Talk:StarForce/Archive 2

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"Cracked

Let me just add that when a game protection is "Cracked" it doesnt mean that the protection is removed, in fact almost all games that are "cracked" have the protection left on the game and the replaced EXE that is in use basically "fools" the protection into thinking the original disc is in the drive. Now a CloneCD image is almost the exact same thing, obviously the clone image is NOT an original but by using programs like Daemon tools or Alcohol 120% it becomes possible to once again "fool" the protection into thinking the original disc is in the drive. Thus the protection has been "cracked" by fooling it. Starforce at one point got around these programs but currently EVERY single starforce game is 100% playable by using a pirate version, Every game can be backed up, Every game can be fooled thus they have all in essence been cracked. Stating that it takes months to crack a game is extremly misleading and makes the article give the impression that Starforce is acheiving something that it very clearly is not.

Another thing to note is that currently, Starforce games are THE quickest games to come out because of the simplicity of making a cloneCD image, so again the months thing is wildly unaccurate.

One other thing I think should be added to the article is that Starforce forces your optical drives to function in a way that they are not designed to causing a "step down" effect with the speed, this eventually will force the drive into PIO mode (which will cause the WHOLE computer to run like its broken) and this can and will damage some drives. I myself have lost a drive in this way and know several other people that have also had the same happen.

But really, saying a game is not "cracked" for months is far from the truth. How about changing the wording to state "It is often days before the game is pirated" ? this is 100% accurate in every way and will also remove the problem of defining the word crack.

Also as for the list of games above.

Codename panzer phase two - http://www.theisonews.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=134485 Prince of persia two thrones - http://www.theisonews.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=136461 Toca 3 - http://www.theisonews.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=138576&highlight=toca+race+driver

I would go on but as you can see every game listed has been released in the pirate world by groups, and cracking a game doesnt just mean to modify the code but to "crack" the protection so its playable from either a backup or a copy, and as you can see starforce fails to prevent this and games are very often released within a few days or sometimes even before the official release dates. But as I said before, I think its maybe best to change the article to say "not pirated for days" as this is a much more accurate way of writing it and is also not misleading.

You should really have a look at some real starforce cracks, the protection is removed so you don't need to install the starforce driver at all. Every example you gave are clones, which aren't even real clones, since they are not exact replicates.

To say that starforce is easy to clone is a total lie, a real starforce clone has never been made. The so called SFclones are only pseudo clones.

If you play a clone, you still have to install the starforce driver. And clones are unpredictable, works on some people's hardware, not for others. If clones can be easily made to work like you said, then that only means starforce is not malware.

And just because a game is released by a group, doesn't mean it actully works. Especially a group like Mirror, who's infamous for making craps.

A professional pirate who sells cracked games, would never sell a clone, because they are simply unreliable.

Robust Physique 04:58, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

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I agree that StarForce's job is to prevent people from being able to play the game unless they have bought it. If a CloneCD image is not playable by someone who has not purchased the game, that does not count as a crack (obviously). If a new EXE is released or some other method is presented which allows the CloneCD image to be played by someone who has not purchased the game, that certainly would count as a crack. As to the protection on the article, I will remove it as soon as people think it prudent. That is, please ask me or any other admin. At the moment, it looks like there's still no firm consensus but we are certainly getting closer. --Yamla 17:03, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Perspectives, perspectives… I won't take sides on this matter; I'll just point out somewhat ridiculous facts. The Starforce (SF) protection system in the form that it's now represented is utterly useless. If you want to play SF protected game all you have to do is unplug your IDE ROM drives, mount an image on any virtual drive manager and you are ready to pillage & plunder. Of course, this course of action can be unimaginably difficult (or considered as nuisance) to some, but it really is just unplugging of a simple cord. In any case the moment you "clean" your system of IDE ROM drives Starforce gives up, and does absolutely nothing… no need for cracks, no need for fuss, just simple and easy as it sounds. In future we can expect that this will change, but we also expect Deamon tools that will emulate IDE devices or version of Alcohol software that is able of making perfect copies (it can be done as you read this, on certain new devices and with certain tools) of SF protected titles. Since this is happening or it's about to happen it is logical that SF will have to find new ways of avoiding pirate attacks which brings me to the point of this article. You see, after every new battle in this great conflict that' forced upon us, there's a little less room on the battlefield. SF will be obligatory to make new restriction and unfortunately there is a very little space for that. Further development of "SF Protection System" leads and thus will result in more (or rather true) incompatibility (as seen during migration on the 64-bit platforms). This will be felt especially by the legitimate users who buy the retail products so they don’t have to mess with the cords, hidden devices and don’t know about such concepts as security rings, kernel or burning media with DPM or RPMS based on the given SF code. Whatever the case, there's certain line in all this and end consumers should recognize it to act upon it. From my perspective regardless of the fact that one cannot make a backup of costly software, despite hidden drivers, implausible security issues and funny reports of hardware damage caused by SF system, this protection took a dive when it started to blacklist other software & hardware (SCSI). This is violation of my personal freedom; it's done on my personal computer which setup I don’t won't to change because of SF demands. This war won't be resolved with force of any kind, enforcement tend to result with such publicity that now (with or without true reason) follows SF around the web and in other media. The funny thing is, all this happened before, and if you remember you'll know that this is just a little bit of history repeating… the things will remain balanced, always had, always will.--Lovelight

