SteamDB changelogs reveal that IO Interactive has already ditched Denuvo in 007 First Light. The change wasn’t mentioned in the game’s 1.1.0 patch notes posted earlier today, though the update officially “introduces fixes and improvements for over 200 issues” reported by internal playtesters and the wider community. Update size varies by platform – it’s 3.6 GB on PC via Steam.

The subject of Denuvo in video games has long been a fiery one. Denuvo is anti-tamper software and a form of Digital Rights Management (DRM), designed as a security measure against piracy. It secures the game at a binary level and is commonly used by single-player game developers and publishers early on in a game’s lifespan to prevent leaks and cracked versions.

No more Denuvo in 007 First Light, and plenty of fixed bugs too

Denuvo has a controversial reputation due to its inherently intrusive behavior, along with claims that it degrades performance – effectively lowering your FPS and increasing loading times due to increased CPU load. The company behind Denuvo, Irdeto, maintains that performance is not affected. You can see the removal of Denuvo in SteamDB, alongside today’s big major update.

Just under two months have passed since 007 First Light was released. Today’s patch is the first major one so far (following an initial series of hotfixes). Be sure to check out the full patch notes here; we’ve posted a summary of the Stability Improvements below – but there’s much more to it, with a large chunk dedicated to mission-specific fixes, alongside new content.

• Fixed a crash on Xbox Series S when resuming the game from the Challenges menu during extended play sessions. 
• Fixed a crash on Xbox Series S after Bond dies during the “Time to Die” boss fight.  
• Fixed an issue that could cause a crash after killing an enemy with the Red Room Shotgun in TacSim. 
• Fixed a crash on Xbox Series S during the “All the Time in the World” car cinematic.  
• Fixed a crash when dying or restarting during Advanced Close Combat Training Tier 1 in TacSim.  

Source: IO Interactive

DRM software has been proven to limit performance in the past – earlier this year, Capcom swapped Resident Evil 4 Remake for a different DRM software and benchmarks quickly proved a loss in performance. Hi-Fi RUSH is another game that ditched Denuvo late last year after a change of ownership, and a growing number of pre-release leaks proves that the anti-tamper software is losing some of its effectiveness as of late, one example being Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight.

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Jack Goodall

At PC Guide, Jack is mostly responsible for reporting on hardware deals. He also specializes in monitors, TVs, and headsets and can be found putting his findings together in a review or best-of guide.