Our Favorite Anti-Piracy Tricks

[@ModernRogue]

You finally tracked down a bag of limited edition Fiery Ghost Scorpion Reaper flavored chips, but the bag just won't open by teeth or brute strength! Fear not, you’ve got a Utili-key on your key ring. This little device never leaves your side and you’re never without a screwdriver, straight and serrated blades, and bottle opener! Don’t have one? Good news: it’s the prize in our free giveaway this week. Just sign up at gimme.scamstuff.com and you could be one of FOUR winners to receive a Utili-key (no purchase necessary, giveaway ends 2/11/2021) Congrats to the winners of last week's Trinken Lid giveaway: Benjamin Fitzgerald and Dayton Henson (We will contact you via email within the next two weeks).

[@mrjoesefus7697]

Love your videos guys please keep it up ;)

[@hackerbot809]

I can't believe you missed the best anti-piracy measure of all time, ships with cannons

[@ehrichweiss]

So my favorite anti-piracy trick is on an application called "Mach3" that's used for some CNC controllers. I bought my CNC from China and they included a "free copy" of Mach3. While using it I kept noticing that my cuts would do fine and then all of a sudden my machine would veer waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay off from the cut path and ruin the cut(and sometimes the cutting tool in the process). The thing is, it'd act like it was working 100% when you entered the registration data, and it wouldn't do it on cuts that would last less than 10 minutes but if you had a cut that was 20+ minutes where you were prone to walking away to take a break, it'd find a super inconvenient moment and trash your work. Thankfully I didn't like the controller I had anyway(it required a real hardware parallel port, NOT a USB one, and it is hard AF to find a fast computer that has those ports) so I bought a controller that had a web interface and was also open source so I didn't have to run afoul of Mach3's measures. Another good anti-piracy measure wasn't on the PC or Mac but on the Silicon Graphics Inc.(SGI) workstations. Those were the computers that produced most of the CGI you saw from the 1980s to the early/mid 2000s. They tied the registration of the software to a hardware ID that was hard coded on your specific workstation. SGI software easily cost $10,000 to $250,000. Eventually someone figured out how to change what the software saw as the hardware ID but by that time SGI was dying as a company so it didn't really matter. Back in the really early days of the internet, I was a courier for several of the piracy groups. I didn't even want what they were cracking most of the time, I just happened to be good at finding sites that would be good hosts, and I could hide our warez with ease. Friends of mine would be like "hey, I'd really like a copy of " and in a couple days time I could have a copy and boost my rep with the piracy groups. Sometime after that I discovered open source software and stopped (purposefully) dealing with pirated goods altogether.

[@itsyourenotyour9101]

You guys should check out Spyro the dragon and the history with that and crackers. One of the best anti-piracy measures. Well, ahead of its time and I think took over a decade. I don't know if you're supposed to post links, but I remember a channel named Tech Rules had great coverage of it.

[@1218Draco]

Thanks for shouting out AC Black Flag 🏴‍☠️

[@Cissa479]

I feel so old when they say “ask your parents” because I always know what they’re talking about 😭

[@ModernRogue]

(us, too, if that helps!)

[@why2k87]

I just know all about it because I'm a huge nerd 🤓

[@boriskortiak320]

Whipper snappers. Yeah, I’m a boomer and you can get off my lawn!

[@DatBoiOrly]

Yeah i know it sucks :(

[@TheRealAlpha2]

I don't feel old, I feel bad for the little gremlins that don't know what they're talking about. Y'all wanna complain about load times on a PS4? try loading your game on a damn audio casset tape! (which, BTW, was the first time I discovered you could back up your games if you had a dual deck recorder.)

[@BaneWilliams]

The thing about the meta one, Game Dev Tycoon, is that it was also self reporting - people would go into the steam forums and complain about piracy taking a toll on the company to the point of making them bankrupt - to which of course everyone would say 'well why did you pirate the game in the first place?'

[@TroyHuch]

If I remember correctly pirates also asked to be able to develop or implement DRM to there virtual games so they would stop loosing money, seemingly unaware of the irony.

[@Jack93885]

I pirated the game and I just saw that as the end state of the game. I've since bought it but I really enjoyed playing that pirated version of game dev Tycoon. Lots of respect for the developers.

[@The_world_is_not_worthy_of_Him]

It's funny because that doesn't actually happen in real life. People who pirate almost never had any intention of buying in the first place, so they're not losing any money.

[@FunBoysGaming]

Man people are dumb

[@FunBoysGaming]

@@The_world_is_not_worthy_of_Him ofc people would rather play a game for free than to pay for it, given they have the option.

[@Metastropheblue]

In the sims 3 the game works until you send your sim to the toilet... Then the box that covers them up stays and starts getting bigger and bigger until it fills your whole screen

[@erwingifslang]

Same for the showers

[@pedroff_1]

They kept it on The Sims 4 as well

[@swirrllfolfsky9803]

That's cool

[@hoagieburger]

This isn't a method but there was a guy who pirated a LucasArts game that had a different title for the pirated version. When he went and interviewed for a job at LucasArts he told the interviewer that he loved the game and gave the pirated name. The interviewer told him about it being a pirated name, but he still got the job.

[@johnwallace2319]

And the man's name was George Lucas

[@IceMetalPunk]

Lmao, yeah, I feel like we in STEM completely understand why pirating is a thing and wouldn't reject a job applicant over it. At least, most of us.

[@joekerr9960]

My favorite "Anti-Piracy" method was for a game called Just Shapes & Beats, game pops up with a screen and an overexcited reader saying "Downloading pirated games is stealing" Then it just breaks off with laughter. After that, it's a recording of the dev saying, "Hey, I know you're pirating the game, but i'm not mad. I played pirated games when i was a kid, i guess this is karma. How about you just tell your friends you like the game, that would be about as helpful as buying the game"

[@joekerr9960]

Not those exact words, but close enough

[@dakotah2468]

This is the sort of thing I would do with the game I am making. Sometimes people just can't afford it but if they tell other people they love it there is a chance those people play and tell even more people. So even if I loose one sale I could potentially gain 100s from that one pirate spreading the word.

[@aidencoxmusicguy5097]

I pirated big rig over the road racing there wasn’t any anti piracy but I had to play big rig over the road racing so that was punishment enough

[@stevencowan37]

YOU'RE WINNER !

