14 ms·

Has anyone ever done an a analysis on whether Denuvo (or DRM in general) is actually a wise investment of capital? I imagine it probably does have some impact o

by kayson 5y ago

Has anyone ever done an a analysis on whether Denuvo (or DRM in general) is actually a wise investment of capital? I imagine it probably does have some impact on early sales in that it will prevent early customers from pirating to try it rather than buying it. But at the same time, you have things like Steam's return policy, the general dislike of DRM, and the publicity/image cost when something happens preventing everyone from playing the game. Not to mention that it seems inevitable these days that it either gets cracked or removed by the publisher anyway. I always wonder if the resources spent on Denuvo would be better spent on the game itself, or marketing the game, allowing the so-inclined to pirate it more easily at launch, but offsetting that with better sales overall driven by better reception, more word of mouth, etc.

dageshi 5y ago
It's really only to protect the launch window. Most games will be discounted later on to the point where they're more or less affordable to everyone. But if someone pirates on release they'll never be inclined to buy at that lower price later on.
- novok 5y ago
  This is the reason why I've mostly heard. TBH it would probably be a good ideas for vendors to remove DRM after a game has been out for a few years and has stopped getting patches for a year+.
  - dageshi 5y ago
    I think a lot of them do. It's not uncommon to hear of devs removing DRM after a certain number of months. Especially nowadays where after a certain point they just want people to play the game ready for when the sequel comes out.
- shmde 5y ago
  > But if someone pirates on release they'll never be inclined to buy at that lower price later on. Just a personal anecdote. I have pirated a shitton amount of video games when I was young and didn't have money. You know what was one of the first thing I did after getting my salary ? I bought burnout paradise. I now own almost 1/2 of all the video games which I played as a pirate on steam and epic. And also people who generally take the pirate route to play video games, never ever generally pay for it. So expecting a pirate would give in to buy a video game which he thinks will definitely get cracked in the near future is not really a good idea.
- jimbob45 5y ago
  Not only this but for some games, the launch window is all they’ll have because the game is terrible. This works as insurance to make sure they make some money.
  - Macha 5y ago
    Also DRM vendors (like Denuvo) have moved to a more aaS licensing model and homegrown DRM solutions fall so quickly they're out of fashion, so there's financial incentive to stop paying licensing costs for games in their long tail phase for sales.
bool3max 5y ago
If it wasn't a vise investment, publishers and developers of AAA titles wouldn't invest in it. But they do.
- logfromblammo 5y ago
  This assumes that companies do not make unwise investments, when counterexamples are legion.
- MauranKilom 5y ago
  As phrased, that's a weak argument. Whoever is calling the shots will have some bias and weigh different conceivable outcomes in a subjective manner that an outside observer may consider unsound. I mean, "publishers and developers of AAA titles" also somehow brought us the disastrous releases of No Man's Sky or Cyberpunk 2077. Or any of the PR disasters of $random_AAA_game. I agree that it's overwhelmingly likely that someone ran the numbers about using DRM at these companies. But it's not unlikely that they over- or under-estimated certain factors. They will have more information than we do, but certainly not perfect information (see also above).
  - tialaramex 5y ago
    > I agree that it's overwhelmingly likely that someone ran the numbers about using DRM at these companies. I wouldn't even go that far. It's very rare for anybody to run the numbers. Humans are too lazy. At most they'll eyeball it. Unless somebody requires hard numbers and they start digging up your process so that it's easier to actually do it than to fake it, no "running the numbers" will happen.
    - lostcolony 5y ago
      I'd go one further (in the other direction). If someone "ran the numbers", I'm quite sure they would have made them public. Because no consumer wants DRM (some are ambivalent, some hate it, but no one is like "oh, thank goodness, DRM"), and the inclusion of DRM by other companies does not threaten your market share, a company has nothing to lose, and only to gain (good will) if they were to release those figures and explain to their customers with cold hard data why DRM is included. None have done so. Ergo, I am quite sure no one has "run the numbers"; they have, as mentioned, eyeballed them and used them to justify their own biases, as humans are wont to do. And either do not have enough of an analysis to release, or realize it is so easy to poke holes in that they shouldn't.
hota_mazi 5y ago
The "general dislike of DRM" is a non issue because it's only shared by a minuscule portion of game players. And most of those who have a dislike for DRM still won't let that get in the way of them playing a game they really want to play at release time. Denuvo seems to be extremely effective at delaying piracy for a few months, during which the publishers of the game make most of their sales.
GuB-42 5y ago
