Another Denuvo Version Falls: Hitman 2 Cracked Days Before Official Release

[Raevenlord]

Well, Hitman 2 has been released, really, but only for special edition buyers, who are able to get their hands on the game where you kill Sean Bean (one of the most killed actors of all time, if I recall correctly). However, the official launch date really is set for tomorrow, so the title is still accurate. And providing the title early for special edition buyers has turned the tides on Warner Bro's decision, and put the pressure on Denuvo... Again. the DRM used on Hitman 2 stands at version number 5.3, but a single day after the game was made available to early players, on November 9th, Denuvo was gone.

That's not much to say on protecting the most critical cycle on any new game release: as Irdeto, Denuvo's parent company, puts it, the first 14 days. You can read the entire press release where Irdeto explains their market understanding after the break. The fact of the matter, however, seems to be that hackers are getting better and better and understanding and circumventing Denuvo's efforts.

As the latest premium game titles become increasingly anticipated by consumers looking to play, data from Irdeto reveals that if a AAA title is pirated upon its launch, publishers can expect hundreds of thousands of downloads of illegal copies, resulting in massive revenue loss.

The most critical part of the release cycle is the first 14 days as the majority of activations occur during this period. For highly anticipated titles, this could include up to 80% of sales, 50% of which are within the first four days.

Irdeto tracked the downloads of a major sports title on P2P networks after the title, which did not include anti-tamper protection, was cracked on the same day of its release. During the first two weeks, Irdeto detected 355,664 torrent downloads of the illegal copy of the title. Given the retail price of the game, this puts the total potential loss of revenue from P2P downloads at $21,336,283.

The research also found that the first day of release alone is crucial for the protection of a AAA title, as 12% of the illegal P2P downloads occurred within the first day of the cracked copy appearing on the P2P networks (and a substantial number of these in the first hour).

"Piracy is a threat that is firmly established in the games industry and, as our research suggests, it can result in potentially huge revenue losses for publishers if their games are compromised within the 14-day window following release," said Reinhard Blaukovitsch, Managing Director of Denuvo, Irdeto. "With this in mind, it is crucial for publishers to implement security strategies that make their games as difficult as possible to crack and reverse engineer. This way they will be able to better protect the revenues that allow them to continue to create such compelling games."

Irdeto, Denuvo parent company

View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[Space Lynx]

Story is wrong.

the crack was a bad crack according to Crackwatch and several other sources.

 

[Vayra86]

Wasn't the story earlier that 4.9 was still not cracked and this 5.3 was on release?

Time for a downgrade

 

[sponge14]

It is cracked, however the crack isn't working except for if you have the exact hardware the crack was written for. Also, 4.9 has still not been cracked, that's what Shadow of the Tomb Raider is on.

 

[Space Lynx]

It is cracked, however the crack isn't working except for if you have the exact hardware the crack was written for. Also, 4.9 has still not been cracked, that's what Shadow of the Tomb Raider is on.

Exactly, 4.9 not cracked, so Denovu is just being dumb I guess by not using it. Makes sense for them though at this point. It is all nonsense. I own 800 steam games, 20 origin, 20 uplay, 30 or so GoG, DRM needs to go away, it is only hurting CPU performance for those of us who are rocking i7-7820hk cpu's with gtx 1070's... cause overheating is so much an issue for me, I have to run at 2.8ghz undervolted.

DRM hurts me a lot even if its not noticeable for you big boy 6 core boys with large coolers.

 

[Readlight]

I can be sure these who download just don't haw money for legal games.

 

[windwhirl]

Honestly, it's not even funny anymore how quickly they crack these things...

DRM hurts me a lot even if its not noticeable for you big boy 6 core boys with large coolers.

Remembering Assassin's Creed Origins and its quad-layer DRM (Steam, Uplay, Denuvo and VMProtect) right now. Almost painful to play on a Core i3-4330...

 

[SIGSEGV]

I hate denuvo drm very much. I just simply won't buy the games that use this drm. I love GOG drm somehow.

 

[newtekie1]

Exactly, 4.9 not cracked, so Denovu is just being dumb I guess by not using it.

The thing is 4.9 has been cracked. F1 2018 uses 4.9, and it was cracked pretty quickly. I'm not sure what is taking so long with Tomb Raider.

 

[TheGuruStud]

Still blaming piracy instead of making games worth paying for, I see.

 

[Prima.Vera]

this puts the total potential loss of revenue from P2P downloads at $21,336,283.

Complete bollocks! Most of the people downloading pirate games don't have the budget to buy it anyways. Those idiots keep forgetting that in most countries 60$ can be 1 week salary...

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

massive revenue loss

I wish they would use the word lost here. Loss means they gained the revenue first.


EDIT: potential loss doesnt sound as threatening or as damaging so they remove the word potential.

 

[windwhirl]

Complete bollocks! Most of the people downloading pirate games don't have the budget to buy it anyways. Those idiots keep forgetting that in most countries 60$ can be 1 week salary...

Indeed. Steam sales discounts are almost seen as a gift from the heavens here.

 

[hat]

Indeed. Steam sales discounts are almost seen as a gift from the heavens here.

Same here, and I'm in the US. I've bought many a game at a heavily discounted price.

