The Answer To Gaming Piracy Was Perfected Over a Decade Ago

14 Sep

The Spore DRM debacle is still making press with the latest story coming from TechCrunch.  One phrase that really rang true to me was Erick’s argument that the legitimate version of a game should never be more hobbled than a pirated version – so true!

There is a lesson here for all media companies. Whether they are producing videogames, movies, or music, adding DRM won’t stop piracy. The best way to stop piracy is to hobble the pirated version, not the official one.

Easier said than done, right?  No, not really – this concept was pioneered and perfected over a decade ago by none other than Blizzard Entertainment with the release of Diablo 1 and battle.net (bnet).  If you’re not familiar with bnet, it was a network integrated into Diablo that managed all of it’s multiplayer interactions (minus LAN).  It opened up a whole new, exponentially more valuable gaming experience because it was the first mainstream game that made the social interactions that we all take for granted in gaming today easily accessible!  The game was ‘complete’ without battle net, but the entire experience wasn’t.

How did they combat piracy?  A valid CD key was required to get on – that’s it – no crazy DRM scheme, no limiting installs, none of the stuff Spore is getting a lot of flak for.  And people bought the game like crazy because no self-respecting gamer played Diablo alone!  (I mean alone in the macro sense, i.e. in the context of bnet).

So, am I saying that every game developed today should have a valuable online component?  That solo gaming is a thing of the past and developers should be expected to provide multiplayer experiences with everything they develop?  Yes!  If the game industry wants to prevent piracy, then yes, the internet is the answer.  Ironically, the internet is also the reason piracy has become so prominent.

  • Anonymous
    Online is the only answer? No. There's one problem with that. I don't like playing online games and I don't like playing games with other people online. And if you think I'm alone in that, you're just ignorant.
  • Online is the only answer to prevent piracy without compromising customer's computers/privacy/gameplay. It's fine that you don't like playing games online, but my point is that publishers should publish single player games with NO DRM and understand that there will be piracy. If they care about piracy, the only method to prevent it is to create a valuable online component to a game that only legitimatly purchased copies can connect to! Hobble the pirates, not the payers.
  • Wraith
    Blizzard rocks, even if the $15/month for WoW is still way too much. Good thing there's plenty of other (legally free) online games available!
  • Blizzard has always cared more about their users than most game devs/publishers.

    I logged countless hours playing Diablo on Battle.net... I don't think I ever actually played the game offline... I made several friends crawling the random dungeons online and I thought every dime I spent on the game was worth it.

    Seeing that Spore was designed from the ground up to provide online users the ability to share their creations and gain access to the creations of other users it really makes the DRM approach seem incredibly greedy. Why not neuter the pirates and allow the users that paid 50 hard earned bucks to do what they please?
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