Microsoft has reacted to news that some players are getting early copies of Titanfall. Surprisingly, Vince Zampella has gone on record that they are not going to ban these players.
About playing early: We won’t stop or ban legit copies. It is prelaunch, so there may be interruptions in service as we prep servers.
— Vince Zampella (@VinceZampella) March 7, 2014
Of course, this stands in contrast to longstanding policy from companies like Rockstar Games, that ban players when they are found to have snuck in copies of GTA early. For them, it’s a matter of blocking illicit sales, which became an issue for them as the series became popular through the years.
It’s possible the situation is different for Titanfall, since consumers are reliant on Microsoft’s servers to play it. Of course, as I’m sure many of you reading this suspect, Microsoft may also be thinking they could use all the positive word of mouth they can get.
Will information about the game be leaked? Possibly. In spite of extensive leaks from the open beta, there is still a lot of information Microsoft is holding close to their chest, particularly in the story campaign.
Ultimately, however, Microsoft may have a really good reason to not even care. This being, they have placed locks on the content that fans can’t get into without their approval. If they’re controlling those locks via the cloud, even better. Vince did allude to server preparation meaning there will be interruptions, AKA, they can shut off the servers anytime they want so early owners get nothing. In any case, none of this will matter in a week. Titanfall is coming to Windows and Xbox One on March 11, and Xbox 360 on March 25.