 

[Tsukiyomi91]

Again, the real customers that DRM that WILL hurt are legitimate buyers who pre-orders or even bought the game in full. Not surprised to see new games getting bypassed when all Denuvo cared is the game companies to pay big, lose big, regardless of whether their anti-tampering software will impact gamers or how bad the game sales are.

 

[hat]

Again, the real customers that DRM that WILL hurt are legitimate buyers who pre-orders or even bought the game in full. Not surprised to see new games getting bypassed when all Denuvo cared is the game companies to pay big, lose big, regardless of whether their anti-tampering software will impact gamers or how bad the game sales are.

Couldn't be any truer. Pirates just remove the DRM anyway, or at least render it ineffective. Not even Denuvo on top of other DRM (on top of MORE DRM) has stopped anyone for all that long... it just turns into layers on layers of shit that serves only to get in the legitimate user's way in one way or another, be it hampered performance or just plain malfunctioning software or both.

 

[Tsukiyomi91]

DRM controversies aside, at least CDPR did not trust their "baby" in the hands of a DRM-making company where their product failed impressively to protect so many other games in the market... xDD

 

[Readlight]

I will not buy Steam game even if i like game and costs 2 euro
There are to much no machine level games who requare internet, steam service,..
Men Go There Own Way

 

[Vayra86]

Exactly, 4.9 not cracked, so Denovu is just being dumb I guess by not using it. Makes sense for them though at this point. It is all nonsense. I own 800 steam games, 20 origin, 20 uplay, 30 or so GoG, DRM needs to go away, it is only hurting CPU performance for those of us who are rocking i7-7820hk cpu's with gtx 1070's... cause overheating is so much an issue for me, I have to run at 2.8ghz undervolted.

DRM hurts me a lot even if its not noticeable for you big boy 6 core boys with large coolers.

You can't blame Denuvo for laptops with crappy cooling and too much TDP in the box. That was your mistake as a consumer buying one.

On the rest, fully agreed...

 

[micropage7]

The thing is 4.9 has been cracked. F1 2018 uses 4.9, and it was cracked pretty quickly. I'm not sure what is taking so long with Tomb Raider.

i dont think it's safe enough, sometimes i think that it got cracked but just for some for some reason to avoid any patch in the future

 

[Space Lynx]

You can't blame Denuvo for laptops with crappy cooling and too much TDP in the box. That was your mistake as a consumer buying one.

On the rest, fully agreed...

Actually it was not my mistake, reviews showed good temps and even lot of people on forumnotebookreviews website said it would be just fine, however, I got a bad one, Eurocom did not seat the heatsink properly on some of the launch models when 7820HK launched, and I was one of those unlucky ones, a support technician told me I had to use shunts. CyberpowerPC refused to help me in anyway as I was over the 30 day period, I filed a complaint with BBB didn't do anything.

I called Eurocom, no callback. Never again will I do a laptop, I will just pay extra for a micro-atx water AIO build, most likely 7nm AMD vega 2 and 7nm vega 2 in Fall/Winter 2019

 

[Vayra86]

Actually it was not my mistake, reviews showed good temps and even lot of people on forumnotebookreviews website said it would be just fine, however, I got a bad one, Eurocom did not seat the heatsink properly on some of the launch models when 7820HK launched, and I was one of those unlucky ones, a support technician told me I had to use shunts. CyberpowerPC refused to help me in anyway as I was over the 30 day period, I filed a complaint with BBB didn't do anything.

I called Eurocom, no callback. Never again will I do a laptop, I will just pay extra for a micro-atx water AIO build, most likely 7nm AMD vega 2 and 7nm vega 2 in Fall/Winter 2019

I'm glad you learned something there at least. But even with a proper heatsink, physics is merciless... small enclosure, high TDP = bound to go wrong. That sucks though.

 

[yotano211]

Exactly, 4.9 not cracked, so Denovu is just being dumb I guess by not using it. Makes sense for them though at this point. It is all nonsense. I own 800 steam games, 20 origin, 20 uplay, 30 or so GoG, DRM needs to go away, it is only hurting CPU performance for those of us who are rocking i7-7820hk cpu's with gtx 1070's... cause overheating is so much an issue for me, I have to run at 2.8ghz undervolted.

DRM hurts me a lot even if its not noticeable for you big boy 6 core boys with large coolers.

What kind of laptop you have that you only run a 7820hk processor that low. I think there is other reasons for the low clock speed, maybe clean the fans, heatsink, or sand off the heatsink.
I've had laptops with 7700hq and I once tried one with a 7820hk and non ran lower than 3.8ghz with everything running at 100%. 7700hq running max at 3.4ghz didnt even pass 72C at stock voltage.

 

[Space Lynx]

What kind of laptop you have that you only run a 7820hk processor that low. I think there is other reasons for the low clock speed, maybe clean the fans, heatsink, or sand off the heatsink.
I've had laptops with 7700hq and I once tried one with a 7820hk and non ran lower than 3.8ghz with everything running at 100%. 7700hq running max at 3.4ghz didnt even pass 72C at stock voltage.

I sent in for professional repair place, cost me $200, and they added shunts, it helped some but problem still not fixed. Don't ask me.

 

[yotano211]

I sent in for professional repair place, cost me $200, and they added shunts, it helped some but problem still not fixed. Don't ask me.

The heatsink might be be getting enough contact with the processor surface. Dont ask you what.