Post by hechelion in How is important copy protection?

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Almost all developers consider it important to prevent illegal copies of their games. The problem is that there are no real solutions.

DRM, or rather, Steam integration, can be broken with a script in seconds. To have better protection with DRM, you usually have to use invasive DRM, and these are often seen more as a punishment for legitimate buyers than as a valid security measure, so you're going to lose part of your community.

Implementing DRM is something you should do very carefully, thoroughly evaluating the costs versus benefits, and keeping in mind that many people who buy and support truly independent games don't want to buy a game with DRM.

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K Storm Studio5 days ago

I understand Steam DRM with a piece of code and game ID to implement into our game and link to a DLL might be invasive, but at least is a way to partially protect a game.

Would you sell a game without it?

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hechelion5 days ago (1 edit) (+1)

I already sell a DRM-free game within Itch.
https://hechelion.itch.io/evorales

I also sell the same game on Steam, and it's integrated in such a way that you can't play it without an account, but I integrated it to take advantage of what Steam offers, like achievements, and not as DRM.
That protection is not considered invasive; what is considered invasive is what other applications, such as Denuvo, do.

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K Storm Studio4 days ago

yes that's what I'm saying, just having a non-invasive protection to avoid illegal copies by checking if a player owns the game. So basically having a DLL or similar that double-checks if a game ID coming from the game (previously implemented by dev) matches the same game in the player account.

how does sounds like?

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hechelion4 days ago(+2)

The problem is that this isn't real protection; it's very easy to hack. But depending on what you want to implement, it might be enough..

On Steam, everyone uses the Steam launcher to play, but on Itch, using the Itch launcher is optional. So you can't always verify the account of someone playing on Itch, and that's a problem if you want to sell your game here.

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K Storm Studio3 days ago

Yes a launcher it is harder to hack and it might be a good solution. Like Steam for instance. Although this requires implementing a piece of code by the developer at the beginning of their games, like in the case of a Steam game. This changes engine by engine, and it can be a little bit tricky sometimes... but I think it's the only solution.

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