Sins of a Solar Empire is a new 4X/RTS game by local developer Ironclad. It looks like a pretty sweet game in itself, but you could find out all about that at any site, what is more interesting to talk about is the fact that it will be DRM-free when it reaches stores on Monday.

For years PC games have shipped with some sort of CD copy-protection which supposedly prevents people from copying the CD or ditching the CD completely. For just as many years, piracy communities have been breaking said copy-protection, and doing whatever they want. The result is an ongoing war, in which consumers are forced to tolerate publishers’ increasingly invasive and debilitating copy-protection schemes while pirates simply snicker at every new attempt and break it with their usual expediency.

Those who have been watching the subject of DRM for a couple of years will remember that Sins‘ publisher Stardock has actually been DRM-free for a while now. In 2006 Stardock released Galactic Civilizations II online and through retail stores with no CD copy protection. Today, it is one of the best-selling strategy games ever.

Publishers need to realize that there is really no justification for using DRM on PC games any more. Stardock has proved that dropping DRM doesn’t mean dropping sales; proved so well, in fact, that they are releasing another AAA game with the exact same distribution model. Will we ever see EA or Ubisoft doing the same thing? I hope enough consumers will scream that they simply won’t have a choice.

Source: Stardock_Games Blog

Further Reading:

• Galactic Civilizations II, Copy Protection, and Piracy (11 Mar 2006)
• Postmortem: Stardock’s Galactic Civilizations II: Dread Lords (5 Apr 2006)
• Starforce Must Die (21 Nov 2006)
• Star Wars: Stardock vs Starforce (22 Nov 2006)
• Ironclad talks 4X strategy with Sins of a Solar Empire (1 Feb 2008)