Earlier today, we posted a story about Ubisoft’s Martin Edmonson defending “always on” DRM as a necessity. Just Cause developer Avalanche, however, seems to have the opposite opinion — arguing that developers need to stop moaning about piracy and look for solutions that offer consumers more incentives.
“If a DRM system constantly needs to be defended, something must be wrong,” founder Christofer Sundberg told Edge. “As a developer you will never win over any fans if you constantly let everyone know how much it costs to develop a game and how much money you lose.
“I don’t like always-on DRM solutions at all, since they offer nothing to the consumer. If you continuously give something extra for registering and being online, and award them for actually paying for and playing your game, it’d be different, but always-on DRM only says: ‘Thank you for buying our game, we trust you as far as we can throw you.”
Sundberg added that piracy will always be a problem, but developers need to accept it and work out ways of rewarding PC gamers for being part of the community, rather than forcing them to do so. Ultimately, he calls DRM a “threat” to the entertaining experience customers should be having, thus securing Avalanche another gold star to add to its mighty collection.
Avalanche: DRM helps no one [Edge]
