Be Excellent To Each Other

Not sure if this has already been mentioned, but TrackMania Nations has been released, and it's a free download. Apparently no StarForce copy protection either.

It's good, get it.

http://www.trackmania.com/en/index.php? ... info&id=94

Do what the man says. It's brilliant.

Nations Forever is the new one.

Don't get anything called just "Nations", it could well have SF and in any case you'd want to upgrade straight away.

If you bought Trackmania United (and why wouldn't you?) this also creates a free expansion pack for that and you have more options when playing on a server with Nations Forever playing freeloaders such as using custom skins, changing your profile and starting thread topics*.

* 2 of these might be a lie.

What is this?

Oooh, shiney shiney. I already bought United when it came out, so now I've got a spanky United Forever. I will have to start playing it again!

"Don't get anything called just "Nations", it could well have SF and in any case you'd want to upgrade straight away.

If you bought Trackmania United (and why wouldn't you?)"

Yep, the original NATIONS does indeed include Starforce whereas the new one thankfully doesn't. It's a great freebie.

However, regarding the "why wouldn't you?" comment regarding Trackmania United, well...because it DOES contain Starforce ! (only a "light" version apparently, on both the retail and downloadable versions, but ANY form of Starforce is dodgy and risky as far as I'm concerned, so your post seems a little bit contradictory in that respect).

That only concerns the original release of Trackmania United though.
If you now decide to buy the downloadable version of Trackmania United bundled with the FOREVER add-on, it no longer includes Starforce.
Unfortunately it costs £19.99.
You can buy a brand new copy of Trackmania United in the shops (with Starforce) for about £6.99, and the FOREVER expansion is a free download, so £19.99 seems a bit steep.

I'm going to wait until the retail version of UNITED FOREVER (without Starforce) hits the shops (it's coming soon apparently), and I'll no doubt be able to pick up a copy for under a tenner within a few weeks of release (great game in short bursts I'm sure, but not worth risking £19.99 on for me).

The lite version of Starforce isn't starforce. It's exactly the same as every other copy protection system on every PC game just about ever. It installs no drivers at all.

I have a version downloaded from Nadeo on launch day and it passes the checks here for instance.

http://www.whoismadhur.com/2006/04/06/s ... e-removal/

This. I check for this kind of stuff for more of a practical reason than an idealistic one cus the low level driver thingies don't tend to work in XP 64 bit, and buying a game to find out it doesn't work would piss me right off.

The Steam version (now defunt, it just goes to Forever) had nothing over and above any game already, certainly didn't try and install any drivers (and if it did try, it failed silently and worked anyway).