Denuvo DRM removed from Resident Evil Village

Nearly two years after its launch, Resident Evil Village has been updated on Steam. A minor update to the game, tracked by SteamDB has confirmed that Denuvo anti-tamper DRM has been removed from the game. A staple of modern AAA releases, Denuvo promises crack protection for the launch window of most titles, at times at the cost of performance. Denuvo also comes with a 5-machine daily activation limit, severely hampering testers and benchmarkers. This particular implementation was criticized for poor performance and optimization and has now been removed.

Resident Evil Village is now free from invasive crack protection

The SteamDB changelog from earlier today reads: “Removed 3rd-Party DRM – Denuvo Anti-tamper, 5 different PC within a day machine activation limit.” Criticism for Denuvo DRM grew when the cracked version of Resident Evil Village reportedly ran faster than the licensed copy. Paying customers were understandably upset for getting an inferior experience after coughing up $60+. Digital Foundry first commented on the game’s poor performance, before Capcom released a statement that optimizations would be made.

Speaking to PC Gamer, Denuvo issued the following statement:

“At Denuvo, we understand that an uninterrupted gaming experience is key, after all, we’re gamers too. With respect to the recent piracy and tampering of Resident Evil Village, we have run multiple tests on multiple machines and there is no difference in the in-game experience on the legitimate version protected with Denuvo Anti-Tamper, versus the unprotected version without Denuvo Anti-Tamper. We cannot comment specifically on the Capcom implementations as they are unrelated to Denuvo’s solution.”

Now that the DRM is removed, benchmarkers will extensively be testing both builds to conclusively define the performance change. While older titles continue to remove Denuvo, newer launches like Resident Evil 4 continue to launch with it. With the DRM company’s promise of protecting launch window sales, it’s unlikely to go anywhere soon.