Frogboy Frogboy

Galactic Civilizations II, Copy Protection, and Piracy

▼

Galactic Civilizations II, Copy Protection, and Piracy

Setting the record straight

from GalCiv2 Forums

Digg is reporting that a website is implying that we want Galactic Civilizations II to be pirated.  Absolutely not! Of course we DO NOT want our game to be pirated. We're a small company, every lost sale hurts us.

This got started because sales reports on Galactic Civilizations II have been much higher than anticipated. We've now outsold the first Galactic Civilizations in North America in the first 10 days. Last week we were apparently the #1 PC game at Walmart. 

Naturally, some peple have taken the conclusion that because we don't have copy protection on our game, that we invite piracy. That is not the case, we simply think there are other ways to stop piracy than CD checks, strict DRM, etc.

What we do is provide a serial # that users can choose to enter when they install and use that unique serial # to download free and frequent updates.

Our license allows you to install the game onto as many machines that you own that you want as long as only one copy is being used at once.

How many sales are lost because people want to have a game on their laptop and desktop and don't want to drag CDs around so choose not to buy the game?

Our company also makes utility software. We've been around a long time -- 14 years now. Our software gets pirated. We don't like it but piracy is a fact of life. And not every pirated copy means a lost sale.

The question isn't about eliminating piracy, it's about increasing sales. It's about trying to make sure that people who would buy your product buy it instead of steal it. 

Our primary weapon to fight piracy is through rewarding customers through convenient, frequent, free updates.

If you make it easy for users to buy and make full use of your product or service legitimately then we believe that you'll gain more users from that convenience than you'll lose from piracy.

We realize that some people or companies might feel threatened at any evidence that implies that draconian DRM schemes or CD copy protection may not make that big of a difference in sales. 

For example, we were quite disturbed to discover that the company that makes Starforce provided a working URL to a list of pirated GalCiv II torrents. I'm not sure whether what they did was illegal or not, but it's troubling nevertheless and was totally unnecessary.

All software is pirated, there's no way around it. We've been making software for over 10 years.  We don't like our software being pirated.  Like I said, every lost sales has an impact on us.  But there are other ways to reduce it than through draconian copy protection systems.

Incidentally, the site that Starforce's forum admin linked to "prove" how much our software was being pirated we visited, followed the instructions on the site to get our game removed and the links were removed within a couple of hours.  We'll continue to follow-up with them.

Update: Starforce has removed the URL to the illegal files.

Update: View follow-up.

523,833 views 309 replies
Reply #51 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
In regards to the question on starforce "So how exactly do I get rid of this Starforce garbage?"

There is a removal tool on the starforce website. Do a search on google for starforce removal tool or some such. you should find what you're looking for
Reply #52 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Hmm...

I wonder if someone could make a business of asking torrent sites to take down their torrents for companies? Would be interesting to see.
Multiplicity - Control multiple PCs using one keyboard and mouse
Reply #53 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I'm not stupid. I'll not pay US$ 50 to put a piece of malware in my computer. This Starforce virus is the dumbest thing that happened to gaming in recent years. It's no surprise this is used because of the retard suits employed the "big" publishers. I'll never buy a game using it because I don't want my PC to become infested and because I'll never give my money to a company that treats its customers as criminals.

Interesting that list of games using SF. Most of them are crappy nickel-chasers.

That URL only prove that the guys behind SF are the worst scammers of the crop. Even the pirates/crackers have better ethics than these scum.
Reply #54 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Yikes. I have apparantly been having that crap on my computer for a loooong time.
But now it's gone for good.
Reply #55 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
stardock arent the only company doing this, lots of small 1 and 2 man companies do this, including mine (Positech). People should buy galciv2 because its a superb game, and you can buy it direct online, not JUST because of the lack of DRM. To be honest DRM doesnt bother me much, as, being a developer myself, I know companies want to protect their investment. It is damned inconvenient though, and kudos to stardock for being so open about the games non drm status.
I keep reading posts from people who talk as if its the only DRM free game thats on sale though, and that's certainly not true, although I'll resist the temptation to pimp my own stuff any further
Reply #56 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
heh like starforce is uncrackable anyway, Id simply post a few links to torrents of cracked game that use starforce.

everything can and will be cracked if the programm is worth the effort.

starforce forces people pretty much to get those cracks to play their legally bought games without destroying their mashines in the process.

anyway keep up the good work stardock! we need more frog-smileys too!
Reply #57 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I honestly didnt care much about starforce, i dont back up or burn CD's so i never noticed it, but after seeing that post (which they've now removed the link i've noticed) i was shocked and quite miffed, so i spent the last 20 minutes removeing starforce and all games with its copy protection, and i'll never buy a game with starforce on it ever again.
They have absolutely NO right to act like that, its sickening.

