DragonGaming wrote:

Another thing to note is that Denuvo actually encourages Piracy as it gives people a reason to crack the game, If Amplitude worries about piracy, then getting rid of denuvo actually will help ease their worries. It may not outright stop piracy (because nothing can), but it will definitely minimize it as there wont be as much of a reason to crack the game.

Do you understand what Denuvo is? I'm seeing a lot of misinformation and misunderstanding in this thread. The information below comes mostly from the Denuvo website itself, but also from personal experience and things explained to me from game developers. Denuvo makes it a lot harder to conventionally decompile games. The reason this is a big deal is because, while yes it delays the game getting cracked for a month or two, but is also because it makes mods that use tools like Harmony way harder to create (despite what they claim on their website, modder friends repeatedly tell me its a lot harder to mod games with AntiTamper). Meaning, if the game does not have a built-in modding system (and frankly, even if it does), modding will not happen until someone figures out a way around it. Amplitude is (probably) adding this, rather than Denuvo AntiCheat, which is way more intrusive, and when -- often -- implemented poorly, drastically effects performance and has kernel level access. What does kernel level access mean? It uses drivers that have access to the core of your operating system and can do virtually do anything they want. This isn't innately bad, though it is incredibly intrusive, but hackers regularly use poorly made drivers such as this to gain access to the entirety of your computer (with a recent example being Genshin Impact.

The game will be pirated whether AntiTamper is added or not. The point of adding AntiTamper is to delay it for as long as possible. Game studios do this frequently, and once the game is cracked, it'll likely be removed.

I don't like AntiTamper, especially as a modder, however, Amplitude is a business and I understand them wanting to delay piracy.

CaptainCobbs wrote:

The point of adding AntiTamper is to delay it for as long as possible. Game studios do this frequently

Certainly not all companies and certainly never Amplitude before willingly selling themselves to Sega while shouting loud and clear, "we promise we won’t change". Remember when Amplitude said, "we promise we won’t change" when they willingly sold themselves to Sega? Well, Denuvo is a first part of that promise and very probably many similar corpo stuff soon to come :))) LOL 

Guess who uses Denuvo in their products? Ubisoft, the company they left to make Amplitude, an indie company that was closer to the customers and fans without all the corpo trash integrated in their games. Guess who never used Denuvo? Amplitude before selling themselves to Sega

Of course, leaving Ubisoft and starting something new was a huge financial risk so they took it anyways, no Denuvo, no corpo trash in their games, only with fans at their side and a dream. Now that they have a few very well received games under their belt and the money and experience they brought in from them, it became less risky as compared to the times when they started from scratch as they did. But, they could not stand it anymore to be just them, with the fans and with a few well done games, who brought in new money and experience, compared to nothing when they started out, so they willingly sold themselves to a big corpo (Sega), they added Denuvo and corpo trash in the games or items form the "we promise we won’t change" package as Amplitude would say. Because now "it's all risky" that they had a good start and money rolling in! When they started out with nothing they did not care it was risky, they did not cried about Denuvo, they went in with love and faith. Now "it's all risky". Yea, great, makes perfect sense, good stuff :))) :facepalm:

Unfortunately, sometimes money and power can corrupt with ease. But never worry. If they won't change in the future other indie companies will emerge to make great 4x games as they once did or maybe other talented people will leave Ubisoft and make a splendid company as they once did or why not maybe if they grow in this mainstream corpo direction and far away from who they were originally, even the talented people from Amplitude who feel what I and others are saying here will leave Amplitude and make their own company as once Amplitude left Ubisoft. I remember when Blizzard was one of the best and friendly companies ever made, they kind of invented the RTS genre, they allowed modding and freedom, then they grew in a big corpo and did not care even about their RTS, they cared just about money, royalties, restrictions, patents and so on. We waited for 10 years but now RTS in coming back. I remember when Yahoo was all the hype. I remember when Nokia = mobile phone. Nothing is forever if you are not trustworthy and you don't care about your fans / customers. Luckily even if it takes time the market corrects itself. A good thing to ponder about

Casual pirates are people who buy games and usually identify themselves as customers. But when companies like Amplitude put Denuvo and DRMs in their games just to tell their customers: you untrustworthy human beings, we don't like you a bit, you look like thieves and criminals and we are putting Denuvo and DRMs in games just for you, never to be trusted customers. So than the customers who buy their games feel and become casual pirates as that is how the company is treating them :))) :facepalm:

Sublustris wrote:

CaptainCobbs wrote:
and I understand them wanting to delay piracy

To what effect? To screw their legitimate customers? Pirates won't buy it either way, no meaningful number, legit customers will deal with consequences.