[@drpibisback7680]

@@stevencowan37 No one is winner when you're playing Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing.

[@pauldeddens5349]

God I havent heard of Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing in years. Please, never remind me again.

[@vetleallum2965]

@@pauldeddens5349 i just wanted to remind you of this game :)

[@pauldeddens5349]

@@vetleallum2965 God I havent heard of Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing in months. Please, never remind me again.

[@artyomswolf4040]

I am disappointed at the lack of "don't copy that floppy" and "you wouldn't download a car"

[@TheRealAlpha2]

Meanwhile people are totally downloading STL files and 3D printing cars now.

[@ladylilithparker]

Over on the Scam Nation channel, there's an older video with a Domain.com ad spot that's a parody of the "you wouldn't steal a car" anti-piracy ads. Brandt stars as the crazy hacker. It's awesome.

[@FunBoysGaming]

actually i totally would download a car

[@stevencowan37]

my favorite souvenir from DEFCON was a sticker that was in the same font and layout as "You wouldn't download a car" that replaced "car" with "bag of dicks"

[@epremier20050]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/a6XHnWCwZt2Hm9E Remind me that Brian himself personally sent me this during the premier xD

[@samuelg6552]

Steams anti-piracy measure is my favorite: make it easier to buy the game than to pirate it. I am not old enough to know anything pre-steam so that is my contribution.

[@leomadero562]

Well its still pretty easy to pirate steam games. (Not speaking from personal experience for liability purposes)

[@erwingifslang]

Research has been done on this and if a game is easier to get when purchased than too pirate people are way less likely to pirate it

[@TheTechDweller]

Just steam protection alone, it isn't really that much harder to pirate a game. Simple image disc and install and it works straight up. some games even spoof multiplayer though steam matchmaking. They don't really care

[@Hutchesonben]

MicroProse's F-19 Stealth Fighter had an interesting take on the "look up something from the manual". When you launched the game, you were asked to identify one or more airplanes from their silhouette, or the game would exit. The back of the manual had a "Common Military Aircraft" section with stats and pictures for each plane that you could check, but these were real-world planes. If you were a big enough aircraft nerd (and let's be honest, if you were buying a flight simulator in 1988, you were a big aircraft nerd), you could identify them without referring to the manual. It wasn't the most effective technique, but it was fun - almost like a mini-game. As a kid I didn't even comprehend that it was an anti-piracy measure.

[@Gambyt6676]

I worked at Blockbuster at the time of Metal Gear Solid. After the first weekend of the game being out, my store put photo copies of the back of the CD case in all the rental copies.

[@MrVampify]

Everytime you say "ask your parents" You make me feel old. Thanks guys.

[@ModernRogue]

We're in the same boat!! Promise!

[@mayomust]

theres also skullgirls, who literally just put the message “what is the square root of a fish? now im sad” on the screen after each fight. when people asked about it they self reported themselves

[@bracenyoung5231]

witcher 3 piracy punishment: all sex scenes are old wrinkly saggy women.. it’s one that scars you for life😂

[@mrsuperguy2073]

Nooo really? Do you have a link or something?

[@thewlf1226]

@@mrsuperguy2073 u want to be scarred for life?

[@mrsuperguy2073]

@@thewlf1226 kinda yeah lol

[@SlyerFox666]

Haha that's not anti piracy that's preparing you for life as you grow older 😂

[@tektrixter]

I'm sure that's *somebody's* kink...

[@Aegcul]

Honestly, i love that Game Dev Tycoon protection for one simple reason - it gives you a great opportunity to act smug AF. Let's imagine that you're active on some Game Dev Tycoon forum and someone comes with a question - "How do you get rid of these pirates? They ruined my income!" Now, you can just smile and say - "Yeah, pirates, they're really annoying, i agree." And just troll that guy.

[@MooseMoosely]

"shortly before Jason dissolved into a puddle of goo..." Is that what we're calling "turning 40" now?

[@MarvinCZ]

So, I guess this won't be about wrapping barbed wire around the railings and posting armed guards on the deck?

[@cdgonepotatoes4219]

nor mounting a 20mm cannon and fire hoses

[@mrjoesefus7697]

Yeah would’ve been a much more interesting video

[@micahphilson]

They didn't even once mention making extra fake cannons to make your ship look better defended. I'm unsubbing.

[@shawnlatour1825]

Mirror's Edge's anti-piracy is very interesting, they make the tutorial impossible along with all long gaps being impossible to cross

[@clintonleonard5187]

I pirated Mirror's Edge and played the whole game, so that must not have worked well XD.

[@fishermanreeltime7466]

@@clintonleonard5187 but it did now they know you're a pirate

[@clintonleonard5187]

@@fishermanreeltime7466 Hahaha. Man, my life has been hell since they found out I was a pirate! Oh wait - no it hasn't! I would yell from the rooftops that I'm a pirate, no one cares.

[@cagethelonewolf]

Cheat engine

[@wizarddd]

@@clintonleonard5187 the reason why it didn't work is because the patches against piracy only stopped it for a very small amount of time, no one really cares who pirates since the morals of it aren't that bad unless you're making money from it and its such a minor and easy to do crime so it's not enforced against at all (the only main protection against piracy has been them shutting down the websites, which is why now most of them are hosted in russia so they can't get them shut down, and sending you a letter in the mail if you torrent pirated stuff and are on specific isp's + are not using a vpn

[@pow3rstrik3]

To be fair game dev tycoon also had a lot of self reporting. A lot of people asking how to prevent piracy in your company.

[@hakonstangebergsli9426]

I came here for this

[@NathanaelKeller]

The one from game dev tyconn is still my alltime favorite. It lets you play and then destroys your work with pure Karma.

[@wobblysauce]

Oh wow, you didn't even flip the script and talk about the anti-pirate measures that made it terrible for some one that actually paid for the content... some even used the cracks to play it normally.

