That's fair, we stopped buying products the minute we stopped demanding physical copies of everything we purchase. On some level I just don't care personally but I can understand why some would. I would however have to go to Huge Success on this one as he has asked multiple times in the thread for someone to point out this denial of service occurring due to DRM.
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PC version of Inside seemingly using Denuvo
- Thread starter JaseC
- Start date
That's fair, we stopped buying products the minute we stopped demanding physical copies of everything we purchase. On some level I just don't care personally but I can understand why some would. I would however have to go to Huge Success on this one as he has asked multiple times in the thread for someone to point out this denial of service occurring due to DRM.
Same thing people said about Steam.
But the masses prefer convenience over no DRM.
But there is evidence that it stops piracy, which can be more than a "lost sale" for a dev if it is anything beyond a single player game.
There are a number of games where the number of pirated copies far exceeds the number of sold copies. And when MP servers come into play, that can mean overloaded servers and ongoing costs that the developer is just not equipped to handle because they never saw the sales revenue.
In these cases stopping piracy wouldn't have to lead to "more sales" to be of a benefit.
Because the vast majority of users don't notice it and those that do are not loud enough to make a difference.
It is the same reason people haven't abandoned PSN in droves. They like the convenience.
It is the same reason people prefer Steam over GoG. They like the convenience.
If you're buying a game online, you likely have broadband so it's not a stretch to say that someone who is buying games online isn't going to be put out 9and likely won't notice) and initial DRM check when first installing a game.
You are correct on the modding point, but you have zero proof that the game will eventually be unplayable.
What game do you think has dev/pub severs being used by pirates?
Memorabilia
Member
Pretty much zero chance I pay full price then. 50% - 75% off sale is my buy in on games I want which use objectionable DRM. Oh well.
SapientWolf
Trucker Sexologist
A console is possibly the worst DRM you can have.
In this theoretical question this is due to that, you can only choose one, DRM and stays in the business or no DRM and is out of business.
Huge Succeeded
Banned
I'm not sure that that's a relevant talking point today where PC is concerned, but I can ensure you that back when keygens and gamespy servers were a thing, there were definitely plenty of people playing online games which they didn't own.
On consoles, though? Yeah, that's a thing. You can play online games on any modded Nintendo console, for instance, or on the PSP. JTAGging was the preferred method of bypassing protection on Xbox 360 because you could still play your (pirated) games online. There are ways obfuscate the fact that you're running a hacked system so that you can play pirated games online on the Vita and the PS3, as well.
I don't really get the issue with Denuvo; it's the best DRM yet, both from the consumer's and the developer's / publisher's perspective. If they really shut down their servers one day, I'm sure developers (or crackers eventually, I guess) will find ways to make those games playable again.
Preservation should be the responsibility of the developer and/or publisher. But history is filled with examples of those who do not bother, and thus the reason why many would prefer games to be released without required support, because they can't be trusted with that responsibility. It's not about being free, but that it should remain available in some form (to purchase), and playable to customers. Piracy, despite its intentions, creates a backup for when these things fail to happen.
I'm glad to see storefronts like GOG take a hard stand on matters such as this, both with DRM and preservation.
How is it the best from a consumer's perspective?
You are assuming that a) the developers or publishers will give a shit at that point and b) they are still around to even give a shit. I mean, you can just see the GFWL games that publishers removed from Steam because they couldn't be bothered to remove GFWL.
Turin Turambar
Member
Well, I suppose he refers to "it just works". Like Steam drm, it's pretty transparent. It doesn't affect your hardware (starforce), it isn't tied to windows OS (Securom), it doesn't make games to crash, or to lose performance, or make loading times slower, or needs a permanent Internet connection (Ubisoft drm in AC2 times).
Wouldn't your own example of Steam DRM be better since it still allows the game to be moddable?
If you start a game on Steam, you can't really tell whether it uses Denuvo or not, it's not impacting the performance or anything. One major complaint about DRM used to be that it also impacts people who bought the game (with false positives and such), but so far that doesn't seem to be the case.
True, GFWL was a pretty deep and complicated integration though as far as I know. Removing Denuvo (or building a version of the game without Denuvo) should be much easier.
Whilst I consider myself Anti-DRM as a consumer, if I was a game developer right now I would probably use Denuvo at launch, but with hopes of patching it out after 6 months to a year. Personally I will not be purchasing Inside as long as it has DRM, as hard as that's going to be.
