Much maligned anti-piracy software developer Starforce has sunk to a shocking new low in making a case for using its product. In a posting on its company messageboards an admin (who may or may not be directly employed by the company) included in a post the link to an active torrent file trading link for the recently released Galactic Civilizations 2. The link has subsequently been removed, but the text of the post remains. The poster states "Right now several thousands of people are downloading the pirated version only from that web-site. Is it good for the sales? Unlikely." This brazen release of the url and accompanying statement smacks of the strong-arm tactics you only see in gangster movies when someone doesn't cough-up the money for "protection."
Doubtless Starforce feels itself more and more backed into a corner. The post comes in response to a
note on the official Galactic Civilizations 2 site that its game was selling fantastically at retailers like Wal Mart, Best Buy and Gamestop--without need for any sort of copy-protection. This is just one more blow against the beleaguered Starforce software that is widely regarded by PC gamers as malware that can cause damage to PC hardware. While Starforce maintains these claims are unsubstantiated, and has pulled stunts such as offering a reward for anyone who would come to Moscow and demonstrate such problems, there are more than enough of them on the Net to raise suspicions.
For its part, Galactic Civilizations 2 publisher Stardock has commendably stayed above it all. A
response on its website details its philosophy for handling piracy and selling games. It's one of the most proactive and refreshing approaches you'll hear: "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." It then neatly wraps up the whole matter by noting that the torrent links were easily removed by going to the offending site and following some simple instructions--nothing that required use of any draconian copy-protection software.
