Atari Technical Support

[Shogun Gunner]

I have a relative who just started playing Civ3 Conquests (he's rather new to the franchise and computers in general). Anyway, his CD is damaged and it won't allow him to start up Conquests. Knowing him, (he's a messy teenager ) he just stacks all his CDs and DVDs on his desk in his room. Anyway, he asked me for assistance, so I sent this message to Atari tech support.

I have placed Atari's tech support response below. What is wrong with them? In a response to the message below, I offered to mail the old, non-working CD back and pay the shipping cost, no response yet.

I'm going to purchase Alcohol 120% so this situation doesn't happen to me. This was originally a suggestion made by our own vmxa1.

Unfortunately we are unable to provide replacements for media, manuals, playsets or CDKey's unless there is a manufactured defect within the original 90 day warranty from purchase. Lost or damaged media, manuals, playsets or CDKeys are not covered under the warranty and we do not offer paid replacements.

When replying please include all previous contacts.

Gary / Tech19
Atari Technical Support - North America
www.atarisupport.com / www.atari.com

-----Original Message-----
From: XXXXX@XXXX.XXX [mailto:XXXXX@XXXX.XXX]
Sent: Friday, December 10, 2004 5:28 PM
To: tech1@atari.com
Subject: Civilization III - Windows XP : North America :


REQUIRED CUSTOMER INFORMATION
Name : XXXXXXXX
E-mail : XXXXXXXX
Birthday : XXXXXXXX
Warranty : Out of Warranty
Product Name : Civilization III
Customer OS : Windows XP
Customer Country : United States

OPTIONAL CUSTOMER INFORMATION
Phone Number :
E-mailed Us Before? : no
Phoned Us Before? : no
Browser & OS : Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US;
rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20041103 Firefox/1.0RC2
IP Address : 141.xxx.xxx.xxx:3589

ISSUE DESCRIPTION
My Civ 3 CD is slightly cracked and it doesn't read when starting the game up. Because it's cracked, I can't play the game. Can I get a replacement CD?

[punkbass2000]

I don't see why one would expect to receive a free CD just because they were careless with the one they bought...

[Shogun Gunner]

replacement CD at cost. Common practice for most companies.

[Modo44]

Maybe because the company made it very hard for the customer to make a safety copy? A copy that he is allowed to make, you know...

[punkbass2000]

I'm not saying they shouldn't do it or that it wouldn't be a good PR, but if you're going to leave your CDs lying around they're going to get damage. IF a "stupidity warranty" was not bought with the game then there's no valid complaint.

[Shogun Gunner]

And what if that happens due to no fault of the customer? There's always a possibility of not being able to read a CD due to not fault of the customer.

Interesting position to take, punkbass. As I stated before, most companies will replace a CD if you send the broken one back. You might be asked to pay shipping and/or a nominal fee.

[punkbass2000]

If it's no fault of the customer then the warranty covers it.

Again, I'm not saying they shouldn't do it, just that it shouldn't be expected of them. If I were Atari I'd definitely do it just to keep customers happy.

[Shogun Gunner]

Incorrect. Read the email response. "only within 90 days"

[punkbass2000]

I find it difficult to believe that this would occur in more than 90 days and not be the customers fault. 90-day warranties are fairly common for electronics goods; any manufacturer fault will make itself apparent during this time. Otherwise you can expect it to last at least 5 years, which is why they try to sucker you into the 3-year extended warranty, which is almost always useless.

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by Modo44
Maybe because the company made it very hard for the customer to make a safety copy? A copy that he is allowed to make, you know...

Making a safety copy is not hard and all virtual Cd products can do it for the three civIII games.

[Sabre2th]

It is actually quite easy to make a backup of Civ3 CDs. I play using an image made with an old version of WinISO. No extra effort was required

[vondrack]

...however, all these virtual CD products are in fact illegal in the EU.

I would not say a word against Atari's approach if the CD was not copy-protected. But it is and since one is unable to make a backup copy by legal means, then they are, IMO, morally obliged to provide replacement CDs at cost whenever the original fails to function (for whatever reason).

The money paid for the game are not paid for the CD. They are paid for the right to use the software (i.e. for the license). This right is perpetual and shall not be affected in any way by a faulty CD.

We published several copy-protected multimedia titles in my country and this was the approach we took: we used copy-protection (LaserLock) to prevent (to some extent) unauthorized duplication, but always provided a replacement CD upon receiving a non-functional original. That's the only way I consider acceptable to both the publisher and the customer.

[alva]

What Vondrack said...especially about the license part.

[vmxa1]

My guess is that they would charge about what you could find it for on ebay or resale. It won't be 5 buck, it will be more like 15 or 19.99 plus shiping.

Your best bet is to take it back to the store for an exchange.

[Modo44]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Making a safety copy is not hard and all virtual Cd products can do it for the three civIII games.

... if you have the required software, that is. And the knowledge to do so, because a simple copy with any application might not work. As Vondrack said, copy-protection is the issue here. If it wasn't there, I'd accept Atari saying "screw you" (they used more polite words, yes ), but as it is - I don't.