Steam Bioshock Demo Woes
So there are a few stories floating around about the interesting fun with Bioshock's anti-piracy setup.
For the record, all indications are that the game is fantastic. I've played with it. It's nice, and I almost bought it... then I learned about some bullshit. (Read on)
It also has a Sony Root-Kit bundled into it. The kind that gets deep into your Kernel and messes with the basic levels of how your OS works. Indications are that it actually messes with the security setup of your
computer and leaves potential holes in it. It also gathers a hardware profile to use as a unique identifier of your machine and then sends info out. Oh and it can't be removed, even if you uninstall Bioshock.
Bonus: many rootkit detection, spyware detection, and virus detection programs call it Dangerous Malware and flag it. Even some Microsoft software flags it. This is only fair, seeing as if you install the root-kit it stops some perfectly valid system tools, including one made by Microsoft and bundled with Vista, from running. Yah nice.
Oh and as a bonus, the game will only let you install it twice. Yes only twice, even if you install it both times on the same machine. Supposedly if you uninstall the game, you get an "installation token" back... only everyone who has tried it says you don't and the latest word from the Bioshock developers is that they will release a separate program for clearing the installation token off a machine, and that they will increase the installation allowance to 5 now.
Oh and for extra bonus annoying, all this invasive annoying anti-piracy bullshit comes on the Steam version too. Making the steam functionality reduantant to disabled. After all, steam is supposed to let you make backup copies and install games on which ever machine you are on, etc.
Nope, not with Bioshock, and have a rootkit while your at it.
Mega-bonus annoying: The root kit is even in the steam demo. Yes, they felt compelled to attach the Root Kit anti-theft bullshit to the FREE DEMO that you get through the built-in-anti-piracey Steam service.
What The Fuck?
I've installed and played that demo. I now have the fucking Sony (as in Sony was sued for having something like this on their music CDs) Root Kit Securom 7 crap on my machine because I played the demo through
steam.
Makes me want to buy an Xbox and switch to the MAC Os.
My Sources:
Daily Jump
Consumerist
Hylomorph
Rampant Games
Mr. Levine Respond's to Bioshock Protection Woes
Phanatic
Bull Shit:
2k Game's Forum
This sort of BS really seems
This sort of BS really seems to be a bad thing for the PC games market. If you were a conspiracy-minded individual, you could say that Microsoft wants people to switch to the 360, where they charge at least $10 more for Bioshock, plus getting the console itself, of course, which drives their sales in an effort to get an even deeper wedge into the console market (not to mention HDTV manufacturers). Then again, that mouse/keyboard combo you were telling me about would make the 360 a great option, especially now that they've released a new hardware revision that includes HDMI and more heat-efficient design. Now if only they had the option to install a custom OS like the PS3... If they did that, I'd do all my game playing on a console.
As to the demo, my guess is that the copy protection technology is so integrated with the game itself that it would've been more work to remove it from the demo than to just leave it in. That said, it's still a shitty thing to do. The only time a resident program other than the game should be running is something to prevent cheating in multiplayer games, which certainly does not need low-level access to work.
I may be covering stuff you've already looked up, but if Wikipedia is right, Securom 7 just installs a running process and some registry keys (a la iTunes, etc.). If so, using the method described here should work to get rid of Securom after you've finished with the demo. It's not all that different from the crap that iTunes or Adobe installs, aside from it checking your DVD drives to make sure you aren't copying the game or trying to run an illegit version. That, of course, doesn't excuse the use of this awful, intrusive crap, but it's not a rootkit.
As to MacOS, it's becoming a slightly more games-friendly option by using Intel chips and current graphics cards. With ID's Tech 5, they've even got a pretty elegant solution to engine design that would make porting future games (running on their engine) to consoles and PCs relatively easy, which could herald a new age of cross-platform gaming. Then again, there's nothing to stop companies from throwing copy protection tech on just about any platform, so Mac, Linux, even consoles could just as easily become as compromised by Securom and it's ilk.