Ubisoft Officially Drops Starforce

totalbasscase writes "Starforce, the copy protection scheme hated by most who've had reason to use it, has lost a customer. Ubisoft has confirmed that not only will Heroes of Might and Magic V ship without Starforce copy protection, the publisher is discontinuing its use in all its games." From the article: "We'd venture it has something to do with the lawsuit raised against Ubisoft for using Starforce as copy protection software. When we asked why they were dropping the company Ubisoft representatives said, 'Ubisoft takes its customer concerns very seriously and is investigating the complaints about alleged problems with Starforce's software. Ubisoft's goal is to find solutions for its customers if there are problems with Ubisoft products.'"

Re:Shame...

[Ahnteis]

Actually, I've had far fewer frustrations with securom then with starforce.

I can live with some copy protection. I don't agree with the idea, but I can accept some compromise.

However starforce has caused me too many problems for me to accept it. I've written several publishers/developers to tell them that if their game includes starforce, I won't buy it. (And of course, appropriate information as to why I won't buy it.)

Good move Ubisoft.

What they should do

[Alarash]

Now what Ubisoft should do is patch all of their games that use StarForce so not only upcoming games will not use this protection system, but the previously released as well. Then only will I believe them when they say "Ubisoft takes its customer concerns very seriously".

What can WE do?

[Zitchas]

Well, for all of the rabid anti-copy protection types up there, here's something nice and constructive you can do: Get your wallet, and go visit your local gaming store. Now, buy every single computer game in there (every copy of them, too) that doesn't have any kind of copy-protection on it. Now go sell them on Ebay or your local pawn shop or something. It doesn't matter what you do with them, so long as you buy them legitimatly and don't return them.

If enough people do this, it will create a large enough blip in the demographics that maybe, just maybe, these companies will sit up and take notice that non-copy-protected stuff can actually make money and all that. And they'll even save money on being able to skip buying some outrageously expensive CP thing.

After all, about all the copy-protection thing ever did was nail the average user. Anyone with any knowledge at all can find hacks on the web to get around it (or, for that matter, a full copy of it for free without the CP). And those with a lot of knowledge can flat out get around it anyway. In short, it doesn't affect those they declare themselves as targeting.

In the mean time, here's hoping that Ubisoft continues their way on the return to sanity, and learns a valuable lesson from all this.

my anecdote

[rossjudson]

Can't say that I've had any problems with Starforce recently, but a few years back a Starforce-protected game did trash a CD-ROM I had at the time. On the first run of the game (I think it was Broken Sword III) there was a kind of "seek of death" sound, and the drive never worked again. Yeah, it was an old drive, but it worked great up until that exact moment.

I don't know what the current state of Starforce is, and I'm assuming they've improved its compatibility. What I have a problem with is the arbitrary installation of a device driver into a system without any form of notification to the user, no explanation of the risks involved, and no way to back out of it.

Software developers really should have a legal declaration that accompanies their software, in which each major component is declared with an explanation, and an inventory of the files that comprise it.

Boycott PC Games and SafeDisc

[Anonymous Coward]

I have switched to console games since there seems to be better backward compatibilty. After upgrading my computer to one that has a DVD drive instead of a CD-ROM drive, I found that all video games I had bought that used Macrovision's SafeDisc v1 no longer playable. Macrovision's code artifically declaired the purchased CD to no longer be an "original." Neither Macrovision or the game manufactor would provide any support in addressing the issue. To date, Macrovision makes no promises that their current copy protection methods will continue to authenticate the disk as being an original if used in a BluRay or HD-DVD computer drive once they become available. Given the lack of any guarentee and the history of lack of forward support to maintain continued re-use of the product has lead me to decide that it is not worth investing in PC games any longer.

As a side note, friends have let me know that the same games play fine from a DVD-ROM drive provided you used the "pirated" version with the copy protection defeated. The bottom line is that Macrovision is not stopping copying of software but rather creating an situation where the "pirates" end up with a superior product over those that payed for the copy-protection enabled version.