Spindle When You’re Winning

Last night I fancied testing out my newly-upgraded computer with a game I’d had for a while but not really played properly, which was my dad’s copy of Command & Conquer 3.

However, being my dad, he bought it on DVD a few years ago and it’s been quite used, left in its case to buffet around, left on coasters… the usual sort of stuff CDs seem to go through. And I know that CDs are actually pretty fragile so it was no surprise (but plenty of disappointment) that the install took so long that I cancelled it, and the disc was covered in a litany of smudges and little scratches.

This post is not a call for EA to replace my game; I know I’ve no chance of getting one. And I suppose both I and my dad cannot be absolved of all responsibility in what happened to C&C3 over the last five years. But I did want to play this game that I have, and can’t.

My dad paid a considerable sum for this game back in the day – technically, for a licence to play C&C3, but the physical media is unusable. Therefore, am I forced to either buy the game again (it’s £14.99 on Steam) or go without, and I don’t think that’s right.

Though of course, I could just pirate a copy of the game and play it. But I feel… morally grey about that. Will Big Content let me essentially “steal” a game I already own to replace my worn media? I think that, yes, this is a situation where piracy – or, more accurately, the acquisition digitally of data I bought before but can no longer access.

File sharing has been under quite immense attack by Big Content this year, so I’m reticent to go downloading a .iso of my game without considering the consequences. I’d rather not get a nasty threatening letter, and I can’t rely on the defence of “they’ll never know” – sooner or later that will catch up. And it’s not like the facts that I’m in possession physically of the game I’d be “stealing” would matter – my IP would be logged, file transfer logged, letter sent thank you very much.

There’s a few lessons in this that can be taken while I mull this over, however:

1. Take care of your discs – As I found out in an excellent Ashens review video, even whirling a disc around momentarily on a presumed-flat, clean surface can cause tiny scratches, so always place discs back in cases when not in use, and don’t swirl them around. Even in the cases.
2. Buy games on online distribution sites – And by that I mean, buy games on Steam. I never used to like Steam but once I started using it in 2010 it’s been great. You don’t ever have to worry about damaged discs and lost serial keys as it’s all attached to your account and totally machine-agnostic. Of course, there’s always deals too, and a large selection of old games which is nice'; for instance, I recently bought SimCity 4 for £1.75, for two reasons: it’s a great game and, yep, I own it already but my discs are almost ten years old…
3. If you can, back up your discs to your machine – I use a duo of excellent, free related programs called ImgBurn and it’s “banned” predecessor DVD Decrypter (Google it, shh!) to back up the discs I already physically own (so shush, lawyers) to .iso files on my hard drive. That way, I can either burn these files to disc to create “new” media if it ever breaks, or better, use these .iso files in virtual DVD drives and eliminate the need for a spinning piece of plastic, which is the weakest and most vulnerable part of this distribution method.

Anyway, until next time, hope that’s been of help as I mull turning fifty shades of morally grey…