Well used, Denuvo is not that bad. It is misuse that cause games to become slow or unplayable. And generally, it only serves to protect the first few months of sales, it is not uncommon to strip out DRM after that. Indie games often don't need it (and don't do it). AAA games are a different story. Including DRM is a significant expense in a low budget game, these games are usually cheaper, and people are often more sympathetic to small studios. Also, indie games need exposure first, and they get at least that from pirate copies, AAA games rely on advertising for that and run close to market saturation so pirate copies are more of an opportunity cost.
- shmde 5y ago
  > Well used, Denuvo is not that bad. Ubisoft admitting that Denuvo ( idk why they used the term third party lol ) causes PC stuttering. https://gamerant.com/ubisoft-third-party-software-pc-stuttering-denuvo/ https://gamerant.com/ubisoft-third-party-software-pc-stutter... Resident evil 8 runs better when it is stripped off its denuvo protection. As confirmed by Digital foundry's video. https://youtu.be/UXZGCwAJpbM https://youtu.be/UXZGCwAJpbM https://www.pcgamer.com/resident-evil-village-drm-denuvo-stuttering/ https://www.pcgamer.com/resident-evil-village-drm-denuvo-stu... You will now see a huge influx of video games being stripped of denuvo because it literally shits itself in 12th gen Intel chips and games become unplayable with denuvo. > And generally, it only serves to protect the first few months of sales, it is not uncommon to strip out DRM after that. Nope, disagree. The only time they strip Denuvo out is when the game is cracked by warez scenes or if the cost of paying denuvo gets bigger than the people actually paying for it. Some video games which are out for well over an year but just got denuvo removed in the last 2-3 months out of the blue. It is because of denuvos incompatibility with win11. 1.Shadow of Tomb Raider (3 years) 2.Rise of tomb raider (6 years ) 3.Injustice 2 (4years) 4.Jedi fallen order (2years ) 5.Nier replicant. 6. Tekken 7 (6years). > AAA games rely on advertising for that and run close to market saturation so pirate copies are more of an opportunity cost. Trust me when I say people who pirate are usually the ones who never ever buy video games. Pirates can never be considered an opportunity cost. Not trying to glorify pirates, but people waited patiently for over an year to play RDR2 till it got cracked, so that they don't have to pay outta their pockets.
the_mitsuhiko 5y ago
I did not do the analysis myself but I saw some numbers and they make it a very good investment. Unfortunately I cannot share.
Izkata 5y ago
This is just one point, but I started pirating games during college because of DRM, after whatever they used in Spore destroyed Windows so badly I had to do a full reinstall and lost a bunch of stuff. Before that I reliably bought all my games. I don't pirate games anymore, but that's only because I stopped playing computer games entirely and stick to consoles, to avoid DRM screwing with my stuff.
- toxik 5y ago
  I’m not trying to be rude here but going from PC gaming to consoles because you dislike DRM is like buying a sports car because you think trucks pollute too much.
  - LegitShady 5y ago
    I don't think he's saying to avoid DRM, rather to avoid DRM on his computer, which playing via console would do.
  - acdha 5y ago
    It depends on whether you object to the concept on principle or to the negative impact on your computer. In the latter case, his actions make total sense.
- arcticbull 5y ago
  Consoles are all about DRM aren't they?
  - tommek4077 5y ago
    Yes, but they would not ruin his PC again.
    - nottorp 5y ago
      Afaik both Sony and MS (yes, even MS) do some internal QA before allowing a game to be published on their consoles. Plus they don't allow (single player?) games to require registering with the publisher. So on the rare occasions I'm interested in a game from the top user hostile AAA publishers, I get it for console.
stiray 5y ago
Yes. "The European Commission paid €360,000 (about $428,000) for a study on how piracy impacts the sales of copyrighted music, books, video games, and movies. But the EU never shared the report—possibly because it determined that there is no evidence that piracy is a major problem." TLDR: https://gizmodo.com/the-eu-suppressed-a-300-page-study-that-found-piracy-do-1818629537 https://gizmodo.com/the-eu-suppressed-a-300-page-study-that-... Study: https://cdn.netzpolitik.org/wp-upload/2017/09/displacement_study.pdf https://cdn.netzpolitik.org/wp-upload/2017/09/displacement_s...
- actually_a_dog 5y ago
  You left out the money quote from the Gizmodo article: > The report found that illegal downloads and streams can actually boost legal sales of games, according to the report. The only negative link the report found was with major blockbuster films:“The results show a displacement rate of 40 percent which means that for every ten recent top films watched illegally, four fewer films are consumed legally.” (Emphasis added.) So, if anything, game companies should literally be putting their stuff up on torrent sites themselves!
  - vimda 5y ago
    I suspect that a lot of that 40% are people who pirate it to try it out before purchasing. What ever happens to demo disks and the like? I miss that
    - agilob 5y ago
      Yup, the only two companies I can trust with game quality are Sega and Valve, all the rest either have toxic communities or had major fuckups with quality, performance or plots, and I don't trust them with $4.99 at all.
      - BizarroLand 5y ago
        I like the rockstar approach. Have a local player game that has a story and a lot of fun mechanics, and then have an online version with fun side quests and adventures with your friends. Totally worth the $50 cost of entry.