[@AMTunLimited]

Before I watch the video, here's my three favorite: 1) Michael Jackson: The Experience for DS - This one is dead simple: if it detected a pirated copy, it would blare vuvuzelas over the music. Non-stop. Simple, but effective. 2) Cross Days - erotic visual novel - This one was kinda weird in that (as far as I'm aware) this wasn't created by the publishers. IT was, in fact, a virus that was dressed up to look like an installer for the game and put up on pirating websites. If you installed it, it would post your name and a ton of personal information to an anonymous blog run by a shell corporation. What I enjoy about it is that all of this was laid out in detail...in the terms of service of the installer. 3) MOTHER 2/EarthBound This is, by far, my absolute favorite. There were a couple of layers of protection that did things like make sure you weren't in a PAL region and such. They also checked if the "cartridge" had more than 8k of sram (the part that held saved games) which most pirated carts did to make them compatible with the most games. If that was tripped, then a nag screen would show up that you couldn't get past. A nag screen that was curiously easy to fix for people copying the game...and that's where the real fun began If you fixed the nag screen, but didn't fix the check that made the nag screen happen (a *much* more significant challenge) the game would run as normal...just with an INSANE amount of enemies spawned. But it's still playable. There's also a few more mysterious checks that apparently no one knows what they really *do*. But that's it. No nags, no warning, no indication of any kind, just ramping up the difficulty to 11, until the very end. Making it to the end is DAMN NEAR impossible, but not completely. If you do manage to get to the end of the game, right before the climax of the story (when pokey turns off the machine, if you've played the game), the game freezes up, going completely unresponsive. When you restart the game... All of the save files are gone. Edit: I have no ragrets

[@purelogarithm]

They mentioned number 3 in the video

[@shrimpboom8]

Number two I vaguely remembered from another video on (real) antipiracy measures. Thank you for pointing it out.

[@mohaa556]

One of the more memorable ones for me are the ARMA games (military simulator FPS) where if the game detected that you play a pirated copy your soldier randomly turned into a seagull in the middle of the mission.

[@bloodlove93]

that sounds oddly useful for what little i know about arma games...just fly to where you need to be.....um..unless you never turn back to human that is...

[@mohaa556]

@@bloodlove93I'm pretty sure the only way to turn back was a full game restart, but even then you would just turn into a seagull again. And considering how long missions can get in arma games it was very unlikely you would finish a mission before it happens.

[@CeatcodeDelta32]

Spyro 3 has a "degrade the game experience over time" anti-piracy system. Eventually a character just flat out tells you "Sorry, you pirated this so you can't progress further" and I might be mistaken but I think it then wipes all your save files soon after that.

[@ETG168]

IIRC it slowly removes your progress as you play, and at one point one of the characters says that you are playing a pirated copy. At the end (if you make it there) it just freezes and deletes your save file

[@alphaking96]

"you got a floppy disk... (ask your history teacher)".. i laughed at that... so when i started at a job and was being trined on the pc program they used... the person showing me said "alright so to save progress just click the little floppy disk" i looked at him and said "careful you might start showing your age"... he responded "if you really want me to show my age i remember when floppy disk were actually floppy"

[@leomadero562]

I am taking a class on "computer essentials" where we learn about the floppy disk as external memory and use microsoft word. It really isn't supposed to be a history class, it was supposed to be a class about modern computers and how to work them efficiently nowadays

[@alphaking96]

@@leomadero562 lol.. Im curious if they have aname on the syllabus for that section...

[@leomadero562]

@@alphaking96 i don't think so, that sounds too useful. We are literally doing a typing test and "learning" how to navigate and make folders (i am a senior in high school)

[@alphaking96]

hehehe

[@ashlyy1341]

@@leomadero562 tbf there seems to be a lot of pushback against learning to type (back when i was in school it as bc the teachers were moderately sexist and saw typing skills as "receptionist work for women"), and ik there's a lot of younger people who don't know how folders work just bc search tools (esp on mobile) have become so powerful

[@JudithOpdebeeck]

Murphy faked his own death and is now living in the woods, off the grid

[@SignalJones]

I wish that was me

[@thewackerly]

With a binder full of CDs labeled with a sharpie

[@soeveth]

I love the Game Dev Tycoon one, and if I remember right it was actually the games devs that put out the "pirated" game on bittorrent the day before or same day as the release date. I loved that idea so much I went and bought a copy of the game just to support the devs.

[@Chronosv2]

This was exactly it. They uploaded a torrent of their own game, and that's how they caught people. It was fantastic and as a hobbyist developer I laughed so dang hard.

[@LucynGoosey]

If you pirate "MIrror's Edge", a parkour game, the protagonist has a fear of heights and you can't make the first jump to start the game.

[@stormlewis5214]

😂. I'm so happy I was too worried to pirate games

[@SSand4]

Brian: "Shortly before Jason dissolved into a puddle of goo..." Me: _sigh_ What did they do n-....? Disclaimer: "*Jason Murphy is alive and well*" Me: Oh good, it's just Brian doing a bit for the ad. Given the number of things they've willingly done to each other on this show, I would legit not be at all surprised to *actually* have one of them spontaneously melt into a puddle of goo one of these days.

[@wraith1371]

Haven't seen it mentioned but the original Spyro games would start to randomly take away eggs that you had already collected which you need to progress through the game. If I remember correctly they also used to mess with the balloons so they would take you to random worlds instead of the one you selected. Same thing happened with the level portals as well. It's one of those that is great because it would just slowly drive you insane well still allowing you to experience enough of the game you might end up actually buying at.

[@IAMFRS]

What is more, pirated copy of PAL version (for european market) would switch between languages during the game making it anoying to anyone who couldn’t speak german, french, italian or spanish.

[@WarpedFlayme]

It would also mess with your health. Tech Rules did a great video talking about it and showcasing their attempt to actually play the game with the anti-piracy activated: kzbin.info/www/bejne/ani8hJiOgddoqbs

[@PersonOfRandomnesss]

"Jason Murphy is alive and well" I don't think living as a puddle can be described as living well. Sounds awful. Especially if he had to live as a puddle after his soul split in half.

[@ngaudio9143]

Heres a thing about Metal Gear Solid I dont think you guys know. For you to get the code to talk to Meryl you had to have an original ps1 mgs case (the 5x5 case). Further into production around when ps2 got popular any ps1 game that was still produce went into the current style cases. Problem with that is that with the new case came a new cover design. Meryls code was not on the new case

[@TheRealAlpha2]

Yeah... but by then Gamefaqs was a thing.

