|
|
|
| Preventing theft |
|
OnlineCop
Member #7,919
October 2006
 |
Good points, but if they're going to download the program illegally in the first place, I'd put them in that bracket of "not your target market anyway". And if people buy your game honestly, then of COURSE you give them the link to the "real" website, and not the "this software is pirated" one. Besides, it isn't really my first impression if I get software for a torrent that "oh look, it just started deleting its own files..." is always the file's fault. My first impression is, "oh, crap. Some jerk put a malicious file in with this. I'll need to download a different copy of it..." After all, if I download the program online, I'm going to assume first that the program is the "real" copy and that it's not going to self-implode on me. If that's the case, I'd say others would share the same feelings.
|
|
HardTranceFan
Member #7,317
June 2006
 |
Quote: So then all you need to do is create two version of your software. The first version, you sell normally. The second is a "breaks down" version that looks and feels (and functions) just like the normal version, except that it's targeted specifically for pirates. After a few uses, it starts deleting some of its own needed files, getting "updates" from your "this software is pirated" website instead of the "real" software-update website, and otherwise becoming a flaming bag of poo. This reminds me of an incident way back at school. A friend had bought a legitimate copy of a game, but someone at school managed to get hold of the floppy disk, copy it and distribute it to the other geeks at school. So my friend created a little 'fix' for the game, which, after it was used a number of times, created some bad sectors on the disk, rendering it useless. We distributed this 'fix', telling people that the game wouldn't work for very long due to a known bug. They bought it hook line and sinker, and within a few days all illegal copies of the game had gone. OnlineCop's suggestion runs along a similar line to what the programmers of Spyro the Dragon did, when they developed a good copy protection, though this was eventually cracked after a few months. -- |
|
OnlineCop
Member #7,919
October 2006
|
HardTranceFan, thanks for that link. It was actually a really cool article. I'm in favor of what they talked about: for commercial games, having a crack time of several months over a few hours/days/weeks definitely puts your game at the top of the cracker community buzz forums. While no game is totally uncrackable, the laziness of crackers often lets them play-test the game only partially before releasing an incomplete crack for the game. I especially liked their picture:
|
|
Timorg
Member #2,028
March 2002
|
C&C:Generals did something similar to Spyro, the copy protection would appear to work, but a random amount of time into a level, all your units would suddenly explode. ____________________________________________________________________________________________ |
|
Thomas Fjellstrom
Member #476
June 2000
 |
I really like that idea, But instead of totally breaking game play, make a different, more simple game out of it. If people want to play the real game, they have to buy it, but what they essentially get out of the illegal copy is a glorified demo -- |
|
|
|
