Full FeedAdventures in Piracy: A look back at some memorable anti-piracy measures
For as long as there’s been video games, it seems like there’s been video game piracy. It’s sadly become a commonplace occurrence, with deserving developers and publishers becoming victims of disrespectful players who would rather steal than pay for a quality game.
Some developers and publishers attempt to strike back. Anti-piracy measures are designed, created and implemented in the hopes of thwarting the game pirates. Unfortunately, these measures are typically no match for determined pirates with plenty of free time on their hands.
This constant struggle between companies and thieves has lead to some memorable, and occasionally funny, piracy protection measures. Today, Gamertell takes a look back at the anti-piracy included in Spore, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates and Earthbound.
Spore DRM
Spore wasn’t one of the first video games to use the SecuROM form of anti-piracy, but it was one of the most notable and ironic instances. Here’s how its piracy protection supposedly worked. The game would install normally, but in order to actually play it, you’d have to be connected to the internet. The game would then touch base with EA online to determine whether or not it was a legal copy that would be able to run on that computer.
That alone was annoying. Add to that the fact that each copy of Spore could at first only be installed on three computers. EA decided to go easy on customers by bumping that up to five. If you need to install it more times than that, you have to plead with EA.
As for the delicious irony - despite the anti-piracy measures, Spore ended up being the most pirated PC game in 2008. As Torrent Freak reported, it was downloaded over 1.7 million times. Looks like some people didn’t have any SecuROM issues.
Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates Thank You for Playing Moogles
Thanks to the ample availability of flash carts, the DS has become one of the video game pirates’ favorite consoles. Downloading, dragging and dropping a file onto a memory card is a lot easier than tracking down a game, going to a store and buying it. A lot cheaper too. So many companies have gotten into including anti-piracy measures, like Square-Enix’s Thank You For Playing Moogles.
Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates was an eagerly anticipated DS release, much like all Square-Enix releases. And, like nearly all DS games, it found its way onto the internet shortly after being released to the general public. Unlike nearly all DS games, it gave pirates quite a bit of trouble.
On pirated copies of the games, a screen with two cute moogle characters would pop up, saying, “Thank you for playing!!” The game would freeze on that screen, forcing the pirates to stop playing.
Unfortunately, pirates soon developed a way around the moogles. For a brief, shining moment though, Square-Enix triumphed over the faceless anons who thought they could get a quality game for free.
Earthbound save-deleting piracy checks
One of the most memorable and drastic anti-piracy attempts is well documented by Starmen.net and concerns the SNES classic Earthbound.
See, the piracy protection in Earthbound had an ingenious design. Not only would it prevent pirates from playing the game, it would also prevent pirates from enjoying the game.
First of all, the game would initiate checks before the game started to make sure it was a legitimate copy. If it wasn’t, screens would pop up saying the game isn’t for that Super Famicom or SNES or that piracy is illegal.
If pirates managed to get past those piracy checks, another would kick in. This time, it effected gameplay. Hoards of enemies would lurk on screen, far more than would ever appear in any legitimate copy of the game.
Should pirates persevere through that and continue through the game, then the big guns came out. The ultimate anti-piracy attack - the game freezes in the final battle and deletes all of your save games.
If more video game companies used anti-piracy checks like this today, we’d see fewer pirates.
Read [CNet] Also Read [Torrent Freak] Also Read [Gamertell] Also Read [Starmen.net]
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I feel like all of these measures at best only hold back the tide for a bit. Still, can’t blame the companies for trying. My favorite anti-piracy measures was from Metal Gear Solid for the Playstation. Right after the game’s first boss you are instructed to call Meryl Silverburgh and to check the back of the game case to get her number. MGS has a lot of breaking the fourth wall moments though, so I don’t know if this was more of hat tip to anti piracy measures in jest or not. You’d think it wouldn’t fly in this day and age, what with the internet and all, but I’ve read comments from some people (even recently) who got really confused at this part of the game and didn’t know what to do.
I remember reading speculation somewhere (Joystiq maybe?) that the book of spells that will be included with Ninokuni could be an inventive new tactic to combat piracy, but if that’s the case it’s a pretty shoddy one. The internet would render it a moot in a day.
on March 26, 2009 at 12:29 AM - LINKOooh… that’s sneaky! I didn’t know Konami did that with Metal Gear Solid. Nice.
I think it was Joystiq, back when they had DS Fanboy. (I miss DS Fanboy.) I think you’re right - an included spellbook is no match for pirates. Seems like internet pirates are able to overcome anything.
on March 26, 2009 at 12:36 PM - LINKnever knew about the earthbound thing. a friend of mine play the rom ( i mean will they really be making any money for me to buy a used snes off ebay and a $100 cart)
he got nothing like that, would be fun to see though.
resistance is futile though people outnumber employees by 10000 of thousands to 1. If it can be made it can be broken. I have seen ds games with anti-piracy that got a patch or AR code within 2 days. Computer games get cracked same day. Movies come out online before they do in theatres and sometimes in dvd quality. Taken for example was released in europe and someone I know saw it in english dvd for testing purposes sub free a year before it came here.
Most people who pirate aren’t interested enough to actually pay for the product anyways so its not lost revenue. I strongly doubt someone who buys a psp is going to buy a ds and a game just to test out barbies dream house and see if they like the feel of it.
Then there are old games. Pirating of something like supermario rpg or chrono trigger hurts no one at all.
Why? Because they no longer manufacture, sell, or repair the games,console,parts or anything. It’s dead. The only people losing money on that is people who are selling the contents of their closet on ebay and they aren’t really hurt because official originals have high collector value. If anything piracy helps in that regard by reenforcing the brand/maker. If one of these new gen’s never get to experience games like valkyrie profile,legend of legaia,supermariorpg,ff2,ff3,chrono trigger,earthbound etc… how will they know wow chrono series is awesome and so is dead squaresoft (stupid enix). By having the early games experienced it creates a potential customer for chronotriggerchross3 the search for the 50th character.
On topic other games that have silly little piracy jests (all fixable by a simply AR code btw)
-DQ5——nds. Gives you a never ending boat ride :)
on June 23, 2009 at 05:07 AM - LINK-Chrono trigger- nds—-infinite time loop on warp points
-Legend of legaia—-at the end of the game in a event called conkram you get a hard time passing.
Black sigil—-nds oh wait thats right its buggy as a rotten log on both cart and rom and they are blaming their unfinished work saying it’s only pirated copies.
I think the Black Sigil issue may not effect all carts. I have the actual game (a review is forthcoming). I’ve been playing it for weeks straight, have over 30 hours logged and haven’t encountered one glitch.
The only time I did encounter Black Sigil glitches is when I put in an action replay code to eliminate the random battles. Then the bottom screen graphics got a bit fuzzy at times.
on June 23, 2009 at 12:03 PM - LINK