Copy protection developer Denuvo has stated that game studios don't get a refund when the copy protection for their game is cracked. The company told this to game site Kotaku after a Reddit user claimed that Denuvo would refund game developers in case the protection is cracked within 3 months after the game's release. The protection was also recently removed from the game Doom.
Denuvo co-founder Robert Hernandez states in an interview with Kotaku about the removal, "we can’t comment on our deals with specific customers, but we do not have any deals in place that offer refunds if a game is cracked within a specific time frame."
"However, each publisher is of course free to remove our anti tamper tech from their title once they feel the protection has achieved its purpose in protecting the initial sales window, or if they have other reasons for doing so, such as selling the title on DRM-free platforms," he added.
When the copy protection was removed from Doom, a Reddit user, who claimed to work for a game studio, stated that Denuvo would refund game developers in case the protection is cracked within 3 months after the game is released. It appears the removal of the Denuvo protection from Doom was because the game publisher felt the protection achieved its purpose.
In case of Doom, Denuvo protected the game from piracy for several months, which according to Hernandez is an "impressive accomplishment for such a high-profile game". Hernandez is also honest about the expectations of his copy protection, which isn't marketed as uncrackable but as a method to keep a game safe from piracy during the crucial initial sales window when most of the sales are made.
The costs of Denuvo for Doom is estimated to be within the millions and also required gamers to connect their PC to the internet every 24 hours. With the removal of the copy protection this is no longer required.
It took crackers a long time to circumvent the Denuvo copy protection. But in August this year hacker Voksi was the first to post a work-around for the copy protection. Meanwhile Denuvo has been patched, so Voksi's method no longer works.