Insofar as balance, I can't say we can verify such an obscure concept as balance, because to do so we would have to define a mid point, which is imprudent. I will say this though, SF does not have the resources (nor does any company or even government) to TOTALLY prevent any and all piracy on something distributed on such a large scale.--64.13.35.17 18:55, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

A professional pirate who sells cracked games, would never sell a clone, because they are simply unreliable. This alone can justify many companies' use of SF.

Yes, in the old days, piracy was not as common as it is now. So StarForce will indeed bring some balance.

Last I heard, SF has recruited some highly experienced former crackers from Unpacking Gods.

Robust Physique 04:59, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Sources? That sounds more like a StarForce press release than anything and given the nature of press releases I think it is imprudent to cite them. (Too much posturing to be considered as a data source.) I doubt that we can verify either way StarForce's recent hiring trends. StarForce, bringing balance? Consider the links here that demonstrate cracked or otherwise pirated versions of the game. I do not see SF as a championing force against piracy, given their history I doubt that anyone should. I don't see where 1 - 10 games protected from cracking even matters, I mean really how many games are there that are "protected" by SF? I'm sure it must be more than 100. So at most we're looking at a 10% success rate at most, not something I would brag about. Also we must take into account another thing, most of these games listed as "uncracked" (I know everyone will jump on that word.) are not that popular. I mean really, they are no Half-Life 2 or Doom 3. I don't know where to cite sales numbers, so I'm going to ask for help here. --64.13.35.17 18:55, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Enough people have said that *currently* starforce is useless that I will back down. Maybe a mention that in the past starforce was effective would be warranted (if it really is useless this article will turn into a historical article instead of a current one anyway). Either way I think the article should no go unprotected Rm999 05:04, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

To put it in perspective, 2 people have said SF is useless, and both have a grudge against SF. Robust Physique 05:09, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

