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As many argue, Denuvo and other game DRM solutions can lead to performance issues.
This effect often prompts many players to return and purchase the game.
This dude is a coder, my kind of guy!
Because of this,Denuvo’s expulsion from a gameis a notable story every time it happens.
PC players will celebrate across social media channels, Reddit, X, etc.
While the majority only celebrate its official removal, some commemorate the not-so-legal times.
A well laid out diagram that helps make the whole process more relatable.
This man is nuts.
“Cracking the game was not a goal I had.
I like Hogwarts Legacy, and thus, causing any harm is not my intention.
It seems more calls come during loading.
I wanted to do research purely for myself.
Fair enough, Maurice.
I don’t blame you one bit.
You may also notice he mentioned his lack of desire to crack Hogwarts Legacy entirely.
This difference means all checks still happen, and Denuvo’s activity continues in the game’s background.
On top of that, I want to patch most of the runtime checks.
For a real crack, it is obviously needed to patch all of the runtime checks.
How did he do it?
The game collects hardware and software data and compiles it into said fingerprint and Steam ticket.
This information is sent to Denuvo’s servers, where some backend work takes place to verify everything.
A Denuvo token is generated for that specific hardware gadget or PC if the user owns the game.
This token is vital for playing the game, as it decrypts values during runtime and throughout the game.
At regular intervals, Denuvo will see if the fingerprint’s hardware and software features match the token’s.
It’s all somewhat confusing.
“Getting fully accommodated to Qiling and finding most of the fingerprint features took me about two months.
Discovering the last one took the remaining 3 months, and I only discovered it by accident.
The performance
So how about performance?
Is Denuvo the big bad we all think it is?
Before getting into this, I was an enormous opponent of Denuvo before reading Maurice’s work.
To an extent, I still am.
“Note that this analysis only applies toHogwarts Legacy.
I don’t know if any of that applies to other games protected by Denuvo!
Whenever the console prints [MOMO] OVERHEAD, one of my hooks triggers.
This essentially means Denuvo intervenes in executing the game (that I had to patch).
In my experience, this has mainly affected CPU performance, and independent analysis confirms this.
In Denuvo’s case, while framerates are primarily unaffected, loading times and file size are.
Some games, likeConan Unconquered, show a 16% performance bump after Denuvo’s removal.
Overall, the framerate impact depends on a developer’s implementation of Denuvo rather than on Denuvo itself.
Maurice’s work is impressiveand deserves praise for documenting Denuvo’s entanglement in video games.
Here’s to hoping many do.
What’s your take on this whole situation?
How do you feel about Denuvo?
Let us know below or on our social media pages.
I’m interested to see what you all have to say!
As always, happy gaming!
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