[@ngaudio9143]

@@TheRealAlpha2 not everyone used internet because it was still a fairly new thing, and in all honesty it kind of ruins that portion of the game even if you have to look it up

[@TheRealAlpha2]

@@ngaudio9143 I dunno gamefaqs was pretty big by the time the PS2 arrived... Oh, and the gaming magazines we're still going strong too! So even if you didn't use the Internet regularly there were resources. Heck I remember one of the magazines specifically showing game endings on the last few pages! Like who thought that was a good idea?!😡

[@a1goldenrunner]

I have that one

[@ghostking6838]

@@TheRealAlpha2 maybe so, but in the uk, only middle to upper class had access to the internet, it wasnt till the ps3 that my home had a ethernet connection

[@Christopher_Wheeler]

I remembering needing to read the manual for the Elder Scrolls: Arena in order to get out of the first dungeon.

[@AlexJonesGaming]

You can get out of it without the manual you'll just be wandering for a long ass time though but I recommend you wander for a long ass time because there's some awesome loot and a lot of gold by the time I left the dungeon on my last playthrough I had 3,000 gold and was Lvl 6

[@jjj6245]

Just a heads-up for Jason, if you ever play Nier: Automata, the game really means it when it asks you if you'll let it delete your save to help other players. And that's not even anti-piracy.

[@drachenpanzer5622]

How would deleting your save help other players?

[@micahphilson]

@@drachenpanzer5622 I'm super confused too, is that a game mechanic?

[@jjj6245]

If you choose to delete your save when prompted the game will create a ship with your name that will occasionally be recruited to autonomously help other players in a bullet hell part of the true ending.

[@drachenpanzer5622]

@@jjj6245 oh shit that's actually pretty cool

[@micahphilson]

@@jjj6245 Neat! So like the ghosts in Dark Souls 3, but you're not actually there to help them, you had to sacrifice to make it.

[@FondlesHandles]

Not a piracy thing, but I remember when games actually had the little booklets that showed you how to play the game and other neat things you can find in the game. Nowadays, all that's left in the game cases is those little plastic tabs that used to hold the booklets...

[@violet-beck]

my old Halo 2 booklet was my favorite :( I miss those so much!!

[@1FatLittleMonkey]

Little booklet? I remember detailed game manuals, sometimes including a whole novella back-story, plus wall posters and printed maps in the box. In the basic edition.

[@tomharner83]

"...in the basic edition." Ah, good times.

[@ConnorNolanTech]

Can verify, rented metal gear from blockbuster. I thought I was screwed, but then I noticed that the absolute legends working at my local blockbuster had a full color scan of the back of the case included inside the rental case. Not sure if that came down from corporate, or if my local crew was just that good.

[@LordSusaga]

One of the specifically brilliant parts of the Game Dev Tycoon anti-piracy method is how it seemed like a regular part of the game, so a lot of the pirates went around asking how to deal with it. When a pirate is asking how to add DRM to a game, you know you've won.

[@larsscholz3762]

The Settlers III (Die Siedler 3 here in Germany) had a physical "marker" on the CD that could not be copied (so they thought :-)). If the game did not find this marker on the CD your iron forges would produce pigs instead of iron ingots so you could not progress in the corresponding tech tree. The problem was, that this marker was so sophisticated, that on some drives even the original CD was not detected correctly. The support hotline for the game went hot with all the legit customers who thought they found a bug... :-)

[@shadowpresident4203]

According to the US Justice Department, Razor 1911 is the oldest software cracking group that is still active on the internet. And with an endorsement like that, you CAN'T go wrong!

[@dragon1130]

I would love to point out all my favorite anti-piracy methods, but, you guys pointed out all of the best ones I've seen. Oh oh, I just remembered. The NES game Startropics came with a note from the main characters uncle/grandpa/whoever and at some point you had to dip the note in water to get coordinates to put into the submarine so you could progress to the next area. In the digital version of the game (released some 20 years later) Nintendo had forgotten to include a way around this and a lot of fans were, of course, angry. Nintendo patched the game's virtual manual to include the note and a button to reveal the code.

[@Wartooth91]

"Star Tropics" on the NES had a letter in the box from the main character's father that says NOT TO OPEN UNTIL THE END OF THE GAME in which there is a password in the letter you have to enter to complete the game.

[@TheMegazonyx]

There is a game where a developer speaks to you about the anti piracy, and says its ok, because he did also pirate it, so he understood... Sadly I forgot the name... So yeah... Edit: Just shapes and beats is what its called

[@zoew.468]

Was it Just Shapes And Beats? I'm pretty sure that game does exactly that.

[@TheMegazonyx]

@@zoew.468 THANK YOU!

[@zoew.468]

@@TheMegazonyx you're welcome!

[@Beateau]

The Sierra anti-piracy was the bane of my childhood when it came to trying to play the Dagger of Amon Ra. We couldn't find the stupid book anywhere, and then we would find it, put it somewhere and then lose it before reinstalling the game to try again. Finally the stars aligned and I got past the check. Played most of the game, but then it would crash right before the final act, every time.

[@manpreetmatharoo6602]

Crysis Warhead: Your guns shoot chickens.

[@reaganharder1480]

That sounds like a game i'd want to pirate specifically for the anti-piracy measures...

[@micahphilson]

That's... just a feature!

[@aaronclark204]

My favorite part about Game Developer Tycoon is that the game didn't detect it was a pirated version, the developers of the game actually released their own 'cracked' copy of the game on the torrent sites right around the actual game coming out. So anyone who was looking for a free copy of the game got the special one, which slowly increased the losses due to piracy until your company went bankrupt from it. Then anyone who complained about the game being unplayable outed themselves as having a pirated copy.

[@jassie138]

Here's my best anti piracy measure: Bring back the demo's. Seriously. And make them good demo's. Like allow people to play freely for 2 hours. 90% of people who pirate(d), my younger self included, did so because they had no money and had to be SURE they liked the game before dropping 50 or 60 bucks on it. Adding a good "try before you buy" type demo system would genuinely stop a lot of piracy.

[@luccasummers4317]

Fallout 2's anti piracy measure will allow you to start the game like normal. However, as you go on, the game will throw progressively large swarms of aliens at you until it is quite literally impossible to beat the game.

