Copy protection behaviour

[Anna]

Hi all, I have looked around the Net and couldn't find anything about this. Does anyone have a list of copy protection deliberate bugs/errors in Amiga games? e.g. if the software detected it was a copy, it would hide a platform, or remove an item you needed to complete an adventure. What do you think?

Anna

[Galahad/FLT]

Originally Posted by Anna

Hi all, I have looked around the Net and couldn't find anything about this. Does anyone have a list of copy protection deliberate bugs/errors in Amiga games? e.g. if the software detected it was a copy, it would hide a platform, or remove an item you needed to complete an adventure. What do you think?

Anna

Lots of them did things like that.

Sleepwalker - Would remove a key barrel that means you can't progress
Hook - Remove three items from the game meaning it can't be completed
Gods - Made enemies harder to kill and extra lives couldn't be collected
Battle Command - Allowed you to play one mission and would then lock up game
F-29 Retaliator - Would allow you to play, and then plane would fall from the sky noting you were playing a pirate copy
Mega Lo Mania - Would detect a pirate copy by playing a sample laughing at you and unable to continue playing.
Codemasters TAS system - Would pop up a screen to tell you to ring a premium rate telephone number to get a code to continue playing.
Turrican - Removal of part of one of the earlier levels means you can't progress

Thats just a few, there were many more

[Anna]

Thanks Galahad, it's cool to hear about the old Amiga games. I had a copy of R-Type 2 that if I moved into a certain position on the bottom left, on the first level, and pressed fire, then the game would crash. Every time. If I avoided that area then the game would continue to play perfectly. Interestingly, when I tried it on an Amiga emulator on the GP2x, years later, exactly the same thing happened! Wonder if it was rubbish coding, or a copy protection bug that the crackers missed? Rubbish coding probably!

[Galahad/FLT]

Originally Posted by Anna

Thanks Galahad, it's cool to hear about the old Amiga games. I had a copy of R-Type 2 that if I moved into a certain position on the bottom left, on the first level, and pressed fire, then the game would crash. Every time. If I avoided that area then the game would continue to play perfectly. Interestingly, when I tried it on an Amiga emulator on the GP2x, years later, exactly the same thing happened! Wonder if it was rubbish coding, or a copy protection bug that the crackers missed? Rubbish coding probably!

Rubbish coding probably, the copy protection was MFM and maybe a copylock, there was no additional ingame protection.

R-Type 2 did need a massive amount of blitter fixes though, wouldn't be surprised if that was the problem.

[Retro-Nerd]

Lost Patrol: The team morale drops pretty fast. Very hard to complete it then.
Lords of the Rising Sun: The Ninja attack is always lethal.
The Killing Game Show: The water rises way too fast.

[Codetapper]

Leander: Unpassable section if a copy was detected.
Dogs of War: Apparently your player stumbles around like a drunk on badly cracked versions.

[Abaddon]

Tusker - items would disapear from inventory when you get caught by the whirlwind (copylock) and the machete would not appear (checksum).

[Galahad/FLT]

Hired Guns - Would overwrite your save file with something along the lines of "PIRATE COPY" after the 5th save.

[IFW]

Abandoned Places 2: your party gets killed after 13 minutes of playing and fun things like that

[cpiac64]

I never managed to play "premier" http://www.lemonamiga.com/games/details.php?id=1787 protection or bad gamer

[roberthazelby]

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

Hired Guns - Would overwrite your save file with something along the lines of "PIRATE COPY" after the 5th save.

I think there was something wrong with the copy protection on there.

My brother spent hours playing through original disks of HG, and it still came up with that, and corrupted his saves.

[Supamax]

Nice thread!
It would deserve to be sticked, IMO

[Leo42]

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

Hired Guns - Would overwrite your save file with something along the lines of "PIRATE COPY" after the 5th save.

Wasn't Hired Guns coming without copy protection ? I remember it could be installed to HD...

[Galahad/FLT]

Originally Posted by Leo42

Wasn't Hired Guns coming without copy protection ? I remember it could be installed to HD...

It had manual protection, and I cannot think of ANY Psygnosis game that didn't have copy protection, they simply protected everything, even their budget re-releases.

[dirkies]

I remember having an email conversation with Jonathan Forbes of LZX on "boobytrapping" the code if it detected piracy. He considered it, but finally did not do this as he feared that people would not realize some piracy detection kicked in and would simply judge LZX as "unreliable". (as it would be subtle way to cripple the software, not to give pirates a hint they had to recrack it). He was aware a lot of people were using cracked versions, but that is something you have to accept, esp in the consumer market back in those days.
It is indeed a difficult choice to make as a programmer: protect your software the hard way and risk losing your reputation with the masses? Food for thought...

[brett71]

Lure of the Temptress (suspected) - if you were following the walkthrough, 3 or 4 steps from the end of the game, there's an object you're supposed to click on, but the "cracked" copy I had back in that day, that particular object was not present, therefore, the game could not be completed.

I always meant to go back at some point and confirm that. I see that in the Zone is an alternate crack. Back in the day, I had bought an original and sent it to Melnok to crack, but he shortly after abandoned the Amiga and he said he sent the originals back to me, but I never got them.

[Galahad/FLT]

Premier Manager 3 Deluxe had some stuff. Crashes later on in the game when certain functions were tried, unable to complete a season, money being decreased.

[freehand]

Falcon flight sim you would stand on the runway and hear a plane and shots then see gun holes on the hud or instruments can not remember which, you could not proceed any further obviously.

[MethodGit]

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

It had manual protection, and I cannot think of ANY Psygnosis game that didn't have copy protection, they simply protected everything, even their budget re-releases.

You quite sure about that?

[lesta_smsc]

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

Sleepwalker - Would remove a key barrel that means you can't progress

Does this hold true for all cracks, or was there a version that overcame this copy protection? (Just finding an excuse as to why I couldn't complete the game!) :P

[StingRay]

The Quartex version of Sleepwalker works fine, only the FLT wasn't correctly cracked.

[fryguy]

James Pond 2 (ECS version iirc) The controls got inverted if you copied it. Pressing left on the joystick made the character go right etc.

[Galahad/FLT]

Originally Posted by lesta_smsc

Does this hold true for all cracks, or was there a version that overcame this copy protection? (Just finding an excuse as to why I couldn't complete the game!) :P

As Stingray said, FLT, well Bob Duncan buggered it up, a very simple crack as well

The barrel would be missing right at the start of the game, so no, you can't blame any cracks any further for your lack of game playing skill

[MethodGit]

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

As Stingray said, FLT, well Bob Duncan buggered it up, a very simple crack as well

The barrel would be missing right at the start of the game, so no, you can't blame any cracks any further for your lack of game playing skill

Oh the joy I had recently of experimenting with this extra check and making the barrel appear out of thin air through hacking while playing.

[Boo Boo]

I think it was the Aga version WHDload but later in the game for me giraffe doesn't move and you can't progress I just use jst version

[amiga_Forever]

lol... Never realized copy protection behavior was so good on the Amiga...

How times have changed...... Now its even easier as you can complete the game always.

Are we going backwards or forwards ??