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Spore DRM is no more (Unless you have a Mac) photo

While quite a few people thought it would never happen, EA made good on its word and has just released a de-authorization tool for Spore. While the five installation limit is still in place, the tool allows you to deauthorize one of your copies to free up one of your five slots.

Unfortunately, the tool is currently only available for PC, so all you hipsters running around with different color Macbooks for each day of the week are out of luck.

While it's nice to see that EA is slowly learning that DRM doesn't work, we can hope that eventually they will abandon install limits altogether. Although, considering how many copies of Spore were pirated, it's easy to see why companies and executives have a knee-jerk reaction to shove restrictions into all their games.

The tool is available now and can be downloaded from the offical Spore Web site.

[Via bit-tech]


Continue: More Spore stories





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24 comments | showing # 1 to 24

mix's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 18:04
mix
Who the fuck is Jonathan Ross?

Glad to see Ea is kind of listening.
jimmcq's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 18:19
jimmcq
"no more" is more than a little misleading. All this allows you to do is stop playing the gaming on that machine. If you re-launch Spore on the same machine, the game will attempt to re-authorize.

So, the DRM is in full affect while playing the game... this just allows you to authorize more than five machines total (but still not more than five can be authorized at a time)
pagancollective's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 18:21
pagancollective
Yeah the DRM is definitely still there. Title is waaaay misleading.
Fana7ic's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 18:29
Fana7ic
And the people of the Internets win once again.
Its not ideal but a step in the right direction.
So now its pretty much like iTunes accounts which I think can also be active on 5 computers and can be resettet.
Dexter345's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 18:34
Dexter345
I still assume that the install limits weren't what had people upset, but rather the single accounts per game.
CALkulon's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 18:53
CALkulon
But will they still put the limits on their new games? That's the real test.
Iron Dragon's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 18:58
Iron Dragon
This fixes nothing. There's still an install limit to begin with. Fuck you EA. Can't wait to pirate Burnout and Mirror's Edge because there's a 99% chance they'll do the same thing with those games.

I just hope Capcom stays with the disk check for Resident Evil 5 / Bionic Commando. I really want to buy both.
Spartan's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 19:12
Spartan
Wow! As was already pointed out several times the DRM is still there so the articles title should clearly be changed to something like "Spore's Authorization Revocation Tool Released!". So let's not spread false joygasms to all the boys and girls in gameland.
player66's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 19:21
player66
Kill Jonathan Ross!
Tactix's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 19:25
Tactix
Ah, now I know who Jonathan Ross is! You and that classy Black and White pic :P

Also, what EA did was not fix the problem, but give the gamers more work if they wanted to fix it. :P If I were a PC gamer, (which I'm not) I'd be pissed that now I have to download a "tool" to fix something that should have not been a problem in the first place! :(
Dao2-SKP's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 19:28
Dao2-SKP
Don't listen to the misleading title... Spore still has DRM, even getting rid of authorization entirely securom would still be there, not that this is anywhere close to being that good :|

fuck securom and fuck ea
Mozgus's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 19:42
Mozgus
Jonathan Ross fails at titles.
Grimhound's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 21:11
Grimhound
EA spy sappin' mah Destructoid?
hpv's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 21:56
hpv
Doesn't sound like the DRM is no more at all. In fact, it's exactly the opposite.
Bennyishere's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/18/2008 23:09
Bennyishere
"Although, considering how many copies of Spore were pirated, it's easy to see why companies and executives have a knee-jerk reaction to shove restrictions into all their games."

Yeah, because the insane pirating of Spore had NOTHING to do with its DRM! Spore was just the best game ever made! Dude, I win with sarcasm!
TehBoognish's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/19/2008 01:24
TehBoognish
This game sucked. It was nowhere near the game I was expecting with all the hype that preceded it.
Glad EA got so ripped off.

btw, I was wondering. Of course every person that pirated the game would not have bought it if they could not have acquired it for free. What percentage of pirated copies equal actual lost sales? I figure its around 15%.
Necros's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/19/2008 01:56
Necros
Coming from a Mac owner: If there is a person who owns more than two Macs (I'll allow for a Mac Pro and a MacBook), I will bitchslap them right out of their trendy clothes.
cartman08's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/19/2008 03:12
cartman08
I'm with hpv on this all they've done is allow you to deauthenticate one copy. You still have the drm there working in the background. This just seems like a publicity stunt in reaction to the amount of pirated copies. I see no change here.
Harkonnen's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/19/2008 04:19
Harkonnen
Hey Mr. Ross, is it Opposite Day up there yet?
Sgt Cheesecake's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/19/2008 09:29
Sgt Cheesecake
The DRM's still there, and this is too little too late. Their reputation has already been absolutely slaughtered because of this DRM and the fact that it took them this long to release a simple tool like this confuses me.
leahzero's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/19/2008 12:06
leahzero
"Although, considering how many copies of Spore were pirated, it's easy to see why companies and executives have a knee-jerk reaction to shove restrictions into all their games."

You're putting the cart before the horse.

Mass pirating of Spore didn't cause EA to slap draconian DRM on it.

The DRM caused the pirating.
Pixelated's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/19/2008 14:48
Pixelated
Now we need one of those tools for Mass Effect, EA you pricks. If they don't though it will have taught me a valuable lesson, to never buy another game from EA especially using their crappy online EA Download Manager. Boy did I get suckered into thinking they care about their customers.
cryocide's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/20/2008 08:45
cryocide
This doesn't do anything for the previous 3 installs between my old PC, or this PC after a couple of reformats. How about a way to reset the authorization count like iTunes offers?
waly666's Avatar - Comment posted on 12/21/2008 19:27
waly666
That game sucked anyway... Glad i didnīt buy it =P
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