Civ7 now includes Denuvo

[Linklite]

That part needs clarification I think

Denuvo - PCGamingWiki PCGW - bugs, fixes, crashes, mods, guides and improvements for every PC game

www.pcgamingwiki.com

A consequence of its use of unique hardware-based code paths, Denuvo Anti-Tamper requires an online connection periodically as the system environment of the operating system changes with new hardware and/or Windows updates. While everything that might invalidate the token stored on the storage drive is not fully known, this happens frequently enough for the anti-tamper protection to be described as requiring a periodic online connection every fortnight or so. This is generally not an issue or hindrance for those with an always present online connection, but can be an annoyance for people primarily using roaming data. Players gaming offline for a long period of time can also suffer if proper preparations are not made in advance to ensure the validity of the offline token. The lack of transparency on storefronts regarding this process from Denuvo Anti-Tamper is a hindrance for potential purchasers, as it means people might not be aware of its presence and periodic online requirement before purchasing a game that, after purchase, the purchaser may find unplayable when an online connection is unavailable.

Thank you. This is useful, and depending on what the process is, indicative that it might be a problem. For whatever reason, my Battlefront game insists on connecting to EA before letting me use the various customisation options I paid for...and often the connection doesn't work, meaning I have to play without or spend up to half an hour trying to get to get it to work.

I really don't want that experience again for a paid game. I don't mind if it's just a background thing that can happen whenever and so I never notice...but if I have anything like a similar experience to BF2, then that would be enough to out me off the franchise.

 

[bv98132454]

Which brings me back to my wondering about this being a test about people behavior.
They 100% knew Denuvo will be added and kept it before launching preorders.
They 100% knew there will be some traction after this comes out.
Now what kind of player base disapproval it will be - that will determine if it's even worth it to keep it.
I'm 100% against any kind of piracy and I do buy any media I think would be of my interest.

I already said this won't have any kernel access.
I said it will obfuscate code (which may also harm modding), and it will have an impact on usage, if hardware changes occur. (or environment in case of proton on linux)
Would people care? I don't know....

Steam should have a policy that if a DRM is announced after pre-orders open all pre-orders are cancelled and refunded automatically. There is no way conditions changed in a week that necessitated the addition of a DRM, they knew that it would be included.

 

[Kwami]

Which brings me back to my wondering about this being a test about people behavior.
They 100% knew Denuvo will be added and kept it before launching preorders.
They 100% knew there will be some traction after this comes out.
Now what kind of player base disapproval it will be - that will determine if it's even worth it to keep it.
I'm 100% against any kind of piracy and I do buy any media I think would be of my interest.

I already said this won't have any kernel access.
I said it will obfuscate code (which may also harm modding), and it will have an impact on usage, if hardware changes occur. (or environment in case of proton on linux)
Would people care? I don't know....

And they added the Denuvo requirement on a Friday before a long weekend, probably hoping that most of us wouldn't notice or that we'd cool down before they got back to work on Tuesday. Scummy all around.

 

[Dale]

Steam should have a policy that if a DRM is announced after pre-orders open all pre-orders are cancelled and refunded automatically. There is no way conditions changed in a week that necessitated the addition of a DRM, they knew that it would be included.

That is really not necessary. Cancelling a pre-order is as easy as a couple of clicks. End of the day it's only a small amount of people who would cancel over a change such as this. It would just be annoying for the 95% of people who don't care about Denuvo.

 

[leif erikson]

Steam Refunds​

You can request a refund for nearly any purchase on Steam—for any reason. Maybe your PC doesn't meet the hardware requirements; maybe you bought a game by mistake; maybe you played the title for an hour and just didn't like it.

It doesn't matter. Valve will, upon request via help.steampowered.com, issue a refund for any reason, if the request is made within the required return period, and, in the case of games, if the title has been played for less than two hours.

There are more details below, but even if you fall outside of the refund rules we’ve described, you can ask for a refund anyway and we’ll take a look. Consumers in some jurisdictions may have additional rights to a refund in circumstances where the game is faulty.

You will be issued a full refund of your purchase within a week of approval. You will receive the refund in Steam Wallet funds or through the same payment method you used to make the purchase. If, for any reason, Steam is unable to issue a refund via your initial payment method, your Steam Wallet will be credited the full amount.

The refund policy is clear. All you need do is ask.