by kayson 5y ago

dageshi 5y ago

It's really only to protect the launch window. Most games will be discounted later on to the point where they're more or less affordable to everyone. But if someone pirates on release they'll never be inclined to buy at that lower price later on.

novok 5y ago
This is the reason why I've mostly heard. TBH it would probably be a good ideas for vendors to remove DRM after a game has been out for a few years and has stopped getting patches for a year+.
- dageshi 5y ago
  I think a lot of them do. It's not uncommon to hear of devs removing DRM after a certain number of months. Especially nowadays where after a certain point they just want people to play the game ready for when the sequel comes out.
shmde 5y ago
> But if someone pirates on release they'll never be inclined to buy at that lower price later on. Just a personal anecdote. I have pirated a shitton amount of video games when I was young and didn't have money. You know what was one of the first thing I did after getting my salary ? I bought burnout paradise. I now own almost 1/2 of all the video games which I played as a pirate on steam and epic. And also people who generally take the pirate route to play video games, never ever generally pay for it. So expecting a pirate would give in to buy a video game which he thinks will definitely get cracked in the near future is not really a good idea.
jimbob45 5y ago
Not only this but for some games, the launch window is all they’ll have because the game is terrible. This works as insurance to make sure they make some money.
- Macha 5y ago
  Also DRM vendors (like Denuvo) have moved to a more aaS licensing model and homegrown DRM solutions fall so quickly they're out of fashion, so there's financial incentive to stop paying licensing costs for games in their long tail phase for sales.

bool3max 5y ago

If it wasn't a vise investment, publishers and developers of AAA titles wouldn't invest in it. But they do.

logfromblammo 5y ago
This assumes that companies do not make unwise investments, when counterexamples are legion.
MauranKilom 5y ago
As phrased, that's a weak argument. Whoever is calling the shots will have some bias and weigh different conceivable outcomes in a subjective manner that an outside observer may consider unsound. I mean, "publishers and developers of AAA titles" also somehow brought us the disastrous releases of No Man's Sky or Cyberpunk 2077. Or any of the PR disasters of $random_AAA_game. I agree that it's overwhelmingly likely that someone ran the numbers about using DRM at these companies. But it's not unlikely that they over- or under-estimated certain factors. They will have more information than we do, but certainly not perfect information (see also above).
- tialaramex 5y ago
  > I agree that it's overwhelmingly likely that someone ran the numbers about using DRM at these companies. I wouldn't even go that far. It's very rare for anybody to run the numbers. Humans are too lazy. At most they'll eyeball it. Unless somebody requires hard numbers and they start digging up your process so that it's easier to actually do it than to fake it, no "running the numbers" will happen.
  - lostcolony 5y ago
    I'd go one further (in the other direction). If someone "ran the numbers", I'm quite sure they would have made them public. Because no consumer wants DRM (some are ambivalent, some hate it, but no one is like "oh, thank goodness, DRM"), and the inclusion of DRM by other companies does not threaten your market share, a company has nothing to lose, and only to gain (good will) if they were to release those figures and explain to their customers with cold hard data why DRM is included. None have done so. Ergo, I am quite sure no one has "run the numbers"; they have, as mentioned, eyeballed them and used them to justify their own biases, as humans are wont to do. And either do not have enough of an analysis to release, or realize it is so easy to poke holes in that they shouldn't.

hota_mazi 5y ago

The "general dislike of DRM" is a non issue because it's only shared by a minuscule portion of game players. And most of those who have a dislike for DRM still won't let that get in the way of them playing a game they really want to play at release time. Denuvo seems to be extremely effective at delaying piracy for a few months, during which the publishers of the game make most of their sales.