Yup, it's an absolutely incredible game
Even doubble dipped on Steam, it was that good
Yeah, that would be the best solution obviously. Protect the initial sales and a first Steam sale, and then remove Denuvo after a year or so.
StereoVsn
Gold Member
Depends on the console. If you do t have huge online/patch reqs, then you can play for a very long time. I have had a few diff Dreamcast, SuperNintendo, Genesis, PSX, PS2, etc consoles, replacing/repairing as they broke. I sure as hell didn't have to worry that since Sega is out of business, I can't play my games.
For more recent consoles, DS, PSP, Vita, WiiU, 3DS and PS3 are also mostly ok with PS4 being more questionable due to patches but even though cruel be backed up through HD backup. Not sure about 360/Xbone.
However, this sort of a trend breaks with PC games with Denovo or online reqs with console games. Denuvo in particular may cause some games to never being broken due to the way their algorithm works since pirates will move on a lot of times before games could be cracked.
The 30 year examples here are nuts. No guarantee of even 10 years here which could be unfortunate (see iOS gaming situation for how badly preservation can be screwed up). I still play games from 90s, so over 20 year old, not to mention 10.
So yeah, on one hand it's understandable that pubs/debts want Denuvo. On the other hand it blows chunks for customers to potentially lose capability to play the game down the road, to be able to mod, heck, to be able to cheat in SP game with CheatEngine.
And the funny part is for all the arguments in the thread nobody can show actual positive trends with utilizing Denuvo. Doom was one example given as potentially positive. This is one of the best FPS of its kind ever released and still under million sales on Steam. I would venture to guess that it's hard to see how antiPiracy prevented jack here. Would Doom be only 500K without Denuvo or would it be maybe only 50 K less sales which would maybe correspond with the cost of Denuvo implementation. Who knows, but the effort of finding g evidence shouldn't be o. Th shoulders of only anti-Hard DRM team.
Hell, look at Witcher 3. It sold very, very well. Could we postulate that presence of Denuvo would have significantly improve sales? Somehow I doubt it.
So on one hand we do have evidence of games not working due to DRM, GFWL/SecureROM and probably more. On the other hand we don't have evidence one way or the other about improving sales.
Personally, again, I would be a lot more comfortable with the software DRM in question if pubs/devs committed to take Denuvo out in a year or two, but I don't see that happening.
StereoVsn
Gold Member
Publisher/Dev has to be around, has to be arsed to give a damn about doing this, and it could be even worse when 3rd parties are contracted to port game to PC.
Couple years down the road that contract is gone, contractor moved on to other work (or maybe out of business), code needs to be found, new contract needs to be done, all for uncertain business prospects. It would need to be done from beginning really and planned for, otherwise it's very small chance of happening.
I have seen some internal studies that have shown it to be a net-positive for title sales.
I can't speak to the methodology used, or garentee the accuracy, but there it is.
From what I've seen, the most popular PC games that got fucked by DRM or newer versions of Windows over the years usually got re-released on Steam or GOG with the old DRM gone and some compatibility fixes applied. In many cases those fixes are directly based on the ones pirates used. In these situations at worst people need to buy new copies of the games but some publishers end up doing code redemption programs (GOG's "Reclaim Your Game" or how Bioshock on Steam apparently accepts old retail codes).
I have a copy of Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines I bought from Direct2Drive around 2010 and it uses activation servers that no longer exist. My copy is unplayable without an unofficial patch that replaces the exe. Of course I could just buy another copy on Steam or GOG. One game that might be pretty much totally lost unless you still have a physical copy is SWAT 4. I bought that from D2D around the same time but have no idea if I can even activate it. It's currently not available digitally anywhere. You also have the infamous GFWL fiasco, but most of the games people cared about were patched and re-released with that DRM gone. I think my copies of Viva Piniata and Age of Empires III are fucked though.
One game that still kind of has issues requiring exe tampering is the original Crysis. From what I understand the Steam and Origin versions won't initially boot up on 64-bit Windows unless you get a new exe or something. According to the Steam page it also still uses SecuROM with a 50-machine activation limit.
The reason I mention these games is because if they'd have been abandoned with Denuvo or something like it intact, it'd be a lot harder to play them. These games with Denuvo in them now could theoretically become unplayable on some future version of Windows, and it'd likely be harder for fans to patch or replace the exes. If the games are really important though I imagine they'd just get re-released and maybe even ripped of Denuvo. A handful of notable games could still fall through the cracks though.
