08/09/2009 06:13:00 | Tom Manners

10 comments

Rate it:

4.00

E-mail to a friend

To:

Bcc:

Your email address:

Message:

Batman: Arkham Asylum designed to inconvenience pirates

Gaming discussionsGaming discussions

Earn XP doing real world good deeds

Final Fantasy 13 Already shipped 5 mil copies

Questions before I buy new rig... What's a heatsink?

Pirated versions will not allow players to use the 'glide' function

Eidos, developers of recently released Batman: Arkham Asylum, appear to have laid a trap for gaming pirates within the game’s structure.

According to one user on the Gamer Limit forum, the vital glide function is disabled when a player is not running a legitimate version of the game:

“I’ve got a problem when it’s time to use Batman’s glide in the game. When I hold , like it’s said to jump from one platform to another, Batman tries to open his wings again and again instead of gliding. So he fels down in a poisoning gas. If somebody could tell me, what should I do there.” said the forum user.

Shortly thereafter an Eidos representative responded to the query.

“The problem you have encountered is a hook in the copy protection, to catch out people who try and download cracked versions of the game for free. It’s not a bug in the game’s code; it’s a bug in your moral code.”

Arkham Asylum was released to Xbox 360 and PS3 in late August and has since gathered favourable reviews. It will be released on PC in mid September.

Discuss Batman: Arkham Asylum anti piracy measures in the forums

News

Game Developers Conference day one roundup

Social gaming and independent development were discussed on day one, rounded off with a few......

1 comments | Read more »

News

Makro run epic Xbox Elite special, win one with MyGaming

Win an Xbox 360 Elite + Fable 2 and Halo 3 this month ...

0 comments | Read more »

Comments (10 posted): Comments (10 posted):

Subscribe to comments feed

HeavyTank

on 08/09/2009 07:14:27

NICE!

instead of trying to stop them, rather make the game un playable if you pirate it. GENIUS!

Justin

on 08/09/2009 09:58:21

lol @ "it’s a bug in your moral code.”

This is far more effective than any CD/DVD protection

Dax

on 08/09/2009 10:01:49

Already circumvented. I would post the proof here but that would be bad.

Mike

on 08/09/2009 10:10:13

lol, any form of copy protection can and will be bypassed, its just a matter of time. People generally wont buy a game until they have played it, there are exceptions of course, the real trick is to get the user to want to buy the orignal after they have the priated copy. Thats where online content comes in.

Tarryn

on 08/09/2009 10:50:28

"People generally wont buy a game until they have played it"

That's what demos are for, wouldn't you believe it.

nerd

on 08/09/2009 12:11:53

Mirror's Edge had pretty much the same type of thing. After a couple of levels, there was a point where the main char would just stop running, so you couldn't get enough speed to jump to the next part of the level.

That was circumvented by a crack as well.

Dark Soul

on 08/09/2009 13:30:20

brilliant idea

D'Artagnan

on 08/09/2009 19:53:02

Same with Assassin's Creed. Couldn't get into one of the cities.

Kiril

on 09/09/2009 05:09:15

the fact that they are able to include such a feature is only madse possible because its on xbox.. cracked xbox games are not as versatile as PC cracks, and looking back at games which have failed to prevent crackers, like gtaIV, i firmly believe that its impossible to protect a pc game

on 09/09/2009 09:47:07

hahahaha this is just a bad crack by some group that got nuked anyway... Its already been fixed by another group and repacked. No matter what, they will always be able to crack these games, console or not.