DRM Assassination: Let's send a message to Ubisoft
PC gaming is doomed, I can feel the storm clouds gathering, ready for the apocalypse. Sure, it’s no more doomed than it has been for the last 20 years, but there is definitely some doom going down right now.
Ubisoft have got a new form of DRM for all their PC games, which will require a constant internet connection to play their games. Tom Francis over at PC Gamer has been playing Assassin’s Creed 2, and this his experience of it:
If you get disconnected while playing, you’re booted out of the game. All your progress since the last checkpoint or savegame is lost, and your only options are to quit to Windows or wait until you’re reconnected.
I don’t like the sound of that. Do you? If you would like to join my protest, read on.
Why this shit is bad?
This new DRM is not good. Here are some reasons:
1. Ubisoft are selling you inferior products at the same prices that they used to. People who buy games using this DRM have a lot less rights than equivalent other games. You right to resell is completely removed, your ability to play offline is removed, your privacy is being infringed, and paying customers are being punished for the actions of pirates.
2. It is a far from perfect system. Ubisoft’s servers will go down, routers will be flakey, ISPs will have downtime and they are refusing to 100% commit to supporting these games in the future. You may be left with a coaster. For AC2, there is no reason that in the event of your connection dropping, they could let you play until the next checkpoint, but it appears that invasive DRM is even more important than game design.
3. Ubisoft are not taking responsibility for it effectively. Of all the retailers selling AC2, only two at time of writing actually state that it requires a constant internet connection to play. If I were selling a game with this kind of DRM, you can be damn sure that I would be doing everything I could to ensure that my paying customers knew about it.
There are plenty more reasons why it is stupid, but these are the main reasons that I think it is bad.
What should we do?
I’d like to try and organise some way of encouraging Ubisoft to stop this. There isn’t any decent mechanism for giving Ubisoft feedback of this kind that they will actually listen too. Boycotts will be ignored (and frankly, gamers are bad at doing boycotts), protesting by buying the console version isn’t going to bother them at all, since they still get paid, and pirating it will do nothing but prove them right (at least in the mindset that they are in).
I’ve racked my brain, and I’ve come up with a form of protest that might just work. If Ubisoft won’t listen to gamers, we need to get someone else that they will listen to to take up our cause.
Perhaps a big retailer.
The reason that pirating the game and saying “I would have bought it if it did not have this DRM” doesn’t mean anything is that it is just words. For all Ubisoft know, you might have never bought the PC game at all. For anything to actually effect their decision making process, they need facts and figures.
What I propose is this. We all decide on one, preferably high profile, entertainment retailer to buy the PC version AC2 from. We pick one that has no mention of requiring an internet connection on their listing. We all then get as many people to preorder the game as possible, we can hopefully get as large amount of the retailers allocated stock as possible.
When the game arrives, we will keep it inside the plastic seal.
Then we will look at the back of the box, and notice that it requires a constant internet connection, and decide that we do not want this game. We will then have 28 working days to return it. Assuming it arrives on day of release (5th of March), we would have until Friday the 16th of April to return it (taking into account Good Friday and Easter Monday: UK bank holidays), so posting it on Tuesday the 13th of April should leave enough margin for error.
When the retailer receives our copies of AC2 with the seal in tact, they will give us full cash refunds. We should very plainly state that the reason we are returning the game is because we are rejecting Ubisoft’s DRM. The game will ship with a return slip that you fill in explaining why you want a refund. You will have to absorb the small cost of postage (90p first class).
The retailer will have a mountain of games that are of much lower value to them than they were at release. They will not be happy about this. This message will get back to Ubisoft.
I’ve looked through the range of retailers selling AC2, and have decided to pick Tesco. They have no mention of the DRM whatsoever in their listing. They are also fairly high profile.
Click here to order it from Tesco.
If everyone who wants to be part of this protest emails me here with the subject “Ubisoft are baddies”, then I can keep track of how many people are going to be taking part, and I will email you to remind you to post it back too.
So here is the plan.
1. Order AC2 from Tesco.
2. Email me to let me know you are in on it.
3. When it arrives, do nothing.
4. Wait until the 13th of April.
5. Post it back to Tesco, explaining that you do not want it because you find the DRM to be unacceptable. Then get a full cash refund.
For this to work, we need to get as many people on board as possible. If you like the sound of sending a message to Ubisoft, then please join in. It will cost you £26.99, but you will get all of that back (minus P&P). Please also spread this around to anywhere you can think, forums, social networking, blogs. I think a good target is holding 100 copies to ransom, but who knows how well we can do.
