The longer a game's DRM lasts, the fewer new sales will be affected by piracy.
The longer a game's DRM lasts, the fewer new sales will be affected by piracy. Credit: Entertainment Computing / William Volckmann
However, the amount of money a publisher can expect to lose on a Denuvo crack depends largely on how quickly the game is cracked, according to Volckmann. A Denuvo-protected game cracked in the first week after release can expect to generate around 20 percent less revenue than if the DRM had remained in place, according to the study, while one cracked six weeks after release game alone costs about 5 percent. of the theoretical total income. After 12 weeks, new sales are so negligible that “developers could eventually phase out unpopular DRM schemes with minimal losses (and possible gains from strongly DRM-averse consumers),” Volckmann suggests (and some publishers have done just that after Denuvo is no longer effective). protect new sales).
Volckmann's data aligns with public statements that Irdeto, creator of Denuvo, has made about the need for DRM to protect the crucial window after a game's release. “We do not position Denuvo Anti Tamper as uncrackable; no anti-piracy solution is,” Denuvo VP of Sales Robert Hernandez told Ars in 2017. “However, our goal is to keep every title safe from piracy during the “crucial initial sales window when most sales are made.”
The difference between a week 1 Denuvo crack and a week 6 crack can represent significant amounts of income.
The difference between a week 1 Denuvo crack and a week 6 crack can represent significant amounts of income. Credit: Entertainment Computing / William Volckmann
Overall, according to Volckmann's data, Denuvo does just that. The average games protected by Denuvo lose almost no sales due to piracy, Volckmann suggests, because the protection “most of the time” is not broken in that initial 12-week window. On the other hand, in a world without DRM, Volckmann projects that those games could expect 20 percent less revenue on the median.
Whatever you think about DRM schemes like Denuvo, the potential to protect against that kind of revenue hit is something major publishers may find difficult to ignore. And there are signs that Denuvo's protection is becoming more resistant to cracks in recent months; The CrackWatch subreddit lists 28 Denuvo-protected games released so far in 2024, 26 of which remain uncracked and two of which were cracked well beyond the 12-week release window. As we see in this study, that kind of strong protection can be worth a significant amount to a game publisher wary of piracy.