Steam offering From Dust refunds
Steam is offering refunds on Ubisoft's From Dust owing to changes to the DRM.
Ubisoft has also announced that it is ‘currently working on a patch that will eliminate the need for any online authentication for From Dust.’ The company is estimating 2 week before the the patch is released.
Ubisoft originally told users that From Dust would not feature the controversial and draconian always-online DRM used in some Ubisoft PC games, then inexplicably reneged on the policy without comment.
If you bought the game and wish to return it, you can either contact Ubisoft directly or wait for Steam to contact you via email.
You can check out our From Dust review for more information on the game.
Are you thinking of forgiving Ubisoft or just getting rid of it as soon as possible? Tell us in the forums.
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Discuss in the forums ReplyNext up in the world of DRM, Ubi adds a usb powered anal probe, that way they can truly fk you over when you play their games
Guess the torrent sites will enjoy the extra traffic....
Cartman should have no prob then :-P
Valve require a constant internet connection? Do explain, I'd love to hear this one...
Ahh, the stereotypical hater / fan-boy...
... As usual, doesn't know the difference between facts and their own flawed interpretation.
STEAM doesn't do DRM, you can access your games offline, and I think you only have to log in once a month at most... Basically, I often play offline Steam games without a connection, no worries.
What Ubisoft are doing is natural for half-arsed companies that always look for the easiest, yet inevitably worst, solution to a problem; do what's easiest for them regardless of the impact to their CUSTOMERS.
Not a problem though, as idiots always have to learn the hard way ;)
ubisofts cretinous log-in does not work with my firewall, or half a dozen other popular firewalls, and i'll be damned if i'll take my pants down for the internet just to play their game!
Steam is a form of DRM as without it you will be unable to play the games you purchased.
However It is not a BS need to always be online bug filled piece of **** draconian form of DRM.
I am a happy Steam user, it is a great DRM platform and an even better gaming service even though I believe they should allow me to at the least change my logon ID, I'd even pay them to allow me to do this, and give unwanted titles away.
Some of us take our pants down to play any game. *looks shifty*
Your definition of DRM must differ from everyone else's too since Valve can (and regularly do) disable accounts resulting in Steam users losing access to their entire collection (examples here, here, here and here - plenty of others around).
And then there is the Steam Subscriber Agreement which contains clauses allowing Valve to:
- revoke your purchases at any time for virtually any reason (section 5: "Valve may terminate your Account...for any conduct or activity that Valve believes...negatively affects the enjoyment of Steam by other Subscribers");
- charge extra amounts to your credit card as they please (section 4B: "Valve reserves the right to change our fees or billing methods at any time...") - they have to give 30 days notice but closing your account (and losing access to everything purchased previously, whether you backed them up or not) would be the only way to avoid any such charges;
- avoid liability if your system is hijacked by malware transmitted through Steam (section 9C: "VALVE DOES NOT GUARANTEE CONTINUOUS, ERROR-FREE, VIRUS-FREE OR SECURE OPERATION..."). This should be particularly significant given Sony's recent problems - at least Playstation owners didn't have to worry about their system being infected with malware allowing others access to their online bank accounts.
For long-term Steam users, section 4B should be the biggest concern since it could be used by Valve to bring in an annual, or even monthly, maintenance fee on all Steam accounts.It's worth noting that Steam initially refused to provide refunds to many users (just like they refused to provide refunds on APB purchases following Realtime Worlds' closure) and only changed their policy when Ubisoft asked them to.
Ubi DRM? It's all stick, baby.
Does it run with Crysis?
Just like eBooks. You have half a dozen (maybe slight exageration) different DRM types as well as several different formats on top of the DRM. So great, you bought a book from Amazon for the Kindle, but the only way to get it to work on your iPad or Android device is with an Kindle reader app. Oh, and if you want to use it on your computer, you need the kindle reader app. If you want to use it on another eBook reader...sorry, you can't. Buy the book through the iTunes store, iBooks on your iPad or iPhone only, sorry.
I point out the issue with that, only because at least with songs and movies it is relatively easy to buy the physical media and convert it yourself to an MP3, MKV, MP4, etc with no DRM attached and use the movie or song you bought on any device you want. Where as a book, buying a phsyical book is hard, time consuming and annoying to convert to DRM freem digital form.
Etc, etc.
You have any idea how much kool aid I need to drink now to get over all that?? :-)
I've been aware for while tbh, although I have put so much money into my Steam account I try and live in denial (still, at least 99% of the games I have brought have generally been at dirt cheap discount price, and should I end up shutting steam cause they go for a monthly fee, I'd have gotten my moneys worth from most of the games).
I miss the days of simple 'none disk copy' DRM (where a simple no cd crack would deal with that for your own pc) and X-fire. I drunk the DRM cool-aid when I got given a Valve courtesy account that adds all Valve games for free.
Sigh, time to go and play one of the games I don't really fully own.
Not really
I play EvE online, I brought it through steam, to play it I just use the shortcut I made to the exe in the steam directory and steam does not start.
To further prove this point, to use the EvE test server I copied the directory from steam put it on a different drive and changed the server connection ip to the test server and still no need for steam.
Dirt 2 is another one I know for sure that works without steam if you use the exe in the game folder.
All I wish for is the ability to gift games you own but no longer want.. How is this any different to specifically buying a game as a gift?
Interesting, I thought Steam would start with all games, I'll have to go through and see what ones will start without, maybe we can make a thread about it.
That doesn't deal with the increasing number of games using Steamworks though - these effectively make Steam compulsory.
To be fair, most other digital distributors (Impulse, GamersGate) have similar downsides (though their activate-on-install gives you a little more breathing space than activate-on-play) - DRM-free services like GOG are safe, as long as downloads are backed up.
To properly verify whether authentication was taking place you would have to:
Woah.......ok, I'm out as that is just scary and seems to show a rather shitty mindset on Valves part....no more full price AAA game purchases from steam. Serves me right for not reading the EULA though but all my new purchases will be via http://www.direct2drive.com/.
Isnt it similar to a VAC ban?
Why so much FUD, AstralWanderer... :?
It may not "properly" verify it in the way's you describe, but lets face it, it's a pretty good indication that you don't need steam to play all of your steam games.
re: the steam subscriber agreement clauses, I'm pretty sure you'll find thing's like that in most subscriber agreements, pretty standard stuff that gives them the option to do whatever they want whenever they want without any form of liability should it all go horribly wrong, nothing out of the ordinary really.
It says it can change "fees and billing methods", so Steam can change the price of games and stop sending the invoice via e-mail, still have to give a 30 day notice.
If you wish to keep fighting windmills, have fun, just dont spread FUD.;)
As for their actions - check the links for yourself (mostly Paypal issues - but for Valve to terminate an entire account over a single game's disputed payment is disproportionate to put it mildly).
We can't find out, which is one of the biggest problems with this.
They could be evil, and we have no idea whether they are being evil or not. What I suspect will actually happen with Steam is that one day - be that next year or next decade - it will become less successful and they'll stop supporting it.
I suspect it won't be much longer than "next decade", anyway. At that point, hundreds of millions of pounds' worth of software around the world will instantly evaporate.
That is not OK.
Subscription, in the context of Steam Subscriber Agreement, is a game.
Nothing to do with paying a fee/subscription for a Steam account.
There is nothing about "monthly charge for a Steam account".
+1
I heard different from totalhalibit....I suppose at the end of the end if the distributor screws you over there will always be cracks available.