Are you with me?
Help spread:
Reddit
Digg
Email to –
Kotaku: tips@kotaku.com
VG247: news@videogaming247.com
Joystiq
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- We Support SavyGamer’s DRM Assassination Scheme - Negative Gamer - [...] over at SavyGamer is tired of intrusive and experience-destroying DRM in games, Ubisoft’s new DRM [...]
- The Sunday Papers | Rock, Paper, Shotgun - [...] This is interesting. Savygamer get a little militant about the Ubisoft situation, and is trying to organise a mass-order-and-return…
- Mad as hell about Ubisoft’s DRM? Try this - [...] the protest boils down to buying Assassin’e Creed 2 PC (or Settlers 7) en masse, then returning it for…
- Mad as hell about Ubisoft’s DRM? Try this| Latest breaking News on Video Games Hardware and Software.| BadPower.com Blog - [...] the protest boils down to buying Assassin’e Creed 2 PC (or Settlers 7) en masse, then returning it for…
- Mad as hell about Ubisoft’s DRM? Try this | NewsSlots.com - [...] the protest boils down to buying Assassin’e Creed 2 PC (or Settlers 7) en masse, then returning it for…
- Mad as hell about Ubisoft’s DRM? Try this| XboxSold.com where you find Everything Xbox| XboxSold.com BLOG - [...] the protest boils down to buying Assassin’e Creed 2 PC (or Settlers 7) en masse, then returning it for…
- Dropbox Linklist – 23/2/10 « KAECY.US - [...] SavyGamer have taken up a scheme which, for the cost of 90p shipping and a little bit of time,…
I may have done my arithmetic incorrectly (in which case apologies) but isn’t 28 days after March 5th the 2nd of April.
Also first you say post on the 16th and then you say post on the 23rd…
So basically; I’m either very confused or you made a mistake.
Good idea though if I had any money I’d totally join in.
Yeah, fixed the typo, when I first worked out the date, I accidentally used the USA release date.
It’s not 28 days, it is 28 working days, so no weekends or bank holidays.
And now I want to do a zombie parody film called 28 working days later.
Ok, I like the idea, even though I was just going to never buy any Ubisoft game again (on any platform) till they stop this crap.
Question though – seeing as this has been posted on t’internet – what happens if between now and ship date, Tesco modify the listing?
Also, potential hiccup: since you already pointed out gamers are so bad at boycotts, how many are going to cave and whip off the wrapping?
Otherwise, I like. I’ll check interest with other quarters…
Not sure what I would do if Tesco modify the listing really. You would still be able to return it for a refund for sure, I just think the protest is best targeted at a retailer not effectively informing their customers of what they are buying.
I guess I would possibly suggest another retailer. Although unless Tesco email people who have already preordered it to let them know, I would suggest carrying on with it.
I think if people are compelled to take part in the protest from reading this, they will manage to keep from opening the game.
As far as they know, you only ever looked at Tesco’s listing when you purchased the game. Any after-the-fact changes just missed your attention. We’re already being duplicitous by selecting a store that fails to advertise a policy we are already fully aware of, let’s not split hairs. Eggs and omelets, as they say.
Uhm, this is a REALLY bad idea (no offense):
First, this requires even more willpower than a boycott. It is one thing to expect someone to not buy something, it is another to expect them to buy it and return it. I have a sneaking suspicion that, if anything, Tesco would have record sales on AC2 :p
Second, it will hurt the retailer more than Ubi. Yes, Ubi may or may not lose some cash on this (depends on how the retail process works at that level) and yes, the store will be made aware. But think about it this way: PC gaming is already “dying”. If you get mass returns, are you going to refuse to stock games with DRM, or just refuse to stock PC games period?
And also, most retailers just put the same blurb that they get in the press release on the website. So if they aren’t focused on PC gaming (and they aren’t…), they might not even follow all the DRM fiascos and the like. This is a pretty big one to miss, but still.
Third, the way this is organized is as an attack against Ubi (and poor Tesco). Not a boycott/protest. You know how protesters tend to get their point across if they are semi-orderly and organized, as opposed to raving lunatics with 2x4s? Same thing here. We do NOT want to become the enemy. Because, if PC gamers aren’t “the enemy” before, they will be after something like this.
