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[DaciaJC]

From the Ars Technica article:

In "The Revenue Effects of Denuvo Digital Rights Management on PC Video Games," published in the peer-reviewed journal Entertainment Computing, UNC research associate William Volckmann examines 86 different Denuvo-protected games initially released on Steam between September 2014 and the end of 2022. That sample includes many games where Denuvo protection endured for at least 12 weeks (when new sales tend to drop off to "negligible" amounts for most games) and many others where earlier cracks allowed for widespread piracy at some point.

Unfortunately, the lack of good publicly available sales data for most games makes it difficult to measure these revenue effects directly. To estimate a Steam game's relative sales decline in each week after release, Volckmann uses a proxy that combines the number of new Steam user reviews and, for single-player narrative games, the game's average active player count. While Volckmann acknowledges that these imperfect estimates represent "the biggest limitation of this study," any estimated biases away from actual sales data seem likely to cancel out across the various games in the sample.

This is how I imagine his analysis worked: he looked at a statistical composite of new Steam reviews and concurrent player counts and found a consistent, significant decrease in those numbers for a given game once its crack was released. You would expect a game's player counts (or number of new reviews) to naturally decline with time after release as early buyers finish their experience and move on, especially for singleplayer games, but that's partially balanced out by people purchasing the game later after release. If, however, pirating the game becomes an option, at least some portion of those who would have bought a legit Steam copy opt instead to download a crack, and therefore you would see a more severe drop in player count coinciding with the crack release compared to the expected natural decline. By looking at a selection of games that varied in how quickly they were cracked after release, he was able to determine the magnitude of the effect the availability of a crack had on these revenue indicators with respect to time.

 

[Donald mac Ronald]

I strongly believe the people who were gonna pirate the game weren't going to buy it anyway. Meaning no loss of sale

 

[Fabieter]

Good way to spend a sunday at work though, killed a bit of my shift

Cool movie also.

Yea was fun. Hopefully your shift is ending soon tho.

I have a softapot for smaller horror movies

 

[clarky]

I strongly believe the people who were gonna pirate the game weren't going to buy it anyway. Meaning no loss of sale

So piracy has zero effect on the games industry is what you are saying?

Edit: I agree with you in principle but theres alot more to it than that.

 

[xrnzaaas]

People who pirate games very rarely buy them, but it is definitely more common that people may want to avoid the purchase until Denuvo is removed. This can be harmful to the publisher since by then the game will be out for weeks / months and have a much lower price.

I'm glad I'm a console player, because I would join that group and wait to have a clean (and patched) product.

 

[clarky]

Yea was fun. Hopefully your shift is ending soon tho.

I have a softapot for smaller horror movies

OT but check out The Substance if you can. I watched it last night, what a ride.

 

[Guilty_AI]

What about the revenue loss due to folks not buying games with Denuvo installed. I know I'm one of those.

Me too, haven't bought a single Atlus game despite being interested in them because of that. There was a strong chance i might've bought Metaphor on release or close to if it didn't have Denuvo.

 

[clarky]

Me too, haven't bought a single Atlus game despite being interested in them because of that. There was a strong chance i might've bought Metaphor on release or close to if it didn't have Denuvo.

Wait a couple of weeks and you can pirate it.

 

[Guilty_AI]

Wait a couple of weeks and you can pirate it.

No, will only buy it if they remove Denuvo after it gets pirated, which they didn't do with their previous titles after they got cracked.

 

[Shake Your Rump]

I find their claim that total sales increase by 20% to be absurd. To reach this number, mathematically, would require either:

1) a number much higher than 20% of all people pirating PC games choosing to buy the game at full-price if forced by Denuvo, or
2) more total people pirating the game than buying it.

Both scenarios are extremely dubious. 20% is simply far too high to be realistic.

 

[Edgelord79]

I don’t understand why people think that if you pirate a thing you aren’t capable of buying it after. This is a false assumption.

I mean this is an article vetted by academic peers. The odds of the model being incorrect is small as it has to pass checks.

