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Bethesda apparently broke its own Denuvo protection for Doom Eternal

arstechnica.com

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Re: Bethesda apparently broke its own Denuvo protection for Doom Eternal

#31

Post by rurounijones »

alkonaut wrote: post #22

How hard can it be to protect AAA games when can't be bought or played without an internet connection? (Can't be bought because you don't buy stuff on physical media any more, and can't be played because there is a huge patch every 3 days that you'll need if you expect to be able to finish it). Just make the damn thing require an internet connection all the time. I don't care. If you are a good publisher then you pro…

> Just make the damn thing require an internet connection all the time. I don't care.

Not everyone has perfectly reliable access to the internet.

Re: Bethesda apparently broke its own Denuvo protection for Doom Eternal

#32

Post by ahartmetz »

henriquez wrote: post #10
AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. Doom has enough of a brand name that the average person probably isn't going to say, "Great, now that I know a DRM-free version exists, I will pirate it!" More likely, someone like me would just say, "Sweet! Now if I buy the game, I can get at a version that won't slow down my performance with all of the obnoxious DRM crap running in the background!"

This is part of why I quit PC gaming and took the plunge to Linux. It seems like every PC game recently requires a social login with its own launcher and a dedicated DRM rootkit. And the privacy policies for all of this stuff are very "permissive." After a certain point you realize you aren't in control of your own computer. At least with consoles you _know_ going in that the manufacturer has every executable on lock…

Please don't say PC when you mean Windows. Playing games on a Linux PC is still PC gaming.

(I play games on a Linux PC myself.)

Re: Bethesda apparently broke its own Denuvo protection for Doom Eternal

#33

Post by roywiggins »

Retric wrote: post #26
capableweb wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Basically most of the sales of the blockbuster games comes from the initial week or two, when people can't wait to get their hands on the game. The anti-piracy protection companies and the game companies know this, and that's why it's fine that the anti-piracy protection gets broken eventually. Just not when the game initially launched.

Preorders are a huge part of that initial sales rush. Clearly those are independent of if the game happens to be cracked on opening day.

If everyone expects the game to get cracked the same day, they might be less likely to pre-order in the first place.

Re: Bethesda apparently broke its own Denuvo protection for Doom Eternal

#34

Post by kllrnohj »

Retric wrote: post #18
google234123 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you understand the point of this DRM. If one week of protection means that you sell 80,000 more copies of your game to people that are too impatient to wait for piratable version, it's worth it. Your analogy doesn't work.

If it’s free then sure, but your numbers are unlikely to be accurate and this stuff both directly and indirectly expensive. So, it’s easy for it to slightly increase sales and still be a net loss.

It doesn't have to be free for it to be worth it. Let's take that 80,000 number. After Steam takes its cut that's $42 going to Bethesda's pockets per unit sold (worst case, ignoring the lowered fees as units sold increases). There's no further distribution costs, so that's a straight 80,000 * $42 = $3.3M of revenue. If Denuvo costs even $100k then it's already paid for itself 30 times over.

As for the 80,000 number, Doom 2016 sold 500,000 copies on PC in its first 2 weeks. You only need mid to high single digit percentage increase from DRM to turn into substantial amounts of money. Heck, if Denuvo costs $100k then even a 1% sales increase during that first 2 weeks would have been a net gain of $110k.

Re: Bethesda apparently broke its own Denuvo protection for Doom Eternal

#35

Post by alkonaut »

rurounijones wrote: post #31
alkonaut wrote: post #22

How hard can it be to protect AAA games when can't be bought or played without an internet connection? (Can't be bought because you don't buy stuff on physical media any more, and can't be played because there is a huge patch every 3 days that you'll need if you expect to be able to finish it). Just make the damn thing require an internet connection all the time. I don't care. If you are a good publisher then you pro…

> Just make the damn thing require an internet connection all the time. I don't care. Not everyone has perfectly reliable access to the internet.

