Gaming Shades of Grey: Is DRM a Necessary Evil?

Submitted by Christopher Groux; March 13, 2013

Article Index
1. Gaming Shades of Grey: Is DRM a Necessary Evil?
2. Does DRM Reward the Consumer?
3. DRM Can Hurt the Games We Love
4. DRM Shackles Consumer Freedom
5. My OpinionMy Opinion

Page 1 of 5

It Protects the Rights of Developers

If you're a real hardcore gamer, then in a lot of cases there are certain developers and development teams you just cant get enough of. Are you a fan of Quantic Dream's interactive move-like gameplay, or is it that you just can't seem to put down any game with the Final Fantasy name in it? Either way, it doesn't matter. Many of us are loyal to the people that create the games we love, and I think that's a good thing. After all, they do slave for years and spend millions of dollars with the goal of making us happy, so don't they deserve a little piece of mind in knowing that they own the right to do whatever they want with what they have made?

developer-rights

That's the argument that you would get from a developer that would most likely be in favor of DRM. The fact is, with torrents and other services so easy to locate, content piracy has never been simpler. In some senses, the only way to keep up with the illegal consumer then is to fight back with an even stronger hand which is exactly what the purpose of DRM is. No matter how you slice it, piracy is stealing. DRM's only intention then is to prevent those less than legit folks from playing so that they might spend the small chunk of cash to purchase the game instead. Whether they actually buy the game is another question, but the development studios do need money to make more games, so in some regards steps to ensure that that cash can flow should maybe get a better wrap than it does.

That argument was probably enough to get most of you in a tizzy, but I think we should roll on to see what the rest of the debate holds!

Back - Read Page 2 of this Story >>

Tags: DLC, DRM, Microsoft, Piracy, Sony

i think those that complain about drm are the ones that caused it to be needed in the first place.

very rare that i have had any issues with online activation or drm checks when playing or installing games.

i love to follow forums finding trolls that all share the same BS dribble that they own the game yet theyre sharing the same errors that pirated cracks ect cause.

i think drm is needed and should be enforced more, it annoys me when people get sh1t handed to them for free, when the rest of us pay our way in life.

# RE: RE: Gaming Shades of Grey: Is DRM a Necessary Evil? — Christopher Groux 2013-03-13 15:50

You are lucky to not have issues, but I wouldn't say it's unheard of. You are right though it is a lot of the pirates that complain the most. As they should I guess. We'll have to cover the ethics of full blown piracy in another article I think.

# RE: Gaming Shades of Grey: Is DRM a Necessary Evil? — ccfman2004 2013-03-13 11:06

I had it many times when the DRM got in the way of playing a game or software I wanted to play and paid for. Look at Spore, what a disaster, it could have been a great game without the intrusive DRM. Pirates had no problem playing it though.

I bought Skylanders Spyro's Adventure for my Mac when it came out and I have yet to play it because the DRM tells me I have no DVD drive when the disc is in the stupid drive.

# RE: Gaming Shades of Grey: Is DRM a Necessary Evil? — dm646 2013-03-13 13:19

im all for legal means of obtaining games but online only drm isnt the best idea imo..like stated we dont have internet all the time or sometimes its slow etc.. but games like Diablo III is an always online DRM garbage crap..and guess what..its worthless to have online only DRM..as the game is still pirateable..the popular DRM cracking team Skidrow have done a little work and have a working buggy server emulator meaning whoever uses it can somewhat emulate the RNG of the game but be offline if they choose..ive never tried it since i cant get the correct version and it hasnt been updated in sometime.. from what ive seen..so online only DRM is a bad direction for companies to go as it can and WILL be cracked eventually..

# RE: RE: Gaming Shades of Grey: Is DRM a Necessary Evil? — Christopher Groux 2013-03-13 15:48

That's one point I knew I missed as soon as I finished typing this. Piracy is somewhat an inevitable thing, so in the end how much is it really helping to use DRM right? Online stuff might slow it down for a month or so, but it never ends it.

