Anticipation over Far Cry 2 ought to be ramping up since the game went gold, and on track for its October 21st release. With the high-profile jostling over the DRM (digital rights management) included in EA's Spore, gamers resigned themselves to the uneasy reality that they can expect more of the same with Ubisoft's Far Cry 2 launch. The folks at Ubisoft's Far Cry 2 discussion boards managed to confirm with the publisher that SecuROM copy protection will indeed be present in the PC version of the DirectX10-supporting shooter.
Perhaps the good news is that the copy protection will be closer to BioShock's revised system than the one for Mass Effect. While SecuROM on Far Cry 2 still limits the maximum number of installations across separate PCs, users can now "revoke" a product activation and essentially get it back by uninstalling the game as was the case with BioShock (after the 2K Revocation Tool was released, and before the activation limt was removed entirely anyways). This technically allows users to install and uninstall the game as often as they like under normal situations across their 3 selected PCs. The revoke system also addresses the issue where an activation would be wasted anyways if a user changes his/her PC hardware configuration for whatever reason after installing a SecuROM-protected title. In Ubisoft's own words:
You have 5 activations per machine on 3 separate PCs.The 3 machine activations can be concurrent, but you must have the disc in the drive to run the gameUninstalling the game “refunds” an activation. This process is called “revoke”, so as long as you complete proper uninstall you will be able to install the game an unlimited number of times on 3 systems.You can upgrade your computer as many time as you want (using our revoke system)Ubisoft is committed to the support of our games, and additional activations can be provided.Ubisoft is committed to the long term support of our games: you’ll always be able to play Far Cry 2.