So please, for the love of all that is holy, tell everyone you know to NOT do this. It is a great knee-jerk reaction, and it feels like it might be our “only option”, but this will either blow up in our faces, or cause more harm in the long run. If you are going to boycott the game, boycott it. If you want your voice to be heard, contact Ubi. But do NOT attack them. This is even worse than “Der, I’ll just pirate it”
I’m sorry, but “Poor Tesco”? That made your whole argument sound a bit ridiculous. It’d have minimal effect on the supermarket but might at least grab their attention. Asda freely admitted in an MCV article last year that they sold MW2 at a loss; so “poor supermarket” doesn’t fly. Doubly-so when you’re talking about the biggest one.
Anyway, the other alternatives ain’t too hot:
1) Boycott: Ubi and others just use the “statistics” to “prove” the bullcrap notion that PC gaming is dying.
2) Pirate: Ubi and others just use the “statistics” to say piracy is killing the industry [another load of bull].
3) Buy it anyway: You give them the idea that it’s OK. Which it shouldn’t be.
What gets my goat, and all companies are doing this recently not just Ubi, is that they’re all using Piracy as an excuse for intrusive DRM because it’s the easy scapegoat, the favourite whipping boy. The truth being that 2nd hand game sales are the biggest “threat” to their pockets and the reason they’re taking these procedures in the first place. But trying to say to the media and general public “we don’t want you owning your property and selling it on” wouldn’t prove as popular a tagline…
Okay, let’s for a moment imagine that Tesco deserves to be the focus of all the ire and the like.
Let’s just think about it this way: you are going to give them sales figures. Sure those won’t last in the long run, but they will still go a long way toward saying this was successful.
All this is doing is penalizing a retailer for selling something you want (PC Games), antagonizing Ubi (that will make them like PC gamers), and actually giving them sales figures so that they can call it a success.
I’m not sure I understand the reasoning behind doing it all in one big pile of returns. Surely the trickling in of hundreds of copies over the entire return period will seem more like a natural process? Or if the goal is to act out a formal protest… oh, I’m not sure. This is certainly the kind of thing that’ll make someone sit up and notice. The real deal breaker would be a massive feature in the news about how easy it was to crack on release day, that’s what I’m interested in. Maybe EA or Valve should offer to patch it out? I’m sure they’d get sued for that though.
I’d go for Game personally – bunch of tossers instore and deserve a shafting IMO
Agreed, and I used to work there.
As good a plan as any. Good luck, Lewie. I only wish Ubisoft hadn’t chosen to do this to Assassin’s Creed.. I adore these games ._.
Don’t worry, they’re doing it with all their future releases as well!
Hey there. I think this is a great idea and wish you the best of luck with this little operation. I would likely be joining in if I didn’t live in america. I WILL try to spread this around a bit. I love a lot of the Tom Clancy franchise save for some recent titles and want to buy the new splinter cell and ghost recon games, but I can’t support this lunacy. Ubi needs to be sent a clear message NOW. the later it comes the less of a chance we have of abolishing this crap.
Again, GOOD LUCK AND GOD SPEED CAPTAIN!
Don’t think it’s much use tbh; Tesco won’t be bothered by it and you’ll just end up at least a pound out of pocket, maybe more if you have a problem returning it. Plus, your orders will still count towards PC sales in the stats.
Better off just not buying it and posting up a standard argument against it’s DRM on as many shopping sites as you can be bothered to, eg. Amazon, Play etc (anywhere you can write a review). That’s what I’ll do and I wasn’t even gonna buy the game anyway cos I thought the first was rubbish!
🙂
I like Jaffo’s idea, so have alread posted review on Play mostly quoting the CVG article. I’m still waiting for it to be approved though…
I’d be much more interested in encouraging each and every journalist who ends up reviewing the game to think very seriously about factoring in the DRM as a major component in their decision of what to write and which score to award.
And risk losing the back-handers they get from the publishers to give their big new blockbuster a rave review, regardless of its actual quality? Not likely.
IMO i think ubisoft should have just used steamworks with AC2 much better than this crappy new “DRM”.
Since Prince of Persia will suffer under DRM aswel, I pledged the respected Jordan Mechner, creator of the franchise, for help. That would mobilise the other PoP-fans who are for the bigger part PC-gamers.
Hey, he create the classcis on a PC(and Mac,lol) if I need to remind you.
You can support my thread there for Mechner to do something to give Ubisoft more headaches:
http://jordanmechner.com/forum/questions-for-jordan/stop-ubisoft/
An account is required to read it for some reason, but the more the answers, the more Mechner will look into it. He maybe has Disney behind his back.
Um… Wouldn’t a retailer just say no if they start getting inundated with returns?
