Here's part two of three in what I'm unofficially dubbing "Digital Rights Management (DRM) day": Valve, in a press released headlined "Steamworks makes DRM obsolete", claim today to have made a "customer friendly approach to anti-piracy" with a new update to their digital distribution client Steam. Our interest is piqued.
The new feature is called Custom Executable Generation (CEG) technology, and "complements the already existing anti-piracy solution offered in Steamworks". How it works is it makes unique copies of games for each user, allowing them to access their stuff on multiple machines without install limits and without having to install root kits (malware designed to hide its comprising of the user's system) on their PC. Note this seems to be in keeping with Valve president Gabe Newell's e-mail to a Steam user we caught wind of in December, where he said the following:
"Most DRM strategies are just dumb. The goal should be to create greater value for customers through service value (make it easy for me to play my games whenever and wherever I want to), not by decreasing the value of a product (maybe I'll be able to play my game and maybe I won't).
We really really discourage other developers and publishes from using the broken DRM offerings, and in general there is a groundswell to abandon those approaches."
And here's what he has to say now:
"Delivering this extension of services on Steamworks first anniversary, demonstrates our commitment to continually develop the platform to better serve the community working with these tools. As we roll out these features, we continue to look for new ways make PC games easier to create and better for customers to experience."
It's really rare to see a man in a position like Newell say something genuinely good for the customer and then actually act on it, so if this works, then here's a pat on the back to you, sir.
Now, the new approach brings up several interesting questions:
1) Are they alluding to SecuROM in talking about rootkits? As far as we know (and correct us if you know differently), nothing on Steam has been sold with extra DRM aside from SecuROM and the various implementations that can come with that. SecuROM, as some may know, has been suspected to be a rootkit, though publishers have repeatedly denied this.
2) Does this mean all or most of that "extra DRM" will be eliminated from Steam games, particularly SecuROM? Even the most avid Steam fans would surely be happy about that!
We've contacted the publisher about these matters, and will update you accordingly assuming we hear back.
Aside from CEG, Valve is cool enough with this update to offer a complete suite of publishing and development tools to developers and publishers worldwide, free, within Steamworks. On the user end, in-game downloadable content (DLC) is here, as is the lobby system we saw in Left 4 Dead.
On another happy note, Steam has hit 20 million users, up from 15 last year. Congratulations, guys!
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