[@Thearmorer89]

I have always laughed at the chickens in Crysis, just all the guns firing harmless chickens at everyone. So basically just CHICKENS EVERYWHERE!

[@GizmosGameLounge]

Star tropics had a letter that would reveal a code needed to continue the game. You had to put it in water to reveal it. That’s my favorite

[@byanymemesnecessary8848]

i would like to argue in favor of piracy, esspecilly when it comes to media preservation. Because often times there are older movies and games that cant be bought anywhere or are not availible on a streaming service and the only way to watch/play them is to already own a physical copy. If there is a pirated version available then it can continue to be enjoyed. and the company isn'tn loosing money because they didn't have thier media availible for purchase in the first place. Sure there's stores like Vintage Stock where you can by them used, but the origonal creaters dont profit from that, the store does.

[@NorokVokun]

yeah. agreed. and as nowadays free demos arent really a thing anymore, i honestly pirate any singleplayer game, play it for about 10% of the reported playtime (6 hrs for a game that is repored to have 60hrs of gameplay etc), delete it and then think about it and decide if i enjoyed it enough to spend the money or if i should move on. I can't afford to outright buy a game i don't know if i'll enjoy it after the refund timeframe is up. so far i bought 90% of the games and repirated 0% of those games i did not decide to buy.

[@chocolatehaxc4141]

Not just an anti-piracy trick, but also an anti-unauthorized production trick was built into a console itself, the Gameboy, the Nintendo logo that you see when booting it up needed to be in the game cartridge for the system to boot up, and so Nintendo could hit anyone who made a game, pirated or otherwise, without their permission with a trademark suit.

[@wackychair]

Correct me if I’m wrong, I think you can actually beat psycho mantis without changing controller ports. After a few failed attempts, you will get a call in which they assume you can’t switch ports for some reason. They then tell you to shoot the statues heads to disable his powers.

[@YungCuzz]

Spyro Year of the Dragon on the Playstation 1 has one of my favorite measures. The game functions normally until you finish the first world and get to a hot air balloon that takes you to the second, at which point the game's fairy companion appears and tells you "You might be playing a pirated copy of this game", and that weird things will start happening. From then on, the game becomes almost unplayable and unstable, with all sorts of bugs, completely random crashes, suddenly reverting level progress with no rhyme or reason, and game elements necessary for finishing the game completely disappearing. The best part is that although EXTREMELY frustrating and time consuming, it IS possible to make it to the end of the game, but after beating the final boss (or before, since you don't really "defeat" them), the game will crash again and totally wipe your save.

[@FappinSteve]

3:18 Jason has a binder full of *_sharpies_*_ written on CDs?_ Astounding.

[@mytube001]

"Sharpies-written-on CDs"... ;)

[@DeviantOllam]

I'm sure loads of people are saying the same thing: the laser error jiggle encoded into original PlayStation discs was very cool, and also resulted in really neat hacky workarounds. Alec from Technology Connections did a wonderful video on this. 💿👍📀

[@Xcess91]

Huh, never thought about Meryl's codec like that, neat.

[@a1goldenrunner]

I have a copy as part of a collection and it has nothing on the back of the box. Sad times

[@laminatedsamurai]

I had a genuine copy of the game I played, and gave up for months before finally getting frustrated and ready to trade the game in. Took the guy at the desk of EB Games to tell me about the back of the ACTUAL CD CASE before I got rid of it. Went back home and then completed an epic gaming session(tm) and burned through the entire game in one go.

[@timmydirtyrat6015]

@@a1goldenrunner If I remember correctly when it says "on the back of the box" it means one of the photos that has the codec frequency on it. I honestly felt proud of myself for getting that one on my first play through.

[@zeke7515]

Spyro Year of the Dragon had some incredible anti-piracy measures. From randomly changing the games language, telling you straight up you may have in illegal copy, and randomly losing progress through the play session.

[@lucusloc]

My favorite anti-piracy measure is to not be a dick people want to steal from simply on principle. Make a good product, sell it for a reasonable price and don't screw your customers after the sale with "add-ons", "Micro-transactions", "required DLC" and other shit tricks. Sure, there will always be people who are willing to steal content. You cannot fix that, all you can do is frustrate your paying customers with ever more onerous barriers to the content they want. How many times has anti-piracy measures *encouraged* people to pirate because the pirates did not have to deal with all the anti-piracy garbage? Single player games that *require* internet connections? Come on, I got that content to play when my internet was out for crying out loud. Why would I pay for that when the "free version" lets me play on an airplane? And that is on top of what amounts to price gouging today (for both games and movies!). Half these content providers think their games are worth over a hundred dollars for the base game and all the "optional content". And heaven help you if it is a multiplayer game, because you and your friends will need the exact same DLC map packs if you want to *allowed* to play together, despite owning the exact same base game. And movies? Yeah, I am not paying theater prices for a one day streaming pass. "But multiple people can watch it on the same pass!", well good for them, what if I am watching it alone dofus? Do I *have* to drag other people in to watch content with me just to get a proper value out of this transaction? Thanks, I'll just check and see if Pirate Bay has it yet. News flash all you "big league" studios, your content simply is not worth that much, especially when compared against the plethora of other great content out there (some of it *intentionally* free!). But if you, at worst, implement some basic, *non-intrusive* anti-piracy measures, sell your content for a decent price, and have a good reputation for not screwing over your customers after the fact, then you should wind up with enough of your customers wanting to support you that you can keep raking in cash. I know I am willing to support good studios producing reasonably priced content with no garbage attached. Good will goes a long way. That is a lesson I think most major studios have forgotten.

[@GamingWO-]

If it isn’t worth it, don’t play it.

[@lucusloc]

@@dylanzrim3635 Maybe you should check out such gems as Dwarf Fortress and Minecraft. Those were games that were essentially released for free on a tip basis. Even now DF is still free to download and play, and while MC is now a fully paid game it has virtually no anti-piracy features yet still rakes in cash like a mint. You can absolutely build a game with little to no anti-piracy and fund it largely off the good will of your player base. Well, ok, the main AAA studios have probably burned that bridge, they have approximately zero goodwill left and they could give away their next ten games and still not see it fully rebuilt, but considering how many times they have screwed over their own users I would not be at all sad to see them crumble, their management teams -go to the poor house- retire to their mansions and the developers actually passionate about gaming go on to found better studios that actually care about the content of their work instead of maximizing their profit to squeeze every last penny out of their player base. Pretty much every AAA studio is due a reckoning, and by my math it cannot come soon enough. There are far too many small studios producing high quality content for us to waste our time with studios who treat customers like garbage, but get away with it because they hold the rights to a beloved franchise. We need to learn to cut ties and spend our money on studios who are worth it, even if it means we do not get to play "dead horse franchise #26".