I could maybe understand some naive number crunchers in Marketing/Finance/C-Suite and some oblivious stockholders possibly reading Denuvo's advertising and falling for that line, but this notion that delaying piracy somehow leads to higher income is incredibly bizarre.  The fact is that Denuvo has failed to stop piracy (which is expected - it will never be stopped), and they are trying to cover up their failure by spreading this lie that "it delays piracy which means you'll make more money in the first few weeks" so they can justify selling more of their DRM snake oil to unsuspecting corpo-types who clearly don't understand the first thing about what DRM actually does and how it affects customers in the long-term. So it's all a big con being put on by Denuvo and other DRM companies, and video game companies just need to give up on this DRM nonsense and instead just focus on providing the most enjoyable experience to the people who actually pay them for their product.

DragonGaming wrote:

GlorySign wrote:

Casual pirates are people who buy games and usually identify themselves as customers. But when companies like Amplitude put Denuvo and DRMs in their games just to tell their customers: you untrustworthy human beings, we don't like you a bit, you look like thieves and criminals and we are putting Denuvo and DRMs in games just for you, never to be trusted customers. So than the customers who buy their games feel and become casual pirates as that is how the company is treating them :))) :facepalm:

and that just reinforces the fact the Denuvo Encourages Piracy, people who would have bought the game legitimately will instead choose to pirate the game

In my post above I just expressed in a more amusing way, how people who buy a game feel (or symbolically "become"), when the company who makes that game tells them from that start that will treat them like thieves and pirates even if they buy the game officially from them

Now, I don't know what people who do not buy the game choose to do in their lives. As far as I am concerned they could buy, support and play the gazillion great games that don't have DRMs and corpo trash in them since the beginning of gaming and they will run out of life first but never out of games as there are so many and life is so short. Even if they just play all the great non DRM 4Xs ever made, you can play that for decades and don't get bored.

Slashman wrote:

There are a group of people who CAN afford to buy games but who pirate them anyway (casual pirates)...that is ostensibly who Denuvo is targeting.

Yes, I was just joking above with that term, but in a sense that is pretty true

Still, there may be a group of people that CAN afford to buy games but who pirate them anyways as you say. There is also a group of people that CAN afford to buy games but will not if you treat them like pirates / thieves and that is very bad, especially if these are your fans that stayed with you through thick and thin and lost countless hours of their life to give you feedback in forums and OpenDevs so you can improve your games (teams of testers that you don't pay and work for you for free). And also bought all your games to support you when you were just starting up and had no help. Now, to give those the finger I find it to be such an ugly scene

Slashman wrote:

There are a group of people who CAN afford to buy games but who pirate them anyway (casual pirates)...that is ostensibly who Denuvo is targeting. Unfortunately there are lot of variables within that group and then you have the group of people who CANNOT afford your game and would not buy it even if you stop them from pirating it. The thing is that you will never know for sure what or how much DRM is protecting a game.

True, but in either case there was not a potential sale lost because the person never intended to spend money.  So in the context of DRM, whether the person pirated game, did not buy it because they could not afford it, or simply ignored the game is a moot point.  In all three cases, there is no money to be made by the devs.

Slashman wrote:

Unless you could somehow have a parallel launch of the same game in two completely separate but similar worlds and see how well the one with DRM does versus the one without. Maybe the Endless could rig something like that but we humans cannot.

This is also true because you are altering the outcome by taking a measurement.  However, the EU did commission a firm a while ago to assess the effect of piracy on sales, and the results said that there was not a strong correlation between piracy and sales for anything except for "blockbuster" movies:

https://gizmodo.com/the-eu-suppressed-a-300-page-study-that-found-piracy-do-1818629537

Now one question that I would like to know the answer to is how much Denuvo costs the devs.  DRM is intended to prevent lost sales, but any calculation for lost sales is going to be complete guesswork.  So I do wonder how often companies end up spending more money on the DRM than they would have "lost" due to piracy.

In all honesty talking about Denuvo is a minor subject and a trap, also arguing amongst ourselves is also a bloody trap

We should focus more on the main topic in my opinion:

How come the people who left Ubisoft so they could found Amplitude, an indie company that was closer to the customers and fans without all the corpo trash integrated in their games, took that huge risk and started from scratch, only with the fans at their side and a dream, they did not want to hear about DRM, Denuvo, Skins, loot boxes and all the other mainstream corpo trash and succeeded with that formula. 

Fans also supported them because they were sincere and transparent. 

And how come after they had a few games and established themselves in the market and they had some income and experience from the games they made, very well received games, I might add, they suddenly changed  and said it’s “all risky” and they willingly sold themselves to Sega to become a corpo like company and added Denuvo that they never wanted to hear about before, as there was not a problem for them and had success by doing so, while also shouting loud and clear to the fans: don’t worry, "we promise we won’t change"

So why after taking all the risk in the world starting with fans at their side, building trust with no Denuvo and corpo trash and having success they suddenly changed and showed everyone the finger, mostly do not care about feedback so much, added DRM / Denuvo, released that watered down, mobile like 4x Humankind unfinished but asked AAA price for that and all the other bs, while shouting: don’t worry, "we promise we won’t change"?

I think this should be the main topic and what can we, the guys who stood with them when they need us, do about it, if anything, so we can get again the no DRM good quality games that we had before and get back the Amplitude that treated us as a partner?