Mass Effect: Andromeda - Denuvo DRM Removed

BoboTheMighty said:

Who is dancing right now?

Click to expand...

I played it Denuvo free at patch 1.05 and experienced a couple crashes but nothing game breaking or save game corrupting. Even if I purchase on release nowadays there are so many fixes and patches that would delay playing anyway. Whats another couple months?

ME:A sales were significantly below what EA/Bioware expected (after costly marketing studies). If you measure success by poor sales, then denuvo was successful for ME:A.

There is plenty of evidence that denuvo harms the performance of video games. Even if denuvo doesn't completely ruin a game's performance, denuvo problems are cumulative to other problems and do add to poor performance and poor sales.

Consumers "get" the actual message of "we don't worry about problems with video game products we sell -- we take the money and run". Consumers know publishers that insist on denuvo don't give a damn about the gamer despite the silly arguments here and elsewhere. It's one of the reasons denuvo games do poorly in the marketplace.

CDPR and GOG treat customers with respect. Their "carrot" approach actually increases video game sales.

ME:A -- another denuvo "success" in the deep discount bin.

__

I doubt Denuvo had anything at all to do with significant loss of sales. The build up to release was filled with memes about poor animations, as well as some lukewarm previews.

To me, game releases on this level are simply a dice roll. Group consciousness and stuff like that plays a big role in it.

I admit to buying the others...ME3 much later after release. But I simply have no interest in ME:A based on what I have seen of gameplay, reviews etc. Removing Denuvo won't change that ;-) may pick this up if the price plummets dramatically, but I guess it will fall and then hold there for a very long time, so probably won't g et to play it.

Wisdom said:

I played it Denuvo free at patch 1.05 and experienced a couple crashes but nothing game breaking or save game corrupting. Even if I purchase on release nowadays there are so many fixes and patches that would delay playing anyway. Whats another couple months?

Click to expand...

Bobo, I don't think a cracked denuvo game is necessarily the same as the game with denuvo removed. The crack may simply give positive responses to the hoards of denuvo calls, hence leaving the denuvo gameplay interference wholly or partially in tact. Removal of denuvo, as with patch 1.09, actually removes the denuvo interference and there is evidence that this can improve game performance depending on the rig etc.

__

Fluent said:

I doubt Denuvo had anything at all to do with significant loss of sales. The build up to release was filled with memes about poor animations, as well as some lukewarm previews.

To me, game releases on this level are simply a dice roll. Group consciousness and stuff like that plays a big role in it.

Click to expand...

As I've said over and over, I agree that ME:A does have other problems. And it is for that very reason that adding additional problems in the form of denuvo is a bad bad idea. As to "group consciousness", I agree and it's quite clear that denuvo has a negative impact on same.

Believe what you wish. I'll stick to believing CDPR's actual marketplace results that show consumers respond favorably to being treated with attention and respect.

__

If it still requires Origin to play, nothing else matters. Period.

RPGFool said:

As I've said over and over, I agree that ME:A does have other problems. And it is for that very reason that adding additional problems in the form of denuvo is a bad bad idea. As to "group consciousness", I agree and it's quite clear that denuvo has a negative impact on same.

Believe what you wish. I'll stick to believing CDPR's actual marketplace results that show consumers respond favorably to being treated with attention and respect.

__

Click to expand...

I believe it's a gamble, man. It's like Neo Scavenger Syndrome on the Codex. It's a lot of luck (IMO) if a game does well or not. There are tons of examples I can give of that. Right place/right time/right luck type thing.

booboo said:

I admit to buying the others…ME3 much later after release. But I simply have no interest in ME:A based on what I have seen of gameplay, reviews etc. Removing Denuvo won't change that ;-) may pick this up if the price plummets dramatically, but I guess it will fall and then hold there for a very long time, so probably won't g et to play it.

Click to expand...

I think a lot of people feel that way. The hype wasn't right for this release, at all. It was muddled at best.

Fluent said:

I believe it's a gamble, man. It's like Neo Scavenger Syndrome on the Codex. It's a lot of luck (IMO) if a game does well or not. There are tons of examples I can give of that. Right place/right time/right luck type thing.

I think a lot of people feel that way. The hype wasn't right for this release, at all. It was muddled at best.

