Denuvo Admits There’s No Uncrackable Game, but the Goal Is to Protect Sales at Launch

Alessio Palumbo
DOOM Denuvo

Speaking to GamesIndustry during Gamescom 2018, Denuvo Sales Director Elmar Fischer admitted that the goal for their anti-piracy DRM software is to protect the initial sales of a game since no title can be guaranteed to remain uncracked indefinitely.

It's a competition. For them, it's really a sport and they are idolised. There is no manual effort needed [for games without Denuvo-like protection), they have more or less generic ways to crack it.

Our goal, and it's still the goal, is to protect initial sales. Of course we would like to have it uncracked forever, but that just doesn't happen in the games industry.

At the same time, Fischer couldn't provide an estimate on how much of a positive impact on revenue their anti-piracy DRM had for the developer/publisher.

Related Story Nintendo Is Not Involved in the Development of the Denuvo Switch Emulator Protection Software

It's a really tough one for us to answer straight. For the games we protect, I think we have a huge impact, especially if we secure the initial sales window then we see a dramatic on the game and also the revenue when you compare it to other games that have been cracked immediately, but for the industry as a whole, it's very tough to answer.

You can see the piracy of the games, but it's really tough to tell how many of these would have bought the game. We can estimate, and even if you take a small percentage of this number then the revenue would increase dramatically.

Lastly, Fischer commented on Denuvo becoming part of Irdeto. According to him, this will provide them with more knowledge and resources.

Correct, we did have a bit of a rough patch in Autumn last year especially with some quick cracks. I think that's also the timing when we had the idea to work together with Irdeto.

Seeking to strengthen our tech actually came from the acquisition with the complimentary tech; a lot of help from their engineering side... they have nearly unlimited resources compared to our 45 people.

Alessio Palumbo Photo

About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.

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