Ubi Soft makes you bend over and take it

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Jackasses.

They have absolutely ruined what was one of the best online shooters I have ever played. First with patches that continually strive to make what was once a unique and strategic shooter into an exact clone of counter strike, and now this.

Thanks Rat Boy. I was considering checking this one out, but not anymore.

as(s)inine

I can''t view that site from work, what is the article about?

"Tobyus" wrote:

I can''t view that site from work, what is the article about?

Ubisoft released the promised Rainbow Six 3 : Raven Shield 1.5 patch yesterday, but they failed to mention their new copy protection scheme.

It turns out that Ubisoft implented code into the RVS 1.5 patch which checks PCs for ANY clone or virtual drive programs and then fails to launch the game if such devices or programs are found. What this has in turn done is disabled thousands of consumers who use programs like Daemon Tools, CloneCD or Alcohol 120% from playing their Ubisoft games even if they have their own physical cds in an actual drive.

After contacting a Technical Support Representative of Ubisoft, I was told that they feel that this is the wrong way to go about anti-piracy measures but they have no say in the matter. They did point out that Ubisoft management claims that they''re covered under their EULA but the EULA does not state once that you are not allowed to have virtual drives on your system during play. It only says that you are not allowed to make back up copies.

Irregardless of what the virtual drives or virtual clone programs on your system are for, you will not be able to play Raven Shield with patch 1.5 unless you remove them completely off your system. Again, you can''t even play when you have the retail cds in a drive unless those programs / virtual drives are removed. This is a violation of consumer rights - those programs are used for perfectly legal reasons especially at LAN cafes to avoid disc loss.

I am a victim of this patch and I refuse to remove my virtual drives - I do not do anything illegal with them whatsoever. Share your comments please.

still at work myself, so I feel your pain.

That is the dumbest bunch of crap I ever heard. I would ask for a refund.

Wow, I cannot believe it. It''s not just using Virtual Drives, if they''re even installed on your system it refuses to play. Oh well, I''d just install my nocd crack as usual. I probably won''t be buying Athena Sword unless they retract this though. There''s no telling what crazy rules they''ll make my computer follow before I can play ""If you happen to have a CD burner, or any CD-Rs, or any p2p apps, or any other games installed ...""

It''s low enough to implement these types of copy protection in the initial release.. its even lower to inflict it with a patch when you''ve allready purchased the game long ago..

DIE! DIE!

Oh, great. Does this mean no Raven Shield on Thursday nights?

I could see this if you were running the game itself from a virtual drive. It would still suck, but I could see thier point. Stopping you from playing if you have one installed at all though is just stupid. Ubisoft mentions they ""had no say in the matter"" so I wonder if they''re going to take the heat for a publisher decision.

Off topic but...

Irregardless of what the virtual drives...

Irregardless is not a word!!!!!

Ah, yet another company that feels it''s own your computer because you had the lack of vision to give them money, well the problem is certainly resolved for the future, I''ll just scratch them off my list of companies to do business with until they come to their senses or wither and die. Both them and RIAA.
My computer and what is on it is my business and mine alone, any company that wants to assert it''s self above my right to privacy can go to hell.

Can you just rename the Clone CD exe file and get around it. Nah, to easy. Well good thing I have two computers.

It is a word, just not a particulary well regarded word. I''ve actually seen it it some recent dictionaries and it showed up on my word a day calendar. Everyone is pretty much in agreement that regardless is by far the better choice, but saying its not a word is false.

http://www.bartleby.com/64/C003/0184...

I''m curious why people run virtual drives for games instead of just downloading the crack? Not that I don''t think this sucks.

f*cking assholes. The only way i can make the game work is with a virtual drive. My DVD/CDR combo makes the game crash even though I have the original game. When I emailed UBISOFT about it they simply told me to buy another one. I used to be able to play the game with a crack but now punkbuster detects the CORE.DLL change in the crack so I gotta use the .EXE crack AND virtual drive to make it work. Now they ban the virtual drives? f*cking bastards, I have no way to play the game now.

I WILL NEVER EVER BUY AN UBISOFT GAME EVER!!!!! (insert any insult possible here) Instead of fixing the f*cking stupid ladder bug that they said they fixed but they didn''t, they put time on f*cking people that bought the game in the first place like me. f*ck them!()/""$(?%""/)$(%("")/$%

"aphesian" wrote:

It is a word, just not a particulary well regarded word. I''ve actually seen it it some recent dictionaries and it showed up on my word a day calendar. Everyone is pretty much in agreement that regardless is by far the better choice, but saying its not a word is false.

http://www.bartleby.com/64/C003/0184...

