Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

[Oct 24, 2009, 12:57 pm ET] - Share - Viewing Comments

Though some folks have been able to purchase Borderlands early, 2K Games confirms that the game's DRM will not unlock until next week's scheduled release dates for Gearbox's role-playing shooter (thanks nin via IGN). The 2K Forums have a comment from 2K community manager 2K Elizabeth explaining the situation:

Yesterday we learned that a fraction of the PC copies of Borderlands were accidentally sold to consumers in some countries but that gamers could not activate their copies yet. Since we learned of this problem, we have been looking into the issue to find the best possible solution for everyone.

I'm going to be completely honest with you guys right now. It is not possible for us to move the planned release date of the game forward. We could not possibly get the games into stores worldwide and out for digital distribution any earlier than planned. Less than 1% of all copies were sold, and if we unlocked the game today, illegal versions would most likely appear on torrents by the evening. I am sure all of you want our PC launch to be as successful as possible, and we simply won't be able to manage that any earlier than already planned.

I want to apologize for those of you who have gotten the game ahead of our release date, and ask for your patience and understanding. The game will be ready in the US and Canada at midnight eastern standard time on Monday, October 26th, and internationally by Friday, October 30th.

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178 Replies. 9 pages. Viewing page 8.
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38.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 16:54

space captain

yarr, bring on those torrents




Go forth, and kill!

37.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 16:24

Longswd

Well, if you needed any further confirmation that the PC delay was all about piracy, there it is, black and white, bold as day.

It's hard to believe that people still think 1 downloaded copy = 1 lost sale, that people would purchase a game if weren't available to pirate. My (admitted) guess is only about 1 in 10 would be a lost sale, if even that. Nor do they understand the greater visibility and exposure of the game to more people results in more sales in the long run, esp. when no demo is available.

This kind of bullshit actually becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy..."Oh, I have to wait extra week to get it for the PC? Fuck it, I'll just go Torrent now then".

Retarded wankers.

EDIT: It IS available on at least one private torrent. So, see self-fulfilling prophecy above.

This comment was edited on Oct 24, 2009, 16:27.




I don't always drink carbonated Mexican rat piss, but when I do, I prefer Dos Equis.

36.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 16:13

Hump

My understanding is that securom protects the retail copies, not steam.

God help us all...... Wreck




---------------------------------------------------------------------- "Both the “left” and the “right” pretend they have the answer, but they are mere flippers on the same thalidomide baby, and the truth is that neither side has a clue." - Jim Goad

35.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 16:01

Krovven

Aye, retail copies are stand-alone and dont require Steam from my understanding. A street date is a street date. Retailers broke it. If nobody had broke it, then there would be no complaints. However I agree their advertising on availability is misleading and furthermore...who the fuck wants to play a game at 12:01am Monday morning? Most of us have to goto work (or school) the next morning. Release it on a Thursday/Friday so we could have been playing it all weekend! Their statement is also contradictory. If you can't get it released around the world at the same time, then how come the very people that have already bought it in European countries are the ones with the Oct 39th release date? Makes no sense. The PC version hasn't been pirated yet, and copies have been being sold for a couple days already. The 360 version has been pirated since the 19th.

34.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:54

Dev

Hump: My understanding is that securom protects the retail copies, not steam.

33.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:44

Hump

I can't remember but didn't Randy Pitchford do an interview a while ago where he said he hates invasive DRM and they weren't going to be doing that with Borderlands?

Technically, it (Steam activation) is a form of DRM but to call it "invasive" is going a bit far. You know what you're getting ahead of time. Its not like someone installed a rootkit on your system without your knowledge of finding out at the last minute that the game has some draconian activation scheme that fucks your system up.

In any case I wouldn't blame Gearbox, shit like this is always the doing of the publisher.




---------------------------------------------------------------------- "Both the “left” and the “right” pretend they have the answer, but they are mere flippers on the same thalidomide baby, and the truth is that neither side has a clue." - Jim Goad

32.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:37

Cutter

They can't move up the digital distribution? LOL! If you're going to lie, you need to do a much better job than that.

Anyway, after 3 days of playing it on the Xbox I'm ready to return it to Blockbuster now. While it's not a bad game, it's certainly not good either. It's actually really boring, and has none of the drive to progress in the same way Diablo does. I guess maybe just moving around 1 setting - the desert - killing the same enemies over and over - bandits and skrags - and finding the same guns with only the most minor of variation, and no armor, gets repetitious fast. I'd suspect most people who actually buy this game are going to feel burned about their purchase in short order.




"Are you crazy? Is that your problem?" - Jack Burton

31.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:26

peteham

Jesus christ you guys can't wait a few measly days for the game to become avalaible like advertised? Get a fucking life already. Read a book, do a crossword puzzle, just please shut the hell up. I am on 2K's side. The retailers broke the street date, and the DRM is doing it's job. What more is there to say really? I'm still patiently waiting for my steam preload to unlock and it doesn't bother me that this won't happen until next week. However: How many gamers do you think know jack shit about release-dates? In any case, knowing about a release date or no, once you HAVE bought your copy, you fully expect to be able to play once you get home.. Ie: NOT wait a friggin' week before your legitimately purchased game starts working. But for the gamers who don't follow schedules/are not in the loop, this has to be doubly confusing... True enough, it was retailers who broke the street-date but it's still 2K's responsibility to take care of their legitimate customer when shit happens. If they hadn't tried to juggle release-dates due to irrational fears of piracy, I'm sure this wouldn't have happened in the first place. I don't get why they can't just turn the game on, either. The damage is done already so you could at least TRY to cater to your fully legitimate customers. Why should enabling activation earlier than planned even affect when pirated torrents start to appear? The game binaries are now most assuredly out there; what more is needed to crack the game? I fail to see the link at all. This comment was edited on Oct 24, 2009, 15:27.