Well done to stardock for not only making a great game but also their attitude towards the people that play and buy their games.
Reply #58 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
One of the reasons I was attracted to buying GCII was the lack of strict DRM, in my opinion, DRM is a completely useless waste of time and money, because no matter what, people will find a way around it. I applaude Stardock for thier policy on how they have tried to avoid piracy of thier software. They havn't done it by treating everyone as a pirate, but by rewarding the people who do pay for thier game.

Not only am I impressed by this, but by the fact this game was so cheap compared to others. I bought the collectors edition version, the case was one of the best I have seen (I'm in the UK so our PC games come in DVD cases, not sure if that's changed in the states), the extras were actually worth it for a change, and it all came to a price LOWER than a regular PC game. The thing that drives people to download games is the stupid prices (especially in the UK, where we pay almost double that of americans...on EVERYTHING, companies seem to think £1=$1).

I admit I have downloaded games, but only as a trial, I don't have alot of money to waste on a crappy game, so I like to try them out first, but when I find a good game I WILL buy it. For instance, I tried out Rome Total War, I really liked it, I bought the Gold edition.

I think what some people say is absoletly true in most cases, when someone downloads a game, they had no intention of buying it, so there was no sale lost. Same goes for films, music, etc.
Reply #59 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I hope Starforce will fade into oblivion. I own both TrackMania games and it makes me really angry as they are really great. Now, I'm not sure I'll play them again, ever, and I'll certainly not recommend them to anyone. Rather the opposite and that hurts Nadeo. It should hurt StarForce.

Stardock, you set a great example. I hope more companies will follow suit and stop penalizing honest customers. I hope...
Reply #60 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I'm one of those that talk for StarForce, but I didn't knew about StarDocks buisnessmodel of serialbound free updates.

But every other company except a few others will only release a few patches - often bugfixes - and as such pirates will not lose much by pirating those games.

About the StarForce admin posting a link to a torrentsite that's something that most people can find anyway....if he had said: "well, GalCiv II doesn't have our protection and is getting pirated" then people would probably tell him to show some hard evidence. Now he did, and he gets blamed for it....

I believe that software piracy must come to an end and that StarForce and the likes are necessary. And if you're wary of StarForce then you don't even want to think about TCPA....
Reply #61 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
How much starforce paid you for this post??

I did like to inform you that games with starforce are pirated too and not necessarly less than games without starforce because it's sure there is at least one hacker who take protection program hacking as a challenge and he like challenges.

If you're saying i'm a pirate than it's official you've been paid by starforce to make that post.
Reply #62 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Look what you have done Brad. You have created a catalyst that is going to change the copy protection world.

You go against the norm of practically all games made these days, in not having copy protection. Sounds simple right? One small idea that is different to everyone elses. Couldn't cause any harm.

Well, now as a result we have seen people "blogging" that you advocate piracy, which is causing great outrage because you said nothing like it.

Starforce make a huge stumble. Bigger than any security holes they might have. No, they actually POST A LINK to a pirated game, something that is the complete opposite to what they are trying to do. This, I can see, is going to create a huge hit on them.

SlashDot is now reporting how you are breaking the DRM mold. And we all know that if slashdot report something then EVERYONE knows about it. People are going to wonder "Who is this company? What makes them so different". The word on every street is going to be "Stardock"

I can see it now, Reports about how Stardock advocate piracy, followed by reports that those reports where wrong, followed by stories of coverups, and then praise. Lots and lots of praise. Nerds fighting on the streets, riots about piracy philosophies. Copy Protection companies going bankrupt for one small mis-slip. Front page stories stating "Three public relation representatives DEAD in horrible shooting accident... (online FPS of course)".

The gaming industry will be changed as we know it, and all because of one small company who decided to be different.. For the better, or for the worse? Only time will tell.

/satire
Reply #63 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
About the StarForce admin posting a link to a torrentsite that's something that most people can find anyway....if he had said: "well, GalCiv II doesn't have our protection and is getting pirated" then people would probably tell him to show some hard evidence. Now he did, and he gets blamed for it....

