The problem with trying to figure out how much effort is worth it for copy protection is that the numbers on how much gets pirated are mostly guess work. The cost of implementation and extra support can be determined, but it is hard to figure out how increased sales due to copy protection compare to that.
Exactly my point - so why do all these companies insist on putting themselves (and their legitimate paying customers) through all the aggravation if they don't even know that it's saving them any money??? <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/think.gif" alt="" />
Read
Peek 31 and
Peek 33, and then tell me it's worth all of that extra work...
Look at how many recent game releases have been plagued by CP-related bugs, preventing legitimate customers from even installing or playing the game - bugs that weren't present in the game prior to the CP being added.
Then think about all the cool features or cool bonus items or extra areas (or just plain gameplay tweaks) that the Larian team could have put into the game if they didn't have to spend so much time futzing around with stupid CP stuff.
So what's the answer? Who knows? But I know I'm going to wait a couple of weeks after this game is released before buying, to make sure that all these last second bugs really did get squashed. I've spent my money on too many other games recently, only to end up serving as a beta-tester for the first couple of months while they ironed out all the bugs that should have been caught LONG before release...
Anyway, I'm not trying to start any arguments about software piracy, and I'm certainly not defending it - I just hate it when paying customers suffer because of issues caused by CP that may or may not be providing any actual benefit to the developers.
I do wish the Larian team all the best, and hope it all works smoothly at release.
John (aka Lord Bubba)
P.S. On a related note - I HATE games that make me keep the CD in the drive in order to play. I do other things with my computer, and swapping CD's in and out every time I want to play the game is beyond annoying! Can you imagine if you had to insert your Microsoft Office CD every time you wanted to open Outlook or Word or Excel? Then insert your Photoshop disc to edit a couple of pictures? Then BACK to the Office disc to check e-mail? It would never fly - so why do game developers get away with it???
