Electronic Arts caught a lot of heat last year for the DRM protection that came with Will Wright’s “Spore.” The technology was supposed to keep the game from being pirated; what it did was piss off a lot of customers who legally purchased the game. EA eventually released a de-authorization tool, but the damage had already been done.

While many game companies argue that such technologies are necessary, some have suggested that they merely offer a false sense of security. While speaking at the Game Developers Conference 2009, indie developer Ron Carmel called DRM “a waste of time” because companies end up paying providers for software that doesn’t really limit piracy. Carmel, who is half of the 2D Boy team, helped produce “World of Goo.”

“It’s going to get cracked even with DRM, it’s going to be available very quickly, so we don’t see the point in having DRM,” he said according to a GameSpot report. “Piracy rates have been released before, and there’s no difference between World of Goo and other games.”

Last year, the studio estimated that the PC version of “World of Goo” had an approximate 90 percent piracy rate. “Spore,” despite its copy protection, was also heavily pirated.

“Spore” was perhaps the most controversial case of DRM use last year, but it is important to note that other games, including the PC version of “Grand Theft Auto IV,” also had copy protection.

“Creating video game entertainment is our passion and we invest a considerable amount of time and effort to release each title, and employ a large number of people in the process,” a Rockstar representative told IGN UK last November. “Having copy protection allows us to protect the integrity of our titles and future investments, but at the same time we have worked very hard to ensure that our solutions do not persecute the legitimate players of our games.”

The spokesperson told IGN UK that “GTA IV has no install limits for the retail disc version of the game,” but that “each digital download vendor has its own policy on the number of installations that are allowed.”

While I certainly understand the desire to limit piracy, I absolutely despise DRM policies. PC gamers who legitimately purchase a game should be able to play it on any compatible platform without having to worry about an install limit. I am certainly against piracy, but protection technologies seem to do little to alleviate the problem. In fact, industry observers have suggested that it actually legitimizes piracy in the eyes of some gamers.

As more companies turn to digital distribution, I will be interested to see how DRM evolves and if studios continue to rely on it. I would love to fully embrace digital distribution, but I feel safer purchasing retail copies of games. If I purchase a disc-based title, that game is mine and I can play it on any compatible platform. When I purchase a digitally distributed title, it doesn’t feel like I actually own the game. While Virtual Console titles and PlayStation Store games can be re-downloaded, it is still unclear if these titles will be playable on future consoles. Granted, retail games might not be compatible with future systems either, but at least they aren’t tied to an online account.

In news that should elate Steam users, Valve claims to have introduced new features that make “DRM obsolete.” Gamasutra has reported that the Custom Executable Generation technology provides gamers with “unique copies of a game that they can access on multiple PCs with neither install limits nor root kits.” I am not really good at translating technical jargon, so it is probably best if you head over to Gamasutra for the full story.

Sources: GameSpot via Eurogamer, IGN UK, Gamasutra

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