39. Don't copy that floppy

🎧 00:00 Flashback – track from the past – show intro

Erik Zalitis 00:04.662 to another episode of Flashback Tracks from the Past. A few weeks ago, it was all about the pirates, the crackers and the wares dudes. But we must also look at the things the gaming companies did to keep your grubby little hands off the games until you forked up the dough. So, for this episode, this is the story of maps, broken diskettes and just how bad losing the manual could be.

🎧 00:08 DJ Daemon speaks: A few weeks ago it was all about the pirates, the crackers and the Warez d00dz. But we must also look at the things the gaming companies did to keep your grubby little hands off the games until you forked over the dough. So for this episode: this is the story of maps, broken disket…

🎧 00:34 ASIKWUSpulse – AM I Dancing

🎧 04:01 DJ Daemon speaks: The ways to protect the games were many and when the crackers found a way around them, the industry invented new ways to make the games you bought work for you, but making it impossible for you to copy them to your friends. The frustration in the industry was enormous and the mecha…

Erik Zalitis 04:01.27 Asic views pulse, am I dancing? So let's talk about games and protections. Well, the ways to protect the games were many, and when the crackers found a way around them, the industry invented new ways to make the games you bought work for you, but making it impossible for you to copy them to your friends. The frustration in the industry was enormous and the mechanism they threw in the mixwere therefore many. Today we'll check some of them out and talk about code wheels, the pesky manual, the map you could not live without, online protections and how they could make you suffer, and of course, the genius of Nintendo's key and lock ships.

🎧 04:49 Siren – The Last Ballad

🎧 09:19 DJ Daemon speaks: First up is the messing with the technology itself. It’s not just about computers. The industry found ways to make VHS-cassettes impossible to copy. Remember – it’s an analog format. So, it’s not that hard to make happen. On diskettes, they would often write to them in an incorrect…

Erik Zalitis 09:19.482 Siren, the last ballad. Okay, let's go through the list then. First up is messing with the technology itself. It's not just about computers. The industry found ways to make VHS cassettes, impossible to copy. Remember, it's an analog format, so obviously it's not that hard to make it happen. On the skits, they would often write them in, well, an incorrect way.that will cause them to become corrupt but still work. Any program trying to copy them would not be able to properly reproduce the discs with the flaws and the game when it started checked for the expected irregularities and refused to work if they were not there. The crackers removed this check and also repackaged the game so it could be copied. That is how we got Eagle Software, Triad, Fairlight and Razer 1911.famous cracker groups.

🎧 10:20 Arcane Toaster – Dandelion (London)

🎧 12:28 DJ Daemon speaks: In order to hear the next song, you need to consult your podcast manual page 34, paragraph 3 and type in the second word in that paragraph in the input field. Yup, the dreaded manual protections. If you had the cracked game, the were removed or would accept any input and still let…

Erik Zalitis 12:28.462 chain toaster Dandelion. In order to hear the next song, you need to consult your podcast manual, page 34, paragraph 3, and type in the second word in the paragraph in the input field below. Yep, the dreaded manual protections. If you had a cracked game, they were removed or would accept any input and still let you play. If you actually paid for the game,You'd better not lose that manual or the game would not work. Sid Meier's Pirates had a number of novel ideas on how to make this work. You see, if you failed the check, the game would still let you play. But your career as a captain would be poor as you would be given very unfavorable stats for your character. The game even warned you about it.

🎧 13:26 Melcom – Headlock

🎧 18:34 DJ Daemon speaks: Nintendo’s key and lock-chip is a marvel to behold. It’s one of the most powerfull copy protections ever deviced. It also protected the NES from running non-approved games. Each cartridge had a key-chip and each NES had a lockchip that would accept a proper key. This system is simp…

Erik Zalitis 18:36.75 Nintendo's key and lock chip is a marvel to behold. It's one of the most powerful copy protections ever devised. At least I think so. It also protected the NES from running non-approved games. You see, each cartridge had a key chip and the NES had a lock chip that would accepta proper key. This system is simple by today's standard but it was impossible to bypass directly until 2006. Some shady game developers would try to cheat the system by using a sacrificial official game and piggyback their crappy game to them.