Most people who can download a 50GB game tend to at least be able to have a connection that allows the game to phone home once a minute or so.

Re: Bethesda apparently broke its own Denuvo protection for Doom Eternal

#36

Post by roywiggins »

vidarh wrote: post #23
smoyer wrote: post #12

> Denuvo says it still considers even a few days of effective DRM protection to be valuable to its publisher customers This is a pretty ridiculous position and should be embarrassing if you work at Denuvo. Would you buy anti-virus software or any other security product with that claim. (Police officer to homeowner) I see you bought a lock for your front door that only offered two days of protection ... it's been 3.5…

This is a poor example. Most locks - like most DRM - does not stop the most determined people from gaining access. It makes it slightly harder, more time consuming and/or more resource consuming to get access, with the hope that it will deter the most opportunistic attackers, and slow the more determined ones "enough" where "enough" is a function of the cost of the protection vs. the benefit of delaying access. We ac…

A lot of DRM isn't like locks because a crack can be applied by casual enthusiasts, not just experts. Keygens are not hard to use, whereas lockpicks require a bit of skill, time, and equipment that you can't just download.

(Some DRM does actually act more like a lock, such as console DRM that require hardware mods and would void the warranty)

Re: Bethesda apparently broke its own Denuvo protection for Doom Eternal

#37

Post by pfranz »

alkonaut wrote: post #22

How hard can it be to protect AAA games when can't be bought or played without an internet connection? (Can't be bought because you don't buy stuff on physical media any more, and can't be played because there is a huge patch every 3 days that you'll need if you expect to be able to finish it). Just make the damn thing require an internet connection all the time. I don't care. If you are a good publisher then you pro…

I knew someone that worked on AAA games (for console). Even with day-1 updates they made single-player a priority during the final push because certain groups (they specifically called out those deployed overseas) can't get updates. Obviously, multi-player must update before playing.

Re: Bethesda apparently broke its own Denuvo protection for Doom Eternal

#38

Post by Retric »

kllrnohj wrote: post #34
Retric wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it’s free then sure, but your numbers are unlikely to be accurate and this stuff both directly and indirectly expensive. So, it’s easy for it to slightly increase sales and still be a net loss.

It doesn't have to be free for it to be worth it. Let's take that 80,000 number. After Steam takes its cut that's $42 going to Bethesda's pockets per unit sold (worst case, ignoring the lowered fees as units sold increases). There's no further distribution costs, so that's a straight 80,000 * $42 = $3.3M of revenue. If Denuvo costs even $100k then it's already paid for itself 30 times over. As for the 80,000 number,…

Denuvo likely costs vastly more than 100k, and the difference in samples are unlikely to hit 80k. Using 2 million for the software and 20k net sales I hit a net loss of 1.1 million.

Yep, those numbers where picked from thin air, but ”As of August 2018, the company employs 1,000 people“, so that math only works if their licenses are freaking expensive. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denuvo

Re: Bethesda apparently broke its own Denuvo protection for Doom Eternal

#39

Post by TrumpSucks »

jimbob45 wrote: post #3

I don’t understand the relationship between the two companies, id and Bethesda. I see that they’re both owned by ZeniMax but nothing else. Is this just a temporary marriage of convenience?

They are all trash, that's all you really need to know.

Re: Bethesda apparently broke its own Denuvo protection for Doom Eternal

#40

Post by dannyz »

Plasmoid2000ad wrote: post #20

Anyone remember the Unreal Tournament 2003 (or was it 2004?) Demo, which had an exe that was compatible with original retail release as a DRM free copy. Of course, Unreal Tournament was a mostly online multiplayer game, and relied on cdkeys as well. I'm surprised with everything i've heard about release pressure and crunch time that this doesn't happen more often.

For the original unreal tournament (1999) you could download the demo and then apply the "nodelta" official update to get the full version of the game.
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