Nonsense. Starforce games have and will be cracked and warezed, too. All using something like Starforce does is:
1) Take money away from the developer (you know, the one that's making actual content.
2) Cause all sorts of problems for, invade the privacy of, treat like a criminal, and generally irritate and annoy legitimate paying customers.
3) Cause the guy who pirates the software a 5 hour job instead of a 5 minute job. Big whoop. The game still gets pirated.

All it takes is ONE person to bypass the protection ONE time, and it's out in the wild, with the genie out of the bottle. If your software has a large enough user base, this CAN and WILL happen. It's all 1s and 0s at that point and a previously 'protected' title spreads at the exact same speed as a previously unprotected one.

The only question is how many customers will you lose, how many customers will you annoy, and how much bad press will you get in exchange for your payments to the 'protection' guys.

On the other hand, you can take the route of respecting your customers and prospective customers. I assume that Brad and the team are intelligent enough to realise that as long as the game didn't totally bomb it WOULD get pirated no matter what protection they put on it.

So, if the alleged protection does nothing to stop piracy on anything but the least popular titles anyway, is it worth the adverse effects of c****ing on your customers?

I believe that software piracy must come to an end and that StarForce and the likes are necessary. And if you're wary of StarForce then you don't even want to think about TCPA....


Annoying your customers and infecting their computers with malware is the way forward? Please dude, step away from the compiler and/or put an "I HATE YOU YOU NASTY CUSTOMER OF MINE" label on all your software so I can stay away from it.

If two parties have mutual respect for each other, no 'protection' aka 'screw-you software' is required. A healthy market can't in the long term have one side doing bad things to the other. Stupid un-protection user-irritating 'protection' is driving piracy as much as any other factor you could care to name.

you might as well claim that shops have no choice but to break the legs of everyone who enters their store. You know, just to make sure nobody runs out without paying for stuff. It's for your own good.
Reply #64 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I believe that software piracy must come to an end and that StarForce and the likes are necessary. And if you're wary of StarForce then you don't even want to think about TCPA....


Imposible. Many people/groups crack games as a hobby, not because they wanted a free game. The harder the protection, the more the thrill, and the more enjoyment they get out of cracking it.
From the searches i looked into, about 10,000 copies have been pirated. Of those 10,000 only 1/4-1/2 have pirated a cracked update. How many of these pirates would ever purchase any game? How many are going to decide they want to purchase it now that they've played it and like it? Take the total pirated copies and subtract the sum of the value of the last 2 questions to give you the actual lose in sales.
While not totally related/relevent to the gaming industry, Anime "pirating" has actually caused an increase in popularity of Anime in the US. The American market for Japanese Anime would be drasticly smaller compared to it's now rapidly increasing growth.
Reply #65 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
To the asshole in #45 - wow. Not being able to afford something for entertainment is not an excuse for stealing it. Starforce succeeds because of attitudes like yours - and it punishes people like Stardock.

Keep fighting the good fight Brad - and the Slashdot story will help you guys.
Reply #66 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Campaigner :
"then people would probably tell him to show some hard evidence. Now he did, and he gets blamed for it...."

Doing things that you get asked doesn't make them right! Even less so for things you might get asked, if you didn't deliver them beforehand, how screwed up is that?? Maybe people should have asked him to jump out of a window, I'm pretty sure he would have done that beforehand too...

Campaigner :
"I believe that software piracy must come to an end and that StarForce and the likes are necessary. And if you're wary of StarForce then you don't even want to think about TCPA.... "

The DRM idea is completely getting the wrong leg of the internet population: Hard working Men and Women (and others) that pay their bills. Let's say such a Jon Doe wants to make a backup of his Game. Oops he can't, its "protected". what will he do? He can't do it legally, because his pc will crash, his DVD (or whatever new technology comes) can't be copied and his data cannot be shared anymore, so what will he do? He will become one of the "pirates". Just because he wanted to treat his content how he wants, not how it's meant by the distributors.
Great job Starforce, you breed what you are designed to prohibit!
For what? for the one in a million person who doesn't buy a product but copies it. Even worse: Those people are still doing it, unhindered by Region Codes, Starforce, the DMCA, or the TCPA/TCG. Why? 'Couse they are smarter, faster and more then the People that invent this stuff.
I for one expect a huge increase in piracy, for every new copy protection and digital rights scheme the distributors come up with. Let's see who is right about the future, Campaigner or me
Reply #67 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I'm one of those that talk for StarForce, but I didn't knew about StarDocks buisnessmodel of serialbound free updates.

But every other company except a few others will only release a few patches - often bugfixes - and as such pirates will not lose much by pirating those games.

