Electronic Arts continues to defend its DRM strategy on Spore. In a recent email interview with MTV EA responds to some of the complaints users have regarding the DRM as currently implemented. The primary complaints are the limited number of allowed installs, currently set to three, and the online authentication that is required each time the game is started.
EA states that the number of allowed installs will be changed to be more like iTunes, allowing systems to be de-authorized as needed. “Right now, with our solution, you can’t. But there is a patch coming for that” said the EA spokesman, Mariam Sughayer. No details for a DRM changing patch have been released yet.
As for the online activation requirement, Sughayer said that if EA “were to ever turn off the servers on the game, we would put through a patch before that to basically make the DRM null and void”.
Internet commentators have questioned the efficacy of the DRM in Spore since DRM free cracked versions of the game were available from peer-to-peer sharing sites before it was available for retail sale.
