14 DAY TRIAL // Video game publisher Ubisoft has announced that it has eliminated its Digital Rights Management solution from its PC-based video games, after a majority of players have criticized the way the company has implemented it.
Stephanie Perlotti, who is the worldwide director for online games at Ubisoft, has told Rock, Paper, Shotgun that, “We have listened to feedback, and since June last year our policy for all of PC games is that we only require a one-time online activation when you first install the game, and from then you are free to play the game offline.”
The representative has revealed that from now on all Ubisoft PC-based games will be free of DRM solution but will still require an Internet connection for activation and in order to use the various online services that they include.
Perlotti added, “Whenever you want to reach any online service or multiplayer, you will have to be connected, and obviously for online games you will also need to be online to play. But if you want to enjoy Assassin's Creed 3 single player, you will be able to do that without being connected. And you will be able to activate the game on as many machines as you want.”
Titles from Ubisoft, ranging from Anno 2070 to Driver: San Francisco, were completely unplayable when the company faced problems with its authentication and online servers.
For a time Ubisoft claimed that the DRM measures that it was using were working and that they were limiting the impact of piracy.
Ubisoft has also recently moved a number of its core PC franchises, like Heroes of Might & Magic and Silent Hunter, to a free-to-play and in-browser model.
The company will continue a policy to launch the PC version of its biggest titles, like Assassin’s Creed 3, about one month after the console packages.