Electronic Theatre has recently received new details on SEGA and Sports Interactive’s PC and Mac Football Manager 2009 copy-protection system. The new system, developed by Uniloc, will reduce software piracy opportunities by making it impossible to deactivate the copy protection on the game until midnight on the night before the intended launch date of 14^th November, 2008. Prior to this time, installation and activation of the game will not be possible.

Football Manager has suffered heavily to counterfeiting in the past, often necessitating bringing the release date forward at the last minute. By partnering with Uniloc, SEGA are not only taking steps to review and upgrade their copy protection, but also insure that there will be no benefit to the consumer to source unofficial product ahead of the street date. We have been told that this will be communicated to every retailer stocking the product prior to launch.

The details of Uniloc and Football Manager 2009 received this afternoon are included below:

About Uniloc Copy Protection

Uniloc’s software works in much the same was as traditional DRM protections, the user is given a number of personal licences tied to their activation key and can use these as required to activate/deactivate their game.  SEGA have worked hard with Uniloc to ensure that the user experience is the best it has ever been with copy protection and a huge leap forward is the removal of the ‘disc in the drive’ requirement of previous years.

We have listened to customer feedback and have chosen Uniloc as a result. There are no hidden surprises with Uniloc, the protection software is completely removed if you choose to on uninstall and there are no blacklists, or hidden drivers stopping other applications from running.

About Football Manager 2009

Football Manager™ 2009 is set to feature a vast array of all new features including, for the first time ever, a full 3D view of the world famous Football Manager™ match engine. Football Manager™ Handheld 2009 for Sony PSP is also set for release on the same day and sees the debut of a 2D match engine for the handheld franchise.

Football Managerä 2009 for PC and Apple Macintosh, and Football Managerä Handheld 2009 for Sony PSP are both set for release on November 14th.

For further information please go to www.sigames.com or www.footballmanager.com.

ManPac

12/11/08