The only way to call BS on this is to ask for the source data from the author and run your own numbers.

 

[clarky]

I don’t understand why people think that if you pirate a thing you aren’t capable of buying it after. This is a false assumption.

I mean this is an article vetted by academic peers. The odds of the model being incorrect is small as it has to pass checks.

The only way to call BS on this is to ask for the source data from the author and run your own numbers.

You think someone who stole something is going back later and buying that product? Why?

Maybe if something leaks early and they intend on buying after.

 

[Guilty_AI]

I mean this is an article vetted by academic peers. The odds of the model being incorrect is small as it has to pass checks.

Knowing modern academia, being vetted by peers doesn't mean anything. The amount of bullshit papers out there is immeasurable

The only way to call BS on this is to ask for the source data from the author and run your own numbers.

he doesn't give the data and says it'll be "available on request"

 

[Edgelord79]

he doesn't give the data and says it'll be "available on request"

That’s why I said to ask the author for the data. I’m confused at this comment.

 

[Edgelord79]

You think someone who stole something is going back later and buying that product? Why?

Maybe if something leaks early and they intend on buying after.

- multiplayer
- goes on sale on Steam
- wants to keep up to date with patches
- there are probably more individualize reasons as well

A good example of this is a game like V Rising (previously had Planet Zoo here which was cracked much later it seems so not a good example) or something with a single player and multiplayer campaign like a Diablo type game.

 

[Sentenza]

It's a paper in an academic journal. This is the receipt.

It's not a receipt when the foundation of your numbers is "guesstimate".

 

[Ozriel]

Metaphor had Atlus' highest ever launch CCUs on Steam.

Somehow, i deeply doubt there's a critical mass of Steam users boycotting games because of Denuvo. And there's no chance in hell it's a bigger tranche than pirates who can afford the games.

 

[Sentenza]

i support denuvo on all steam games.

^
Person that doesn't play on PC, for the record.

 

[Goalus]

Does this also apply to games like World of Warcraft, the Elder Scrolls Online, Final Fantasy 14, or Concord?

^
Person that doesn't play on PC, for the record.

Or: Person that doesn't use Steam to play on PC.

 

[clarky]

- multiplayer
- goes on sale on Steam
- wants to keep up to date with patches
- there are probably more individualize reasons as well

A good example of this is a game like Planet Zoo.

-Multiplayer or live service games are different, doubtful they have a piracy problem at all with online checks every time you boot one up
-If i had a game on my hard drive im not even paying 50p for it why would you?
-Patches, also available on the steal .
-There probably isnt.

Planet zoo?

 

[Sentenza]

Metaphor had Atlus' highest ever launch CCUs on Steam.

It's also one of their first major releases that isn't a late console port.

 

[hemo memo]

So paying consumers are the one getting screwed. Someone who pirated the game wouldn't care what state they get to play the game in.

 

[Astray]

I don’t understand why people think that if you pirate a thing you aren’t capable of buying it after. This is a false assumption.

I mean this is an article vetted by academic peers. The odds of the model being incorrect is small as it has to pass checks.

The only way to call BS on this is to ask for the source data from the author and run your own numbers.

The vast majority of pirates out there don't do it out of some grand ideal that cannot be negotiated with otherwise, they do it to save money. I don't really understand why some people don't want to accept that fact.

A pirate may not buy EVERY single game they want if Denuvo was on all of them, but they will buy *some* of these games if the wait gets long enough and an inviting discount happens. That's where the %20 figure comes from.

If I'm a company that has to report to shareholders and has to pay its employees on time, then up to %20 of my launch window volume can be a huge amount of money that is not worth messing with.

This is why companies continue to hire Denuvo. Thanks for coming to my TED Talk.

 

[Fabieter]

Do people remember how rocksteady punished pirates with arkham asylum?

 

[clarky]

The vast majority of pirates out there don't do it out of some grand ideal that cannot be negotiated with otherwise, they do it to save money. I don't really understand why some people don't want to accept that fact.

