Bioshock 2 is hitting the shops packed with DRM. The game appears to use SecuROM and comes with a five-machine activation limit.

2K Games has no problem telling its users about this. According to a note posted on its official forum "BioShock 2 is using a standard Games for Windows Live activation system, much like other games you have played in the past."

This means that you do not always have to be online to play or save the game—you can create an offline profile for the Single Player portion of the game. 2K was using SecuROM only as a disk check method for the retail copy of BioShock 2. That is its only use, the site said.

However there is a small matter of limiting the disk use to five machines. Ironically if you want to avoid much of the DRM you can actually download the game from Steam.