[@MansMan42069]

Says the pretentious douche atop his high horse.

[@lucusloc]

@@MansMan42069 Sorry, I was unaware that "don't be a dick to your customers" was a high-horse position.

[@MansMan42069]

@@lucusloc Wrong. It's being on a high horse when you *also* support piracy in the same breath. You can rant about Big Vidya all you want but your words amount to nothing but platitudes.

[@SgtLion]

Thank you! For showing the conclusion of that multi-million dollar investigation into the effects of piracy that said the inescapable conclusion is that piracy was actually GOOD for the industry. There's even indications of a _causal_ link between a game being pirated more and being bought more.

[@skepticallypwnd]

Well, I'm glad someone noticed. Our upload was actually delayed an hour because I fell down a 'rabbit hole' investigating this concept, and tracking down a copy of the article. - Modern Rogue Editing Supervisor

[@Spideryote]

The best anti piracy trick is to make a game actually worth paying for these days

[@dtllmpn]

I remember seeing a top anti-piracy list that had the top one being the game playing a video message from the developer. He does a "I'm not mad, just disappointed." thing, and then asks you to leave good reviews and share about the game.

[@dougdennis3681]

Just Shapes And Beats.

[@boriskortiak320]

Dongles Marking a specific sector on the floppy as a bad sector so it wouldn’t copy. That spot held information to confirm a legit copy.

[@lucusloc]

Got around pretty easy with bitwise copy instead of sector copy. A similar principle worked for CD copy protection too. I had a number of programs that did bitwise copy (there are a number of legitimate reasons to do them). All you had to know what that this was a thing and all those "on disk" protections were useless. Dongles were harder, but even those could be copied (especially if they were just simple mass storage devices with "hidden" files on them). You could go so far as to implement true encrypted key dongles, but then you would have to pair the software with every key. The logistics and cost of that are probably not worth the added protection.

[@boriskortiak320]

@@lucusloc yep, but not everyone could write or knew about bitwise copy algorithms. I often ran into dongles on more expensive, smaller market software where the cost of matching was worth it.

[@lucusloc]

@@boriskortiak320 Yes, low volume high value software often uses individually customized dongles. Often times the dongles are customized by hand when installed by a technician from the company that made it (as me how I know). That is, of course, and entirely different type of game than consumer software. What works for them will not work for games and media.

[@WhereWhatHuh]

Worked with a couple of phone systems that needed a dongle on serial port that was actually connected to a live PC. Disconnect the Serial data and you couldn't enter programming modes. NEAX 2400 ICS...

[@lucusloc]

@@hanelyp1 I mean, we have basically had that technology since the beginning. A lot of the older dongles used asymmetric key pairs to authenticate with the software, similar to how TLS works over the wire. The issue always is how do you pair that up 1-to-1 with a single software license. Automatic sync is no more difficult to crack than license keys or other anti-piracy measures, and manual sync requires a lot of manpower from the company implementing it. And yes, there is always the issues of software cracking, with with memory editing or straight up replacing the authentication binaries. The only real way around that is to constantly update the software with stuff the customer actually wants. This is kinda why I said shooting for as close to 100% effective anti-piracy measures is futile and hurts your customers more than it gives you any benefit. (check my other comments on this video).

[@JackArcherX]

I know of quite a lot of these, but here are a few favourites: - The Michael Jackson Experience on NDS: It allows you to start the game and play half of a song, after which point the entire OST is replaced with vuvuzelas, then the game overwrites your save file so you can't escape the vuvuzelas. - Spyro 3 Year of the Dragon: Throughout the entire game, every single time you tried to save the game, it'd remind you that you're a horrible person for pirating the game and will warn you to stop playing. As you keep going, the game will randomly take mechanics away from you, like your flame breath or gliding. If you get to the final boss, the second you enter the arena, the game throws you back to the beginning of the game and corrupts your save file. - Cross Days: The game itself already had very questionable content, being an erotic story involving underage characters, however, if you tried to pirate it, the installer would collect your information while getting the game ready, then it would ask you to fill in a few polls for "Improved user experience". When you launched the game, however, it'd lock itself on an error screen, screencap your desktop and upload all of the info it collected about you AND the cap of your desktop to a public forum. The only way to get your info taken down from there would be by registering to the forum and making a public apology on the thread, basically outing yourself for the whole thing.

[@ConaRikan2]

so, a twist on the 'self reporting' technique, there was a game that actually locked not only the game itself, but a lot of the player's computer. In order to unlock it, the player had to post on a very public forum "I am , and I pirated . Email address is " for the developers to send the unlock code. The twist, though, is the game in question was an Adult Only game. In essence, you had to admit, to the whole world, that you were a thief and a pervert to get your computer back. Yes, people posted. No, I don't remember the name of the game. I think it was Japanese or Korean, not sure.

[@IceMetalPunk]

I mean... I feel like that would be illegal on the dev's behalf, no?

[@ConaRikan2]

@@IceMetalPunk All depends on the laws in that country.

[@DanielAKA]

I'm glad you mentioned the one about Metal Gear. Me and my friend were playing through it one day and got stuck on that exact situation. We went back and forth around the map trying to find another CD case that we might have missed before I eventually went online and tried to find a walkthrough. A total of 30 minutes since we began and I go back into the room and the conversation is like "Dude, the frequency is on the back of the CD case." "I know! We've been looking for that." "No, you don't understand. It's on the Back. Of. The. CD. Case." And then I showed him the case. I think went for the alcohol at that point. Ah memories :D

[@kylemozisek4885]

Metal gear solid twin snakes. It blew my mind when I found out about the frequency on the case

[@marcoadda48]

It was the first MGS in particular, Twin Snakes as you know is its remake

[@Dimencia]

Can we all take a moment to appreciate how Jason thinks "batman flapping his cape" looks like a seagull

[@ShamrockUSA]

I have an "unofficial" version of beamng drive and the loading screen shows a pirate in a little boat full of gold rowing away from a big 1800's sail boat. I love that they can just tell that you didn't pay for it.

