Deus Ex: The Gall
[Update: An impending update for The Fall will allow the game to be played on jailbroken devices. “We did not state clearly that the game would not support jailbroken devices and so we will be switching this off via an update, so that all the supported iOS devices will be able to play the game in the near future,” Square Enix tells Joystiq. “We feel it’s the right thing to do in this situation and apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.”]
The gall of some people.
Here I was innocently joking in Chris Carter’s review of iOS exclusive Deus Ex: The Fall that the lead character looks like Jean Reno, amidst all the “I never asked for this” quips. Then I catch wind, via Kotaku, that Eidos put restrictions in play to keep owners of jail broken iPhones and iPads from playing its $7 mobile Deus Ex — restrictions that are kept hidden until users actually buy the thing. Playing on a jail broken device disables shooting.
While you could feasibly play through the game stealthily, sans guns, players (via user reviews left on the game’s page) have been running into this restriction during The Fall‘s early tutorial, which could mean progress is stopped from that point on, unless you can get through the tutorial another way.
What dystopic cyberpunk future have I wandered into? Jail breaking your iOS device is a perfectly legal thing for you to do with a pricey piece of technology you purchased. Eidos is treating such consumers like pirates by implementing this hidden, game crippling feature. If this is meant to be an anti-piracy measure, it still strains credulity, because I doubt pirates would find it challenging to get past such a measure. If you have a jail broken iOS device, save yourself $7 and avoid Deus Ex: The Fall.
Eidos Disables Your Guns in iOS Deus Ex, If Your Device is Jailbroken [Kotaku]