🎧 19:22 Vincenzo – Lost in transponation

🎧 22:07 DJ Daemon speaks: One of the previous episodes of this show that was about computer piracy was called “Dial a pirate”. That’s a reference to the code wheel called just that from the game Monkey Island. It was a wheel, where you rotated it as to match up a pirates lower and upper part of their heads…

Erik Zalitis 22:07.406 Vincenzo lost in transponation. One of the previous episodes of this show was about computer piracy and it was called Dial a Pirate. That is a reference to the code wheel, called just that from the game Monkey Island. It was a wheel where you rotated it to match up apirates lower and upper part of their heads to prove that you bought the game. It was a smart move as it fit the humorous style of the game and still worked. The crackers of course removed the need for that as well.

🎧 22:45 K. Jose – Staring Danger in the Eye

🎧 25:28 DJ Daemon speaks: I have done many episodes of this podcast, and we’ve spoken about some of those protections previously. This one has been a favourite for me to talk about, and it’s SID Meier’s Pirates. That game had a map. It was a physical one that was too big for my dads Xerox-machine and purpos…

Erik Zalitis 25:28.398 KJose staring danger in the eye. I have done many episodes of this podcast and we spoken about some of those protections previously. Well, this one has been a favorite for me to talk about and it's Sid Meier's Pirates yet again. That game had a map. It was a physical one and it was too big for my dad's Xerox machineand purposely dark and with contrast levels that would make copies hard to read. Believe me, I tried this a number of times. No crackers could really fix this as it was before computers could show large pictures and run the game at the same time. So there.

🎧 26:14 Ida – Funky Lesbians

🎧 27:54 DJ Daemon speaks: Let’s move into more modern times. The digital right management era to be specific. At this time, the Internet was there and every time you started a game it would validate the game against a server. Many painful stories are told about the users that could not even start the games…

Erik Zalitis 27:54.68 neither funky lesbians. Let's move into more modern times. The digital right management era to be specific. At this time, the internet was there and every time you started a game, it would validate the game against the server. Many painful stories are told when the users could not even start the games they bought as the servers were down or malfunctioning.And Sony's infamous rootkit that pretty much hacked your Windows installation to make you hide stuff. Yeah, well, it made it clear that the only winner were those that illegally copied the game and thus didn't have to contend with that. Well, I get a story about that.

🎧 28:41 Laamaa – Opl Omega

🎧 31:33 DJ Daemon speaks: Somewhere in the mid naughties I bought a weird game called Sacred 2. It, just as its predesessor had to be the buggiest games every developed. Me and a friend played two-player co-op over my network mostly to laugh at the many weird glitches that could make our characters explode…

Erik Zalitis 31:33.318 Lamer strikes again, OPL Omega. Somewhere in the mid-noughties I bought a weird game called Sacred 2, or as I call it, Scare 2. It, just as its predecessor, had to be the buggiest games ever developed.Me and a friend played two player co-op over my network mostly to laugh at the many weird glitches that would make our characters explode without a warning or freeze for no apparent reason. But copy protection was horrible. I switched to XP, Windows XP 64 bit as soon as I got my AMD X2. And the game itself would still work, but the copy protection would not.The solution? I downloaded the cracked and thus illegal version. And it worked. Hey, don't judge. I did pay for the game, remember?

🎧 32:36 Nim – Life Hardships

🎧 36:26 DJ Daemon speaks: And now we have almost arrived in modern times. In 2012 Microsoft had a service were you could buy and download music to your Zune. You know, Microsoft’s ilfated, Ipod rip-off. In 2015 Microsoft shut the project down and on March 12, 2017 the site closed. Sad as it was for the, wha…

Erik Zalitis 36:27.054 Nim, life's hardships. And now we have almost arrived in modern times. In 2012, Microsoft had a service where you could buy and download music to your Zoom. You know, Microsoft's ill-fated iPod rip-off. In 2015, Microsoft shut the project down. And on March 12th, 2017, the site closed.Sad as it was, for the two people it still used to zone, it also meant that the songs they previously bought would no longer play. Clowns to the left and jokers to the right, here I am in the middle with a brick of a media player. Send me an email if you want a free doorstop.

