Tim Willits supports always-on DRM

[Xeros612]

Story here.

Tim Willits said:

"Diablo 3 will make everyone else accept the fact you have to be connected," he said. "If you have a juggernaut, you can make change. I'm all for that. If we could force people to always be connected when you play the game, and then have that be acceptable, awesome."

You've gotta be fucking kidding.

[Ultraboy94]

Ah well. There goes my possible future purchase of Doom 4.

[printz]

I can't wait for the day when a blockbuster game gets released, that requires a monthly fee just for single player! Hahahahaha!

[Enjay]

Tim Willits said:

In the end, it's better for everybody. Imagine picking up a game and it's automatically updated.

That "better for everybody" line smacks of the arrogance and ignorance trap that many isolated software developers fall in to. You know, like when they change a whole bunch of stuff about a program because it seemed sensible to them, or they thought that no one used a feature, or they decided in isolation how a feature would work best - then they are surprised and confused when they get deluged with 1000s of complaints from people who have have their work routine messed up.

Anyway, I don't have to "imagine", I have experienced auto updates in games. I don't like it. I want to update when I want to update, not when I am forced to. When I want to play, I want to play. I certainly don't want to sit and wait for a download. Even if I am allowed to play while downloading, what if it's a download that I don't want? Stop trying to force stuff on me! A single player game doesn't need to be updated just because the devs decided to change some minor thing (and probably package it with 3GB of pointless content while they are at it and perhaps overwrite and custom changes that I have made).

Nothing on my computer is set to auto update except my virus definitions.

Tim Willits said:

Or there's something new you didn't know about, and you didn't have to click away.

Nope, I'd rather click away. Or, to be clearer, if I want to play a game, I want to play a game. If I want to find out about something, I want to find out about it. I don't want to be told about something new that I didn't know about when all I want to do is hop on to a game to kill a few bad guys for fun. I just want to play dammit.



And that's not even getting in to the tin foil hat conspiracy theories about what other information, etc, is being gathered through your "always connected" link to big brother when you log in and auto-ask him if you are allowed to play today.

Still, I've seen this shit coming since Steam was first rolled out. How many "always on" connections to how many game services are we going to need before it's all done?

printz said:

I can't wait for the day when a blockbuster game gets released, that requires a monthly fee just for single player! Hahahahaha!

And it will happen. That's the way things are going. Lease software is the future I'm afraid. And I'm sure we will be told that it is for our benefit in that case too.

[kmxexii]

I don't mind doing stuff like playing through the steam client when I feel like it, but the idea of being forced online to play a single player game irritates me. Good thing the dearth of single-player content I currently have for, well, everything will probably past me longer than I have to live.

[Kirby]

Enjay said:

*Large rant about assumed features and the like*

This right here sums up my POV perfectly, thanks for that Enjay. Why force an entire package on someone when most of us only want a few select items from the entire thing? Why make it required that I download and update everything YOU give me? If I am in need of something, I KNOW HOW TO FIND IT! Auto-Updating as an option is just fine; the people who find it useful will use it, those who don't want it will just update themselves if they want to.

It's not good manners to force what you want onto others, though always-on DRM seems to skip over that concept and jump straight to the conclusion "It's good for you because we said so".

[printz]

Who is Tim Willits to talk about marketing strategies? I thought that's the job of the CEO or whoever. Can't say I'm much fan of this guy, he made some average (at least fun) E4 maps and shitty PWADs, and became creative director of Id because of this. Yick.

[Gez]

No, Tim Willits. Your [id's] fans aren't always connected. The ones that are can easily be seen on the network; the ones that aren't cannot but that doesn't mean they don't exist.

And imagining something that manages automatic updates? Did you know you guys were already on Steam? You might want to look into that. Note, by the way, that Steam offers an offline mode. Hey, guess what, Tim. I use Steam in offline mode exclusively, only going online to download something. I'm not interested in automatic updates because I want to know what's happening on my computer and I like to read changelogs before applying the changes.

[Phml]

I'd say things but you guys already made all the good points, so yeah. Always online = never buy, and not a big loss thanks to indies, mods and old games.

[Enjay]

He is right about one thing though: "if you have a juggernaut, you can make change". All you have to do is release a product that people want badly enough and they will accept the strings that come with it. Once they have done that, the door is open.

[kmxexii]

printz said:

Who is Tim Willits to talk about marketing strategies? I thought that's the job of the CEO or whoever. Can't say I'm much fan of this guy, he made some average (at least fun) E4 maps and shitty PWADs, and became creative director of Id because of this. Yick.

Well, he was also part of the Strife team. At least that's in the past.

[geo]

I don't support always on DRM... but once every 3-5 minutes randomly. Like 4 minutes one time, 3 minutes another. Internet connections break.

[Maes]

*pats his Doom source ports and free games like Wesnoth*

[Aliotroph?]

I saw Hollenshed go on a rant in an interview about how PCs need to be more like consoles because the developer has more control. I got the impression, even from a transcript, that Carmack probably wanted to yell at him.

The only current id guy who ever says anything I like is Carmack. Everyone else spouts something boring about how bump-mapping is awesome or how DRM is awesome. Former id guys do/say cool things. John Romero may not be be a star developer anymore, but the stuff he writes on his blog sits well with me.

[geo]

Carmack goes on about mega textures... went on for 30 minutes of it in his keynote speech.

