While some developers are upping the ante in the ongoing battle against video game piracy, one publisher has actually balked at one of their more ambitious ideas and decided to abandon it entirely — at least for two of their upcoming titles.
Though Ubisoft had initially claimed that both From Dust, the downloadable “god game” that recently hit Xbox Live and PC, and Driver: San Francisco would require a constant Internet connection on the PC, they have since changed their mind after what must have been some serious gamer backlash.
According to Ubisoft, outcries from fans on forums and in comments have forced them to re-evaluate their decision, and moving forward, those games will not be DRM-locked. It’s a small victory for gamers who were perturbed at the thought of no offline gaming, but it by no means confirms Ubisoft is moving away from this concept.
More realistically Ubisoft did not want to flood two titles that are unknown quantities — From Dust being a downloadable niche title and Driver: SF hoping to jumpstart a waning franchise — with bad press. If say Assassin’s Creed: Revelations were to require a constant Internet connection, a realistic possibility considering the growing popularity of the game’s multiplayer modes, I don’t think Ubisoft would be as gun-shy.
Still, this is definitely a victory for the PC gamer, and hopefully can pave the way for other publishers/developers to stop requiring ancillary services to run a specific game (I’m looking at you Origin).
Piracy is obviously a problem in the PC gaming world and one that publishers are going to need to address in one way or another, but only if they can escape punishing those gamers who purchase the game legitimately. Don’t count this as the end of DRM-based gaming, just hopefully a move away from it.
Do you think that Ubisoft has abandoned the idea of a constant Internet connection or is this just a unique circumstance? How do you feel about publishers using this method of security?
From Dust is out now for the PC.
Driver: San Francisco releases August 30, 2011 for PS3 and Xbox 360, and September 27th for PC.
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Source: Rock Paper Shotgun