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.

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.

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.

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.

http://www.play.com/Games/PC/4-/9606606/Assassin-Creed-II/Product.html

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Spread the word, NAO!

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.

+ AFAIK, Amazon don’t have any mention of the DRM and/or Internet Connection requirements in their product page (apart from the comments section).