A pirate may not buy EVERY single game they want if Denuvo was on all of them, but they will buy *some* of these games if the wait gets long enough and an inviting discount happens. That's where the %20 figure comes from.

If I'm a company that has to report to shareholders and has to pay its employees on time, then up to %20 of my launch window volume can be a huge amount of money that is not worth messing with.

This is why companies continue to hire Denuvo. Thanks for coming to my TED Talk.

The only discount a pirate is waiting for is the one that costs nothing.

 

[DrFigs]

I strongly believe the people who were gonna pirate the game weren't going to buy it anyway. Meaning no loss of sale

The cracks are random. there's no schedule for them to come out. so if you see a decrease in sales on games that are cracked early, it seems pretty straight forward that it's because people who would have have bought those games pirated it instead.

 

[Kasane89]

Companies lose money by giving denuvo money. They gain money by forcing some (not all) pirates to buy their game day 1. They lose money because of players who dont buy any game with denuvo implemented or because of reported technical problems, which can in turn lead to worse reviews and sales as well (in extreme cases). pirates who never buy games or are just very poor will still not buy their game especially with a steep pricetag like metaphor. pirates who just look to save money may ignore it as well, you know we have alot of alternatives nowadays. no piracy could theoretically mean less overall active players, which leads to less people talking about your game, which could in turn lead to less sales.

Topics like that are too black/white to me. Piracy cant only just reduced to "loss of sales". In many cases it may help to bring a niche product or medium out there to a new demographic.

 

[yurinka]

The paper doesn't include the supposed data he did use to make the study. So can't be verified and can't be seen if the sample and methodology was good/representative enough. In fact we can't even double check if all the claims are just made out.

 

[Minsc]

I think it's pretty easy to prove piracy reduces sales - just take the presumption that there was a way to 100% absolute eliminate all pirated content. No pirated console hacks, no downloads, literally not a single way to pirate ANYTHING at all.

All of a sudden these people who only pirate, Switch games, PC games, buy DS's with the system hacked already with 200+ games included and what not, what do all these people simply decide gaming ceases to exist for them? Doubt it.

If you could eliminate every aspect of piracy, aka scorched earth it, there'd definitely be more sales.

But I also think you can argue fairly easily that piracy adds to game sales, just not immediately, but way down the road. I'd argue a number of people who pirated games in their youth when they have more time than money and don't become degenerates or homeless or die from drugs or cancer or whatever, or simply fall out of gaming entirely, and carry their passion for gaming in their adult years will now have some disposable income and no longer care about wasting the little time they have after work to deal with piracy, and are likely to be buying games.

I also love the family/account sharing angle too. We all get riled up over piracy, but how is it fair if two friends share or let each other borrow games? That's a lost sale all the same, family share, sharing passwords, etc. If you want to get down to it, in the eyes of a game pub/dev, anyone who plays their game without paying for it, is stealing IMO. That includes people who play games their family members own, or people who share their login with friends to save money.

 

[clarky]

The cracks are random. there's no schedule for them to come out. so if you see a decrease in sales on games that are cracked early, it seems pretty straight forward that it's because people who would have have bought those games pirated it instead.

How do you know if your seeing a decrease in sales after a game is cracked?

The best way would be to look at console sales of the same title across the same timeframe, if pc sales drop off a cliff when a crack come out but console sales remain steady then id say yes anti piracy measures are working. But as far as im aware this study provides no such information

 

[Edgelord79]

The only discount a pirate is waiting for is the one that costs nothing.

This as an absolutism that is a problem. It’s most likely incorrect and based on faulty logic. Hence large companies still continue to use Denuvo to protect initial revenue on large titles.

Look I’m not going to change your opinion, but an academic paper that is vetted by peers is as far away from an opinion as you are going to get compared to forum posts that are true opinion pieces.

Your arguments are again based on “my experience and “my friends” not actual models or numbers that have been vetted.