Click to expand...

Hate to break it to you but there is an actual field of "marketing" complete with actual scientific and practical studies supporting the existence of principles that enhance product sales. Not perfect but a far cry from a complete gamble or roll of the dice.

'Nuff said.

__

RPGFool said:

Hate to break it to you but there is an actual field of "marketing" complete with actual scientific and practical studies supporting the existence of principles that enhance product sales. Not perfect but a far cry from a complete gamble or roll of the dice.

'Nuff said.

__

Click to expand...

Doesn't Andromeda clearly go against what you just posted here?

And Stardew Valley had barely any marketing at all. But okay. While there are ways you can try to increase sales, there's no surefire ticket to success. It's a lot of hit and miss.

Fluent said:

Doesn't Andromeda clearly go against what you just posted here?

And Stardew Valley had barely any marketing at all. But okay. While there are ways you can try to increase sales, there's no surefire ticket to success. It's a lot of hit and miss.

Click to expand...

ME:A doesn't prove that marketing does not work; rather ME:A is simply a case of poor marketing. That camel can only carry so much weight and it started in a weighed down state with poor reputation of Origins, EA/BioWare, etc. Then add in some poor game decisions... Then add in denuvo.

Hey; you've obviously convinced yourself that good marketing can't help a product, You can lead a horse to water…

__

No, I'm just not convinced that marketing is the main factor in whether media sells well. Sure it can help, it can also hinder, and in some cases it can make no difference. I.e. it's a roll of the dice.

Hindsight says it was poorly marketed. I'm sure at the time they thought they were marketing it great. It's not that cut and dry, IMO.

But anyway, it's something silly to argue about. I'm glad they removed Denuvo but it will probably still be used in the future if it deters the first week or two of piracy.

Fluent said:

No, I'm just not convinced that marketing is the main factor in whether media sells well.

Click to expand...

That's good considering no one here made such a claim. He said marketing enhances sales, and it does without a doubt.

I'd actually try this now, but just realized it's probably not on Steam or GOG. I didn't play ME3, because it's origin only and partly for the ME2 dlc scam. Sadly I bet MEA is origin only, too. I'd like to applaud ea for this but they are still so far down in the cesspool it would be like slapping shitballs.

To those who asked, I'm not an expert but denuvo seems to create/run an additional RAM Swap file. This is why you might have noticed any denuvo game needed at least 1gig more RAM than any comparable game/engine. Iirc (probably getting it wrong, but to busy to check atm) Mad Max a moderate graphic quality game (made for consoles) requires 5 gig a RAM, instead of a usual 4 gig for it's quality/engine.

Mad Max is a pos game.

It's extremely delusional to think Denuvo would have had any noticeable impact on ME:A sales. First of all, the vast majority of sales for a game like this are on PS/Xbox anyway. When you take the remaining 5-10% of sales that are actually on PC…probably only like 10-20%, at most, of PC customers even know what Denuvo is, and then some small percentage of those actually give a shit enough to not buy a game because of it. In the end it would absolutely be a completely trivial amount.

But hey, let's not let common sense and actual facts get in the way of RPGFool's silly crusade.

Denuvo is a completely trivial factor unless you're a pirate.

NewDArt said:

Denuvo is a completely trivial factor unless you're a pirate.

Click to expand...

It's not that trivial, as there is a possibility to end up with a situation like in the case of GFWL demise. As Denuvo authentication is on the company's servers, if the company goes down we end up with games that we can't play anymore.

I have a few games with Denuvo protection (DA:I, ME:A, Mad Max, Hitman 2016) and i can't say that i am not worried of what will happen in the case that Denuvo goes down. So calling it a trivial matter isn't exactly a way to describe the situation.

When GFWL, quite a few games were lost, as the devs were gone or not willing to invest in a patch that would remove the protection requirements. Same happened with certain games that had an always online requirement and were protected by SecuROM (Darkspore comes to mind, a game where the customers lost the access completely, as EA closed the servers as the authentication servers were already dead).

