Since Paradox has so great support with patches im guess this will be the ultimate weapon against warez versions, since they sledom crack patches.
The problem is that the latest cracks don't crack the protected game.exe or patch files but disables the CD copyprotection all together. It doesn't matter how many patches are released, if a crack can mimic a Original CD 100% it will work with the patch from the second it's released.
I now that if I couldn´t play with 1.07b I would be really envious of those who could.
Well I own the game, didn't help me when I wanted to play the 1.06 or 1.07(a) versions. The adding of the copyprotection forced me to wait almost 2 weeks after it was ready and downloadable for the German version.
The problem is that the more effort put into copyprotections the bigger the challenge for the literally hundreds of people that really get a kick out of breaking these protections. The harder it is to breake the larger the honour for the guy that breakes it first.
Somewhere in the mist on this battlefield, software developers and paying customers alike are trying to lick their wounds and avoid the incoming artillery fire in war they didn't want any part in in the first place.
Currently we sadly have a loose loose situation where the copyprotection shrapnel is hitting the paying customers as much as any potential 'non paying' (nonworking games, late patches, etc...). Still the developers have to get paid for all the time and effort they've put into their software but have little or no means to prevent illegal copying.
The only thing the developers can hope for is that enough people consider their work worth paying for (excellent support of released games shure is a big + in my book ,-).
The only other way, as I see it, is to have a freely downloadable game that is only playable OnLine with a pay-per-minute policy (rates could be really low, like 1c/h, since it would have littel to no distribution & printing overhead).
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/ Stefan Huszics
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