Stalker 2 has... Draconian DRM.

[BreakfastMan]

Oh dear, yet another company tries to save their game from pirating. HOW DARE THEY WANT TO EARN MONEY?

Oh dear, yet another company that has decided that they are going to essentially stop me and others like me from playing their game. HOW DARE I WANT TO PLAY SINGLE PLAYER WITHOUT HAVING TO WORRY ABOUT MY SPOTTY INTERNET CONNECTION?

 

[PingoBlack]

Oh dear, yet another company tries to save their game from pirating. HOW DARE THEY WANT TO EARN MONEY?

Oh dear, yet another company that has decided that they are going to essentially stop me and others like me from playing their game. HOW DARE I WANT TO PLAY SINGLE PLAYER WITHOUT HAVING TO WORRY ABOUT MY SPOTTY INTERNET CONNECTION?

Don't buy it. Is that so hard?

 

[Continuity]

Oh dear, yet another company tries to save their game from pirating. HOW DARE THEY WANT TO EARN MONEY?

Look. The paying customers are more that willing to throw money at the guys... We love their games! and Pirates are going to pirate anyway, either they don't have the money to buy or they just want a free ride anyway.. and no DRM is ever going to stop piracy.

So what are they achieving really?

 

[sapphireofthesea]

Well that is fail. Stalker is what I play when I have no internet acess (or it is just messing about with me). I also have serious issues with the constant internet access issue with games that are specifically made for the sinplayer storyline.

Have been patiently waiting for this game but I will have to forgo on the grounds of disagreement with the DRM. I am hoping they revise this decision in future. (Bear in mind I was similarly geared up for Shogan 2 but have not gotten it because of the forced need for Steam).

 

[Flames66]

There's another game I won't be getting.

 

[BreakfastMan]

Oh dear, yet another company tries to save their game from pirating. HOW DARE THEY WANT TO EARN MONEY?

Oh dear, yet another company that has decided that they are going to essentially stop me and others like me from playing their game. HOW DARE I WANT TO PLAY SINGLE PLAYER WITHOUT HAVING TO WORRY ABOUT MY SPOTTY INTERNET CONNECTION?

Don't buy it. Is that so hard?

I won't be.

The thing is, it was a game I was quite looking forward to and was planning on purchasing when it came out. They essentially lost a sale right there. It makes me understandably a bit frustrated with the whole situation, especially considering games that don't have DRM (EDIT: Or have a DRM-less option), like the Witcher 2, can still sell quite well (about 1 Million copies well [http://www.wbj.pl/article-55824-the-witcher-2-nearly-1-million-copies-sold.html])... -_-

 

[Continuity]

Jesus christ some people... Is this REALLY that big of a hassle? *****, *****, *****.. It seems every day the gaming community is heraling a new reason why the gaming industry is 'dead' to them.

So you must be connected to the internet in order to play a SP game; so fucking what? If you're a PC gamer, you're connected to the internet 98% of the day, the other 2% might be the wee hours of the morning when you IP shuts down the connection for maitenence. Whats the issue?


Boycotts, project 10 dollar, DRM, etc. etc. I've been a gamer since I could hold a controller (1990) and you know what? The industry has never been BETTER, but the community has never been WORSE!

Let me give you a few reasons why this is a problem:

Stalker games are buggy and broken and community patches and mods fix this to a large degree - No longer possible.

Stalker games are sandbox RPGs and benefit massively from mods - No longer possible.

Stalker games crash. Lots. Adding potentially flaky internet to the mix is not going to help.

What about when I want to play the game on my laptop somewhere where there is no internet connection? or when I want to play this singleplayer game when I've maxed my broadband CAP for the month and dont want any internet traffic which would cost me £5 per GB over the limit?

 

[BreakfastMan]

Well that is fail. Stalker is what I play when I have no internet acess (or it is just messing about with me). I also have serious issues with the constant internet access issue with games that are specifically made for the sinplayer storyline.

Have been patiently waiting for this game but I will have to forgo on the grounds of disagreement with the DRM. I am hoping they revise this decision in future. (Bear in mind I was similarly geared up for Shogan 2 but have not gotten it because of the forced need for Steam).

You do know that Steam has this helpful little function called "Offline Mode", right?

 

[MolotoK]

Even if this does prevent/reduce piracy, it will also reduce sales and piss off normal customers.

Make your game worth 50 bucks first and then worry about pirates. I bet only a small fraction of pirates would even play the game if they didn't pirate it.

 

[sapphireofthesea]

Well that is fail. Stalker is what I play when I have no internet acess (or it is just messing about with me). I also have serious issues with the constant internet access issue with games that are specifically made for the sinplayer storyline.

Have been patiently waiting for this game but I will have to forgo on the grounds of disagreement with the DRM. I am hoping they revise this decision in future. (Bear in mind I was similarly geared up for Shogan 2 but have not gotten it because of the forced need for Steam).

