If you’re a PC gamer such as myself, no doubt you’ve heard of and laughed your ass over Ubisoft’s newest method of DRM, which got put into effect in Assassin’s Creed II (which is why I recently bought Borderlands instead). For those who don’t know, this is what the DRM basically entails:

• Constant connection to Ubisoft servers required
• Saves are saved via their game server
• Game linked to your Ubisoft account

Now, this may not sound terrible, but lets break down each part and give the general complaints for each component:

Connection to game server. Well, for a start, it’s a single player game. Requiring a *constant* internet connection is just retarded to begin with, but then put into account all the people who don’t have stable internet access (those serving overseas, people who still have dial-up), and a bigger problem begins to come into view. Secondly, this method also requires Ubisoft’s servers to stay up for the duration of your gameplay. Ubisoft has already proved themselves incompetent at this task (leaving LEGIT customers unable to play).

Save data saved to server. If you lose connection to the internet before you reach a checkpoint? Have fun losing all your progress since your last checkpoint. Another problem has a appeared via the forums, however, that when the server is online, it still seems incapable of saving your progress properly (leaving people with 4-5 hours of progress going unsaved).

Game key linked to Ubisoft account. Imagine how many people want to return their so far defunct game (due to their dead game servers). Now imagine that none of them can, since the game key is linked to their Ubisoft account. Now, this isn’t exactly a big deal for me since I’m a big-time Steam user (hey look, I actually bought the original Assassin’s Creed), but there are still plenty of people who are pissed about this among other things.

So, pointing out the obvious, what would lead somebody to even want to buy this instead of pirate it? There doesn’t seem to be much motive to spend a fun-sized $60 for a game that doesn’t work when you want it to (or, thus far, ever). So, leading more people towards piracy is an effective DRM? I think not.

Quoting a CrunchGear commenter:

I get that gaming companies are trying to find ways of staying profitable and that they (wrongfully) think that DRM is the answer. I think a better model is the one we saw with Mass Effect 2. Buy the game, get a unique promo code that gives unique content. That way, there’s an incentive for paying for a legit copy rather than a punishment when the DRM goes awry like it always does.

Which is exactly how DRM SHOULD work. Paying customers should be REWARDED for their legal dealings, not punished! However, since companies like Ubisoft and EA are too retarded to use such common logic, I’m willing to work out a deal for companies who insist on putting such restrictive DRM on their games:

If you intend to make a game depend on services from not only my end but YOUR end as well (activation servers, game servers, the like…), I want some sort of guarantee. I refuse to shell out my hard earned money to your company with the risk that you might not hold your end of the deal, leaving me with Gigabytes of expensive, dead code. Here’s the thing though: I make the terms of guarantee. You’ve had your turn to try out DRM, and it’s clearly not working. However, since you seem so inept to realize it’s killing your sales, you’re clearly too inept to come up with an acceptable guarantee.

Here’s the way I see it: The instant my game quits working due to anything DRM related (minor bugs exempt as long as it’s easy and quick to fix), I get my money back. People get their money back when they receive dead hardware, so why shouldn’t I for your nonfunctional game? However, I still get to keep the game, or may continue to play it for a discounted price if a fix is ever released for it. That’s right. Don’t like it? Then don’t offer it, and I won’t buy your shitty DRM’d to fuck game.

I’m not going to put my money out on the line just to have your DRM fail as horribly as AC2’s. If you can’t handle the game data from legitimate customers (or, as Ubisoft likes to conveniently blame, a DDoS attack [in which case you should probably be smart enough to invest in DDoS protection]), then don’t make it required to play the fucking game. Why you would even consider DRM in the first place, considering what happened to Spore!

So, there it is. If you insist on DRM, I insist on a money-back guarantee. You’re not the only one with a say in the matter.

So, awhile ago I picked up PHP Web Stat, which is essentially a lightweight website statistics script for your website. It’s pretty featured, although a bit ugly and in need of a few extra features before I’d consider it “complete”. A public demo has been setup and has been running for a few months, so you can have some fun browsing through that. Keep in mind, however, you can choose to set a password to check such data if you have the script setup on your own site.

So far I haven’t had any problems with the script. There were minor difficulties setting it up, but that was due mainly to the fact that the creators’ native tongue is obviously German. The data is satisfying, the results are realtime, and so far they appear to be accurate. However, the only thing I find a nuisance about the script is that the creators charge for the script while still asking for donations (e.g. the donation link in their menu). Now, I know they probably put a lot of work into the script, but if you’re charging for the script, I don’t see any reason to attempt to solicit donations from users. Of course, this is probably because of the point I’m now bringing up:

The script’s been released under a GNU license, even with the normal charge for the script. What does this mean? It means that I, or anybody else who has obtained the script, is free to release it to the public as they see fit (so long as they give credit and do so freely; not like I’d sell other peoples’ work though, right?). What does this mean for you? It means you get a cool-ass free script, along with updates, for no charge to you for being such a faithful cool dude and reading my site.

So, without further a due, here’s a direct download link. Feel free to spread the word, and if you really like the script, buy it or donate (but not both! That’s just wrong!)

From a BBC report detailing an Albino Hedgehog’s stuggle with obesity.