Where are all the cracks?
 

Is it me, or have many of the recent big releases not got cracks available for them? Games like Titans, TigerW04, Space Colony amonst many. Is it the new Safedisc/Securom protections that are foxing the crackers. I buy originals, but it's not half P****ng me off having to swap CD's all the time. COME ON GUYS, GET CRACKING!

heh you really dont have a clue, those games were cracked, your source for cracks is just crap.. thats all

Re: Where are all the cracks?
 

Funny thing....becuse there are a Topic thread named "Where To Find Cracks"....:p

Where can I look for these cracks other than Siedler, G******world, Meg****mes, G****ix, or all the file sharing programs. Even Spielebrennen who can normally be relied on, seem to have had legal grief, and dropped all their cracks! Please
give me some pointers to better sites/methods.

Hey, don't bag Spielebrennen man, thats a damn good site, they might not have lots of cracks, but every crack I have ever downloaded from them works.....

I guess you will just have to be patient for GameCopyWolrd to update, they always have the cracks, so please be patient for everyones sake, remember, they first have to be submitted to GCW first, then it will be the webmaster (Empire I think?) choice whether they are posted on the site or not.....

All files/games will be posted, but you first have to get them to be able to post them... obviously

Indeed, but where are the files for some of the popular titles like Age Of Empires 1 & 2 and the Sims, I notice they are missing?

The cracks for Age Of Empire (Microsoft) and The Sims + Expansions (EA) can you find on GameFix .

@viperspit01:
www.spielebrennen.de doesn't have any crack since a few month !!!
The reason is (when i remember right) the new copyright law here in germany.

Ok Thanks for that, but they have No-CD patches, No-CD patches don't violate any copyright laws in any country in the world as they are a stand alone patch and dont contain any of the games code. They are no different to mods, patches, trainers etc.

They certainly violate the DMCA in the USA, and they will also violate the new laws coming down in all european countries because of a european directive. I'm not saying people will be actually sued for breaking a copy protection, but in the USA this is theoretically possible NOW. The DMCA forbids any bypassing of a copy protection device, and this includes patches. It will be interesting to see whether they can actually enforce this, but don't have to much illusions about patches...

In Sweden any type of crack even no-cd patch are violate the laws. It's forbidden to backup your program, game or video in Sweden, even if it's in private use! :o

If altering game code is going to become illegal parse, are the game crack sites days all coming to an end? I have never downloaded a game in my life (other than a Demo or maybe Beta), but the thought of having to have the original on my desk gives me the creeps. I like to have my originals tucked safely away, while my backups are in a wallet if (or when) I need to reload windows and get the games re-installed. Let's be straight about this....Most downloaded WAREZ versions come pre-cracked anyway, I know as I've seen them being flogged at a local car boot sale. It's normally the genuine folks who are looking fo nocd cracks. The only problem I see is that having the crack enables you to sell the original and keep the game. While this is illegal, at least the person has bought the game in the first place, and thus the developer gets is money. I'm afraid honest people are few and far between nowadays. The fact is, when you can chip an x-box and buy an extra HD for peanuts, and then run hundreds of the latest titles from an option screen, it's just too tempting for many people, especially with games costing so much. There needs to be a radical new way in which we pay for and play our games. I purposely Don't own any console because it's more difficult to back-up the games. Unless I can make a back-up, I don't feel as though I OWN the game, if you see what I mean. I am reliant on the original not getting errors (rare I know, but it does happen). Console makers have to protect their products to a certain degree of course, but I've never bought any console since cartridge based ones. A cartridge is a solid piece of electronics that you feel is your own (sound like Gollum!), where as a cd is volatile media in my opinion. I know my veiws are sad and rather paranoid, but that is how I feel.

Thats actually not 100% correct, what we have is stand alone "NO-CD patches" which lets just say, change the games orignal "byte Patterns" (jumps etc.) to disable the cd checks, this is not illegal, as the no-cd patch does not contain any of the games code (for instance, the no-cd patch can be a dos mode program, or a patch created with some in-house software). On the other hand, however a "Fixed exe" as most people like to call, are the games original executable with the code "reverse engineered" to remove the protection (removing the protection is not illegal in many contries, as this constitutes "backing up your game", im not 100% about this in Europe though), however the "Fixed exe" still contains the games code/coding, therefore using these "fixed exe" on a non legite copy is no different to pirating the game itself (as in obtaining the copy illgeally, say off some of the popular peer to peer programs, kazaa, overnet, e-donkey etc.)

And if you don't belive me check with your local BSA, and they also comply with the digital millenium act.

But Krondike if you say in your homeland that you can't backup your games in any way (which by the sounds of things, you need a new government!, as you legally purchased the game, and if its a "US" copy, then the EULA agreement still gives you the right to back up the game, when you click "I agree", so theres a bit of a technical for all the lawyers out their!) then yes that means any form of backing up your game, whether is be no-cd patches or not is illegal. Do you know why they came up with this law Krondike, and was there anything anyone in Swedan could have done about this? Pertition perhaps? Letters to the government? I know that letters and that might not work, but sometimes its worth a try.

BTW whats heppening with Alcohol 120% software? Because didnt they have to stop making it or something?

actually altering the executable in any shape or form is against the eula, and also probably some laws in some countries.. a no-cd patch (which patches the executable, either in memory or on disk) is strictly speaking illegal as the eula states no reversing allowed therfore for the patch to exist, the executable would have been reverse engineered/debugged to find where to patch..
like it or lump it, using cracks/no-cd patches or whatever is against the eula and by that its also against the law.. as for the magical right to be able to backup your software, i'd love to know who dreamt that one up as i cant see any legal information about it at all and i have searched.