[@ShoxieRaccoon]

its not exactly anti-piracy, but more of an adjacent thing... but iirc titanfall had a system where it would put hackers and pirates into blacklisted lobbies... so instead of being banned outright for hacking, you would be forced to play with all the other aimbots

[@GamingWO-]

Most online shooters have a similar thing, it’s not /just/ Titanfall

[@ShoxieRaccoon]

@@GamingWO- lol idk what shooters you're playing then, since titanfalls the only one i've ever heard of doing that... unless you're talking about SBMM systems that tend to throw all the hackers into high skill lobbies since their K/Ds and SPM is so high do to cheating, but if so thats more of a side effect than the devs intentionally putting it in

[@stevencowan37]

@@ShoxieRaccoon They might also be thinking of a fighting game (I *think* it might be Marvel vs Capcom 3 but I'm not positive) whose matchmaking system accounted for ragequits and put people who consistently ragequit into matches with others who would disconnect before quitting to avoid the loss.

[@lukebortot7625]

@@GamingWO- you should see a non-prime queue wingman game is CS:GO, not an honest player in sight

[@GamingWO-]

@@ShoxieRaccoon titanfall and cod, two major ones. CSGO outright bans you if they find out

[@septegram]

A friend of mine worked for a development company back in the 1990s. I don't remember what they made, but it was designed to notify them if someone tried to decompile the code. A rival company tried to be clever; they set up a fake company to buy a copy and everything. Then started decompiling the code on a computer that was *connected *to *the *Internet, so it reported back "hey, someone's trying to decompile me!" So my friend and her colleagues were sitting there watching the process while on the phone with their lawyers. It didn't turn out well for the pirates.

[@azraphon]

There are two types of video gamers: those who admit they've pirated a game, and liars.

[@Xomsabre]

Facts

[@parkerwhitman996]

I never did but I sure as hell tried as a kid Rip family computer

[@Crazyclay78YT]

last year, when i was 13, i pirated several games. i dont have a way of getting money, or spending it online for that matter, and if i really wanted to buy something, i had to give my parents cash and they would keep saying are you sure you want to buy this, is it was so much easier to pirate them, however I am semi-smarter than normal 13 year olds. i downloaded the torrents on a virtual machine, so if I *did* get a virus (never did) it wouldnt mess up my host computer.

[@BasedPeter]

The fun thing about Eastern Europe is that when you guys had these things in the 90's over in the US, we still had them readily enough in the early 2000's that I can relate to this experience.

[@SarahGreyWolf]

Command and Conquer Red Alert 2, when you entered a skirmish or multiplayer game, a minute after starting, all your base would just explode instant game over

[@MaoMaster69]

I like the anti-piracy measure from Just Shapes and Beats. Basically, all that happens is that the dev talks to you. He says stuff like, "I remember when I was a kid, I didn't have any money to support my favorite developer. So I just want to say, if you cannot support the game devs with money, you can support them with words." What I like about this is that it realizes that everyone and anyone has pirated before, so making some malicious anti-piracy measure is not only blasphemous, but also hypocritical, and I like that the dev recognizes this. That kind of non-alienating attitude is something that I'd go out of my way to support.

[@Shadowgaming105]

The parkour game Mirror's Edge slows your movement speed just enough so you can't make a jump at the start of the game

[@necrobynerton7384]

... i think it actually slows it almost completely so you cant even move and when you arrive at the ledge you just drop down

[@brianmiller6340]

I remember back in the mid-late 80s, my dad had C64 disks that he had mimeographed copies of the manual for the game, just so we could answer the question that would pop up during game play.

[@danielr3310]

I stopped burying treasure in my back yard and marking it with a big 'X' - no pirates ever since 👍

[@gooster8265]

The original Spyro had some pretty insane anti-piracy, basically slowly corrupting your game and possibly deleting your save. It would randomly delete rescued dragons, send you to the wrong world, or just straight up crash, along with a bunch of other things.

[@OfficialChinoLoks]

Every hispanic that goes to “La pulga” has experience piracy.

[@klikkolee]

Every time anti-piracy comes up, I'm always thinking about people triggering it even though they have a legitimate copy. "You got this error? You're a pirate! No need for me to double-check anything!" Most anti-piracy detection is built on a house of cards. It's a miracle that it's still practical.

[@Nightmaredeathdealer]

This should be a podcast

[@Mr._Maniac]

This is probably my favorite trick of all time because of how funny it is. While the actual game of "Enter the Gungeon" doesn't actually have any anti piracy measures, however the open source project "Mod the Gungeon" does. If using the mod on a pirated version of the game, the very first level dumps you into a room with a bunch of Lord of the Jammed enemies, and nothing to defend yourself with. If you managed to survive and make it to the boss room, you'll be stuck with a glitchy version of The Beholster boss. When you inevitably die from it, the game will crash seconds later. Along with crashing the game, you'll end up finding 2 tabs opened on your web browser of choice. The first being the Steam page for Enter the Gungeon. For you to actually buy the game rather than stealing it. The other is a KZbin video. I'll just post the link here for you to witness. (Hopefully is this is talked about in a future vid talking about anti piracy, I simply ask to wait to click the link before filming the episode.) kzbin.info/www/bejne/n2nNppJnZbOefbs

[@WhereWhatHuh]

Hey, did anyone have this Modern Rogue video freeze in the middle with a message that said, "Error Code CAPTAINMORGAN-ModernRogue?" 'Cause I bought this video in a store, honest...