# valid points but skipped... — Anger007 2013-03-13 14:56

you raise many valid points (and some not so valid) however you skip a rather important one - cost. many people resent the costs and the companies are blaming piracy for a rise in the costs and this is partially true however the big companies are making more profit than ever before despite the rise of piracy and on top of that the developers only get a small cut of each sale - even online only services like steam (ing pile of sh*t) only give them a cut and still take the lions share and get away with not providing physical media and the ability to terminate your account - effectively stealing all your hard bought games. drm with me ranks up there as the biggest load of bullshit on the planet - its there for one thing, to get more money out of people. the price of a game could be more than HALVED tomorrow if the devs got all the money, but theres always some big ass company claming rights to distribute etc so your not telling me that distribution rights (etc.) cost MORE than a game that takes 2-5 years to develop costs. the big companies are the blame for the rising cost of games - end of discussion.

# RE: valid points but skipped... — Christopher Groux 2013-03-13 15:47

You're a smart one Anger and are very right about that. You went even deeper than I cared to but you are very right. It's just like every other media industry. The distributors get the most dough. Just like the artists that make music see very little from album sales, it's the same here.

Does that mean we should strip them of all of their earnings rather than just some though? I'm no fan of DRM either, I just want to know what you think.

# its not right too... — Anger007 2013-03-13 20:39

its not right to strip them of their earnings of course however i do feel that the devs deserve almost 100% of any profit a game makes. i know if i made something worth charging for i would expect to get the majority of the cash, with perhaps a bit for advertising and perhaps a bit for downloadable services but its vastly weighted to the big companies. games are dying because the big companies are strangling the business to get as much money from it as possible. i know there in it to make money but its not in the correct proportions. also i feel its a con that services like steam can get away with charging the same price for the same game but provide no physical media yet you can walk down to your game shop and have a disk for the same cash and they cant disallow your continued use of that disc (at least for now). they also, because of the nature of downloadable media, can then block or restrict your access to the games you paid for - this is another thing i think that's wrong. the game devs almost certainly agree with some form of DRM but all of the solutions out there cost too much, add to the lining of the bigwigs pockets, and are woefully inadequate. brand new games not even for sale on shop shelves have been cracked and downloaded sometimes as much as months before release and this alone proves DRM doesn't work and doesn't help either. DRM just punishes the legit people and slightly taxes the real hackers. also sorry for the rants i have a real opinion on this topic, having been a real hc gamer for many years and have seen how bad DRM can get.

# RE: its not right too... — Christopher Groux 2013-03-14 10:28

Makes a lot of sense, but in Steam's case there are plenty of times where digital is cheaper too. They're having sales constantly, which is why so many people love them. I do get what you're saying though. Unfortunately downloads are the way the entire industry is headed though...

# yeah... — Anger007 2013-03-15 22:06

IMHO its a good idea in theory (cheaper games, quick updates, lots of on-line playing) but in practice its a bad one (locking of accounts, less QC of games before release, using users as beta testers, most games being the same price) and yeah i forgot steam does now do some cheaper games but for the most part the prices are on par with those in stores. i know its like swimming upstream but i still fully resist download only games until the big companies give most of the cash to the devs and forget their love affair with drm. with those 2 things the cost of games could for once go down a bit and breath life into a flogged to death scene. unfortunately its just going to get worse until the back breaks and the whole system crashes in on itself (which i can see happening within 5-7 years).

# RE: Gaming Shades of Grey: Is DRM a Necessary Evil? — LJMjollnir 2013-03-13 17:22

I was going to bring this point up aswell...

Specifically for SimCity in this case.. as of the moment i dont know of an online crack but it wont be long before its made.. the game was released with 5 servers and last time i checked it was up to 21 servers from what i can say is it will probably end up costing them more hosting servers then it would have been in lost sales (and personally i dont count piracy as a lost sale as in most cases they may not have bought the game anyway) This kind of backwards DRM is really only hurting the customers and its really about time we start voting with our wallets and stop paying companys that put in this stupid form of DRM

+1 # RE: Gaming Shades of Grey: Is DRM a Necessary Evil? — t0nito 2013-03-13 19:01

Maybe if the prices weren't prohibitively high people wouldn't pirate so much anyway...

# and i just heard.... — Anger007 2013-03-13 20:42

i just heard the cost of games for the ps4 are now expected to be over £70 - thats just absurd. i can still remember the days when i could go into a game shop with a 5 pound note and come out with a copy of the game on tape or disk and still have change (all be it 1 pence).

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Gaming Shades of Grey: Is DRM a Necessary Evil?

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