As I stated in the article above (perspetives, perspectives…) fact remains that SF doesn't work on SCSI devices, and buy not working I mean really not taking any action at all. The image (clone, copy…) doesn't need to have any properties of original, you just insert it in virtual drive and the game will run within seconds and without any SF checks. This is main reason why I cannot take Staforce seriously in its current form and you can verify all said as easy as you can unplug your IDE cords. The protection can hardly be called bulletproof if you can get around it in ways described above. I would also like to answer that grudged remark, cause the fact is, I have nothing against copy protection systems; and only reason for sharing my thoughts is fact that I work as a freelance journalist and I was forced to look into matter a bit closer then usual. Actually I think that Starforce took a huge step in the security of the executable and .dll files, but judging by the information's caught on Web it failed in tasks of pure copy protection and its functionality can be easily defined by the terms – forced & restrictive. Unfortunately the most interesting articles about SF are written in Russian, but after little BableFish translation and visit to CDfreaks, Deamon and Alcohol forums things should be a bit clearer. While I'm at it, might as well add that most attention-grabbing thing about Starforce is ability of its code to perpetually change (morph) while being investigated with debugging tools, thus making any reverse engineering as fun as looking for typing errors in War & Peace. I would also like to point out Wiki article about XCP (Xtended Copy Protection) controversy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XCP), because it should be linked with one discussed here. If you read about XCP you'll found quite unsettling similarities between these two protection systems. Further more the fact that SF denies a right to backup media needs far more attention. It's closely related to "fair use" doctrine, and therefore shouldn't be neglected (it's like having a car with only one key and no means to make duplicate; everything is just fine until you, or someone of a kin loose it…). As far as working executable cracks there are indeed very few of them available, because reverse engineering of code takes enormous time and effort and crackers seem to be more focused on emulation and/or cloning. However, one can easily verify that successful copies have been made, and if you dug a little deeper you'll found quite elaborated tutorials on how it's done. But, please let me be absolutely CLEAR on this. The fact that it can be done, doesn’t mean that SF is useless from everyone's perspective. You do need some technical knowledge to unplug cables;) and you have to read about it in very strange places (not including this one:). While unplugging of IDE drives is rather easy way to get around SF, I won't hesitate a second to call it profoundly extreme… Making of a functional SF clone is another thing, it can be done, but it is truly exhausting endeavor which implies very, and I mean VERY steep learning curve. SF is far from perfect but it does what it's supposed to do and it does it with great amount of success. I don't think that you should change anything about that; facts stated in your article are as close to truth as possible and I have found them useful as a fine summary of current events. However the fact remains that SF is easily avoided, and there is not a word about it anywhere. Also, If you would allow little suggestion, discussed article should say a few things about such tools as Starforce Nightmare, Starfu*** and a lot, because when Starorce meet these enforcers and they collide results can be quite annoying. Once again, I did lot of reading on this topic, so let me repeat my true concern. With all implemented measures and countermeasures there is a very little room on SF battlefield for any reasonable maneuvers. It started with modifying of original OS drivers, continued with blacklists and forcing of own hidden device drivers (in California, Sony silently installed hidden XCP drivers and got burned buy consumers, media and court), and one really has to wonder where it all leads and how will it end…--Lovelight

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There have been a few false truths posted here since I last saw the page so perhaps I better clean them up a little....

When a clone is made of a starforce game it is indeed a perfect image of the data contained on the CD or DVD, Starforce however will check the media to see if it contains an ATIP flag (meaning its a disc which can be written to) if the ATIP flag is there the image simply wont run, however if you place one of these burned images into a reader which has NO burning capabilities it will run fine as a normal reader cannot check for the status of ATIP, this is one way of running a starforce protected game and can be done by almost anyone with a basic knowledge of piracy.

Secondly when some Starforce games are released in CD format they come with patchers which will patch the image so it can be burned as a 100% clone but MUST be burned onto a certain media the patch program supports-

Now heres how incredibly easy it is to run a clone of a starforce game : Use alcohol to make a perfect image which MUST contain the correct DPM information, store the image on your HD, mount the image with virtual drive pro and disable your IDE drive with the same program. EVERY starforce game will run this way without the need for unplugging hardware or any kind of burning, you can also store the starforce image on burnable media and mount it the same way, no need to reboot other than to install the starforce media. As you can see the most basic user can follow these simple instructions so its probably just as easy (if not easier) than using a crack.

Obviously there are many other ways (a simple mount on daemon tools on an nforce 2 or 4 motherboard requires no unplugging of drives) or simply unplugging the IDE optical drives is another. For example, recently I went down to my local video store, hired a copy of X3 and loaded alcohol, set alcohol to the standard settings normally used for starforce or any other protection, made an image and once done I no longer needed the disc in my optical drive, total time to take an original and make a perfect clone fully installed and working took me roughly 40 minutes.

I wouldnt say that was difficult at all. And I never had to unplug any drives.

Also the information about starforce drivers not being installed is simply false, xpand rally which was released by ultima was one of the first (if not THE first) starforce games to be FULLY cracked and still installed starforce on the system. Although I admit there have been a couple of games which have been destarforced totally, but these are often just .EXE protected executables and the reason it was removed is becuase demo versions or patches were accidently released without starforce present on them, in ALL other cases the starforce is still there, this is exactly the same with Securom AND safedisc, the protection is never removed totally but rather fooled just in the same way as a clone image.

And the statement about "if you play a clone you still have to install the SF driver" yes thats correct, the protection itself (as you yourself have admited) is still present on the system yet has been cracked so that it cannot see the game as being a backup, EXACTLY the same way as a crack.

