Widescreen Gaming Forum

People on Reddit are reporting that Assassin's Creed II and Splinter Cell Conviction no longer require constant connectivity to play. I'm guessing Ubisoft feels the DRM has (or hasn't) served its short term purpose for those particular games, and isn't needed any more.

You still need to connect to their servers to launch the game and to install it. This isn't any better. As long as the illegal copy provides a better service to the gamer they will still lose out.

To install the game I don't find a big deal as you can look at all the digital content delivery services. However to launch it becomes a bit of a nuisance if someone is playing the game mobile (plane/bus/train) or out of any internet coverage.

At least they are dialing it down over time. I don't mind that approach quite as much, protect your assets based on their profit making ability (as time goes on likely profit goes down). Civ 4 for example removed all DRM when the complete collection was published, no CD-Key, CD Check, limited installs etc.

By dialing it back as well they may not be as likely to run into issues in 3, 4 or more years when they have a limited number of authentication servers running if any. Having constant connection DRM in a 5 year old game would make me look towards a way around it.

When I was told about this, it sounded like the DRM had been disabled completely; no need to be online at all... made me want to go buy AC2. Reading up in more detail proves that Ubisoft still have no interest in treating their customers in an appropriate manner, so still won't get my money. I guess I'll have to do without the supposed 'best' part of the AC series. Which is a pity, as I double-dipped on Assassins Creed (had PS3 version, got PC version when it got cheap) as I do prefer gaming on the PC.

Although i don't agree principal wise, i took the dip a while back in the sales, and i can't say it affected me at all.