Ubisoft’s new DRM scheme, which [URL=http://www.gamepolitics.com/2010/01/28/ubisoft-drm-phone-home]requires a constant Internet connection[/URL] to authenticate game sessions, had a bit of a hick up this weekend.
Ubi posted to [URL=http://twitter.com/UBISOFT]its Twitter feed[/URL] this morning apologizing to “anyone who couldn’t play ACII [Assassin’s Creed II] or SH5 [Silent Hunter 5] yesterday.” While the company [URL=http://www.destructoid.com/facepalm-ubisoft-drm-servers-bork-downing-ubi-pc-games-166149.phtml]originally blamed[/URL] the outage on “exceptional demand,” Ubi stated on its Twitter feed that their servers were “attacked, which limited service from 2:30pm to 9pm Paris time.”
Ubisoft added that “95% of players were not affected, but a small group of players attempting to open a game session did receive denial of service errors.”
[URL=http://www.joystiq.com/2010/03/07/ubisoft-drm-authentification-server-is-down-assassins-creed-2/]Joystiq[/URL] also points us towards [URL=http://forums.ubi.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/4721051016/m/7481010838?r=6531081838#6531081838]a thread on the Ubisoft forums[/URL] in which the affected “5%” voice their displeasure.
[B]GP:[/B] On a related note, I grabbed Battlefield: Bad Company 2 for the PC this weekend and during the install was prompted to choose my favored method of DRM—disc-based or online authentication (I chose disc-based). In a perfect world there would be no need for DRM, but if it is required, this method of offering the user a choice at least goes a little way towards lessening the impact (and might make DRM-based gaming functionable on [URL=http://www.gamepolitics.com/2010/02/25/soldier%E2%80%99s-war-drm]an Army base[/URL] or [URL=http://www.gamepolitics.com/2010/03/01/another-drm-victim-details-woes]a cruise ship[/URL]). Bad Company 2 uses Sony’s SecuROM technology.
[IMG]http://forums.theeca.com/images/EA_DRM.jpg[/IMG]
As another aside, while the DRM tech worked fine, Bad Company 2 had its own online problems for a little bit yesterday, though their issues appeared to be Punkbuster-related.
[I]|Thanks PHX Corp and DarkSaber![/I]|
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