Would Tesco really give a toss?
Wouldn’t this mean high sales figures for the game?
I don’t really get it… And I don’t see this working unless you’re doing this co-operating with another site too and get a lot of people behind it…
Nar, the law states that we have the right to return goods bought over the internet without it costing us a penny. Plus that means we should be able to get the P&P refunded along with the product’s refund.
*snip*
I’m happy for you to disagree with me Jigs, but at least be polite please.
Yeah Jigs, there’s the ticket.
Instead of voting with our wallets, lets fight piracy with censorship and denial. As long as the game companies think we’re taking it lying down, they’re sure to stop dishing it out.
This sounds like a very good idea, but I live in the US. I suppose I will find myself some other retailer.
I think the best option here is to get as many reviewers and public representatives on board. And as Jaffo suggested, users can write poor reviews on all the online retailer websites, explaining just WHY the game is worth 1 star.
You do realise ‘Savy’ is misspelled, and should be ‘Savvy’? Also, good idea!
Lewie really is that incompetent. 😀
Hey, at least it’s memorable.
Yeah, I am dyslexic, and misspelt the name when I first registered it, but it kinda stuck ;D
Or could be “Savey”
That’s the way I always looked at it.
There is no right or wrong way to pronounce/interperate it ;D
You’re link to buy from Tesco is a referral that puts cash in YOUR pocket so here’s a big fat go fuck yourself.
To be fair, all links on SavyGamer are affiliate links. However, commission is always canceled whenever items are returned, so I won’t earn a penny from this (I will however, be able to track the exact number of copies of AC2 ordered).
Lewie is a link? oh you must have meant ‘your’. If you’re gonna flame at least use the correct words, here’s a big fat go learn some grammar.
I find it interesting how the concept of a letter of protest / complaint has been completely disregarded as useless. If some exec got 10,000 emails and 2,000 scraps of paper delivered to their desk, you can bet they’d at least THINK about changing step. The reality is, as earlier commentors have posited, there’s no other way to communicate our grievances effectively without significant potential backlash.
Have any of the larger gaming mags weighed in on the issue in a negative / critical manner? Does anybody even read those any more?
No exec will ever get any email or scrap of paper delivered to their desk. All your emails go through a filtering process, either automated or done by some poor intern bloke that files them under “abusive”, “threatening”, “nonsensical”, etc. They are then forwarded to yet more intern blokes in the HR department who have explicit instructions on how to deal with each type of email. Most are ignored. Others are answered with automated templates in the likeness of “We are glad to hear from you and appreciate that you have opinions. But we just don’t give a shit.”
If for whatever reason an exec would be willing to read through negative “fan mail”, the head of HR (or someone appointed by the head of HR) would then pick the most mild-mannered and grammatically correct of the bunch. So what the exec ultimately reads is a self-apologetic, long-winded, and ultimately ineffectual expression of mild dissatisfaction by a mildly unhappy customer (and likely one on a topic completely irrelevant).
And then gamers ask why it seems like game companies don’t seem like they even know what gamers want. (They know what the numbers show them, and in the business world the numbers don’t lie). It is because there is simply no communication between publishers and gamers. There isn’t even any communication between the publisher and the game they are publishing. What, you think they actually play the games they publish? You think companies publishing porn movies actually watch what they publish? It’s a business, and you don’t have to necessarily like the line of work to do business. And I can assure you that there are plenty of execs in game publishing companies that look down on games the way they’d look down at porn. They only do their business with the numbers, and stay away from the product as far as possible.
I think this is a good idea. I really hope it pays off, Lewie. Sick of this rubbish. Amazed by the self-fulfilling cynicism of a few of the commenters though. Whilst I was behind the boycott idea, I’d always thought along similar lines – just not buying it will only reinforce their belief that PC gamers are not worth selling to in the first place, for whatever reason. Hopefully this will show that we can part with our money to make a point, and show them the cash they could have had, were it not for the DRM.
TBH I think Amazon would be a much better choice of retailer since you could make it an international “petition” as opposed to just a UK one. This would then result in better exposure and (hopefully) results.
+ AFAIK, Amazon don’t have any mention of the DRM and/or Internet Connection requirements in their product page (apart from the comments section).
I whole heartedly agree. I was completely on board until you mentioned the retailer should be tesco, which gave me a pause until I realized it was UK.
” … they are refusing to 100% commit to supporting these games in the future. You may be left with a coaster.”
