Confessions of a Pirate

I wouldnt describe myself as a law abiding citizen as such, I am strictly a conscience kind of man, and if my conscience happens to align with the law then thats a bonus. I mean if it were made legal to murder people, I don't think my conscience would agree. Laws a merley guidelines, blurry ones at that and to believe any law is just simply because it is a law is ignorant at best.

I'm quite a fair guy when it comes to copyright really, I mean for every snide dvd I have I must have at least 12 originals that were legally paid for. I generally end up buying a legal copy of the snide film if it merits it, I did this with Rocky Balboa and John Rambo (Very sceptical before they came out, but sly deserved my money.

I dont have any pirate xbox 360 games, I just dont see the point of that kind of hassle. Besides I'm patient, I'm still waiting for fifa 09 to drop even further in price, after all fifa 08 still has lots of online life in it.

Now onto the Football Manager series. Right next to me I have the legally purchased copies of FM07 and FM08, both bought and paid for. Great games with no stupid DRM, worth my money if you ask me.

FM09, Oh boy did you drop the ball a little. I know lots of people who previously bought this series but instead opted for the "Non-DRM cracked version". I dont know if people are aware of this, but the patch SI released actually enabled the demo version of the game to be turned into the full version (minus the manager holiday mode; weird). I know I was playing the game at least 2 full days before you guys, and even then you had activation problems.

So why the hell am I here confessing to illegal activity. Well like I describe I,ve never been against SI not getting my money. £25 has always seemed like a great price to me, I know FM is a game you keep playing until the next version is released.

Basically guys I want to go and buy FM2010 next year, I really do but you got the pull your head out your arse over this DRM protection. IT DOESNT WORK, IT NEVER HAS AND IT NEVER WILL. I realise this was most likely more SEGA's decision than yours, but next year guys you gotta be firm and insist on no draconian DRM protection.

Maybe you can pursuade them to release future batches without this draconian style set up, I would happily give up my cracked version for a legitimate copy that also has the editor (which I dont have).

A final note. Instead of banning as soon as you can. Why not try to engage, because believe it or not there are pirates (as you call us anyway) that do wanna be fair. Give us the chance, strip away this silly DRM and watch sales flourish. In fairness you might not feel the impact this mess has had this year, but you might feel it for FM2010.