Gorgon

Companies are unable to settle for 'good enough' they want to solve the issue. I remember a time when Steam was the worst privacy infringement DRM had to offer. Well, it's also the leading digital distribution system in the industry. Its big flagships like Halflife got cracked because Valve was a prestigeous target, the same reason that Windows will be cracked nomatter how hard it is to do. I suspect this always online thing is also about trying to wedge other things in. Targeted advertising, forcing all players to be part of the inevitable 'online store' function. They aren't doing it just to be stupid, it's all part of a sinister plan.

Yeah things are moving a little too fast. I'm used to being able to edit minor points and spelling without communication issues.

Because doing nothing would be analogous to giving your product away. You will have beaten the illegal downloaders, and bankrupted yourself in the process of course. A Scheme consumers are happy with is not nothing.

As has already been established, you don't need DRM for Law abiding citizens, as they are already paying for the games. Also established, DRM doesn't function as any sort of barrier for pirates. So DRM fails at it's intended purpose of preventing piracy, and your counterargument is that if we stop using it people will stop paying for games? There's a logical fallacy right in the center of your argument. No, what I mean is this. There are people who don't torrent and don't know how to apply a crack, who aren't in the loop, just aren't offended by DRM, spend their time on other more rewarding things... For that demographic DRM is 100% successful. For the other, probably vastly larger group of gamers who do, there is no effective response. So, yes, you punish your core consumer base because it's what you can do. In the end it works out better than doing nothing. You guys need to wrap your heads around the fact that DRM can be effective for some people. The speed with which games are released illegally, or the ease with which DRM can be bypassed doesn't change that. When DRM gets draconian it's because the companies think they finally know a way to get ahead of the curve, and they are mostly wrong. This is all true.

You do know that the shirt analogy is a really bad one rigth. If you could magically duplicate shirts at no cost we would be getting somewhere. I count CD check in the DRM category, don't you guys ?

They make the developers lose less money than they would have otherwise. DRM doesn't work very well, but it's still better than giving the games away. This is not rocket science, honestly, you seem to be stuck in the same argument. We have already established that DRM has lots of drawbacks, now lets move on. What is the alternative ?. That's right, there isn't one.

They work for the law biding plebs. I know it's a shocking concept, but there are people out there who don't torrent games for no other reason than that it's illegal.

I don't understand the argument for not using DRM. Yes we have establised that it works very poorly, but what is the alternative. 'Prettty please pay us' ?. How are you going to get financing like that. Lets not be naive. No DRM may work for good old games where the development costs are negliable, but it's here to stay, and going without it is not a real option.

The future of biometrics

I'm sure they are well aware of the analog loophole, and that all it really takes is time regardless of what software it is. The main problem for publishers is not that a game can be cracked, but that torrent sites are so prevalent it's often many times easier to download a game illegally than to pay for it. P2P is the real enemy, and their victories so far have been very minor.

Leave it to the Chinese to make a cheap knockoff without any hidden hooks.

So, you can have a bad desktop or a bad laptop. Win !.

I think you will get tired of poking the screen in lieu of a keyboard really fast.

Nothing wrong with being a socialist except that in the American political venacular there is little to no difference between socialist and communist, it simply means something else than in the rest of the world. A misnomer that goes back virtually unchallenged to the cold war. In most of central Europe Obama would be right of center and certainly not a 'red' of any denomination. So, Obama is an American socialist.

I thought philology was the study of language. Doesn't sound very language studyish

Offline mode always works and you can always launch your games. The problem is getting into it. It'll often try to update Steam for 5 minutes before it gives you the offline mode option, but it IS there, even if you try to turn that mode on with no net on a fresh boot. Edit: As it stand nows, my Steam folder is about 180gigs and my GOG folder 30 or 40. I always try to buy on GOG first to avoid ALL DRM, but Steam has been extremely pleasant. None of the nastiness I was expecting. I get 'could not connect to steam' and that's that, nowhere to launch my games. If I lose connectivity while logged in it says 'game not available at this time'

The breast thing is weird, if you are 18 you can't be mistaken for a young child, maybe mistaken for 16-15 and that would be a longshot. Also, it's descrimination. Small boobed women thrown in jail for frolicking picks, big boobed ones land promotions.

Uh'huh, I'll be sure to let my girlfriend know. It'll save me a ton of effort. *Badum tish*

While it wasn't as dark as Aliens, I wouldn't call it a family film. I mean besides the violence and alien sex, Ridley is a smoker! That's pretty dark. Yes, what a badboy.

Dragon age is CD key, I think, can't remember. In any case no problems playing without an active connection.

Offline mode works, sometimes. Mostly you are not allowed to launch games in offline mode. Maybe you have to have booted up steam first which requires connectivity, so offline mode would be for people who have logged in but lost their internet. Pretty useless.

I have, it's weak rehash of what we have already seen. Not even T-bag can help matters.

I wont be getting any of those games, for me the absolute limit has been reached with steam (no connection means game is 'unavailable') which I still use because it compensates by being very easy to use.

Ohh and watch your computer(s) ant's are attracted by the vibrations given off by by electrical machinery. Might want to get the cases off the floor at least.