Also there are two forms of (what some would refer to as) cracks, there is firstly the modification of an exe file (or in some cases many data files) and then there is loaders which are simply TSR programs (terminate and stay resident) which can sit in memory and fool the protection (a good example of this is starforce nightmare which blocks starforce from checking for the presence of an IDE drive in the system - however this only works up until V3.5 of starforce but the same technology is in virtual drive pro and will be included in the next version of daemon tools and alcohol). These programs simply beat starforce currently. Incedently "professional pirates" dont "sell" games, there is a strict code of honor amongst most pirates and if a person were to be found selling games they wouldnt be able to obtain these games from "professional" places much longer.

And for the record, every game mirror have released has worked perfectly, its the people who run them that do things wrong and cant follow instructions, on isonews people often miss parts of the instructions on running them, already have software on their system that has conflicted with starforce (thus an original game wouldnt have run) or have been previously trying to beat starforce by changing registry permissions and things and have never reset these settings. Being a moderator of isonews I read about EVERY starforce game that comes out and can vouch that this is true, and if you dont believe me you're welcome to go check yourself.

So to stop typing before I end up writing a small book here, I think the article should maybe say "Cracks are often not released for weeks, sometimes months however cloneCD images are simple to make and readily available on the internet for download and several programs exist that will mount these images and allow the user to play any starforce game, these images are normally released within days of the games release" I think this refelects the current status accuratly and if the next version of starforce changes this then we can all agree that the article should be updated to reflect this, but I honestly believe that the wording now is not only false but wildly out of date and very misleading. my interest in this article was to show true facts about starforce, and although I must admit I dont like starforce (I dont install starforce games anymore myself due to hardware failure from it) I do think that this article should have an unbiased and truthfull information about it, and to be honest the wording now makes it sound like someone from starforce has been editing it (no offence meant to anyone over that - if any was taken then my apologies).

Uncle_Mart

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Yay. I have a Promise Ultra66 card in my Windows 2000 machine, because I need extra IDE slots. My fastest drives (including my DVD drive) are connected to the motherboard. I have a CD burner installed on the Ultra66 bus.

Now, the problem with this situation is that the Ultra66 drivers present themselves as SCSI, which renders any game using starforce unplayable on my system. I'm not about to unplug my Promise card every time I want to play a game, and I really don't want to have to keep unplugging my DVD drive (which is faster than my CD writer at reading discs) and rebooting every time I want to play a game. Now I understand why the games I bought don't work. Now I understand why I need to verify what copy-protection scheme a given title uses. Thank you, Wikipedia, for having an article and talk page explaining this technical wall.

11:55, 5 March 2006 (UTC)~

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Good to hear it helped someone, but while im here I'd like to lodge a formal complaint that this page is FAR too wide ;)

Might be an idea if that quote up the top is truncated into two halves or something :)

Also I would like to add that Robust Physique's idea of mentioning about what starforce has acheived up until recently DEFINATLY deserves a mention, as much as I dislike starforce, it HAS acheived something that no other protection has ever come close to, and that (at least on some games, Robust Physique is quite complete but as he said may contain more) beating the pirates totally, there are still games that havent been cracked, and it isnt because they cant but rather the effort of doing so would just be far too much to ever be worth it. That alone is an incredible feat to manage. Starforce has set milestones in the protection industry, the debate about how they have done it will probably continue for a long time to come but facts are facts and Starforce has proven itself to have some very innovative ideas which have worked. If Robust Physique would like to suggest a new set of wording for the days/months thing, clone part and the part about Starforce acheving what others have failed to do then I'd be more than happy to give my opinion with everyone else?

I'd also like to say how astounded I am at the wikipedia staff from remaining so neutral, as a moderator on isonews I know exactly how hard this can be.

Page protection

The page had the protection tag, but was not actually protected. I've therefore removed the tag for the moment. Do people here still feel the protection tag is needed. What steps have currently been taken to reach dispute resolution. I'd be willing to mediate a dispute if those involved wish it. jacoplane 17:00, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm leaving this unprotected for now (I had forgotten to press the "protected" button) in the hopes that the editors continue discussing the dispute here. It's easy enough to reenable protection if people get overenthusiastic and try to enforce their sides through edit wars.  :) --Yamla 17:46, 5 March 2006 (UTC)