GuB-42 5y ago

Well used, Denuvo is not that bad. It is misuse that cause games to become slow or unplayable. And generally, it only serves to protect the first few months of sales, it is not uncommon to strip out DRM after that. Indie games often don't need it (and don't do it). AAA games are a different story. Including DRM is a significant expense in a low budget game, these games are usually cheaper, and people are often more sympathetic to small studios. Also, indie games need exposure first, and they get at least that from pirate copies, AAA games rely on advertising for that and run close to market saturation so pirate copies are more of an opportunity cost.

shmde 5y ago
> Well used, Denuvo is not that bad. Ubisoft admitting that Denuvo ( idk why they used the term third party lol ) causes PC stuttering. https://gamerant.com/ubisoft-third-party-software-pc-stuttering-denuvo/ https://gamerant.com/ubisoft-third-party-software-pc-stutter... Resident evil 8 runs better when it is stripped off its denuvo protection. As confirmed by Digital foundry's video. https://youtu.be/UXZGCwAJpbM https://youtu.be/UXZGCwAJpbM https://www.pcgamer.com/resident-evil-village-drm-denuvo-stuttering/ https://www.pcgamer.com/resident-evil-village-drm-denuvo-stu... You will now see a huge influx of video games being stripped of denuvo because it literally shits itself in 12th gen Intel chips and games become unplayable with denuvo. > And generally, it only serves to protect the first few months of sales, it is not uncommon to strip out DRM after that. Nope, disagree. The only time they strip Denuvo out is when the game is cracked by warez scenes or if the cost of paying denuvo gets bigger than the people actually paying for it. Some video games which are out for well over an year but just got denuvo removed in the last 2-3 months out of the blue. It is because of denuvos incompatibility with win11. 1.Shadow of Tomb Raider (3 years) 2.Rise of tomb raider (6 years ) 3.Injustice 2 (4years) 4.Jedi fallen order (2years ) 5.Nier replicant. 6. Tekken 7 (6years). > AAA games rely on advertising for that and run close to market saturation so pirate copies are more of an opportunity cost. Trust me when I say people who pirate are usually the ones who never ever buy video games. Pirates can never be considered an opportunity cost. Not trying to glorify pirates, but people waited patiently for over an year to play RDR2 till it got cracked, so that they don't have to pay outta their pockets.

the_mitsuhiko 5y ago

I did not do the analysis myself but I saw some numbers and they make it a very good investment. Unfortunately I cannot share.

Izkata 5y ago

This is just one point, but I started pirating games during college because of DRM, after whatever they used in Spore destroyed Windows so badly I had to do a full reinstall and lost a bunch of stuff. Before that I reliably bought all my games. I don't pirate games anymore, but that's only because I stopped playing computer games entirely and stick to consoles, to avoid DRM screwing with my stuff.

toxik 5y ago
I’m not trying to be rude here but going from PC gaming to consoles because you dislike DRM is like buying a sports car because you think trucks pollute too much.
- LegitShady 5y ago
  I don't think he's saying to avoid DRM, rather to avoid DRM on his computer, which playing via console would do.
- acdha 5y ago
  It depends on whether you object to the concept on principle or to the negative impact on your computer. In the latter case, his actions make total sense.
arcticbull 5y ago
Consoles are all about DRM aren't they?
- tommek4077 5y ago
  Yes, but they would not ruin his PC again.
  - nottorp 5y ago
    Afaik both Sony and MS (yes, even MS) do some internal QA before allowing a game to be published on their consoles. Plus they don't allow (single player?) games to require registering with the publisher. So on the rare occasions I'm interested in a game from the top user hostile AAA publishers, I get it for console.

stiray 5y ago

Yes. "The European Commission paid €360,000 (about $428,000) for a study on how piracy impacts the sales of copyrighted music, books, video games, and movies. But the EU never shared the report—possibly because it determined that there is no evidence that piracy is a major problem." TLDR: https://gizmodo.com/the-eu-suppressed-a-300-page-study-that-found-piracy-do-1818629537 https://gizmodo.com/the-eu-suppressed-a-300-page-study-that-... Study: https://cdn.netzpolitik.org/wp-upload/2017/09/displacement_study.pdf https://cdn.netzpolitik.org/wp-upload/2017/09/displacement_s...

actually_a_dog 5y ago
You left out the money quote from the Gizmodo article: > The report found that illegal downloads and streams can actually boost legal sales of games, according to the report. The only negative link the report found was with major blockbuster films:“The results show a displacement rate of 40 percent which means that for every ten recent top films watched illegally, four fewer films are consumed legally.” (Emphasis added.) So, if anything, game companies should literally be putting their stuff up on torrent sites themselves!
- vimda 5y ago
  I suspect that a lot of that 40% are people who pirate it to try it out before purchasing. What ever happens to demo disks and the like? I miss that
  - agilob 5y ago
    Yup, the only two companies I can trust with game quality are Sega and Valve, all the rest either have toxic communities or had major fuckups with quality, performance or plots, and I don't trust them with $4.99 at all.
    - BizarroLand 5y ago
      I like the rockstar approach. Have a local player game that has a story and a lot of fun mechanics, and then have an online version with fun side quests and adventures with your friends. Totally worth the $50 cost of entry.