One thing that's also concerned me recently is that you don't see a lot of post-2005 games from big publishers on GOG. EA, Ubisoft, Square Enix, and the like seem willing to release stuff from the early 2000's and earlier DRM-free, but we're not even seeing last-gen-era stuff like Assassin's Creed II, Crysis, or Splinter Cell Chaos Theory brought back without DRM. Who knows when that stuff would ever be considered "old" enough to be on GOG.
I have a copy of Vampire the Masquerade Bloodlines I bought from Direct2Drive around 2010 and it uses activation servers that no longer exist. My copy is unplayable without an unofficial patch that replaces the exe. Of course I could just buy another copy on Steam or GOG. One game that might be pretty much totally lost unless you still have a physical copy is SWAT 4. I bought that from D2D around the same time but have no idea if I can even activate it. It's currently not available digitally anywhere. You also have the infamous GFWL fiasco, but most of the games people cared about were patched and re-released with that DRM gone. I think my copies of Viva Piniata and Age of Empires III are fucked though.
One game that still kind of has issues requiring exe tampering is the original Crysis. From what I understand the Steam and Origin versions won't initially boot up on 64-bit Windows unless you get a new exe or something. According to the Steam page it also still uses SecuROM with a 50-machine activation limit.
The reason I mention these games is because if they'd have been abandoned with Denuvo or something like it intact, it'd be a lot harder to play them. These games with Denuvo in them now could theoretically become unplayable on some future version of Windows, and it'd likely be harder for fans to patch or replace the exes. If the games are really important though I imagine they'd just get re-released and maybe even ripped of Denuvo. A handful of notable games could still fall through the cracks though.
One thing that's also concerned me recently is that you don't see a lot of post-2005 games from big publishers on GOG. EA, Ubisoft, Square Enix, and the like seem willing to release stuff from the early 2000's and earlier DRM-free, but we're not even seeing last-gen-era stuff like Assassin's Creed II, Crysis, or Splinter Cell Chaos Theory brought back without DRM. Who knows when that stuff would ever be considered "old" enough to be on GOG.
When it is uncracked, it is the worst DRM you can have.
In many ways, the "better" a DRM solution is the worse it is for the medium in the long term.
More_Badass
Member
Brought back? Aren't those games available on Steam? I can play Crysis and Chaos Theory fine on my laptop
we could say/argue that denuvo has encouraged a lot of devs to port their games to pc. i'm okay with that. would it be okay and end the denuvo argument if , the game dev/ publisher would remove the denuvo drm after lets say 2/3 years automatically. would it be fair? i would totally be okay with it. a win/win situation for devs and gamers.
Shrike_Priest
Member
How is it not super simple for Denuvo to create a service with a built in fail safe in case they go belly up?
Like a kill switch? Or is it a double blind situation? Some kind of remote deactivation ought to be possible. If not remotely through the servers, then from some kind of serial-reclaim-service.
If not, there should definitely be a way for them to retain an Un-Denuvoed copy and have some contract where they are responsible for disseminating that in case of going bankrupt.
These seem like issues that would be problematic, but far from impossible to solve. And if they get a working model for it, DRM could finally be useful.
I'm guessing the amount of gamers who would opt out of getting a game because of Denuvo are so small that it isn't worth it for Denuvo to take that extra responsibility.
Like a kill switch? Or is it a double blind situation? Some kind of remote deactivation ought to be possible. If not remotely through the servers, then from some kind of serial-reclaim-service.
If not, there should definitely be a way for them to retain an Un-Denuvoed copy and have some contract where they are responsible for disseminating that in case of going bankrupt.
These seem like issues that would be problematic, but far from impossible to solve. And if they get a working model for it, DRM could finally be useful.
I'm guessing the amount of gamers who would opt out of getting a game because of Denuvo are so small that it isn't worth it for Denuvo to take that extra responsibility.
Deathknell
Member
Was gonna buy it and support devs, now i'll just stick to a walkthrough.
Thx denuvo.
Thx denuvo.
