Itās a bit late, but EA has finally got around to releasing a tool that will āde-authorizeā Spore installations so the game can be more easily reinstalled in the future.
In a classic case of ābetter late than never, but not much,ā the tool has arrived three months after EA vowed to ease off on Sporeās DRM restrictions in the ānear future.ā With the tool, Spore installations can be de-authorized at any time, even without uninstalling the game; if that happens, and the game is launched again in the future on that machine, it will attempt to automatically re-authorize.
Unsurprisingly, however, there are limitations to the toolās capabilities. It only works with current installations, so installations on older machines that were not cleared with the tool remain unavailable without a call to EAās customer service department. The limit of five systems on which the game can be concurrently authorized also remains in place, and naturally it will do nothing to address complaints about hardware and software incompatibilities with SecuROM.
On the upside, the tool will help ensure that authorizations arenāt unnecessarily lost to system upgrades; owners who install a new video card, for instance, only need to de-authorize the game with the tool, install the card and then start the game, at which point a new license will be automatically created.
EAās new Spore De-Authorization Tool can be downloaded here. To learn more, have a look at MaxisCactusā message at Sporedum.
via: GameCyte
Published: Dec 18, 2008 1:09 AM UTC