Gaming Rise of the Tomb Raider Review

*which* PC version did you test?

I'm guessing it wasn't the Windows app store version, but I thought I'd check...

Also curious to see how the two compare performance wise...

 

That'll be the Denuvo copy protection doing its thing then.

 

How many Gb of memory do you have? Will 8Gb be enough?

Are you guys doing a performance review?

Great review, but I'll buy the game on a Steam sale

 

Oh great, are we back to those days?

I remember the last time I installed Crysis via the DVD I have Securom was it? totally borked my rig and all of my virtual drives.

It was so bad I have just bought it (Crysis) via Steam.

 

Denuvo will be in every new game released till crackers finally get around it, With Fifa and just cause 3 still holding strong to the point where people who want to play them both have now played it.

 

Don't get me wrong I think it's a good thing, right up until the point it starts causing crap with your PC.

When I first installed Crysis back in 2007 it caused me no end of trouble. Firstly Securom deleted all of my virtual drives that I use to play my own games from (stuff like Daytona USA for example that I own but don't want to put up with the noise of my DVD drive spinning up constantly) and then I could not remove it. Sod's law I completely reinstalled Windows and then a couple of weeks later they released a removal tool. /rolls eyes.

But yeah, I am all for protection. It means I get to laugh at people complaining about there not being a crack for it and giving out all sorts of reasons why they can't buy the game.

It's not caused me any issues so far. TBH? until today I had never even heard of it because since Steam offered refunds on bad games (or ones you simply don't like if you haven't played them for too long) I had stopped going in seek of cracked games to test before I handed over the cash.

And I own nearly all of the games that include it too

 

The 3 big titles are Dragon Age Origins, Fifa 16 and Just cause 3, DA O took nearly 2 years to correctly crack, and its a new version of the system thats on Fifa and Just Cause 3.

The 2 biggest Game cracking teams have already said its a lost cause, As the way they did it the first time is not doable now, It can not be brute forced and if a game goes past a few months its just a waste of time them doing it. Both teams are Day 1 release teams its easy to find out who they are so i will not type it incase thats agaist the rules.

If some of the better hackers in the world say its not doable quick enough for them to bother id say Denuvo has a Win for game publishers.

 

It definitely sounds like it's not worth the bother. I found this post on Reddit supposedly from some one in 3DM in China..


Please note: No one (other than people working at denuvo) really knows how it works 100%. This post is just my observations from attempting to analyze denuvo, and it is certainly just one technique out of the N that it has and uses. However, I think this is the most crucial technique of denuvo, and why it has been so hard to crack.
So what's the magic behind Denuvo? Environment dependent obfuscation.
First of all, Denuvo is NOT a shrink wrap anti tamper system. Developers must integrate their code with denuvo, including marking non-performance-impacting but essential functions for Denuvo's obfuscation. For example, this may be a function that initializes the engine. It should only be run once, so making it slower doesn't really impact overall performance.
What Denuvo does for these functions is that it generates at least dozens of different versions that are functionally identical, but each codepath is specifically formulated to work only in one processor environment. Then Denuvo stubs out this function during the build process.
Essentially, Denuvo protected binaries come with some parts empty, that must be downloaded from the Denuvo servers after successful authentication. However, Denuvo's servers have at least dozens (if not hundreds or more) of variants for each function.
What do I mean by processor environment? It's basically any slight differences you may have with your processor. It's not just what processor you have, but what revision it is. Two i5s with the exact same model numbers, but manufactured on different dates, can have different revisions, like bug fixes or small optimizations.
To give you an idea of how many different revisions / specs there are for a single processor model, check this out... http://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ ... 05554.html
There are a lot of slight differences and weird quirks in how different processor revisions operate. Some of them are tiny, like different timings of an opcode in certain situations. Denuvo definitely has put a lot of research into this, I would not be surprised if they're working directly with Intel.
So, after successful authentication that is verified by Steam or Origin, Denuvo then patches your binary with specific codepaths that will ONLY work on your specific processor.
You can't patch these away, because the game relies on them to work and the functions are crucial to the game. You can't just collect one and patch it into the "some-parts-missing" binary, because it'll only work on your processor AND you will trip the challenging integrity checks that seem to be dynamically generated, again, based on your processor. Not to mention the whole scheme is incredibly obfuscated.
Serious props to the denuvo team for such an advanced anti tampering system. And I'm sure this is just one part of it.


Very interesting.

 

They have been trying to crack the new one for nearly 4 months and they feel Denuvo has the next release ready to go as soon they do crack it. So they said in one of the posts that he feels it's a total waste of his time.

They only continued the first one to prove it could be done but as they said if 2 years is the average crack time who actually cares. As the game will be so cheap by the time it's cracked. More so on stuff like FIFA.

I expect more and more publishers to use Denuvo and stop Piracy dead in its tracks perm on PC. As I said in another post is not be optimistic about been able to download a crack in 2 years for the latest titles.

 

I never realized this is not out on PS4, Hmmmmmm might have to be on PC then

 

It's really not that bad. Slightly better on Nvidia atm but Nvidia had a head start and had a day one driver lined up for it.

Just waiting for Crossfire support before I begin play

 

I haven't bothered with a dodgy game in years. Steam sales are so cheap and the grey market CD keys are so convenient/cheap. That's just me, though. I know earn a fairly decent wage (37 years old) and I don't have to worry about making rent each month. When I was younger I was on £8.50 an hour living in London and money was very tight. My views on copied games were somewhat different.

 

What do you mean by correctly crack? I saw it took a month for DA:I to be cracked. If the anti-tamper software is causing issues that's pretty sucky. Was there ever any evidence about the SSD degrading rumours that came out with DA:I?

Game looks interesting, shame I can't run it!

 

Yeah, I'd never advocate piracy but if the persistent slowdown and heavy ram usage is down to copy protection that's a real kick in the balls. Beyond the story that's the most annoying part about the game.

 

its an xbox exclusive for 1 year - slated for PS4 late this year

 

Thanks. I own the XBOX 1 also but not sure I want it on that console,

 

Just under £10 from the india XBOX store on Win 10.

 

Ok - back to the game...

I'm 50% of the way through and I'm still very, very much enjoying it. There are a couple of bugs, but as stated in the review none have stopped my enjoyment. I've got 16Gb RAM and I also had the memory fill up, but when the game crashed (only once) when I restarted it had not lost any progress.

But the bear fight! That took me a while I have to say...

 

Regardless of the bargain-licious MS India price, I still think this is going to be a 'wait for it to be fixed' for me..