You do know that Steam has this helpful little function called "Offline Mode", right?

I am aware but steam also has a nice little lock out mode which means if the company goes bust (or changes something that makes me want to leave) you can't use that piece of plastic you bought.

 

[Jandau]

They're idiots.

You know which game tried this? Assassin's Creed 2. You know what happened? Pirates simply played the game, got all the server-based content and then put out a crack that contained all that content and simulated a server connection (all of it offline, naturally). The game could be played normally with no internet access required. I used the crack myself on my copy of AC2 since I was in no mood to endure Ubisoft's retarded DRM schemes.

This is an extra stupid idea for Stalker's developers. They aren't a big studio. They rely on the good will of their fans. And they just kicked their own fans in the nuts. Stalker 2 will likely suffer, but not because of piracy, but because the devs got stupid...

 

[Steppin Razor]

If a group of techno-mages manage to work their techno-sorcery to get around this, then I'll gladly pick this game up. When it goes on sale for $5 or less. I can deal with the various other forms of DRM out there, but this always-on internet crap is where I draw the line. If we lived in a world where ISPs could guarantee internet at all times, the market wasn't flooded with shitty routers, and games companies could ensure that their servers wouldn't crash or drop connections, then this shit could fly. But we don't live in that world, so GSC Game World can go fuck themselves.

 

[lukey94]

Some of the DRM these days is just ridiculous, C&C Tiberium Twilight for example, you have to be logged into steam to play it in the first place, then you have to log into the C&C severs to play singleplayer, I lost about 4 hours of playtime because whilst playing I only save at the end of a session and let autosave do the rest for me. But when my connection to the server (not my ISP) dropped, I lost all of that because they couldn't get my autosave back.

DRM is where the console gamers have an advantage, but even then gamers who buy used games are getting penalised by online passes and project 10 dollars. There is some DRM that makes sense (serial keys and registration to play online) but wiping someones saved games because of a fault with the servers ..... not cool!

 

[GiglameshSoulEater]

Well that is fail. Stalker is what I play when I have no internet acess (or it is just messing about with me). I also have serious issues with the constant internet access issue with games that are specifically made for the sinplayer storyline.

Have been patiently waiting for this game but I will have to forgo on the grounds of disagreement with the DRM. I am hoping they revise this decision in future. (Bear in mind I was similarly geared up for Shogan 2 but have not gotten it because of the forced need for Steam).

You do know that Steam has this helpful little function called "Offline Mode", right?

You do know that offline mode is horrendously buggy and often doesn't work, right?

And that doesn't help if the game data is downloaded on the fly because since you aren't online, you can't download it! so you can't play the game.

OT: Damnit, that sucks.

Alas, one less sale. With my poor connection theres no way i want to get booted from the game for a hiccup with my connection.

 

[SinisterGehe]

At least there trying to stop Piracy its better then them just laying down and having people steal the game.

Yeah but you know, that will be cracked in matter of days and then the honest good willing customer shave to suffer if they have connection issues. Yes, make the life easy for the criminals but god damn you if you dare to treat your customers like honest people... It makes sense to tag everyone as a criminal, because then everyone is in equally shit position... but no wait! The pirates will win this battle once again.

 

[FreebirdLegend]

They really need to just stick to the same thing. I mean its a good idea but like someone said before me the S.T.A.L.K.E.R games are very buggy. It kinda seems it might be almost unplayable if you have to download stuff while your playing. But if they perfect that idea and make sure it was not to buggy it probably would not bother me to much (unless my internet becomes crap). But either way I am going to buy it.

 

[plugav]

It seems like something that could potentially cause trouble for players, but it doesn't sound as "draconian" as some of the DRM out there (at least you can sell the game). And unlike most of the DRM out there, it might actually do its job for a few weeks (unlike regular DRM which doesn't work at all). It's still abusive, mind you.

Wait a minute... Didn't Shamus Young suggest that king of "protection" once ? I believe it was here, on The Escapistmagazine.

Actually, he said it was so awful it might actually work. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/experienced-points/7467-Experienced-Points-Impossible-to-beat-DRM]

 

[Vault101]

Jesus christ some people... Is this REALLY that big of a hassle? *****, *****, *****.. It seems every day the gaming community is heraling a new reason why the gaming industry is 'dead' to them.

So you must be connected to the internet in order to play a SP game; so fucking what? If you're a PC gamer, you're connected to the internet 98% of the day, the other 2% might be the wee hours of the morning when you IP shuts down the connection for maitenence. Whats the issue?


Boycotts, project 10 dollar, DRM, etc. etc. I've been a gamer since I could hold a controller (1990) and you know what? The industry has never been BETTER, but the community has never been WORSE!

I am a rare gamer in that I have download limits...rediculous download limits..but yeah Im not very interested in the game anyway

oh and of coarse the principle of the thing..blah blah blah "dont want my games at the mercy of a server/would like to play when I want how I want" blah blah that kind of thing