30.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:26

Darks

I love their philosophy on how if they unlocked it now so those who bought that game can play it but if they did that it would be all over the pirate sites... WTF do they thinks going to happen come Monday you morons!! I’m sure it’s already being cracked as we sit here typing. All their doing is delaying the inevitable a few days longer. And this brings up another good point why the fricking hell is this game being released on a Monday and not unlocking Friday so we can play the damn thing throughout the weekend? Totally stupid marketing if you ask me. I bought Torchlight and its getting the same ass treatment as BL wait till Monday and it will unlock. Totally lame! This comment was edited on Oct 24, 2009, 15:31.

29.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:25

Beamer

Alright, this just makes no sense.
None.




------------- Music for the discerning: http://www.deathwishinc.com http://www.hydrahead.com http://www.painkillerrecords.com

28.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:24

BadPennyz

I just wish I could play the damn game this weekend.

27.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:22

Fion

Sounds like another candidate to flood every customer review site and online store (like Amazon, Newegg, etc) and rate this game a 0 like we did with Spore. It's a far more constructive way to protest than simply to pirate the game.

26.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:21

A51Abductee

After all the hullabaloo over the invasive and ridiculous DRM in a previous 2K product, Bioshock, it's saddening that PC gamers are seemingly willing to take it lying down this time around. Why buy this game and support this asinine arrangement where you relinquish ownership control, of something that you paid for, to a corporation.

25.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:17

Parallax Abstraction

I can't remember but didn't Randy Pitchford do an interview a while ago where he said he hates invasive DRM and they weren't going to be doing that with Borderlands?

Not that it matters. From what I've heard, this game is a mess on PC, just like every other Gearbox game. Poor performance, menus that don't support the mouse, 360 controls being shown even when no controller is plugged in. Gearbox has once again considered the PC an afterthought but still expect people to pay for it. Screw that.




Parallax Abstraction Geek Bravado \| Retro Flashback \| All Together Now

24.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:17

Rhett

Much like I've seen been said, and said myself (been following this bullshit since thursday): There's the people who preordered on PC and desperately waited for it to unlock. Then there's the average consumer who has NOT been constantly up to date on the situation like reading Steam/2k/Gearbox forums and knowing that you CAN NOT PLAY regardless of HOW you purchase or access the game, until the 26th. There is NO WARNING on the box, no warning until you install the game and make it UNRETURNABLE under normal circumstances, to almost ANYWHERE you bought it from. Steam users knew exactly what they were in for, but not people who just happened to pick it up in-store and say "Oh, cool, I want this game." So yeah, that's the major fuss. The other fuss is that 2K out and out lied to everyone, did NOT do any optimization (likely, unless there's a day 0 patch, but GBX has been busy with events and such), and is blaming it all on sales and piracy. While the DRM might be doing its job SO FAR (I have heard that the game has been available on private trackers, but I'm doubting that it even works at this point), it's causing so much of a pain to legal owners. You could say it's all the retailers fault, but when your advertising team is a bunch of goddamn monkeys, who's fault is it really when they put out ALL 3 versions on the same release day as is ALL OVER THE WEB? (see: TV ads, Facebook, etc like below poster says) It's all one big clusterfuck Still waiting for Steam release btw two days to go...

23.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:17

Fion

Heh, reminds me of GTA: IV where it took me 5 days to get the game all activated, fully sign up to Rockstars garbage, I even had to re-install my system so that GfW-L (that POS,) would run on my system. So five days later I am finally able to get through all the bullshit MS and Rockstar required to try and prevent piracy. I thoroughly enjoyed the game, though no where as good as the first two (not counting the original top-down ones.) Funny thing is my buddy pirated the game. He had it the day before Steam had it, and where as I spent 5 days going through flaming hoops to be able to 'legitimately' play the game. He copied over a crack and was off and playing 30 seconds later. It was then I decided I wont buy another game that puts me through that kind of shit until the industry wakes up and realizes; With these tactics you only hurt the honest fans of your game! This comment was edited on Oct 24, 2009, 15:18.

22.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:08

Prez

... and the DRM is doing it's job.

Yep it is; that is to say, it is keeping paying customers from playing the game while most likely a cracked copy will be available on P2P sites in hours if there isn't one already.

This comment was edited on Oct 24, 2009, 15:10.




Prez on Soundclick http://www.soundclick.com/bands/pagemusic.cfm?bandID=604888

21.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:07

Bumpy

If the box does not contain a written warning about the activation time and type, then as a customer I'd be mad as hell. PC gamers complain because they are treated with prejudice and disrespect. Course, pirating does the same towards game makers but 2 wrongs don't make a right.

20.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:04

Dev

Creston: In this case, it nearly is lol. Being as the retail version isn't unlocked for play, and steam isn't either. In many cases nowadays there's not even an instruction manual inside the game box.

19.

Re: Borderlands' Firm Street Dates

Oct 24, 2009, 15:00

Creston

Name another hobby where you can pay for a product, have it in hand, and can't actually use it until they tell you you can. There's no point in trying to use common sense with 'everyone', since his father/brother is currently using the family braincell. After all, preloading something on Steam is EXACTLY the same thing as buying it in stores, right? Creston

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