 

[clarky]

I think it's pretty easy to prove piracy reduces sales - just take the presumption that there was a way to 100% absolute eliminate all pirated content. No pirated console hacks, no downloads, literally not a single way to pirate ANYTHING at all.

All of a sudden these people who only pirate, Switch games, PC games, buy DS's with the system hacked already with 200+ games included and what not, what do all these people simply decide gaming ceases to exist for them? Doubt it.

If you could eliminate every aspect of piracy, aka scorched earth it, there'd definitely be more sales.

But I also think you can argue fairly easily that piracy adds to game sales, just not immediately, but way down the road. I'd argue a number of people who pirated games in their youth when they have more time than money and don't become degenerates or homeless or die from drugs or cancer or whatever, or simply fall out of gaming entirely, and carry their passion for gaming in their adult years will now have some disposable income and no longer care about wasting the little time they have after work to deal with piracy, and are likely to be buying games.

I also love the family/account sharing angle too. We all get riled up over piracy, but how is it fair if two friends share or let each other borrow games? That's a lost sale all the same, family share, sharing passwords, etc. If you want to get down to it, in the eyes of a game pub/dev, anyone who plays their game without paying for it, is stealing IMO. That includes people who play games their family members own, or people who share their login with friends to save money.

How is family/account sharing even remotely like piracy? Its a feature provided by steam, publishers can opt out if they like. im not breaking any law by using it

 

[Minsc]

How is family/account sharing even remotely like piracy? Its a feature provided by steam, publishers can opt out if they like. im not breaking any law by using it

I actually think most people who are 100% big time anti-piracy are also pro piracy when it comes to physical. They strongly feel all the things they want to say is bad about piracy, those same things somehow don't apply to physical games, and it's ok to freely give away or borrow physical copies to whoever they want, and they'd probably even argue doing so - sharing games for free - actually increases games sales - now where have we heard that before? Yup pirated games could lead to increased sales eventually too.

Sharing games is the same when it comes to lost sales. Even if you're allowed to do it that's irrelevant, we're talking about people playing games without paying for them. That means someone who pirated and someone who borrowed a game did the same thing. Both people resulted in no sales.

 

[Fabieter]

I also love the family/account sharing angle too. We all get riled up over piracy, but how is it fair if two friends share or let each other borrow games? That's a lost sale all the same, family share, sharing passwords, etc. If you want to get down to it, in the eyes of a game pub/dev, anyone who plays their game without paying for it, is stealing IMO. That includes people who play games their family members own, or people who share their login with friends to save money.

While you have a case that not every download is a lost sale the thing you wrote above isn't remotely the same and actually I kinda felt someone being triggered by this thread focusing on pirates . Is there any kind of reason for that?

 

[clarky]

I actually think most people who are 100% big time anti-piracy are also pro piracy when it comes to physical. They strongly feel all the things they want to say is bad about piracy, those same things somehow don't apply to physical games, and it's ok to freely give away or borrow physical copies to whoever they want, and they'd probably even argue doing so - sharing games for free - actually increases games sales - now where have we heard that before? Yup pirated games could lead to increased sales eventually too.

Sharing games is the same when it comes to lost sales. Even if you're allowed to do it that's irrelevant, we're talking about people playing games without paying for them. That means someone who pirated and someone who borrowed a game did the same thing. Both people resulted in no sales.

So much wrong in this post its untrue

 

[Panajev2001a]

I actually think most people who are 100% big time anti-piracy are also pro piracy when it comes to physical. They strongly feel all the things they want to say is bad about piracy, those same things somehow don't apply to physical games, and it's ok to freely give away or borrow physical copies to whoever they want, and they'd probably even argue doing so - sharing games for free - actually increases games sales - now where have we heard that before? Yup pirated games could lead to increased sales eventually too.

Sharing games is the same when it comes to lost sales. Even if you're allowed to do it that's irrelevant, we're talking about people playing games without paying for them. That means someone who pirated and someone who borrowed a game did the same thing. Both people resulted in no sales.

One is based at least on some legal precedent (see First Sale Doctrine), the other is not.

