So, recently, I pulled Gears of War off the shelf once more, for some LAN-COOP action with a friend of mine. After the endless installer, I decided we did not have the time to patch the game, and tried to fire up the game.A nice box told me:
"You cannot run this game with moddified executable code, please reinstall"

That's odd -- this is a fresh installation. Two of them, as a matter of fact. What gives? Turns out Games For Windows Live, which already murders the Multiplayer experience of several games, now actually will not let you play your own games.Now, for those of you too lazy to follow the link, what essentially happened is another run-in with Digital Rights Management: the exe is set to expire and will not let you run the game past the expiry date. (It stands noted that this is caused by Games For Windows Live, which is also used in GTA IV, Crysis and Dawn of War II, so one has to wonder whether those will go down in a ball of flame soon, as well).

Neither party (Epic nor Microsoft) wants to "point fingers", and for a good reason: Although Microsoft made an incredibly bad product (GFWL), Epic has chosen to opt to roll with it, and their devs didn't notice this little bug. Notorious cracker Razor1911 did not either, however, so perhaps we should not judge too harshly.

Secondly: What kind of DRM is this? It can be bypassed by, and I kid you not: setting back your Windows time to before the expiry date. Ergo: this system utilizes the Windows date and time to verify the true date and time, which can be changed with a few clicks. Not even the BIOS time, which would at least require a reboot of your computer to fix.

Guys, can we just stop with the terrible, terrible DRM systems you keep devising? You really are only hurting your paying customers, not the pirates.

p.s. Epic has released a patch to fix problem for you: clicky.

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Steam is selling the entire Ghost Recon series for 20USD. For those of you unfamiliar with the series, looking for some quick advice from a hardcore Ghost Recon player:

Ghost Recon & Island Thunder & Desert Siege: Back in the day, these were the most tactical shooters money could get, and I've spent countless hours with my friends trying to beat the maps. Enormous fun, but if you want to enjoy these games, you better be prepared for a jump back in time. These were the days when the enemies would shoot from their eyes, not their guns, and where bullet trajectory and ballistics consisted of straight lines. It's definitely a ton of fun, but only if you're not expecting it to hold up to a modern game. Bonus points for having coop multiplayer in a tactical FPS.

Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter (I): Back when it came out, I had been very excited about it. Since I loved the series so far, I instantly went and got the game. It featured beautiful, absolutely beautiful graphics, clunky controls, terrible AI and uninteresting missions. On Metacritic, it received an 8.0, which must have been based solely on just how beautiful it is. I found it unplayable due to the aggravating AI, and quit playing when in rapid succession my squadmate, whom was to cover a street, turned his back on the street to stare at a wall, which caused my squads' death. Then, after respawning, we move past that bit, I tell my squad painstakingly which areas to cover, only to have them do so standing straight up, while what we are attacking is sniper positions. In order to get to cover, they decided to run into the base. Unless you're looking for just a pretty shooter, pass this one up.

A blurb from IGN:
"Yes, I was sick of the same old brown city by the end of the game and, yes, I did hate the stupid checkpoints, but the rest of the game is so enjoyable that I still found myself smiling in spite of those frustrations."
I found nothing to smile at.

Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter (II): This quote from PALGN says it all:
Despite obvious problems with the AI, GRAW2 is a solid, polished game that will draw you in and keep you hooked to the end.
Except.... I wasn't drawn in. At all. Just annoyed with the AI.

Although the entire package is only 20 USD, I recommend passing on it, and buying a proper shooter instead. A measly $10 more gets you the Orange Box.

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