Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!um-math!hyc
From: hyc@math.lsa.umich.edu (Howard Chu)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Flaming Irritation
Message-ID: <613@stag.math.lsa.umich.edu>
Date: 7 Apr 89 12:04:04 GMT
Sender: usenet@math.lsa.umich.edu
Reply-To: hyc@math.lsa.umich.edu (Howard Chu)
Organization: University of Michigan Math Dept., Ann Arbor
Lines: 82
UUCP-Path: {mailrus,umix}!um-math!hyc

I've read so many interesting articles in this group this week, it's a shame
to be complaining like this, but I'm really pissed off about things, so here
goes...

I heard a lot about Falcon, from Spectrum Holobyte. Saw folks playing it
(in monochrome) on Macs at work, people just loved it. Heard that the ST
version is the best implementation of all of them (AT, Mac, Amiga...). Well,
I went to the local store, ordered a copy, waited for it to arrive, and
tried it on their machine. (This is a long time span, much compressed...)
Looks great, boy, I'm impressed. Bring it home, the damn thing won't boot.
I get variously - plain desktop, 2 bombs then the desktop, or the startup
screen followed by 4 minutes of disk grinding, followed by an Exception
message that horizontally scrolls across the screen. Gee, I guess I have
a drive speed problem or something. Can't believe that the game would have
trouble running on my Mega.

Also bought Tetris. Also from Spectrum Holobyte. This game also pisses me
off. It as well as Falcon is distributed on two single sided floppies. Fine,
that's usual. Why can't I install these things on my hard drive? They take
forever to load, and in the case of Falcon - will never load. What is this?
I have to send in $10 per game just to get legal backups? After just spending
$80 on the games themselves? As a software buyer aren't I entitled to usable
copies of my software? Tetris invariably crashes after playing 10 times in
a row, after accessing the disk. It seems to be checking for some protection
flag on the disk and not finding it. Perhaps I'm not expressing myself very
well at the moment - I spent a very frustrated couple of hours with these
two packages, late at night after some intense hacking. Words fail me as I
attempt to convey my frustrations. Sort of like the irritation I felt with
Dungeon Master, which is also heavily protected. I spend all this effort to
put together a fast system with fast hard drives, and I get tied to slow,
unreadable floppies for commercial software? Huh? The Mac and PC versions
of Tetris and Falcon have been copied all over creation, but the evil cheapskate
Atarians can't be trusted not to pirate software? Geeze, for further insult
I have to squint at this stupid "codewheel" just to be allowed the privilege
of playing the game that I rightfully purchased. (Falcon.) Assuming the
computer is able to read that much of the disk.

There's a good, sensible rule I read in the Atari Developer's kit (which I
finally received. Good stuff here.) which says not to hard-code drive names
or paths into your software. Makes sense, let the user move the files around
as they see fit. All of these programs appear to have hard-coded pathnames.
Bleah....

There's certainly something to be said for protecting one's investment, but
I am utterly disgusted here. I'm picking on Spectrum Holobyte here because
I think they're being grossly unreasonable. Copy protection that doesn't
interfere with operation of the actual software is fine, but protection that
hinders operation is worse than obnoxious. It's criminal. (And don't tell me
about that "no warranty express or implied" clause - shrink-wrap licenses
like that are another sore point. "Breaking the seal implies agreement to
these terms" on a piece of paper wrapped in shrink-wrap is a total crock.)
For Falcon - a very complex game, one you couldn't even think about playing
without the (huge) manual. Then they add in this STUPID disk protection,
and this funny codewheel thing. Geeze, why can't you just have plain old,
every-day readable backup-able disks and use something else for the key?
How about a stupid joystick/cartridge/whatever port dingus, or a specially
protected Key disk that has to be in the drive, but doesn't actually have any
of the software on it? That would at least allow installing the software onto
other than the stupid floppies...

I suppose what really irks me at this point is seeing everyone copying the
same programs all over the place on their Macs, while I'm sitting here with
a couple worthless disks on my ST. Gee, if suddenly overnight the ST were to
completely replace every Mac that'd ever been sold, would that stop piracy
of Atari software? Software companies *seem* to think that they don't have to
worry about "professional" machines because their users are Too Honest for
that. @#$%#@$%^$%^&$%&@#$@!!

I guess I should just get back to hacking... I get more use out of PD software
anyway. My $80 is utterly wasted. (The store owner won't accept returns on
software because "disks are so easily pirated." !@#@#%@^#)

By the way - even if you don't mind dealing with protected disks, I'd stay
away from Tetris. The ST version is particularly slow and unresponsive. It
often misses keystrokes, making it impossible to do well at higher levels.
The sound routines also, in a word, suck. They lose time with screen and
mouse activity - pop up a menu, hear the music skip a beat. Drag the cursor
around a bit, likewise. For $35, you deserve better, and can easily find it
elsewhere.
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