Oh finally, someone willing to speak truth about that deformed, ugly looking elephant in the room everyone walks in, stares at and asks why the heck it's always looming over them like Michael Jackson at a Boy Scout campfire. CD Projekt RED's CEO, Marcin Iwinski, has come forward to drop a much-needed truth bomb on the whole ugly business of DRM.
Gamespot spotted the comments from an interview Iwinski – the man in charge of the company currently working on The Witcher 3 – had with the crew at GiantBomb, where the CEO spoke like someone who doesn't have their balls tied to an investor's profit margin manifesto, saying...
"It seems to me that the industry as a whole knows DRM doesn't work, but corporations still use it as a smokescreen, effectively covering their asses, pretending to protect their intellectual property in front of bosses, investors, and shareholders,""I've actually had quite a few discussions with high level executives who admit they know DRM doesn't work, but if they don't use it somebody might accuse them of not protecting their property. Whenever policy trumps common sense, the best interest of gamers is lost in the process,"
Heck yeah, that's how you get it done!
Now if only the other publishers would actually listen.
The thing is, my biggest gripe with DRM isn't the practice of using a means of security to protect intellectual property. I don't mind that at all, really. The thing is, the measures in which to protect the property have escalated from shrug-worthy (cd-key on the back of the case), to slightly cumbersome (finding words in manuals at specific pages on a certain line), to bothersome (connecting online to check the serial code), to downright annoying (Games For Windows Live).
The DRM measures have grown increasingly restrictive, even going as far as limiting the amount of times you can actually install a product (e.g., Securom). The whole thing has done nothing but deter legitimate gamers from buying the product while encouraging pirates and crackers to find new ways to break through the security measure, no matter how difficult.
The only DRM that wasn't cracked day-one (but they're still getting there) is the worst of the worst kind of DRM: always-on DRM. SimCity and Diablo III are two games that sacrificed brand reputation in an attempt to control piracy saturation, but the only thing it did was stop legit customers dead in their tracks from playing the product they paid for. That's not to mention all the heartache suffered at the hands of gamers not running a specific operating system.
Iwinski offers hope, though, stating that there is a bridge that can be made to shorten the gap between corporate profits and consumer engagement, saying...
"Will it be more pirated than if we put DRM on it? I definitely don't think so. Practically every single game's DRM is cracked on day 0 (or even before then), so that's not really an argument for using it," ..."With a DRM-free release, we're hoping to build more trust between us and gamers."
Well I sure hope this works out, especially with the DRM-free Witcher 3 coming up. It would be great to throw it in the faces of bigger publishers that treating customers with respect pays off. Hopefully gamers will do their part in revolting against a DRM-laden PC gaming society by supporting the DRM-free editions of games with great financial verve.
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