🎧 37:16 Manwe of SandS – Evening Glow

🎧 39:34 DJ Daemon speaks: All right, just joking, I never had a Zune. I’m not that unfortunate sunnova… Ehh.. Never mind… So, as I said earlier, all DRM make the honest user suffer the most. They have to spinning their wheel, sift through their coffe-stained manuals, blow on the cartridges, choose their ope…

Erik Zalitis 39:34.104 Man V of sands, evening glow. Alright, alright, I was just joking, I never had a sun. I'm not that unfortunate son of a... Nevermind. So, as I said earlier, all DRM make the honest user suffer the most.They have to spin their wheel, sift through their coffee stain manuals, blow on the cartridges, chose their operating systems to match their copyright protections or maybe, I don't know, sacrifice a goat. And the laborers downloading stuff illegally, hmm? no problems for them, except the frequent malware and spyware that comes along.for the ride.

🎧 40:20 Marwin and Voice – Revelation

🎧 43:38 DJ Daemon speaks: Today, the whole debate may be dead. Do you still download movies and mp3s? I mean, we have Spotify, HBO and Netflix. Or why not YouTube and Google Music. Like listening to books? Try Audible or some other service. Podcasts are everywhere. Ah, well, when this is done, I will put on…

Erik Zalitis 43:39.512 Kevin and voice revelation. Today the whole debate may be dead. I mean, do you still download movies and MP3s? We have Spotify, HBO and Netflix. Or why not YouTube or Google Music? If you like listening to books, you can try Audible or some other service. Podcasts are everywhere.well, when this is done I will put one of my Beatles vinyl records on my record player and laugh at it all.

🎧 44:16 Mystra of Brainstorm and Nectarine – Zico

Erik Zalitis 46:52.846 Mistra of Brainstorm and Nectarine, Seiko. Alright, enough DRM talk, let's talk demo parties. Again? Yes, I can't stop talking about them, you see. But data men tell no tales. That's the slogan of the Edison Party of 2021 that runs on the 9th of July and ends on the 11th. It will be online.and a physical meeting for a select group of 50 people. Which means you have to be quick if you want to be there in person. But the sales of the on-site tickets opens in a few weeks. The online tickets are 50 Swedish kronor a pop. That's about five dollars and they can be bought on Edison party.dot com right here right now you

🎧 46:53 DJ Daemon speaks: All right enough of the DRM talk. Let’s talk demo parties. Again? Yes, I can’t stop talking about them you see, but data men tell no tales. That’s the slogan of the Edison party of 2021 that runs on the 9th of July and ends on the 11th. It will be online and a physical meeting for…

🎧 47:46 Nim – Meridian Highway

🎧 48:51 DJ Daemon speaks: There’s not much to add right now, but the next week will see less activity as we approach vacation time. But as I said the last to episodes, the podcasts will continue. There will be less of my live broadcasts, but the station will stay on 24/7.

Erik Zalitis 48:52.172 Nim, Meridian Highway. Nim is a frequent flyer this episode. There is not much to add right now, but next week we will see less activity as we approach vacation time. But as I said in the last two episodes, the podcast will continue.There will be less of my live broadcast, but the station stays on 24-7.

🎧 49:19 Nim – Reentry

🎧 51:17 DJ Daemon speaks: … And in the end of this show as it is now, I, DJ Daemon is calling it a day. This show will soon be available as a podcast. Thanks for listening.

Erik Zalitis 51:20.238 And in the end of this show, as it is now, I, DJ Demon, is calling it a day. This show will soon be available as a podcast. Again, thanks for listening.

🎧 51:33 Shaman – Melting Sunbeam

🎧 54:12 DJ Daemon speaks: Says good bye.

Erik Zalitis 54:13.198 common melting sunbeam. This is the arcade radio network and the show that is known to this world as flashback tracks from the past and it's also a podcast so you can be listening on your podcast player or on your radio. Remember that if you want to say something if you want to contact us we are available on the email address radio at a record dotnet or on.

🎧 54:45 Nim – Resuscitation please

🎧 58:47 DJ Daemon speaks: Presents last song.

Erik Zalitis 58:48.302 Nim, resuscitation please! Yeah, if you're saying that, you're either a zombie, an undead or a ghost. Anyway, last track for today. It will be static art and soft vibes. See you in a week, Derrickade Radio Network, your leader in tracked music.

🎧 59:11 Statikk Art – Soft Vibes