one. You could of course simply say "illegal version detected" or similar, which wouldn't tell the user precisely how it detected it.

[mivayan]

Archonsod said:
Unlikely. Pretty much every mainstream game since 2000 has incorporated similar protection, and this hasn't really happened yet.

Most mainstream games have intentional bugs if the program thinks you're a pirate? I find that hard to believe.

Depends on why it's being triggered. If your checking against a list of known suspect keys, then those people with legitimate keys who are being flagged have either had their key stolen or else have made it available to the public (breaching their EULA).

Couldn't at least a few legitimate users have their cd key be identical to a widespread one created by a key-generator?

I know with other companies employing similar protection they're usually happy to issue a new key or similar if you can prove ownership.

Yeah, support can probably solve such cases. But I dont want everyone to email support everytime a patch introduces an odd bug.

[Kamamura]

Turin - I am an example of a person who was persuaded to buy by this 3.06 copy protection. I don't care much about the money, but international payments here are a hassle, if you don't want to open a big hole into your account (credit card - I don't trust them). But 3.06 was such a hassle that I persuaded my friend to order it for me. So, this scheme might be considered to be somewhat successful, because it's defense in depth, and no cracker will bother to look for all the checks inside the code.

[Archonsod]

mivayan said:
Most mainstream games have intentional bugs if the program thinks you're a pirate? I find that hard to believe.

They're not intentional bugs. Many developers treat it as a kind of Easter Egg. To take Vietcong for example, if the protection triggered it reduced the hitboxes to a single pixel, gradually enlarged characters heads over time and other strangeness like low gravity grenades. I've actually seen cases where tech support has been asked how the protection can be triggered because players want to see the game in that mode.
I guess it depends on the developer - plenty probably see it as an 'officially sanctioned' method of goofing about with the code.

Couldn't at least a few legitimate users have their cd key be identical to a widespread one created by a key-generator?

The small number of false positives I was talking about. Most keygens wouldn't come up with an actual key though (they're designed to trick the checking method rather than duplicate the keys themselves).
The problem there though is telling them the key entered is fake - they have the manual in front of them, your likely to confuse the matter. In that case, you'd need the user to get in touch so you could identify the problem - instead most would likely attempt to return or exchange the game thinking the key was broken.

Yeah, support can probably solve such cases. But I dont want everyone to email support everytime a patch introduces an odd bug.

Happens whether there's a bug or not : You can see the difference on these forums though - if it's an actual bug, everyone can replicate it and people tend to wait for official word from the developer (it becomes a case of the bug becoming "known"). In the case of the copy protection, you find only a couple of people with the problem and others stating that it's working fine for them, which would hopefully encourage those with the problem to contact support.
At the end of the day, I suppose the logic is that pirates aren't going to pay for the game, so why bother marketing to them? Rather than using the protection as a method to enforce a shareware licence (ie encourage people to buy the full game) it's used simply to prevent illegitimate users from playing the game. Yes, it might lead them to think the game is unplayably buggy, but since you're not counting them as part of your potential market in the first place, you don't really care.