Monday, September 08, 2008

Spore released with Draconian DRM

It would appear the much hyped game Spore has hit a snag; namely it's draconian DRM. The out-cry over this has turned into a hate bomb on Amazon of over 500 1-star reviews, mostly criticizing the DRM but also the dumbed-down game play.

First of all, the game incorporates a draconian DRM system that requires you to activate over the internet, and limits you to a grand total of 3 activations. If you reach that limit, then you'll have to call EA in order to add one extra activation.

"Creating" your creatures is pointless (cosmetic only, because everything is based on stats), and brings you about the same excitement as dressing up a plastic doll.


I seem to recall Will Wright giving a presentation where he said that how you designed your creature would determine it's survival. Apparently it's been dumb-down so much that the creature design is mostly cosmetic; depending on the run-of-the-mill stats and dice rolls of the average RPG. The space phase supposedly pales in comparison to Sins of the Solar Empire that boast 500,000+ sales, in part, thanks to no DRM.

Maybe EA will learn a powerful lesson from this. Who knows?

I know that until they get rid of the DRM, I won't be bothering with Spore or any other EA game.

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