Giving GTA IV PC a Pass

Why, why does it have DRM? I have played all the GTA (Grand Theft-Auto) games since GTA III (Vice City is, in my view, one of the best games ever created). I was looking forward to GTA IV on pc, but why must it be on DRM?

For those people who do not know what DRM is; it stands for ‘data rights management’. It’s a measure that games publishers use to prevent game piracy. The strategies are numerous; games with DRM require you to go onto the internet to activate the game (no internet, no play); games with DRM only allow you to have a number of installs (go beyond that and the game can’t be played).

I just think DRM is stupid. Here’s my experience with DRM. With no experience with DRM before, I bought the game Spore. Another highly-anticipated game, I found that I can’t play the game. It requires me to have an internet connection to activate. An internet connection to activate a game that is NOT online! The stupidity of that still amazed me and the thing was that my internet was down at that time. So I had to wait 3 days to play the game while the Starhub technician fixed my internet problem.

That is nothing to the real problem of Spore. Spore only allow 3 installs! So right now, Spore is in my pc and I can’t uninstall it because if I do, I can only install it another 2 times. Brilliant! A game that is taking up disk space on my pc and there’s nothing I can do about it. I can’t uninstall it even though I’m not playing it now, because of the stupid DRM.

So DRM not only make me wonder whether I can play the game I buy; it also makes sure I won’t be able to get rid of the game once I install it! Brilliant! So brilliant in fact, I think I will give GTA IV a pass.