The final thing I want to discuss is the DRM scheme if you buy the game online through Aspyr’s GameAgent service. DRM stands for ‘digital rights management’ and is a form of copy protection aimed at preventing piracy. If you buy the retail disk you simply install, enter your serial number and get to playing. Aspyr’s new GameAgent offers online purchase and secure download of select Aspyr games, with Call of Duty 4 being the first. The Mac forums caught fire when the game was released with complaints about download speed, failed downloads, failed installs and so on. This is to be expected for such a highly anticipated game on a new service. Anyone who bought Half-Life 2 through Steam right at release remembers this sort of thing well.
The concern for many users was that they would be chewing through their limited number of activations and downloads. This is because GameAgent uses a DRM system that limits the number of downloads, the time between purchase and download, the number of computers you can install the game on, and the number of activations. In detail, you can install the game on up to two computers, and activate up to ten times. There is no deauthorization method, so when you’re done you’re done. GameAgent offers an optional (i.e. costs additional money) ‘protection plan’ that allows for more downloads over a two-year time period. This system - download-limits, hardware-limits, and activation-limits - is the most … um … limited in the industry: Steam would still download and install a fresh copy of Half-Life 2 for me on my new laptop last week despite having installed and uninstalled it countless times on perhaps a dozen laptops over the last four years. Similarly Direct2Drive and GamersGate allow you to redownload games you bought once you have your account set up. Even EA games, which has similar limits for some things, allowed me to reinstall Crysis again despite having bought it last year and not added download protection.
Am I saying that GameAgent is anti-consumer? Yes. Buying the retail copy will allow you to install and uninstall without limit for all eternity so long as you have compatible hardware. We all know that this game is either already pirated or will be soon enough. Therefore this draconian system punishes one group: those who choose to buy it through GameAgent. That is really unfortunate - especially since shelf space for Mac games is almost non-existent. When I heard about GameAgent I was thrilled - Mac games need no longer be limited to a few online channels, but could be easily grabbed in digital form. Then I discovered that what was offered cost more than the retail copy and had a very short expiration period. Sadly, in this state I have to strongly recommend avoiding GameAgent at all possible costs. Forget convenience, buy from somewhere else.