Sony Patents Game Demos That Rot Over Time

[Ridik876]

Why do people keep saying it will be cracked? Of course it will. But how is that ANY different from what the current state is. People are going to crack the full games anyway...how is this any more accessible? It's not. I think it's a great idea for the honest consumer. This dishonest one is getting the game free anyway, demo or not.

 

[wild9]

What next: full games that magically open your wallet and grab more cash if you buy them second-hand?! Better not go there I guess, eh, Sony..

 

[kikireeki]

I think that would leave us even more disoriented!

 

[rockola]

Sorta like how the games rot your brain as you play 'em.

 

[b0o]

This isn't actually about demos. Its about used games. They will try to use this to lock out used games and make it so after a game is so many months old or used on a different console/pc it'll degrade. The industry wants to move consumers away from buying games to licensing/renting games so they can keep charging them money and kill the ability to sell used games.

 

[Guest]

This idea is nothing new. People were talking about degrading demos and degrading copy protection several years ago. It still hasn't happened, and being granted a patent for such a general concept is silly.

 

[micr0be]

i'm gona go patent patent.

 

[JohnnyLucky]

Reminds me of a "new and improved" version of the 30 day free trial.

 

[matt87_50]

sounds cool. In theory. May as well just make it a limited time trial though.

 

[pythy]

Sounds cool, I can imagine this working in a car racing game. You play for 2 hours and the wheels just fly off. Game degraded......

 

[the associate]

More like Sony degraded...

 

[kingnoobe]

Don't think they should've been able to patent it. But I see nothing wrong with the idea itself. It's actually a decent one. Specially for multiplayer games *that can't be cracked. Will you can but can plan on legit servers*. Games are already being pirated this is nothing new, so using that as "it will just be cracked" is a no shit sherlock moment. But it's gonna be up on torrents as fast as it comes out anyways, if not before it actually comes out lol.

 

[swamprat]

Shouldn't they need to be specifying a method for how they would do this in order to get the patent?
I vaguely remember Operation Flashpoint being supposedly one that'd degrade over time if pirated - so if it's a vague idea without any substance of 'how' then they should get stopped by prior art. Shouldn't they?

Personally I prefer demos to be small and useable.

 

[chomlee]

If the size of a game on the ps3 store was 20 gig, I might download it overnight, but people with the smaller hard drives might not have the space. To me it just seem easier to do what they are doing now.

The only thing I can think of is cost to produce a demo version instead of giving people the full version with the degrading algorithym attached. Wouldn't a time limit be easier? I have played games that already have that.

 

[rhino13]

It's kind of like food that tastes good when you chew but has an awful aftertaste moments later.

 

[btk1w1]

Sony are pushers.

One could almost see them thinking...
Let's bait them, hook them then reel them in.

Corporate greed knows no bounds.

 

[zak_mckraken]

How about a game that kicks you in the nuts more and more as you play? You can then pay to stop the nut-kicking or continue playing with the demo, with added nut-kicking. I'm sure some people would still rather play for free...

 

[princeofdreams]

Demo's are getting larger and larger recently, often an A1 title the demo comes in at way over a gig in size, this is bad enough when teh demo only gives u 1 small level or 30 mins of game play, but can u imagine a demo of a game full size such as AVP (15 gig)of BFBC2 (20 gigs) no way will i bother downloading that for something that will only last a couple of hours.

I am not concerned about pirates, we have always had them, for way back with the commodore 64 and the Sinclair spectrum, there always will be pirates (for the foreseeable future anyway)and this system wont change it at all, as long as the pirates can be kept away from the MP side of things balance is maintained.

It is in fact a good idea, but premium products are far to large to make it practical in my opinion

 

[jwl3]

Pretty stupid - a demo is intended to make you want to buy the game - I wouldn't want to buy it if the graphics started becoming blurry. Who knows if that's the demo or the actual game sucking.

 

[cscott_it]

Yes, because there would never be a warning message ever that would mention about this being a demo verison and that's why 'X' is happening.

I mean really, let's get some more mindless tool feedback.
Though I imagine most of you that would post those comments and demo the game would just mindlessly buttonmash or keyboard-faceroll through them without reading.

This is a really good idea. If you assume worst case implementation of everything, then our current suck-ass demos are the best it will ever get. I hope most of those comments are jokes.