Well, here's something that slipped through the cracks. While we were all busy condemning Ubisoft for its restrictive, must-be-online PC digital rights management, EA has crept in and done the exact same thing.
In a post over on Command & Conquer 4's forums, EA community manager Apoc writes "First thing to be clear about, Command & Conquer 4 has NO DRM. Zip, zero, zilch, none."
Sounds great! Until, a few lines later, he says this. "To play Command & Conquer 4, the computer needs to be connected to the internet."
Uh. Apoc. If the publisher is imposing limitations on when and how a game can be played, it's DRM. While it's unclear how often you'd need to be connected - whether it's just at startup, or whether it requires a constant connection - what is clear is you'd still need a connection at some stage. So laptop gaming is out. As is playing when your internet connection is down.
It's sad to have to highlight this only a day after giving EA a pat on the back for removing some DRM from Battlefield Bad Company 2, but hey, I guess different arms of EA do things in different ways.