I am trying to replay some older Nancy Drew games (Ransom of the 7 ships, Shadow at Waters Edge). They install and on startup ask for an activation code in a popup window. I enter the code that I had used previously and get connection error from the server. On using the manual activation that sends a request code to D2D, I get a form letter stating that they are working on it. Its been over a week since I contacted them for the first game, and I got the same response when I tried another game. Even some Nancy Drew games like Captive Curse that I don't think I ever had activation codes, are asking for them.

Has anyone else had this problem recently?

Jim

While doing a search about this problem, I found this page.

It appears that other people are having this problem as well, and it doesn't sound very promising as to a resolution. Maybe someone else here will know more.

Thanks Marian,
I did get a response from D2D with the directions to download the latest copy from their site except they don't list any Nancy Drew games on their site, which made me realize that the games that I downloaded previously were from Digital River. At Herinteractive they still indicate that Digital River is their download manager. I rechecked SAWE and sure enough the activation link sent me to Direct2Drive. Most confusing. Has anyone purchased and downloaded a Nancy Drew recently and did it come from Digital River or Direct2Drive.

Thanks

Jim

As far as I know, if you buy a game from HeR Interactive, it goes through Digital River.

My advice would be to get your Nancy Drew games from somewhere else, though (like Big Fish or Steam). HeR Interactive/Digital River download policies are lacking compared to the other two sites that I mentioned. We have had a few members here in the past who were very disappointed when they needed to redownload a game and found out that they could no longer do so because either too much time had passed or they had used up the number of downloads they were entitled to. They make you pay extra for an extended download policy and for these reasons I really can't recommend them as a good place to buy Nancy Drew games.

A further note...I went back onto my Herinteractive account, order history and downloaded 4 of the 5 games that were giving me grief. Voila they all worked without asking for any sort of activation and they all came from Digital River. The one that wouldn't gave an error message of too_many_days_have_passed. I sent their support an email for clarification. Still can't figure out why Direct2Drive inserted themselves into the activation process initially. And yes indeed I will be avoiding Herinteractive/DigitalRiver downloads as much as possible.

Thanks for your help.

Jim

I'm glad that you were able to download all but one of your games.

The Tages copy protection activation server is down. I chatted recently with D2D about the problem since their games used Tages. They said they were working on the problem. So there may be light at the end of that tunnel.

DRM... the scourge of the planet.