About the StarForce admin posting a link to a torrentsite that's something that most people can find anyway....if he had said: "well, GalCiv II doesn't have our protection and is getting pirated" then people would probably tell him to show some hard evidence. Now he did, and he gets blamed for it....

I believe that software piracy must come to an end and that StarForce and the likes are necessary. And if you're wary of StarForce then you don't even want to think about TCPA....


I would just like to offer you a shovel, I want to make sure you dig yourself so deep that starforce will never agian see the light of day.
PS If you would be so kind as to drag all the other DRM's down with you I would very much appreciate it, thanks.


Reply #68 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Wow.. I hope this goes further and further. Submit this story to all your favourite blogs and news sites everyone.
Stardock, the little game/skin company that could. ^_^ Oh.. I can't wait for the next PowerUser.tv episode, I'll have to make sure I'm not somewhere public when it starts and Kristin introduces Brad.. I feel cutting to the imperial march would be apt..
Reply #69 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I wouldn't worry about not buying games with Starforce: I buy more games than anyone I know, and DT defeats all the Starforce I've encounted. I will *not* religiously find/insert a physical disk once I've paid for a game, sorry. My original, paid-for CDs are all in a case on my shelf - my games are run off images from a fileserver or use cracks.

Except GC2, of course, since Stardock don't automatically assume I stole their game. Bravo.
Reply #70 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Well, I started off by pirating the game, but I just got my nice collector's edition tin in the post this morning. Yes, people actually do this, we're not mythical . It helped that Amazon are doing it for £18 including postage. They're doing Civilization IV for the same incidentally, and a deal on the pair.

Meanwhile, Starforce does appear to be quite effective as copy protection. From what I can see Googling around, the sure way to beat it is by unplugging your cd drives, which is probably a bit much for most people who just want to play X3. Those with nForce 3 & 4 motherboards have a simpler alternative alledgedly. I'm also a bit skeptical about the computer-destruction stories that are circulating about it. But I do think it goes over the line in its intrusiveness. There should at least be a prompt box with a warning - burying a mention somewhere in a ridiculously long license agreement that no-one will ever read just doesn't do it (would these things stand up in court? Isn't it disgusting to think that people actually get paid to write all that crap?).
Reply #71 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Wow, this is interesting.

It seems that some good is already coming out of this. Stardock better start manufacturing those games faster, because I'm guessing already high sales are going to go up.

Starforce, on the other hand, should probably be searching the local phone books for a good lawyer.



By the way, does anyone have a list of other companies that don't use DRM? Companies that don't assume their customers are crooks tend to offer better customer service in my experience. As it is I only know of Paradox Interactive, who is also GalCivII's European publisher.
Reply #72 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
i'm very impressed with this game and that it has no copy protection on the actual game and rather on the updates. I hate having to have cd's in the drive to play the game, especially when I already have a legal id key!!

Just today I lent my dad my copy of Rome Total War (I am no longer playing it) and he cursed the fact that he had to have the cd in the drive to play it.

The GalCiv2 model is awesome!
Reply #73 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Is StarForce run by a bunch of jerks? I mean, it's one thing for people to praise GC2 for a lack of heavy copy protection. It's quite another for the pre-emenant copy protection maker for games to actively urge people to pirate anything that isn't using their stuff.

Indeed, that might be illegal. You should consult a lawyer to find out. I'd love to see those jerks get slapped with a "cease and desist". Or worse.

It is in fact the reason I bought it because now I don't have to go around looking for the lost disks, ruining my CD Rom reader by keeping a stuipd disk in there that IS NEVER USED.


I don't particularly mind CD-based copy protection. For those games, I just rip an image of the disc and mount the image as a separate drive. I might have to muck with the registry to tell it to look for a different drive, but that's usually it. And, for older games (StarCraft) that use the CD drive for streamed music, it works very fast.

No, my problem is with anything that installs some separate application on your machine (And StarForce is among the more crappy of this kind of app). Or something that looks for image mounting software and fails when such software is present.

Anyway, I just wanted to encourage you folks and Stardock not to give into the pressure


Pressure? Is someone exerting some kind of pressure on StarDock? Considering GC2 has broken 100,000 in sales, I'm not seeing a lot of pressure to enhance their anti-piracy measures.

and DT defeats all the Starforce I've encounted.


What is DT?
Reply #75 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Haven't read through all the comments but if no one has posted this yet:

http://www.similarities.org/starforce.html

Check it out.

VOTE WITH YOUR WALLET.