The only reason it''s ""become"" a word is because there''s so many ignorant clowns out there using it. By that logic, ""ain''t"" is a word too. Guess what, it''s still not correct. So, ok, ""irregardless"" is a word; it''s just an incorrect word. Like ""stupidness.""

Oh yeah, back on topic: Up yours, Ubi Soft.

So they''re disabling the program for THOUSANDS of loyal customers, to shut down the efforts of a few hundred pirates (most of whom wouldn''t have bought the game, and all of whom will just download a NEW crack soon anyway)? Smart move, guys! Way to ensure customer loyalty!

In addition, they''ve probably violated privacy laws, since I doubt that their EULA enables them to search around on users'' hard drives for anything that interests them. What''s next - looking around for Internet activity and disabling the program for any users who visit Slashdot?

I''m not surprised, really. They''ve been trying to get virtual drives killed for quite some time, since users can swap image files and run it from clone CD or something.

Still, it''s silly to take this step. If you have a legitimate key, then what difference would clone CD or a virtual drive make? And if you don''t have a valid key, then you aren''t going to let copy protection stop you-you''re going to get the no-cd crack to get around it.

All they end up doing is pissing off legitimate users.

I''ve been unhappy with Ubisoft ever since I bought Rainbow 6 3 to play at a LAN party and found out it won''t run on a LAN unless the LAN has Internet access. After a bunch of research on their old and busted site, I found a switch in an .ini file that would make it stop trying to check the Internet in a LAN game. However, after that, the game would lock up. Their tech support people blamed our switches, which is the most {ableist slur} thing ever.

Now Ubisoft has committed this douchebaggery. I will personally see that they burn in hell. Or better yet, I might just contact the Better Business Bureau. We''ll see.

Also, I''m pretty sure I''m not gonna buy any more Ubisoft games. I was really pretty interested in Prince of Persia and XIII, but now, they can suck it.

hmm... it seems like everyone is into consoles and slowly killing the PC gaming with their gorilla warfare...

"Nei" wrote:

gorilla warfare

You mean this game?

Nei-

Not too sure what you mean.....Consoles have gotten more powerful, and are generally easier to code for (one set of hardware), but I don''t think you can make the logical leap from ubisoft''s copy protection schemes to the death of PC gaming.

Consoles aren''t a safe haven either, since I know of sources where I can download Xbox, PS2, and Gamecube games for free, and places where I can get the cracks and emulators to run them as necessary. I''m sure you do too.

I can understand them wanting to prevent piracy-but the whole industry is better off by finding another way, not these draconian measures.

Ok, 2 things... what I meant by everyone is into consoles as of late is that a fair amount of titles that were mainly for PC now take a priority for consoles and the ported back to the PC... though I know that rewriting the code from the scratch for the pc is allot more work than for consoles because there is identical hardware and software configuration... PC is all over the place!

...and by gorilla warfare, I mean that it''s getting harder and harder to avoid some body dictate what you can have on you system... latest example -> Ubi-soft!

Yeah, this is really weak. The same problem is happening with XIII, and every new game they ship will have the same ''upgrade''.

It''s a real shame, I just got paid and was going to buy Splinter Cell and Prince of Persia. Was. Not going to anymore.

If this game could not have gotten any worse. Stric9 and I used to play RvS all the time but after Ubi caved in to all the 1337 whiners, its just a shell of its orginal implementation. I will not purchase another Ubi game.

I will not buy any of their games either. PC or otherwise. Shame too, I wanted both XIII and PoP as well.

Looks like there''s a new patch oncoming.

Ubisoft will be releasing a fix to the recent Raven Shield 1.5 patch. This fix will address the virtual drive issue that was a result of the newest version of Safedisc implementation in the 1.5 patch. The problem is being rectified by reverting to the version of Safedisc that has been on previous Rainbow Six 3: Raven Shield software and patches. We were unaware of this problem with Safedisc and this is why we made no mention of it in our Readme.txt file.

That sounds plausible, actually - that the zealots that develop Safedisc copy protection (thank these guys for significant slowdowns in your favorite PC titles, kids!) screwed it up. The real test will be to see if UbiSoft uses them again for its next game...

Hmm, sounds to me more like Ubi doing a little CYA.