[@AsrielDreemurrPlays]

my favorite anti-piracy system was the one used in the original Spyro trilogy. if the game detected that it was pirated the game would play like normal until the second world (if I remember correctly) and then the fairy (I forgot her name) would say "I'm sorry spyro, this appears to be a pirated version of the game. if you continue to play while it's in this state there will be unexpected behaviors" (or something along those lines) then after that point models will start getting warpped, the music will freak out. enemies will change their behavior dramatically making them harder. Though theoretically you can finish the game in that state, you'd need to be a world record speed runner because at some point the game will just Alt-F4 Shift-delete itself

[@whynotll83]

Can't believe Jason melted into a puddle. F

[@azureumbra]

In 1992 (in the UK if I remember correctly), a cable company ran an ad for a free t-shirt with a number to call to claim it. However, the ad was scrambled so that only pirate cable boxes could see it. The phone number actually dialed their company headquarters, and then they dispatched the police. No word if they brought the T-shirt with them.

[@null_subject]

One important note: None of the drms mentioned in this video actually work. You can pirate Alan Wake and you won't have an eyepatch, same with the scorpion from Serious Sam 3. These "features" are more akin to easter eggs as they do not prevent anything-although sometimes they actually become a pain in the ass for the legitimate customers. [EDIT] Lots of misinformation in this one. Beating Psycho Mantis DOES NOT require changing controller ports: this is patently false.

[@clintonleonard5187]

This. It's all for media attention, it doesn't actually stop piracy, lol. I pirated most of these games.

[@StraussMax]

Also: pirating is absolutely ethical, period.

[@Jawack]

@@StraussMax Because it's not stealing but copying? You know that's a bullshit argument right?

[@KaisarVA]

It's not that they don't work so much as, like every other form of DRM before it, people have found ways to circumvent them. They're more of an obstacle to make pirating a little more difficult rather than an outright preventative measure. No matter what you do, people will find a way to get around these systems because pirates are really dedicated, so it's really just a small game of cat and mouse between devs and the people trying to crack the game.

[@StraussMax]

@@Jawack nah, supporting AAA companies with their exploitative crunch practices is simply reason enough to not buy anything from them and to simply not pay them for fucking over wth their employees is reason enough. This doesn't apply to small indie developers though.

[@jeffreymoffitt4070]

I got the best complement today. I was told that i know things that nobody is supposed to know. I want to thank you for facilitating that complement!

[@Cthulhu013]

Developers need to understand that the people who can afford your product will most likely buy it if they consume it whereas people who are poor won't, and yet they still provide advertising for your content, assuming it's good.There's always a place for piracy. The success of Game of Thrones owes a lot of it to piracy. You don't lose money from people who wouldn't have bought it anyway, but you do gain popularity through word of mouth, which will translate to more sales overall. Combining a "leak" with a good marketing strategy can be a game changer for the success of your content.

[@ModernRogue]

Sorry for the misunderstanding, Reverend, the sermon pulpit is over on another channel...

[@ghostking6838]

One of my favourite anti piracy things was in THPS4, where if you pirated a game, the game became so dummy hard, we're talking: no money to upgrade stats, tricks just suddenly stop working, your character having a hit box so wham doing an ollie causes you to bail, skitching onto a car would clip you through the floor and more, I never hear people talking about it but that was one of the funniest afternoons at my cousins XD

[@danielmcdowell6006]

Serious Sam background=good episode

[@LuciferSpiro1993]

This isn't an anti piracy one, but in RDR2, if you want to enter the Blackwater area from chapter 2 to the end of the game, you can, but there is a permanent bouty when you are in the area. Dodge the bounty hunters and head to the main area from RDR1, and a sniper kills you as soon as you cross the border, until you reach the epilogue. I'd have that on a random timer if the game was pirated. You might have 30 seconds, or 20 minutes, but every now and then, BANG, dead pirate. Accellerate the timer as you progress through the game, with more enemies, and tougher ones. Crash right before the end with a "corrupted" save game with self report piracy code. Better yet, have the corrupted save able to load on a legitimate copy of the game to get a reformed pirate in game reward.

[@auv8118]

jeez i remember playing a pirated version of serious sam 3 and than just screaming and running while an immortal fast scorpion came across the doorway and i couldnt kill it or on red alert 2 when everyone started friggin exploding.

[@LucaSerg83]

the red alert 2 thing was annoying since it could happen even if you had a retail copy

[@carlz0r]

I remember playing these Star Trek adventure games as a kid, made by Interplay. One was called 25th Anniversary, and one was called Judgement Rites. At a couple of points in the games you'd be told by the federation to warp to a certain star system.. so you'd pull up the warp screen and just see a grid with a bunch of random stars. You had to look in the instruction book for the star system name, and match it to a corresponding grid in the book so you'd know what system to warp to in the game to continue the plot. If I remember correctly, if you got it wrong, it'd put you into a brutally difficult dogfight against a Klingon Battlecruiser or something.

[@Ruckal]

Basically just the Arkham Asylum measure with a different skin, but in Mirror's Edge 2 if you were playing a leaked or pirated version of the game, you weren't able to jump. In a parkour game. Needless to say you would only have access to the opening cutscene and nothing more.

[@leomadero562]

Something great would've been to just randomize the delay between jumps, so like you could press space and jump 0-2 seconds delayed randomly. Just so that people don't just quit when they can't get past the first level but enough that people start ripping their hair out trying to time their jumps and failing

[@laurenceperkins7468]

The games that had you reading text out of the manual to fill in the story often wasn't for anti-piracy. It was because the disk space for all that text was *way* more expensive than a printed book in the early days. The interesting bit was if you read through those old game books you'll quite often find a lot of false leads and fake stories to throw off people who try to cheat by reading the entries without being told.

[@agent_galactic2856]

Spyro: Year of the dragon. That's all I have to say

[@Semystic]

?

[@agent_galactic2856]

@@Semystic !

[@brevin630]

So the thing about Game Dev Tycoon, it isn't the game itself that detects it's a pirated copy, but it's actually a different build of the game. The developer of the game made a separate build of the game, and then, under several dummy accounts, uploaded the modified game numerous times onto ThePirateBay. The developer not only knew his game would be pirated, but he actively messed with pirates by uploading numerous versions, all with the piracy feature. The feature was added to later releases of the game as a "Hard mode" of sorts, but the effects are lessened from the original version.

[@ARandomAccount110]

When within the first 400 views and first 15 comments: Huh, stop, please, I can't be this early.

[@kirkskywalker1701]

I always feel that when I am early to a MR video.

[@MJZearen]

I was literally waiting to see if you guys brought up Game Dev Story. I love that one so much. It's probably the best I've ever heard.