[Maes]

Well, if you consider always-on DRM, take a look at WoW. It's unplayable without a regular subscription, and the software per-se is unusable in single player mode, yet that hasn't hindered its success in the least. The monthly subscription you pay IS the DRM.

Of course the concept doesn't translate well to pure single-player, stand-alone, not net-connected games, so the obvious next step will be to kill them off by making them fashion victims :

"Single player games? Wuzzzaaaat? That's, like, so ooooooooooooooooold man!"

and making the very concept that you can play a game NOT backed up by an active network connection, obsolete, or relegated to -some, mostly portable- game consoles.

[geo]

Well I know many people that are using illegal copies of Photoshop where it checks if you're illegal when you start up each time... catch is you can just disconnect, start the program and then connect again. Why pay $1,000 when you can outsmart the system?

That's why I say once every 5-10 minutes do a check. Being on every second is a little strange unless they have it where you need to be on every second and if you get disconnected, you have 10 minutes to get back on. That would be better than it kicking you out of the game instantly.

[Aliotroph?]

What's the point? That kind of DRM is usually easily cracked. The only people who suffer are the ones who aren't trying to beat the system or aren't savvy enough to find a work-around for when the net goes out because the cable company is shit.

[Nems]

I doubt this is an accurate representation of everyone at id Software's view of the matter and more Tim Willits talking out of his ass because "lol game journalism."

Still, the fact you have people thinking always-online DRM is a good idea is disappointing.

I'll be keeping an eye on this. It's highly unlikely Rage will have this nonsensical bullshit (considering how close to release it is; however, I've been wrong before) but if Doom 4 and more future games start adopting this shit, I'll be finding me a new hobby. I'm not spending a cent on any game that's run like that. \:

[chungy]

id Software has already been on the Steam train for a few years, so this is really not news at all. (And really, if you read the article, what he's talking about is essentially Steam.)

If it is only about Steam, an eventual Mac OS version (if made) would have it too, though the Linux engine (less likely to be done soon) wouldn't have such DRM. :P

[geo]

I guess my point is... DRM while you play or no DRM. has never affected me at all in the slightest. My Internet connection is solid and never gave me any problems. So I don't care what they do. Does DRM make them nazis? Nope. Does everyone in the company love DRM? Nope. It doesn't matter.

[Nems]

chungy said:

id Software has already been on the Steam train for a few years, so this is really not news at all. (And really, if you read the article, what he's talking about is essentially Steam.)

The article sounded more like (to me, at least, when I read it) that he was in support of that fucking awful Ubisoft shit. At least with Steam I can set it to offline (though I haven't checked as of late to see how much of an improvement offline mode is from the last time I used it).

[geo]

There is video game journalism? I thought it was all video game marketed media and "opinion pieces." Like people that cover movie news. Is it really journalism when a movie studio flat out tells you what's happening to hype their movie and then you preview it or review it?

[StevieWolfe]

Nems said:

The article sounded more like (to me, at least, when I read it) that he was in support of that fucking awful Ubisoft shit. At least with Steam I can set it to offline (though I haven't checked as of late to see how much of an improvement offline mode is from the last time I used it).

If its going to go the route that Ubisoft went, then I'm seriously not going to purchase Doom4.

[GreyGhost]

Apart from my opposition to such an in-your-face form of DRM, the 50+ year old copper network I'm connected to isn't reliable enough for always-on internet. In any case, what happens to "your" game when the publisher decides to shut down the authentication servers?

Enjay said:

Lease software is the future I'm afraid. And I'm sure we will be told that it is for our benefit in that case too.

Could work if the game is a free download and eminently forgettable, but there's no way I'm getting involved in a purchase + pay-to-play arrangement.

[Scripten]

Nems said:

The article sounded more like (to me, at least, when I read it) that he was in support of that fucking awful Ubisoft shit. At least with Steam I can set it to offline (though I haven't checked as of late to see how much of an improvement offline mode is from the last time I used it).

It's quite useful. I'll often play STALKER over the LAN with my girlfriend, since only a few games actually use Steam for online features.

Anyway, this is obviously bullshit. I'm pretty indifferent about Steam, since it allows a lot of convenience for such a service, but as has been said, the lack of an offline mode would be very irritating. It's really the application of DRM that is hurtful to the consumer moreso than the existence. The shitty system put in place with Spore is a perfect example of how to fuck your customers nice and hard.

[caco_killer]

Nems said:

At least with Steam I can set it to offline (though I haven't checked as of late to see how much of an improvement offline mode is from the last time I used it).

Steam has had an offline mode for years. All it wants to do is make sure your game is fully updated first, so its not a really hassle to deal with.

[Sharessa]

Good thing that 90% of the titles I'm looking forward to are indie games. Might get Skyrim eventually and will probably buy any future Valve titles, but I for the most part AAA titles are regurgitated crap. At least I have my Mount & Blade.

[sirjuddington]

Personally I don't have any problem with it, it's not ideal sure but my connection is generally fine enough.

That said, I don't disagree with the complaints about such DRM either. There is absolutely no point in a single player game requiring a *constant* connection to play - it isn't going to stop piracy any better than offline DRM and just makes the game unavailable or at least barely playable for a number of customers. How that makes any business sense I don't know.

[hervoheebo]

I only buy from companies I like. Oppressive DRM is over the line. Sorry, id.