 

[Fabieter]

I actually think most people who are 100% big time anti-piracy are also pro piracy when it comes to physical. They strongly feel all the things they want to say is bad about piracy, those same things somehow don't apply to physical games, and it's ok to freely give away or borrow physical copies to whoever they want, and they'd probably even argue doing so - sharing games for free - actually increases games sales - now where have we heard that before? Yup pirated games could lead to increased sales eventually too.

Sharing games is the same when it comes to lost sales. Even if you're allowed to do it that's irrelevant, we're talking about people playing games without paying for them. That means someone who pirated and someone who borrowed a game did the same thing. Both people resulted in no sales.

Only a pirate themselve would argue like that.

 

[Minsc]

One is based at least on some legal precendent First Sale Doctrine, the other is not.

So much wrong in this post its untrue

All I'm looking at is simply lost sales. Someone who doesn't pay for a game whether from "legal" or "illegal" means is someone who didn't pay for a game. That is a lost sale, true and true.

 

[Kasane89]

I think it's pretty easy to prove piracy reduces sales - just take the presumption that there was a way to 100% absolute eliminate all pirated content. No pirated console hacks, no downloads, literally not a single way to pirate ANYTHING at all.

All of a sudden these people who only pirate, Switch games, PC games, buy DS's with the system hacked already with 200+ games included and what not, what do all these people simply decide gaming ceases to exist for them? Doubt it.

If you could eliminate every aspect of piracy, aka scorched earth it, there'd definitely be more sales.

I respect your take but i disagree.

Lets just look at something more extreme. Animes. Lets assume none of the official streaming services existed and suddenly pirate streaming sites would cease to exist. What would happen to all these millions of anime fans if they had to suddenly buy overpriced Blurays and no other choice? I can guarantee you most people would stop caring about anime and move on with their lives and start caring about other things.

piracy also brings exposure, ease of access when you live in regions with stupid laws, preservation etc. There are alot of facettes to this, but i can guarantee you that eradicating piracy 100% would lead to a smaller industry.

Also reminder what Gabe Newells (Valve) had to say about piracy: "Piracy is a service problem". If your service is good enough for the individual then players will naturally decide to rather buy legitimate copies. but you know, everyones circumstances are different.

 

[Schmendrick]

I actually think most people who are 100% big time anti-piracy are also pro piracy when it comes to physical. They strongly feel all the things they want to say is bad about piracy, those same things somehow don't apply to physical games, and it's ok to freely give away or borrow physical copies to whoever they want, and they'd probably even argue doing so - sharing games for free - actually increases games sales - now where have we heard that before? Yup pirated games could lead to increased sales eventually too.

Sharing games is the same when it comes to lost sales. Even if you're allowed to do it that's irrelevant, we're talking about people playing games without paying for them. That means someone who pirated and someone who borrowed a game did the same thing. Both people resulted in no sales.

That is the most horrendously stupid comparison I've read on the internet today.

 

[winjer]

An argument can also be made, for Denuvo reducing sales.
For example, Jedi Survivor had tons of performance issues when it launched. The worst part were the stutters from asset streaming.
These were bad, even on high end machines. But mid and low end machines got even worse.
EA released 8 patches, but the stutters remained in large quantity. But with patch 9, that removed denuvo, stutters were greatly reduced and frame rates in CPU bound scenarios, also got a nice boost.
And a lot of people were put off from buying the game, because of all the performance issues that Denuvo brings.
Worst yet, Denuvo costs 25.000$ per month. So that is an extra cost that studios have to deal with.

 

[Panajev2001a]

All I'm looking at is simply lost sales. Someone who doesn't pay for a game whether from "legal" or "illegal" means is someone who didn't pay for a game. That is a lost sale, true and true.

Does not matter, it is not the same thing at all and dear Lord what is legal and what is not matters (read the link if you want the justice department reasoning on it if you want) . You stop having access when you load the game to your friend or when you sell it. Same principle behind the used games sales market.

