Ubisoft not bringing back always-online DRM for PC games

Ubisoft, which had ditched its notorious always-online DRM last year, has confirmed that it will not be going back to it.

In an interview with PC gaming site Rock Paper Shotgun, Ubi’s worldwide director for online games Stephanie Perotti and corporate communications manager Michael Burk said that future Ubisoft PC games, including Assassin’s Creed 3 and Far Cry 3, will only require one-time activation on PC.

We’ve obviously heard from PC customers that they were unhappy with some of the policies that we had in place, and that’s why we’re looking to make these changes,” said Burk.

The heavily criticised DRM, which required players to be online at all times even for single-player games,hasn’t been implemented since the release of Driver: San Francisco last year, but many feared that it would return in this year’s high profile releases.

This will especially come as a relief to Indian gamers, who may not always have steady and constant access to the Internet.

Also touched upon in the interview was the topic of delayed PC releases, which seems to be a regular occurrence for Ubisoft games.

This year you will be able to enjoy Far Cry 3 at the same time as the console version. Assassin’s Creed 3, which is a huge game, is coming just a few weeks after the console version, while in the past it was – what – months after. So we’re really focusing on making sure that at the same time we provide a really good PC experience, and really as close as possible to the other versions,” Perotti said.

Assassin’s Creed 3 is scheduled for release on 30th October, with Far Cry 3 headed for a 29th November release.

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