Outside of perhaps MGSV I don't think you really can. Pretty much everything else on PC using Denuvo was a PC mainstay, and a few are even PC exclusive games.
yeah like the other quality indies that went out of business not due to their shitty games but due to pirates
Soemtimes its just an excuse where to shift a blame for crap game's sales
well even MGS5 can be argued ... Ground Zeroes is noDRM and sold really well for what it really is (aka overpriced demo)
it might be super simple but these DRM providers rarely do such a thing ... see securom which is abandoned even though its still pretty much owned by Denuvo (previously known as SonyDADC creators of securom)
There even might be some contractual nonsesce forbidding devs to do it ...
CecilRousso
Member
It's not Denuvo that plays a role there.
They won't do things like that.
Yep, in fact, let's take a list of Denuvo games:
FIFA 15
Lords of the Fallen
Dragon Age: Inquisition Electronic Arts
Battlefield: Hardline Electronic Arts]
Batman: Arkham Knight
Mad Max
Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
FIFA 16
Anno 2205
Star Wars Battlefront
Just Cause 3
Rise of the Tomb Raider
Unravel
Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2
Far Cry Primal
Hitman
Need for Speed
Eve: Gunjack
ADR1FT
The Climb
DOOM
Homefront: The Revolution
Total War: Warhammer
Edge of Nowhere
Mirror's Edge Catalyst
Sherlock Holmes: The Devil's Daughter
INSIDE
Every single one game in this list would have a PC version regardless
ftfy
Huge Succeeded
Banned
hell of a lot less convenient than piracy, that
shinjimimura
Member
Won't buy then. I don't like DRMs and I do the only thing a customer can do to change things: vote with his wallet
And if they're pulling this off with a lot of games, chance that Valve will revoke their abilities to refund in the future.
Gamezone
Gold Member
Console DRM is way worse in my opinion.
Yeah, those poor "fucked" consumers. I can't imagine how they handle a one time online activation on steam games.
bee
Member
bleh, avoiding windows and oculus stores is easy, avoiding denuvo is becoming harder, i do have a few games with it on already but going forward i can't support this shit anymore, maximum i'll pay for any of these games is definitely under £10, including doom etc
funny thing is, the hardcore pirates already get around it by buying into shared offline steam accounts, you can get doom on pc for £5-6
funny thing is, the hardcore pirates already get around it by buying into shared offline steam accounts, you can get doom on pc for £5-6
CecilRousso
Member
You're just not looking at the bigger picture.
This thread in a nutshell, really
Gamezone
Gold Member
I don`t like Denuvo at all, but publishers seems desperate to protect their games, no matter what, and Denuvo surely beats crap like always online DRM, and it will probably secure more games from being released as always online in the future. I don`t believe that every Denuvo game is going to be shut down without there being some sort of solution. If the game can be offlines, it shouldn`t be a problem to release without Denuvo when it gets older. If a game is designed to be always online, that would probably require massive work to get it running offline. And there`s the satisfaction of knowing that pirates won`t be able to play games like Inside.
What bigger picture? That somehow this anti-tamper software (because that's what it is) won't be broken 20 years down the line when you want to play MGSV but Microsoft carpet bombed Valve and steam no longer works?
The only DRM that I can think of that has never been cracked is game manual answer DRM for obscure titles no one bothered to keep around. Why would this be any different?
Hello, person who has never had to deal with DRM going wrong on them, causing them to have to jump through hurdles to play a game they tried to support (if they're lucky).
Advice: don't use MGSV as an example. What that game will likely be (currently is) by the time it is cracked is not that game that peopled loved.
GrantDaNasty
Member
OK.
First of all:
a) so it's acceptable if it's a big publisher/dev, but suddenly when it's an indie dev, piracy concerns shouldn't matter?
b) I think you're overestimating what that number means. Steamspy shows Total Owners, and Total users who've played. Even if you're going by Total Owners, realize that LIMBO was one of the first Humble Bundle games, back when you could literally give $0.01 to get a Steam key for it. By that logic, those 3,727,693 copies equals $37,277. (We can most likely assume at least 50% of the copies are normal price/sale price so that estimate is a worst-case scenario, but again, your post seems to be based on the logic that all copies were likely sold at a price that would've covered all the work and effort spent making the game [and the sequel, which apparently was in dev for 6 years]).
Look, if you don't like Denuvo and wish to not support it, that's fine, but please don't spread this bullshit theory that Playdead is trying to line their coffers and are being greedy. :/
"one" time, if "one" now means "multiple", yes.
It checks with Denuvo-owned servers to let you play. It is inevocably DRM.
I've dealt with both starforce and securom.