Laut einer neuen Studie drohen Publishern 20 % Umsatzeinbußen bei Spielen, wenn Denuvo DRM schnell geknackt wird
https://www.tomshardware.com/video-games/publishers-face-20-percent-game-revenue-reduction-if-denuvo-drm-is-cracked-quickly-according-to-new-study
22 Comments
Wow, it’s almost like piracy hurts sales.
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Interesting. If the initial release window is so important, I wonder what sort of revenue is lost when games are released half-baked and in desperate need of several serious patches. Don’t these typically take months to prepare?
So it hurts them less than legit sales? /s
Based on asspull numbers since the “researcher” had no access to actual sales figures and based on the very stupid assumption that a large chunk of pirates would buy if they had no other choice (anecdotally, no one I know who pirates regularly would even consider paying).
I can’t find the actual data in the study, but I’d be hesitant to believe it. For one it starts with the assumptions the odds of a game being cracked quickly is random, but only tested that against metacritic scores to see if metacritic correlated with speed of crack.
I think it’s safer to assume how fast something is cracked isn’t random. Instead it’s probably dependent on the game security, game type, publisher, and popularity. None of which is accurately reflected by just metacritic score.
A small indie dev making a small game might get popular and have bad security and get cracked fast but have a steep revenue drop off because they don’t have the marketing or other tools to capitalize on the popularity. Vs a big dev that can capitalize on popularity and be harder to crack.
If that is the case, any revenue reduction correlations could just be dependent on all or any of those factors and not fully related to the speed of cracking. Personally I have a hard time believing a 20% reduction from being cracked.
name 1 recent denuvo game that has been cracked quickly
I don’t have access to the article but I’ve put in a request with my university library, we’ll see if they approve it.
Maybe 1-5% is lost revenue at best.
People that crack/pirate are people that would never have bought it or cannot afford it.
These articles always make me laugh. Check out the most common torrent piracy sites, and you’ll find that the numbers on the torrents are quite low.
You’re telling me that so many of your potential customers are pirating your game that your new game is losing 20+% of what it would make, but there’s only 7 people seeding the torrent?
Clearly it’s not 0% but 20% is bullshit. Piracy != a lost sale. Some people pirate because they can’t afford it. That’s not losing a potential sale because they’re not buying it anyways. Some pirate because they can’t access it in their country. Again, not a lost sale. Some pirate and see if they like it and then purchase it (I do this often). There is a section, I’m going to guess still the biggest section but not 20%, that can A.) access it freely B.) Afford it and then C.) Choose to pirate it anyways.
To calculate this, wouldn`t you need the same product release at the same time, one with denuvo and one without. And then calculate the impact?
I haven’t looked at the study yet but right off the bat I’m wondering how they got to those numbers.
Did they track torrents and counted every peer as a lost sale?
Did they keep track of every peer’s download status and made sure they only counted the ones that actually completed the download?
Did they compare sales figures of completely different games with and with DRM?
I feel like no matter what, the result would be rather questionable since it’s almost impossible to determine how many people would have bought a game if piracy wasn’t an option.
Not playing a game is a viable option. If piracy isn’t an option, a pirate just isn’t going to play the game. $70 is quite a bit more than free.
I bet the people who can’t buy Sony games due to the PlayStation account requirement are more likely to pirate them.
Yeah, bc people using a pirates copy will buy in that same time frame… or maybe they would if the game wasnt shit and had a demo… so is DRM then more about lying and selling a hidden product? If you can afford it, you buy it, if you like it you buy it.
No one is cracking Denuvo. One of the last denuvo releases that got cracked was Hogwarts Legacy more than 2 years ago.
Have they researched game revenue reduction when a game has Denuvo DRM compared to not? How many don’t get a game out of spite of its DRM and pirate it later (if possible). Surely that amount of people isn’t zero. I wonder how impactful the perception of a game is to its sales- considering Denuvo gives it a bad rep among certain communities and people that may not have otherwise paid it any mind or actually bought it.
Funny, because I won’t buy anything with these nasty-ass pseudo-rootkit DRMs
/r/patientgamers awaits. Be free!
Were I a publisher/dev I’d look for some kind of refund clause in contract before purchasing Denuvo for my game.
Is this funded by Denuvo? There is literally no way to prove this.
Reading both the article and the one it’s based on… there’s zero actual data shown to back that claim up unless I’m blind. It’s not explained how Denuvo is actually stopping 20% of sales being pirated.
Given how big of a claim 20% of pc sales being pirated is, I’m going to take this with a grain of salt.
all i see is a load of bullshit