How To Fix Punkbuster kicks for Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (BFBC2) on Steam

If you are playing Battlefield Bad Company 2 on PC through Steam, you may be getting kicked by Punkbuster after a few seconds anytime you join an online game. This is most likely due to a conflict with Punkbuster and the BFBC2 Beta installation on your PC.

To fix this:

1. Go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common
2. Delete the Battlefield Bad Company 2 Beta folder, which includes Punkbuster
3. Go to Punkbuster's website and get www.punkbuster.com/index.php?page=pbsetup.php
4. Launch the program
5. Once launched, click add game
6. Select BFBC2
7. Browse to C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\battlefield
8. Click OK and then click Check for Updates.

Punkbuster will now initiate a download for the BC2 Punkbuster client.

UPDATE: You may also need to remove the BFBC2 Beta folder from "My Documents" as well before this will work properly.

NOTE: Do not let Punkbuster run in it's default destination. It is set up to go to the BFBC2 Beta folder instead of the correct BFBC2 release version folder.

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HBO greenlights 'A Game of Thrones'

Great news for George RR Martin fans, HBO has greenlighted the highly anticipated fantasy series "Game of Thrones."

The premium network has picked up the project for a first-season debut next spring. Nine episodes plus the pilot have been ordered. Production will begin in Belfast this June.

The pickup comes on the heels of another HBO big ticket series order, for Terence Winter and Martin Scorsese's drama "Boardwalk Empire."

From the moment "Thrones" was first announced in development, the series based on the George R.R. Martin novels has generated enormous, perhaps unprecedented, online interest for a series at such an early stage.

The sprawling tale set in the mythical land of Westeros tells the story of the noble Stark family who become caught up in high court intrigue when patriarch Eddard (played by Sean Bean) becomes the king's new right-hand man. The four-and-counting books in the series would each be used as one season of the series.

Unlike many fantasy novels, the "Thrones" series largely avoids relying on magical elements and instead goes for brutal realism -- think "Sopranos" with swords. Martin, a former TV writer ("Beauty and the Beast"), writes each chapter as a cliffhanger, which should lend itself well to series translation. David Benioff and Dan Weiss are the series creators. (Source)

Woot!

I'm so excited, I just can't hide it!

Official propaganda for Battlefield: Bad Company 2.



And let's not forget to blow some shit up.

Feb 2010: What I'm Playing/What I'm Paying

My February gaming was a letdown.

I have embedded the new What I'm Playing/What I'm Paying spreadsheet for January below.  The overall spreadsheet (includes previous months) can be found here.

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Game of the Month


Mass Effect
Cost: $4.99 (Steam Holiday Sale)
Played: 5 hrs
3-words: Sucked, gets better.





My game of the month was Mass Effect; in honor of the release of Mass Effect 2 this month.

Mass Effect is growing on me.  At first I despised the combat and drawn out conversations.  Mass Effect has one of the worst introductions to an RPG that I've ever played.  There was nothing in the first four hours of the game that made me jump for joy.

However, I now have a feel for the game and have let the cards fall where they may.  I'm picking up steam, rock hopping across the galaxy and sticking to the main storyline.  I find the side quests easily and best avoided.  I didn't log as many hours I had hoped this month, but I do still plan to finish Mass Effect.

March's GotM: Battlefield: Bad Company 2

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/Played

In the /Played section, I cover other games I played during the month.

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 Beta

I love the Battlefield games.  Bad Company 2 is the next great title in the series and I spent most of my gaming time with it this month.  From my initial impressions post:

The first thing that struck me about Bad Company 2 (BC2) was it's destructive nature. As can be seen in the video, almost every wall and obstacle can be destroyed. This was something promised back in the days of Battlefield 2 and only partially realized in BC1. BC2 takes it to another level. No wall, box, barrel, or cement slab seems safe. Annoying sniper on the third floor three buildings down? Level the first two buildings and smoke that fucker out.

The full version goes live March 2nd and I am dedicating most of March to this great game!

Allods Online Open Beta

Its been an up and down month for Allods Online and its open beta.  I put a few hours in and have Healer and Scout leveling slowly, but surely.  Regardless of how the cash shop debacle turns out, I have to admit that Allods is a fun game to play in its free version.  That's why its so disheartening that the upcoming game changes could kill the fun.

Also, my Allods Online guide is coming along nicely.

Left 4 Dead 2

Left 4 Dead 2, like most of Valve's games never gets old.  I hooked up and rocked out for some great VS. matches on The Parish campaign.  The finale, bridge map for The Parish is one of my favorites.

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/Paid

Total spent this Month: $49.99
My Value Rating: Average

Bad Company 2 was expensive at $49.99.  I would have felt more comfortable at a $35 price point.  However, I was fortunate enough to receive a $75 "points" card as a bonus from work.  One of the few things it can be used on is a prepaid card usable on Steam games.  That is the only reason I shelled out $49.99 for this game.

I have now used up $105.16 of my $180 gaming budget for 2010.  Stay tuned each month to see if I can stay on track!

Calm Down! SecuROM DRM in Battlefield: Bad Company 2

I hate DRM as much as the next person, SecuROM being one of the worst offending DRM schemes out there.  However, the heat that Battlefield: Bad Company 2 is taking for including this DRM is out of proportion to the facts of the DRM works.  Fortunately, we have level-headed redditor, SnakeDiver, to steer us through the fog.  He posted a great response to a comment in /r/gaming over on Reddit.com.

I've capture the comment in its entirety:

If you have been following BF:BC2's blog then you would have read How BC2 Uses Copy Protection .

Of course it's going to be disabled by pirates. It's inevitable. All it is is a deterrent. But SecuROM doesn't run like it has in the past in BC2.

• It runs only when the game runs, and really only does anything on first launch.
• It's a wrapper contained within the EXE. Launch the EXE and SecuROM does it's check and game goes
• It doesn't install anything into the Kernel

In reality PB is more invasive then this SecuROM. The only thing annoying is the download limits. I wish they'd have a smart activation server, not just a "limit to 5 installs" server. With the smarts being, unlimited installs but if you install X times within X geographically dispersed locations within X amount of time, we're going to block your key.

Complain about real piss-poor DRM such as UbiSoft's "always-on DRM". BC2's DRM is, for the most part, non-invasive as DRM should be. I don't care if they want to protect their code as long as it doesn't get in the way of my use of the product (or of other products).

Again, I don't like DRM. Pirates are already playing BFBC2 on pirated servers, days before the official launch. However, DRM is a fact of life for PC gaming and voting with my wallet is the only way I can let game companies know what I think of their DRM schemes.

I vote for Valve's games on Steam, because Steam offers more than just DRM protection for the games. I didn't vote for EA's last DRM disaster, Spore, and its originally planned "phone home every 10 minutes" DRM. I will NOT vote for any of Ubisoft's new "always-on DRM". I will and have voted for the new SecuROM bundled with BFBC2. its not perfect, but its not as terrible as it once was.