 

[Zecon365]

I'm still excited for Civ 7, but I definitely will not be buying it as long as there's Denuvo. The online requirement (even if it's not an always-online requirement) is horrible for archiving and game preservation. The company behind Denuvo will not be around forever, and Firaxis will not be supporting Civ 7 forever. Verification servers will go down for good eventually. If Denuvo isn't removed from Civ 7 at least after development officially ends, and assuming nobody figures out a way to crack the game to be Denuvo-free, then every day the risk increases that you will not able to play Civ 7 eventually because of Denuvo's online requirement. People deserve to be able to freely access the things they've bought without obstruction for eternity, because they own them. Buying a game shouldn't be a temporary license to play it, no matter how long that license lasts.

 

[number51]

Steam refunds exactly 0.0% of the requests it receives.

LOL good luck trying to get a refund from that nameless faceless monster corp!!!

 

[Siptah]

Steam refunds exactly 0.0% of the requests it receives.

LOL good luck trying to get a refund from that nameless faceless monster corp!!!

I never had any problems getting a refund from Steam.

 

[Atlas627]

Steam refunds exactly 0.0% of the requests it receives.

LOL good luck trying to get a refund from that nameless faceless monster corp!!!

Well that's not possible, because I and many other people I know have gotten refunds via Steam. Is this supposed to be satire and I've missed the joke?

 

[Ogro]

Good luck. The company that makes the software doesn't release much information to the public because they prefer for us not to know how it works.

What we do know:

• The executable cannot run without first being decrypted.
• The decryption step cannot happen without an authorization token from Denuvo, which requires an Internet connection.
• The tokens are generated based on a collection of information sent to Denuvo, which includes the hardware configuration of the computer that the game is installed on.
• The Denuvo-wrapped game runs in a virtual machine, which can impact performance.
• The combination of the virtual machine and the encryption make Denuvo very difficult to crack.
• Modifying the executable (and possibly the DLLs) will cause the decryption step to fail, which can impact modding capabilities.
• The game can only be installed on X computers in a Y hours. Based on the Steam information, it's 5 computers in 24 hours for this game.

What we don't know:

• Exactly what information is collected by Denuvo.
• For how long a token is valid; or, how often the game has to connect to Denuvo's servers.
• What Firaxis plans to do if Denuvo stops supporting its software in the future and its servers are no longer available.
• Whether Firaxis plans to remove Denuvo at some future time.

I would add to the list the allegation that some part of Denuvo remains even if you delete the game. That is definitely something we should know more about.

I just found a group in Steam that lists the game that uses Denuvo, named Denuvo-Games. Very handy for concerned people.

Based on quick google research, it seems game with Denuvo released from 2023 are indeed being cracked less. Which will unfortunately prevail when corps are making decisions. If they can avoid cracked competition when the game is at its highest price (beginning of the product life cycle) , then it is worth it. They won't care as much of cracked competition when the game is selling cheap later on. Remember that they are not aiming at 100% thieve proof, but enough that makes it not worth it.
Will it be a liability for users? I am sorry if you live in "America" and still think it is about the people and not the money.

 

[Dale]

Steam refunds exactly 0.0% of the requests it receives.

LOL good luck trying to get a refund from that nameless faceless monster corp!!!

Not true at all. I have refunded a number of games purchased pre-release, and refunded pre-release. One of those was Humankind, which was also a Denuvo game, so I refunded before release. Once Denuvo was confirmed gone, I pre-purchased again.

 

[Olleus]

Based on quick google research, it seems game with Denuvo released from 2023 are indeed being cracked less. Which will unfortunately prevail when corps are making decisions.

Cracking =/= pirating. Non-cracked games are still being pirated. This is the most that I'm allowed to say on this topic.

As for Steam refunds, I'm not sure I've ever been denied one, and I've probably had over a dozen by now. Including when I was over the 2h playing time limit and it was for purely subjective reasons (UI was causing eye strain that gave me migraines).

 

[Professor Phobo]

Never been denied a steam refund myself.

 

[Gedemon]

I would add to the list the allegation that some part of Denuvo remains even if you delete the game. That is definitely something we should know more about.

it's just the token, a single file, which is inert.

 

[thecrazyscot]

I haven't participated in this discussion yet as I've been trying to avoid any knee-jerk reactions. But after a bit, I think I can honestly say...I don't care. As long as I can run the game fine it doesn't bother me. And if it's the same implementation as Marvel Midnight Suns, it shouldn't negatively impact me. The 2k Launcher causes me some startup problems with MMS, but not Denuvo.