While this is true, they also commented this by saying that they are able to patch the DRM out of the games in question if they ever do decide to bring those servers down permanently for whatever reason, and that that’s a patch they’d be willing to release in such an event.
I agree with the rest of your points however. But my plan of action will be simple, I won’t buy the game. I might pirate it just because of this anti-piracy attempt however…. We’ll see. These nazi-manners kinda always backfire.
Don’t tell me you actually believe that the promise of patching out DRM is anything more than empty air. Think of how many games that require internet connection (through being inherently multiplayer) EA has killed in the past by pulling the plug on their servers, without any patches or releasing dedicated servers to the public. Just a few days ago EA closed down servers for Mercs2 and LotR:Conquest. Those games were barely a year old. Those games were [i]multiplayer[/i] games. Assassin’s Creed and Settlers and a lot of Ubisoft’s games are singleplayer.
COME, GET ON THE BANDWAGON! WE MUST PUSH LITTLE CART!
Spread the word, NAO!
This plan sucks. Try again.
I really think the intentions behind this idea are admirable, but I just don’t think people will be arsed to follow it through. I mean, I hate what Ubisoft are doing with their DRM; I’ve written about it, even. You know what, though? I’m still not going to do it, because I’m a bit of a lazy sod that way.
I still think the best way of making a protest is by simply not buying the game on the PC platform. If sales for AC2 on the PC actually turn out to be less than for the original, then they’ve simply got to give their DRM a second look. They’d have to be extremely bloody-minded not to.
My theory, though, is that they are that bloody-minded. They don’t care about what people think, and the sales are going to poor, and they’ll just say “Look, piracy!” and stop publishing their games on the PC – which, really, is what they’ve been wanting to do for a while.
If there are only two options here – of Ubisoft either releasing games with this fascist DRM or getting out of the market altogether – I’d rather see them doing the latter. Good-fucking-riddence.
Simply not buying the game on PC only gives Ubi the excuse to say that the PC has become a nonprofitable platform for investment.
The above outlined course of action is a decent one, IMO, with the only major flaw of Ubisoft as a corporation cherry-picking the numbers and statistics that they feel like looking at or reporting. I also think that pre-orders should be canceled at the latest possible date for those of us in the states with less amicable return rules, to potentially stick retailers with far more copies in-warehouse than they planned on. I also think that people should stop buying Ubisoft games on consoles; however, getting console gamers to to do anything for the sake of gaming as a hobby at large is next to impossible if their platform of choice isn’t at risk. Relatedly, I think that if Ubisoft games were suddenly taken off of everyone’s Gamefly queues, it would send a similar message.
If you really want to pass a message to Ubisoft, there is a far easier way to do this than annoying one retail outlet. Metacritic is, unfortunately, something that game companies use very often. Heck, I’ve seen job offerings where one of the requirements was shipment of a game with a metacritic score of over 90. So rather than getting a hundred people to play bait and switch with Tesco, here is what you do:
Go to Metacritic. Look up Assassin’s Creed’s reviews and jot down the websites of the reviewers there. There are lots, so get all the big names, but also the other ones that have given the game a high score. Now compile a list of the emails of all the editors of those websites/magazines and have the hundred people email [i]them[/i] about second game. And be adamant that in the email it is [b]clearly mentioned why the effect of the DRM [i]should[/i] influence the final score of the game, and not simply mentioned in the review with a sad smiley.[/b]
If a large enough population of the reviewers are influenced, and agree, and their reviews carry a lower score because of the DRM, and it is clear in the review that the DRM was the cause of the score lowering, then that would be a far stronger message to Ubisoft.
Also, isn’t another idea to go on Amazon and bombard them with one-star reviews?
Low reviews on Amazon due to DRM would be far more effective, it also tends to get news coverage on several news websites as well as blogs far more so than sending back to a particular retailer. We’d also do well to make sure sites such as Megacritic etc have low reviews due to DRM, user reviews matter these days.
I don’t quite see how user submitted scores on Amazon affect anything, but that’s because I don’t shop for games on Amazon. Phil does bring up a good point that it [i]could[/i] be picked up by some kind of news outlet.
However, I don’t think we should focus on just one venue. We should all do as much as possible to fight back. Tesco, Metacritic, Amazon, anything and everything. The more the better. And by spreading it wide, the effect will loop back onto itself.
All these publishers are usually public companies, what kind of say do shareholders get? Is it as easy for an executive to ignore a letter from a shareholder rather than a member of public?
