Anybody who knows me well knows that I have been buzzing about Spore for the past months, waiting for its
release yesterday. The new game by EA has such high potential to be cool, you are essentially master of the universe that exists in your PC.
I have actually bought two copies of Spore thusfar, and played for a couple of hours. I got two copies because the gameplay offers a rare oppertunity to get Sarah involved in gaiming. Spore is supposed to be one of those cross boundaries games that many people can get into, so I thought there is actually potential for Sarah and I to play together as apposed to her usual scoffing at me “wasting time” gaming.
So from what I have seen so far, spore is great fun! however this is not a review (that will come later) but an indictment of EA for what should be considered criminal practice – including consumer hostile Digital Rights Management software on Spore.
Most people will agree that the basic premise of DRM is good – EA and all of its employees deserve to be rewarded for the work they have put into creating this digital world for us to play with. Game programmers have to eat too and all of that. The problem is that EA has decided to try to ensure that its programmers eat by spitting on its paying customers.
You see in a quest to keep pirates from copying Spore with free reign, EA turned to the Securerom solution of DRM which is simply WAY TOO HARSH. Securerom actually blocks users from installing Spore on their system more than 5 times. This is BAD for users like me (hardcore gamer types) who often swap out hardware in their PCs, and therefore have to re-install software. This is why my genuine copy of Windows Vista will not activate anymore without me calling India and giving them a 300character long string of validation rubbish.
So – I can not install spore more than 5 times. That sucks, I have 3 computes (and as I said, I have 2 copies of spore to use more than one computer at a time…). I am a computer scientist, hardware enthusiast, and gamer which adds up to me making lots of changes / installs / reinstalls on my systems. This also makes me probably the best customer EA could have.
And what do I get? Screwed by their DRM – thanks.
Now users are protesting EA’s mean DRM by givig Spore LOW ratings on amazon.com Go here to let EA know what you think. At least BioWare had the ability to sway EA’s crappy DRM policy for Mass Effect somewhat…
///EDIT - One of my thoughts got lost during writing and failed to make it here
The really funny, and unfortunate, thing about this is that the game was already stolen and cracked (Securerom removed) the day BEFORE the official release. That just goes to show you that DRM is ineffective and mostly hurts the average, PUCHASING consumer…
I read it was 3 installs, not 5.
And the main problem is that the game is not that great. Sure the idea had a lot of potential. But this potential has not been used. The game is repetitive, too simple, and the idea of evolution means almost nothing in the gameplay.
This is very disappointing.
Add this average quality game to the DRM issue, and it makes a product that should not be bought.
(my detailed opinion about Spore here (in French))
Thanks for the correction on the number of installs – that is no good at all. I will probably eat up that amount up in less than a year.
I have to say that so far I agree with you about the quality of spore. I have progressed to the tribal stage (to have the game crash and set me back two hours) and sofar the creature stage is very boring. Kill, make friend, repeat is quite boring. And then there are “super creatures” running around that you have absolutely no hope of killing because they have over 1000 health etc. What is the point in that?