When i understand right the new german copyright laws, it is forbidden to bypass any copy protection. The way you use for that is not important. And that mean not only software-ways (Cracks/NoCDs). Also hardware. My LiteOn CD-Burner is able to make perfect 1:1 backups of Safedisc2 protected cds. Now it's illegal to make a backup of that.

And thats the problem with the new law. The manufactors only have to print "Product is copy protected" on the label/box of their product, without really having a copy protection on the CD.
If you have a backup of it, you have break the law.

Or do I see that wrong?

Just changing 1 byte (or supplying this information in any kind of way - text, patch or whatever) is already illegal under US DMCA & will be illegal in most eu countries but is not implemented yet everywhere because of current fair use laws from country to country. Germany is most likely on of the first eu countries implementing this eu law in german law

Sweden law is totally crazy as they have totally thrown out fair use (e.g. backup for own use). You may wander who drafts up these laws...

We know this is a problem for ANY site which is supplying files and/or information... These laws are a bad thing as you can not do anything anymore. Even showing a bloodpatch or whatever on your will be illegal one way or another... And the biggest problem that these law are unstoppable...

And yet again, its not illegal to supply/host tools to enable people/yourself to backup your games, their is no consistancy with these laws.

Therefore hosting/supply of "No-CD patches" (please read the defintion between a "fixed exe" and a no-cd patch in the previous posts) even if they are deemed illegal is not illegal to host them, because they constitute a method of backing up your games, therefore its only actually "illegal" if you are using them.

And the best thing about that is that there is nothing they can do about that law (as in change it, to become illegal to host these no-cd patches") The same goes for "hacking" (computer hackers) tools, its not illegal to supply tools, nor to supply informtation/articles about hacking.

So basically they could theoritically ban these "fixed exes" from being hosted, but not no-cd patches, as they dont contain any of the games code or coding.

Therefore I would not fear the no-cd patch side of things, but just maybe "fixed exe" files.

But I do see where you are coming from Tippex in a way.

Hey guys, if there _really_ is a difference between no-CD patches and no-CD patched EXE's then "all" we gotta do is change the packaging of no-CD patches.

Rather than supplying an already hacked EXE, packages should contain (the download location of) the hacking tool(s) (the more automated, the better) and a short description on what to do. Then everyone would be able to hack his or her own copy of the program. No original program code included!

This, mostly, depends on the large cracking groups, though, as they're not willing to publish their hacking tools: decryptors, unwrappers, decompressors, process dumpers etc... Which is quite understandable, knowing that the published tools may help companies create even nastier copy protections... ;)

Joe

Well actually, its not that hard at all to create No-CD patches from already "cracked" executables, there are many tools out the which will allow you to make a patch from an already cracked executable (one with the protection removed and/or cd checks), the sole purpose of these "patchers" is to make the game cracks into seperate, stand-alone patches much smaller in size (than the cracked exectable), in the area of of small kb size patches. They work by scanning the executables and find where the jumps etc. have been changed or moved, then creates a new seperate stand alone patch and writes these "byte batterns" into the patch. When the patch is run on an orignal exe file it changes these jumps.

I know FBSA does this, all you need is one of the cracks, and bobs your uncle, you can make a stand alone no-cd patch. Just get one of Deviances, Fairlights, GimpsRUS, Drunk etc. crack releases and use them as you base, then run the patching program, repack the no-cd patch with an .nfo file and submit it to all the sites.

Btw, spielebrennen offers any type of crack no more.
The reason was already mentioned above (new German law), but imho the admins are just scared...well, I would be so, too, if I was them ;)

AFAIK, the law affects mainly music and movie mediums...

@ viperspit01

I would gladly go back to a patch only system as this would save us A LOT OF BANDWIDTH as patches are about 100-1000x smaller than an executable... the good old days ;)

But as Joe Forster/STA already tells you that most of the current protections (SD/SD2/SR) use an encrypted EXE. To decrypte them you'll need a unwrapper. As these are just not available for every version of the protection, it is impossible to do this yourself! That is why there are Fixed EXE's and not just (smaller) patches. If you would create a patch, by comparing the original EXE and decrypted EXE then the patch will be bigger than the orginal EXE (as the files are just too different), so this is useless. Most likely you did not try this yourself ;)

FBSA only makes patches for games which are protected with a CD-Check (these executables are usually NOT encrypted). If they have a patch for an encrypted EXE then they always tell you to get the decrypted EXE first.

EMPiRE,

Yeah I do realise this, and that is why often you will see with some of the No-CD patches that they are accompanied by the "Fixed Exe" and also the much smaller patch, the patch obviously removes the CD Check from the Fixed Exe, which most crackers don't remove, as there is not need to if you going to use one of thier ISO or "Warez" releases.

But if you were to make available these No-CD patches, then the people can still use them, all they need to do is find the Fixed Exe (if you know where to look you can find them) then all they need to do is download the no-cd patch from GCW then find the Fixed Exe from somewhere else....and in the nfo file all you need to put is just for them to find the fixed exe release and run the patch, this would avid your site hsoting any of the fixed exe's which may contain some of the games code.

This may have to be the method for the furture for sites like GCW and alike. To have the No-CD patch bigger than the fixed exe or original exe is better than having no no-cd patch at all. And best of all the No-CD patch wouldn't contain any of the games code or coding, which is perfectly legal in USA, Canada, Great Britain, Australia, Spain, France Russia, China, Japan and many more other contries. (Im pretty sure some countries in Europe, especially those who are members of the European Union (the Euros currency and all) aren't allowed to backup any of their games or software (which someone has already mentioned) in any shape of form, which is just crazy.

But in regards to the No-cd patches, I doubt any of the crackers (major ones anyhow) will make no-cd patches for thier releases instead of "fixed exe's", so its left to just the people who submit files to GCW to do this.