Last week, Doom Eternal got its first post-release update, which along with a new progression system and some quality of life tweaks, introduced Denuvo Anti-Cheat. And that, well… didn’t go as id expected, at all.
A massive surge of negative reviews since then has crashed the game’s ‘Very Positive’ rating of 88% positive reviews down to 78%. A 10% drop doesn’t really seem too negative reception, right? Let me clear that for you.
Since the new update, Doom has received nearly 7 thousand new reviews, 87% of them being negative.
Why the hatred?
Denuvo Anti-Cheat is considered to be a shady Windows Service by many (or most) as it has full access to your PC at a kernal level, i.e., it hangs along with your OS in background, all the time. That obviously raises suspicion and concern, as a simple vulnerability can give core access to your system to anyone. Moreover, a lot of people have been experiencing performace issues since the addition of the kernal-level DRM.
In a post on the Doom subreddit, executive producer at id Software Marty Stratton announced they’ll be getting rid of the DRM, while clearing out some rumors.
“As we examine any future of anti-cheat in DOOM Eternal, at a minimum we must consider giving campaign-only players the ability to play without anti-cheat software installed, as well as ensure the overall timing of any anti-cheat integration better aligns with player expectations around clear initiatives – like ranked or competitive play – where demand for anti-cheat is far greater.”
said Stratton.
He clarified that Bethesda didn’t force them to implement the Anti Cheat. It was solely id’s own decision to deter the small minority that just wants to ruin the fun for everyone else.
So, the community voicing its resentment actually worked, and id will be removing the DRM in the next update, atleast for now.
Check out our review of Doom Eternal here.
[UPDATE: As promised, id Software has gotten rid of the kernal-mode anti-cheat with the new Patch 1.1]
The patch notes for Update 1.1 as taken from the official Bethesda website are as follows:
Removed Denuvo Anti-Cheat integration
- Use Windows add/remove programs to uninstall Denuvo Anti-Cheat
Fixes for PC Only
- Fixed several crashes associated with customizable skins
- Fixed memory-related crashes affecting some users
- Reverted a VRAM allocation change that caused some users to experience degraded performance with Update 1
Also, this doesn’t affect the console versions in any way, as this is a PC-only update.