Buying on Steam means I don't own my games anyways, it's licenses all the way down. Fortunately, Valve is pretty flexible with refunds and if the game does become unplayable I'm confident they will provide recourse.

Now if Civ7 ever came to GOG, I'd happily buy it there instead. But that won't happen any time soon, or ever.

 

[Olleus]

it's just the token, a single file, which is inert.

Are we sure it (or some other Denuvo file) doesn't communicate back home? We know that Denuvo does so periodically, it doesn't seem absurd that Denuvo might initiate that in some way even without launching the game. If the token is just an inert file, why do EULAs specifically forbid us from deleting it, even after we've uninstalled the game the token is for? Has any of this been audited by a third party? I don't think these questions are tin-foil crazy to ask.

 

[Olleus]

Buying on Steam means I don't own my games anyways, it's licenses all the way down.

To be fair, it's always been that way. Even when you owed the disc, you didn't own the game, just the license to play it. Same thing with music or films. It's just that these licenses are being steadily more enforceable for the past decade or so... What I miss most from physical copies is the ability to lend / borrow games from friends (even though that might have been technically illegal at the time too).

 

[pokiehl]

Are we sure it (or some other Denuvo file) doesn't communicate back home? We know that Denuvo does so periodically, it doesn't seem absurd that Denuvo might initiate that in some way even without launching the game. If the token is just an inert file, why do EULAs specifically forbid us from deleting it, even after we've uninstalled the game the token is for? Has any of this been audited by a third party? I don't think these questions are tin-foil crazy to ask.

I checked the Persona 3 EULA that you (or someone else found) that has the typical Sega Denuvo portion. It doesn't say anything about you not being able to delete whatever that file is. Is there another game?

Also, Irdeto acknowledges the undeleted file from uninstall on their website and says you can just manually delete it. I think Gedemon is right.

 

[Gedemon]

Are we sure it (or some other Denuvo file) doesn't communicate back home? We know that Denuvo does so periodically, it doesn't seem absurd that Denuvo might initiate that in some way even without launching the game. If the token is just an inert file, why do EULAs specifically forbid us from deleting it, even after we've uninstalled the game the token is for? Has any of this been audited by a third party? I don't think these questions are tin-foil crazy to ask.

It's the Denuvo code in the game's file that call home, which, as I understand it, is the reason you'd have to launch the game once before going offline if you want to be sure the token is valid for your current PC configuration. There could have been a driver/windows update after the last time you've launched it, and the time you're going offline for example.

edit: ironically if there was a part of Denuvo installed outside the game to do the check periodically, you wouldn't have to worry as much about being locked out of the game when going offline at the wrong time.

 

[Olleus]

I checked the Persona 3 EULA that you (or someone else found) that has the typical Sega Denuvo portion. It doesn't say anything about you not being able to delete whatever that file is. Is there another game?

From that Persona 3 Reload (2024) EULA you just mentioned:

If you disable or otherwise tamper with the Denuvo Anti-Tamper Technology, the Product may not operate properly and you are in material breach of this Agreement.

My interpretation is that this flatly contradicts your claim. And of course there's the even more alarm-bell ringing clause:

In no event shall SEGA be liable to you in connection with the components that may be installed on your device relating to the Denuvo Anti-Tamper Technology.

What potential harm are they denying liability for? Considering the customer has no relationship with Denuvo, how could they recover damages from Denuvo if harm does occur? Why bother with this clause if there's nothing but an inert token file living on a disk? It's not the first time I've mentioned these questions before, and there's never been a better answer than a stony silence or a "don't worry about it".

Also, Irdeto acknowledges the undeleted file from uninstall on their website and says you can just manually delete it. I think Gedemon is right.

That Irdeto's website contradicts written EULA makes me trust them even less.

It's the Denuvo code in the game's file that call home, which, as I understand it, is the reason you'd have to launch the game once before going offline if you want to be sure the token is valid for your current PC configuration. There could have been a driver/windows update after the last time you've launched it, and the time you're going offline for example.

Yes, I understand that's how they say it works. But I'm asking if this has been verified by a 3rd party audit or the like? Again, this wouldn't be the first time that DRM software did more snooping than it claimed to on the tin.