You are going into wildly deranged territory here…

 

[Minsc]

Does not matter, it is not the same thing at all and dear lord what is legal and what is not matters . You stop having access when you load the game to your friend or when you sell it. Same principle behind the used games sales market.

You are going into wildly deranged territory here…

So you're saying if there are two scenarios they are not the same with lost sales?

Scenario 1:
Person 1 buys the game, finishes it, and lets person 2 and 3 borrow their game, and they play and finish it.

Scenario 2:
Person 1 buys the game, finishes it, and person 2 and 3 pirate the game.

In both scenarios there is 1 sale. So you can easily argue that borrowing has lead to the same reduction in sales as piracy has in the above examples. This is literally accurate.

 

[Schmendrick]

Last I checked it was impossible to get any data on "what if" scenarios. That "study" is at best guesswork aka worthless.

 

[Fabieter]

I respect your take but i disagree.

Lets just look at something more extreme. Animes. Lets assume none of the official streaming services existed and suddenly pirate streaming sites would cease to exist. What would happen to all these millions of anime fans if they had to suddenly buy overpriced Blurays and no other choice? I can guarantee you most people would stop caring about anime and move on with their lives and start caring about other things.

piracy also brings exposure, ease of access when you live in regions with stupid laws, preservation etc. There are alot of facettes to this, but i can guarantee you that eradicating piracy 100% would lead to a smaller industry.

Also reminder what Gabe Newells (Valve) had to say about piracy: "Piracy is a service problem". If your service is good enough for the individual then players will naturally decide to rather buy legitimate copies. but you know, everyones circumstances are different.

your point doesn't make any sense with the quote of gabe. If pirates don't buy games and would just move on if it was taken away. Why would they buy games with a better service. I kind of agree with gabe. I don't agree with the rest of your point.

 

[Minsc]

your point doesn't make any sense with the quote of gabe. If pirates don't buy games and would just move on if it was taken away. Why would they buy games with a better service. I kind of agree with gabe. I don't agree with the rest of your point.

Gabe's service quote to me is basically the huge surge of Napster evolving/becoming irrelevant once the industry figured out streaming like Spotify.

 

[Fabieter]

So you're saying if there are two scenarios they are not the same with lost sales?

Scenario 1:
Person 1 buys the game, finishes it, and lets person 2 and 3 borrow their game, and they play and finish it.

Scenario 2:
Person 1 buys the game, finishes it, and person 2 and 3 pirate the game.

In both scenarios there is 1 sale. So you can easily argue that borrowing has lead to the same reduction in sales as piracy has in the above examples. This is literally accurate.

Yes and person b and c buy games as well and give it to their friends. A pirate is always a lost sale in fact one download can lead to dozens of people playing it for free at the same time which is not the same at all.

 

[hinch7]

Yeah this is nonsense lol.

 

[clarky]

So you're saying if there are two scenarios they are not the same with lost sales?

Scenario 1:
Person 1 buys the game, finishes it, and lets person 2 and 3 borrow their game, and they play and finish it.

Scenario 2:
Person 1 buys the game, finishes it, and person 2 and 3 pirate the game.

In both scenarios there is 1 sale. So you can easily argue that borrowing has lead to the same reduction in sales as piracy has in the above examples. This is literally accurate.

Your forgetting what if someone gives the game away, or buys it used, or gets it on ps+ or gamepass, all lost sales, all the same as piracy.......

 

[Minsc]

Your forgetting what if someone gives the game away, or buys it used, or gets it on ps+ or gamepass, all lost sales, all the same as piracy.......

Eh, you're confusing my initial point (where I do agree that piracy does reduce sales, at least in some ways) which was not to say they're the same as piracy, but simply to say there's other meaningful areas you can explore when looking at potential lost sales beyond just piracy. And certainly the same argument we are making for piracy - if it didn't exist there'd be more sales - would be true for some of those areas. If the ability to lend and borrow games didn't exist, people who employ that ability and borrow games, would no longer be able to play them and now have to buy instead.