All these shareholders are usually wealthy market players or hopeful white-collared blokes that went to the wrong advisory agency. The chances that any of them actually give a rat’s arse about the games’ quality is little. What they care about is the return on their investment, their dividends. And so when the chairman of the board shows them a slide explaining how DRM will increase profits by decreasing number of units pirated and, by correlation, increases the units sold, that will be enough for them.
And of course it doesn’t matter that DRM rarely stops piracy, because the board will never show THOSE numbers to the public. And the only truly knowledgeable ones and those that care are just a small minority who’s combined vote is a tiny fraction of the hundreds of thousands of shares.
Another fight we could put up, and which is perhaps the most drastic of all options, is a psychological attack. We simply ignore Ubisoft. We ignore Assissin’s Creed2, and Settlers, and any game they release. And by we, I mean the PC community as a whole. This will include reviewers and magazines, too. Imagine if all of a sudden everyone but the odd small website and blog starts to completely ignore anything by Ubisoft and completely shuns them. No mention whatsoever, not even of the shunning itself. Now that would be an effective message right there. It would greatly impact them because all these websites and magazines are very important to marketting. And if this pushes them over the edge and they give up with PCs entirely, then as someone has already mentioned; good riddance. Let them take their shite elsewhere.
That’s an unfeasible plan, though. It involves having websites and magazines that make money on these articles and reviews to intentionally reduce their profits. And I don’t know about every website and magazine, but most are run by companies and managed by boards that are just like the game publishers. They’d never agree to something like that.
That’d be a wonderful thing, but unfortunately it’d never happen.
Personally, I’m boycotting all Ubisoft product, not just PC (although I’ll be taking part in this plan of attack). I actually started by boycotting Activision’s stuff late last year, around the same time all their MW2 bullsh*t and related articles all started appearing.
I think all else we can do is an all out assault using Amazon, Tesco, online blogs etc, and just tweeting about how crap it is as much as possible. Although the best case scenario would be that AC2 (and SettlersVII) is released with the DRM, then patched out later and scrapped from future releases, as it’s likely too far along to take it out now.
Just crack the game, remove the DRM, and play like normal.
I fully support the idea, but I’m not from the UK, and therefore I won’t be ordering a game for which I have to pay like 4 EUR to return.
Don’t they email you when you preorder so that you confirm the order one the game is out? That would be great, ’cause then I could preorder it and cancel the order when I get the email.
Check out the customer ratings on Play:
http://www.play.com/Games/PC/4-/9606606/Assassin-Creed-II/Product.html
The Play.com Nazis have deleted all the reviews for Assassin’s Creed 2 on the PC…
Wow, now THAT’s a story a gaming website ought to publish. If only there was access to the reviews that were deleted, though. You think they’d be in google’s archives?
Brilliant idea. If I still lived in the UK I’d definitely get in on this.
My concern is that the number of returns will be ignored and all your campaign will do is pad the number of sales, proving the DRM has no impact.
A better approach would be to write a (physical) letter to Ubisoft explaining that you would like to buy this game but refuse to because of the DRM.
Do NOT say that you will pirate it, simply state that although you really wanted to buy this game, the DRM is offensive and you refuse to support any company that uses that.
I wasn’t going to buy AC2, but ‘m planning to do this for SH5.
Minimal cost to the individual, but if enough people do this, it can definitely get their attention.
I don’t think any letter (physical or digital) will matter. They’ll just toss them.
The only thing that matters to these people is the money. They can show the sales from the returns if they want, but in the end they won’t see the money from them. And that will get them thinking more then a letter which they won’t even look at.
Tesco? Never once heard of them. Might be a good idea to pick something higher profile, like Amazon or Gamestop.
Let’s look at the options we have open to us:
1) Buy the game – it shows that they can get away with this nonsense
2) Pirate the game – it proves they are right
3) Buy it on a console – Shows that we just aren’t interested on the PC, or that PC gamers don’t want it in general.
4) Boycott the game – They will be looking at sales figures and piracy figures, not abstentions.
5) Write a letter – As pointed out above, letters will be ignored or ineffective
6) Go through with Lewie’s idea – Actually registering our disgust in a way that they might pay attention to.
It is wrong to assume that if we don’t buy the game then Ubisoft will take this as a sign that either we don’t want the game on the PC, or that the PC market is not worth publishing in anymore.
If they had a certain amount of sales for previous, similar titles, and now a sequel suddenly has /significantly/ lower sales, people will start to look into why, and I assure you they would not ignore their DRM as a possibility.
Earn money with CELL PHONE!!!
i earned in 2 days 30$!