I would highly recomend that you start and try to run a small company before you attempt to preach how things should be done. It is only when you are face real choices concerning profit and loss and managing for profit will you come to understand that companies are not faceless, soulless money-grubbing machines. They are often dynamic and people driven, do not dehumanize what you do not understand.
I assure you that companies can, in fact, survive while simultaneously allowing second hand sales to exist.
1. Your friend.
What friend? People keep telling me about this mysterious friend I supposedly have, but I have no idea who he is. I don't know who previously owned the game, I bought it second hand from a store.
He sold you a copy of the game, he is not an agent of Stardock nor is he a licensed retailer on Stardock's behalf. He could (and did) sell you a copy of the game, but he could not (and did not) sell you the license that would have supplied the support.
I wonder how many fucking times I've explained this already. Here it comes again: the store had no possible way of knowing about the game's DRM. It is not mentioned anywhere on the packaging, and the nature of the game does not suggest that it would have anything that would prevent second hand sales (and it wasn't made by Valve). If they had quickly googled "sins of a solar empire" + drm, they would have gotten the impression that it has no DRM
at all.
2. Yourself. Hopefully this will teach you a lesson to allways purchase a game from a licensed retailer if you intended to receive patches and updates like everyone else.
Uh, I'm pretty sure the game store I went to is in fact a "licensed retailer." Furthermore, games utilizing the kind of DRM that SoaSe has are rare. Even World of Warcraft, for fuck's sake, has patches available as redistributable executables. This is yet another thing that I've already explained ad nauseam. Is there any reason in particular why you need me to repeat myself?
I would recomend that you attend a class and come to and understanding on how licensing works.
How licensing works is irrelevant.
Patches and updates are support. No ifs ands or buts about it.
Meanwhile in the
real world, almost all games are patched through methods that do not require you to register a serial key with an online service.
Unless Zubaz, Craig Fraizer, Kyro and the unknown ammount of employees affiliated with Stardock are the most charitable people I've ever met, (in a pseudo kind of way, I am playing thier game) or they expect and demand a paycheck now and again.
If their continued existence is based upon limiting second hand sales, they deserve to go bankrupt as soon as humanly possible.
You also seem to have difficulty understanding privilages, entitlements, obligations, rights and all that jazz.
No, I understand consumer rights just fine. I understand, for example, that consumers should have the right to purchase used goods without any artificial and arbitrary restrictions placed upon them.
"Free" patches and updates are indeed becoming a gold standard in the industry.
Becoming? They've always been the standard. But now companies like Stardock and Valve are changing that.
You may be unaware of this, but data storage and server usage costs a FOURTANE.
You may be unaware of this, but it's cheaper to let Fileplanet etc. host your patches than run an online service for them.
I am not entitled to having access to these forums. Granted it did come with the game when I installed it, but with one click any moderator can change, delete or lock threads or ban me permanently from the forums. There would be nothing I could do about it either.
Don't go waving "FREE SPEECH!!!!" doesn't exist here, sorry.
What in fuck's name? Where did I go or was about to go waving "free speech"? I don't remember saying much if anything about these forums, and I certainly haven't brought up free speech.
FYI Deisel and Gasoline are indeed petroleum by-products, but they are not the same thing.
Did I say they are? And who cares?