If it's the retail version, you're dealing with SecuROM with (if memory serves) limited activations, although they may have removed the activation limit. Not sure on that.

This is actually less of a problem - I'm pretty sure the game will install just fine. Or alternatively you can try and import you CD-KEY into Origin and if it works you'll be able to download pre-patched version + DLC.

However, with DRM, the "library" lent you a book, but made you think that you bought it. Quite a shady behaviour.

Anyway, buying the game for real (=DRM free) here on GOG for a few dollars surely wouldn't hurt the OP so much.

And downloading it pre-cracked from a Russian torrent site won't hurt the OP at all. It's the principle of the thing :-)
I don't think the library analogy is correct. As others have stated, I bought a license to use the game - I did not expect somebody would one day be able to pull the plug on it and stop me from using my legally purchased (not borrowed!) software.

Well, it's up to you.
They surely tricked you with the DRM thing, but now you'll just end up with an illegal copy.

An Illegal copy as backup for my non-functioning legal one. I would sure feel more satisfaction if I would be able to use my licensed one, but as I have said I have no intention for paying a second time for something I should have working.

Don't think anyone mentioned it, but just FYI the GOG version comes with both the 15 year anniversary and the 20 year anniversary edition. It was about $1.99 or less in the promo if it happens to come up again. For all the headaches and lost time, effort and upset or other negative emotions one could feel over such frustrating things regarding DRM, $2 is a cheap price to pay to not only solve the problem at hand but also get the new 20 year version also and not worry about DRM with the game ever.

I understand also there may be a "principle of the matter" to this as well but at the end of the day I've found that quite often doing the thing that moves me away from a negative experience to a more positive one is more pleasant even if it costs me a small amount of money to do so or some other temporary inconvenience, and getting closure on things that irritate me is nice too. Sometimes biting my tongue and moving on just fills life with more happiness in the end.

I just fired this game up a few days ago and it is pretty slick compared to the original although you can configure it to have the same resolution etc. as the original also. Definitely worth $2 to experience the game at its best and avoid a headache at the same time.

Life has taught me not to believe to advertisements. The fact that a company advertises it as a purchase does not make it one.

Life has also taught me to expect online servers to go away, which is why, to the best of my ability, I do not borrow (nor purchase, nor use) any software that is dependent on the presence of such a server (unless I happen to own the server myself...).


That's what companies are for, shady behaviour. That and the introduction of regional banning.

That's a bad analogy because piracy is copying, not stealing. One is a civil law infringement and the other is a criminal law infringement. A proper analogy would be if photocopying anything from the library was banned by copyright law (let's say due to some country's draconian copyright laws), and that we have to pay to have the library materials lent out. Now suppose someone wanted an old magazine from the library, but the library no longer lent that old magazine out, and then the person chose to commit copyright infringement by photocopying the entire magazine (i.e. "piracy") for personal use. The person argues "it's a stupid system, so I'm not going to abide by it". That'd be a proper analogy, and then it'd be up to you to decide on the ethics of it.

Maybe you'd still disagree with that person's decision, but at least cut it out with this "stealing" crap. Your analogy would be equivalent to if the person decided to physically steal the magazine from the library's back room and climb out the window (well, your exact words were "steal books from a library").

Dude, you never owned it!
Anyway, do as you want obviously.

Just try to use GOG for the next games, to avoid other nasty surprises.

I use a crack for ME.

Not long ago I activated my physical copy of ME on Origin. Worked without a problem.

Have a look in your registry [if windows] software/gamecompany, and see if there is a reg value in it [demo reg key] if so edit it, and paste in your full version key..

just a thought

all the best

If you're running exactly the same executable that you ran 8 years ago, maybe there's some sort of date bug in the program and you could try temporarily changing your system date to what it was when you first ran the executable to input the activation code.

I've had a software program I'd bought online do this to me when I reinstalled it a couple of years later. It kept telling me my activation code was invalid and I was starting to wonder if I had developed a serious case of dyslexia... until it occurred to me to try temporarily changing my system date back and the activation code was finally accepted. Why the programmer even included a date-check routine on a program sold with a perpetual licence in the first place... beats me.

Thanks for all the suggestions. As I've already finished the game on the cracked version, I don't really feel like messing with it anymore. If I get a reply from the developers, I'll let you know.