Those idiots don't seem to understand that DRMs actually hurt sales. Here is a simple breakdown:
100 players split into 3 groups:
- 20 seasoned pirates (or players who just don't have the funds to buy new games) -> They will always seek to crack the game no matter whether there is DRM or not -> No sale
- 30 wealthy players who always get the game on the launch day -> They will always buy the game on the launch day regardless if there is DRM -> Sure sale
- 50 wary players who always check the price, contents and also whether there is any intrusive and performance degrading DRM which might also stop working in the future rendering the game completely dead -> The more layers of DRMs implemented, the more expensive and system resource heavy the game becomes -> Diminishing sale, moving to the pirate camp
As you can see from the above, the more layers of DRMs, the less buyers.
This is exactly my thinking; its a losing battle for DRM. The more versions of it get hacked, the heavier its going to be, or more intrusive, scaring off ever more people from a sale.
As for piracy, its also an age thing: today I really don't have the urge to pirate everything while back in the day 90% of what I had was taken for free and it was good sport 'getting it'. Right now, I buy all my games & software. But the marketplace is also a lot healthier for gaming, and thát is the key really. These publisher-specific outlets with their own Store and DRM layers are also counterproductive in terms of getting sales. People don't really prefer having to install several launchers beyond the games themselves, just as everyone flocks to on-demand services such as Netflix, Spotify... it are those vendors that should be supported by the big publishers if they really want to combat piracy. The fact that they don't and instead push their own silly, buggy platforms shows that piracy really isn't that big of an issue for them, or that they are just looking at it in the wrong way.
Objectively, the largest contribution in combating game piracy was and still is Steam, and GOG as a distant second. You could even state that Steam is a key driver for all these indie publishers and devs popping up, alongside Kickstarter.
