Stupid anti-piracy rules!!!

Black Panther · May 18, 2008

I'm all in favour of genuine games but when anti-piracy becomes a sheer nuisance it freaks me out! :mad:

I bought a legal copy of Two Worlds from gameplay.uk

Installed fine... then I got the message:

This version of the game cannot be run in your location. Please email legal@zuxxez.com for help

.

A quick search on the net brought me to find out that many people have this problem, for the simple reason that they didn't purchase the game from their own country!!! When they emailed Zuxxez Entertainment the advice they got was that they had to adjust the time zone on their pc to the country from which it was bought! Meaning that for the game to work you have to forget you have a clock on your pc!

Now I live in Malta (Europe) and the game was bought in the UK which is also Europe. To play the game I have to put my time zone on GMT like UK time, meaning that my clock now displays 19:20 instead of 20:20...

What made me mad is that had I known about this before I'd have bought the game from Italy which is my same time zone (I would still not have bought it locally at twice the price:shadedshu)

Am I supposed to check these crappy anti-piracy settings every game has before I buy it so as to avoid silly stuff like this?!?

I seriously doubt if this is in conformity with EU regulations... because a situation like this forces the customer to make his purchase from his own country, rather than shop over the EU for the best price. :mad:

I also hope this change in time zone won't freak out any of my other games/applications... or I'd have to continually have to change from GMT to GMT+1 and back again!

/ rant over... :ohwell:

echo75 · May 18, 2008

now thats what i call "using time wisely to make money" .

sorry to hear that mate, i will feel bad too.

Darknova · May 18, 2008

That's odd. I ordered Two Worlds from Germany before it was out in the UK and never had that issue :confused:

Morgoth · May 18, 2008

same problem with earth 2160..
its there crapy dev team!

ElWapo973 · May 18, 2008

Wow that definitely sounds rediculous. So you bought an OFFICIAL COPY of the game with a VALID REGISTRY KEY and then they say you can't use it just because it's not from your country! WTF gives? Theres gotta be a way around that BS. :mad:

Do they have a Customer Service number? Emailing can be slow and unreliable at times and doesn't have the flexibily that speaking to someone directly provides. At the least I'd imagine they should have given you some kind of option to exchange the key you have for a new one. In other words you give them your current key(which they will then disable) in exchange for one that will work in the country your are located.

I mean imagine if someone moved from one country in Europe to another(businessperson, students, military, etc)? These companies would have to be crazy to believe that their customers will buy yet another copy of a game THEY ALREADY OWN just to play it somewhere else! I strongly suggest you get in contact with them again and demand a better answer. Good luck to you either way. :toast:

DaedalusHelios · May 18, 2008

Just crack your legal copy. Thats what I do and its 100% legal. You are just altering a game you own so it can be played on your PC.

Black Panther · May 18, 2008

Well the game runs fine.... with my clock an hour backwards set to UK time-zone... :laugh:

People sure have complained about this issue.

psyko12 · May 19, 2008

Yeah just use a fix if you own the legal stuff then its not bad, Lol for their anti-piracy way of protection... That kinda country racism..

Ripper3 · May 19, 2008

Simple fix: Set to GMT, set the time automatically, and don't allow your PC to update via the internet. So you get the same time, but the game still runs.

It's about as retarded as having anti-piracy warnings on DVD movies. The people that bought the DVD fair and square, have to put up with the stupid warning, and can't fast-forward or skip (unless their DVD player ignores the DVD's directions, and skips if it wants to), but people with pirate copies have the warning removed, or can easily skip it.
It will likely be fixed with a patch, once they come to their senses and notice it's the stupid form of "copy protection", since it doesn't work.

Widjaja · May 20, 2008

A little off topic about this anti piracy thing going over the top:-
I can't remember which game it is but it is rumored the exe checks with a server every ten days to see if your copy of the game is legal.

What happens to people who don't have internet on thier gaming machines?

spud107 · May 20, 2008

not used steam then?

ZenZimZaliben · May 20, 2008

You've all heard of Spore...Its a phone home game. It requires a internet connection even though there is a single player and you dont have to play multi. Yet with out a internet connection you can't play through legit means.

Widjaja · May 20, 2008

spud107 said:
not used steam then?

No never used steam.

The first signs I saw of this way of anti-piracy was with Colin McCrae DiRT.
The save file became corrupt whenever I wasn't connected ti the internet.
Athough this was a bug, but seriously do they expect every one to be online 24/7?

Why should there be this kind of copy protection for PC when consoles do not?

My PS2 was able to play copied games and it's only a matter of time before everyone will be able to do the same on a PS3 and Xbox 360.

spud107 · May 20, 2008

with steam you have to connect to your account before you can access your games,
offline mode is there but sometimes doesn't work,
offline mode is pointless for tf2 anyway . . .

Black Panther · May 20, 2008

I never used steam either.

Honestly I doubt I'd ever buy a game if it'd be compulsory to log on to the net for playing it. Why should anti-piracy force me to make an internet connection on other pc's I have in other premises, and together with internet I have to have antivirus, antispyware and all that plethora? It's too much for a simple game.:shadedshu I just want to pay good money, get a legit game and be over it.

Solaris17 · May 20, 2008

i crack my games...even ones i bought mostly because they require disks to play and my dvd drive is crazy loud...but thats what id do.

Nitro-Max · May 20, 2008

at least you can stay up as late as me

panchoman · May 20, 2008

wow that sucks.

lemonadesoda · May 20, 2008

The only way this time of software control is defeated IN THE LONG TERM is to return the good for a refund. The retailer gets pissed off... but legally they have to accept it. The distributer gets pissed off... but legally they have to accept it... and finally it works its way back upstream.

Complain on the forums. Let people know about this BS.

And demand a refund from the company that sold it. In the UK, they HAVE TO ACCEPT A RETURN, if is cannot be *fully utilised* in the way it was advertised. You have 30 days.

Do it.

Davidelmo · May 25, 2008

Nobody has mentioned, but you should download Peer Guardian 2 and Zone Alarm.

That will blacklist a load of servers and stop applications from "phoning home."

You'd be surprised how many apps phone home, even though they have no reason to use the internet. Windows Media Player is notorious.. I know it gets song info etc from the internet but at the same time I have downloaded a lot of mp3s and I don't want it phoning home with that info.

Also, several game installs try to phone home straight after installation has finished.

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Stupid anti-piracy rules!!!

Black Panther

echo75

New Member

Darknova

Morgoth

Fueled by Sapphire

ElWapo973

DaedalusHelios

Black Panther

psyko12

Ripper3

Widjaja

spud107

ZenZimZaliben

Widjaja

spud107

Black Panther

Solaris17

Super Dainty Moderator

Nitro-Max

panchoman

Sold my stars!

lemonadesoda

Davidelmo

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