The Energon Pub

Didn't see this posted here yet, so here goes

Spore and Mass Effect to require net connection to validate game every 10 days

I'm reading this and thinking, what if you ge hacked or get a trojan that steals your key? Someone else uses it, you get banned. So now you're out $50 on a game that you legitimately own and all because EA is paranoid about piracy.

Last time I checked SecuRom has been causing more issues in legit copies than actually protecting from piracy as the last Sims expansion is already cracked so that you can play without the CD. When my wife goes to play Sims 2 she has to turn off Lightscribe because SecuRom thinks it's somethign to let her play burned copies as opposed ot writing labels on discs. ~_~

And the best part about that is, if you can't figure out on your own why it wo't run because of the SecuRom, EA basically tells you to shove off because obviously you have something on your PC that lets you pirate. What? So Lightscribe is helping my wife pirate?

This is solving nothing other than to alienate their player base. And here I was getting ready to upgrade my PC so I could actually play Mass Effect and Spore.

A patch that does away with the validation will be released within days, so no worries. And Securom certainly won't send a message back to EA telling them to blacklist you if it doesn't get along with your machine.

If your key is compromised you can get another one just by providing proof you purchased the game.

Nothing to worry about.

I'm just glad Mass Effect has made it to PC release.

Penny Arcade's Take on the SecuRom issue

LOL

I am installing this now. So far it hasn't confiscated my hard drive and sent it back to EA for inspection.

But it's probably the longest non-os installation I've sat through.

Edit: ... IT WON'T RUN! Installed, entered serial, but as soon as I try to launch the game or configuration, instant crash.

Heads will roll if I don't get this working.