DRM removed from Bad Company 2

Better late than never, right? Today Bad Company 2 received a patch that removes the game’s annoying SecuROM DRM, and provides some minor performance upgrades and bug-fixes. However, DICE seems to have decided to include ALL previous patches in this one. So even if you already have all the other patches, you’ll still have to still download the full 2.6 gigabyte file.

The full list of changes are as follows:

-Removed some memory leaks
-Fixed crashes when the game attempted to render lots of content (high detail, high FOV or
multiple-monitor modes); this should particularly help multi-monitor users
-Chat window no longer causes lag spikes
-Chat window reworked opacity & visibility-time is controllable through settings in settings.ini
-Clantag is remembered when using auto-login
-Banner URLs can be up to 252 characters in length
-SecuROM wrapper removed from non-Steam version
-Minor performance enhancements
-Reduced rubberbanding on servers with more than 24 active players
-PrintScreen takes a screenshot, file stored in DocumentsBFBC2Screenshots directory

Now, I’m glad they’re still supporting the PC version and all, but it seems kind of odd to bundle ALL patches with it. Especially when they’re not a lot of fixes. Kind of got a rude wake-up when I realized my PC was downloading a 2.6G file, but whatever.

For a bit more details and a dinosaur joke, head over to the Battlefield Blog

Side note for the few interested in what the SecuROM actually did: when you install Bad Company 2 you get two choices: use a disk-based activation check to activate the game without having to connect to the internet, or activate it by connecting to EA’s servers. The former lets you activate it if you have no connection, or an unreliable one, but you need to keep the disk in the tray to play. The latter lets you play without keeping the disk in the tray, but have to connect to the ‘net to validate the game. It’s a bit better than other activation methods, which don’t give you any choice.