Can someone explain to me why my perfectly legally bought copy of MA on install is telling me that it won't run because an illegal copy was detected?

I have run this on my laptop also and there is no problem.
Laptop graphics card is not powerful enough to play the game.

I presume this is because there my desktop drive is a DVD-RAM?
Panasonic SW-9571.

What sort of copy scheme is this?

I presume if this is the case it just a frisbee now? Should I send it back to the online retailer and begin warning other customers that the game is unplayable in certain drives due to some copy protection scheme?

Not impressed. I don't appreciate being accused of being a pirate because I have non-standard hardware.

I"m 99% dvd -ram as in "random acess memory" does not exist. I have a DVD-ROM and it will run the disk just fine.

Hi, Thank you for your posting.

You know, with computers and those different hardware types sometimes problems may occur. We are verry sorry for the inconvenience you had.

I can assure you that Wargaming.net's and Matrix Games' specialists will do their best to find out the reason for such copy protection behaviour.

Could you, pleaese, fill in the support form here:
http://www.massiveassault.com/support.php

So that we get more information about your system and can contact you with possible solutions.

One thing, which now comes in my mind:
Do you have only single DVD Drive? Or you also have another CD-ROM or another DVD drive installed on the same computer?

One of our playrs had a problem because of two drives mounted on his PC. Please, have a look here:
http://massiveassault.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=207

and there was a solution proposed, which really helped.

Thank you for your understanding

Dryfire to answer your point try here

http://www.netbored.com/dvdrdrive/sw-9571.htm

It does exist, its not a typo. I should know as its installed in my machine right now. Its an odd format useful for backups. Also does DVD-R and DVD-RW. So you are 100% wrong about being 99% sure it doesn't exist. Anyway I'm just easily irritated at the moment so I will stop harping on about this.

Vic, yes I do understand that different hardware can cause problems. I'm just a bit annoyed by the error message to be honest. Considering the amount of games I've purchased I've never yet had one accuse me of being a pirate. Thats something of a first. It just really got on my nerves for some reason. I have some other Matrix games titles and I've never had this problem (Squad Assault,Uncommon Valour).

The configuration on this machine is probably quite odd as it is a single DVD-RAM drive with a card reader (Secure Digital cards etc.) instead of a floppy drive. Small form factor machine similar to a Shuttle XPC.

I suspect one particular item that might be a problem is that I have Alcohol 52% on the machine also which acts as a virtual CD-Drive to mount drive images on. Very handy with a large harddisk as you don't have to keep swapping cds all the time. I had checked out the post you mentioned but it relates to having two CD-Drives so I had discounted it. Possibly the game wishes to be run from the Virtual drive but unless I can make an image file of the CD then I won't be able to do this. Considering I run most games from this virtual drive anymore I'd rather not have to de-install it.

This is the European edition published by GMX media. Perhaps thats relevant. I will fill out the support form also.

I have replied your email to support.

Thank you Vadim.

I will hopefully get a chance to try this tommorow. I must say your effort in supporting this is very much appreciated. I have have never had a developer build a specific patch for my particular problem with a game before.

Many thanks.

No joy with this Vadim unfortunately. Still getting the Illegal copy error message.

Stupidity on my part. Didn't copy the patched exe into the game directory. Once I did it works fine.

Many thanks.

Now with all that behind me I can hopefully get stuck into the game.

Just goes to prove that the developers are "really" behind this community which is fantastic news .

Ren

It certainly is. I have no complaints. A specialised patch to solve my particular problem with the game is not something I expected at all.

About the only other company I might have expected that from is Stardock Systems (Galciv).

hmmm i'm having this exact same problem with my bought copy of MA.... this whole thread didn't make sense to me, so could someone plz explain?? thanks

lol sweeeeet ... i figured it out... took the ma.exe straight off the cd, and replaced the exe in my MA folder...works great now!! lol

Hi,

I'm having the same problem after applying the ma_gmx_1.0.190 patch. The program runs correctly prior to the patch.

I just applied the patch and received the Illegal Copy detected message. Restored the original ma.exe and it does run correctly but defeats the purpose of the patch just a little...

I am running Windows XP SP1 and have a DVD ROM, CDRW.

Bill

I'm having the same problem as WYBaugh. Game runs great before the patch, "Illegal copy" afterwards. I am running XP and have a CDRW.

oh if replacing the exe again is gonna hinder me from playing multi then i need a new exe.... i guess maybe i still have the same prob

any solution to this (devs )

thnx ciao

Guys, could you please, check into this:

Which regional versino do you have?
USA? (Published by Matrix Games and Tri Synergy)?

If you have puchased the game in the USA or Canada

The thing is that currenly only the EUROPEAN Patch is available, and if you downloaded the European patch and tried to install it above the US-purchased version, then of course, you would have that illegal copy problem.

Please, post in this thread which regional version of the game you have.

Thanks.

I too am seeing the illegal copy error.

I purchased the game from Electronics Boutique in the US. I installed the English patch assuming it was related to language not origin of purchase. I have tried running the game on a CD-RW and a standard CD drive (this system contains both). I get the error with each.

I realize after rereading your download page that I should have used the Trueupdate first. Trying after downloading and installing the GMX version states that the game is up to date.

I removed the ma.exe as someone else suggested and renamed ma_orig.exe as ma.exe. The game works fine in this state. Trueupdate still doesn't see a new update though.

Thanks Vic. I do have the US version from Tri-Synergy. I'll wait for the right patch.

Vic,

Thanks for the info and you are correct...I can't read! I have the US version.

Bill

Well, yeah... you know... there are other territories speaking American language... it was back in 17th century (if I'm not mistaken) when American pilgrims occasionally spread that language to a couple of small European islands ....


I'm kidding, of course...