This type of protection hurts the paying customer, as the pirate won't have to deal with it. If you've missed the recent developments, Denuvo is now cracked in matter of days. So, yeah, i am happy when a company drops a protection that affects the customer and has zero impact on the pirate. I wish more companies to do the same. Even better, i wish more companies to follow GOG's example. I feel more inclined to buy games from GOG, a place where the client isn't mandatory and allows a backup of the bought games. Add to that the fact that games sold there have zero protection and you get why i feel that GOG's way of doing business deserves my respect.

wolfsrain said:

It's not that trivial, as there is a possibility to end up with a situation like in the case of GFWL demise. As Denuvo authentication is on the company's servers, if the company goes down we end up with games that we can't play anymore.

Click to expand...

They can just patch it out. GFWL was much more integrated and harder to patch out, but even so - it was done for several games.

I have a few games with Denuvo protection (DA:I, ME:A, Mad Max, Hitman 2016) and i can't say that i am not worried of what will happen in the case that Denuvo goes down. So calling it a trivial matter isn't exactly a way to describe the situation.

Click to expand...

Some people worry about everything. Doesn't change how I see it.

When GFWL, quite a few games were lost, as the devs were gone or not willing to invest in a patch that would remove the protection requirements. Same happened with certain games that had an always online requirement and were protected by SecuROM (Darkspore comes to mind, a game where the customers lost the access completely, as EA closed the servers as the authentication servers were already dead).

Click to expand...

Online games is not the same as Denuvo - as they depend on server architecture to be live. Denuvo can easily be patched out - should anyone want to.

This type of protection hurts the paying customer, as the pirate won't have to deal with it. If you've missed the recent developments, Denuvo is now cracked in matter of days. So, yeah, i am happy when a company drops a protection that affects the customer and has zero impact on the pirate. I wish more companies to do the same. Even better, i wish more companies to follow GOG's example. I feel more inclined to buy games from GOG, a place where the client isn't mandatory and allows a backup of the bought games. Add to that the fact that games sold there have zero protection and you get why i feel that GOG's way of doing business deserves my respect.

Click to expand...

As I said, the "hurt" is trivial.

That said, you can call it whatever you like - and if you think it's a big deal, it's a big deal for you.

NewDArt said:

Denuvo is a completely trivial factor unless you're a pirate.

Click to expand...

Yves Guillemot 2.

I've already replied to you why Denuvo is not trivial in games you play and why it should be used - MMOs. It's probably not as cheap as other "solutions".

Another reason why it's not trivial is the recent version I've already reported about where Denuvo, because of whatnot licensing problems, had to replace certain code inside it which caused performance hog.
https://www.rpgwatch.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1061453683&postcount=119

joxer said:

Lemme start with:
https://www.pcgamesn.com/rime/rime-cracked

Not only has Rime been cracked, but the pirates also claim that Denuvo was directly responsible for performance troubles, namely stuttering. According to them, the anti-tamper tech is constantly sending signals to check if the game is legit, impacting performance.

Click to expand...

https://torrentfreak.com/new-control-denuvo-piracy-protection-cracked-170602/

“In previous games like Sniper: Ghost Warrior 3, NieR Automata, Prey there were only about 1000 ‘triggers’ called, so we have x300 here.”

But according to the cracker, the 300,000 calls to triggers was a mere “warmup” for Denuvo. After just 30 minutes of gameplay, the count rose to two million, a figure he delivered with shocked expletives.
…
“Protection now calls about 10-30 triggers every second during actual gameplay, slowing game down. In previous games like Sniper: Ghost Warrior 3, NieR Automata, Prey there were only about 1-2 ‘triggers’ called every several minutes during gameplay, so do the math.”

Click to expand...

Okay, maybe the new Denuvo version is bugged with this excessive behavior, not saying it was intentional.

There is however something else to conclude from this. As the infromation came from a person who cracked it, not some rumorbased facebook hating wall, it only means that other Denuvo verasions in previous games were not causing performance problems as some people were preaching all over internet. Some even here on forums.

Since it appeared, I wasn't against Denuvo, in fact I thought of it as the best DRM possibility out there so far (yea, the best would be noDRM at all, but since CEOs want to have something it's IMO the least evil one).
However, unless it was a bug and not a deliberate resourceshungry version for whatever reason, the lastest Denuvo should go to hell.

Click to expand...

But whatever man, continue to live in your world.