Resident Evil Revelations, the spin-off, third-person shooter from 2012, is being review bombed on Steam following claims that Capcom updated the game to include DRM (digital rights management) software. As of this writing, the RE Revelations Steam rating, based on recent reviews, has plummeted to ‘mostly negative,’ following an influx of criticism beginning on Wednesday January 10. Capcom has previously said that it regards videogame mods as equivalent to cheating, and a variety of backend updates have been made to Resident Evil Revelations during the past week. The creator of the DRM software allegedly added to the horror game has also replied to players, though the contents and nature of Capcom’s recent updates remain unclear.
Resident Evil Revelations is a third-person survival horror game, wherein you take control of RE stalwart Jill Valentine, investigating a supposedly abandoned cruiseliner. While it is almost 12 years old, Capcom has recently released a series of updates for Revelations, including bug fixes and alterations to a variety of file depots in the game’s backend.
On Wednesday January 10, following a range of Resident Evil Revelations updates, players on the game’s Steam forums claimed to be experiencing technical and performance issues, including unstable frame rates, crashes, and more. One player shared a post referring to Enigma Protector, a third-party DRM solution. “‘The Enigma Protector,’” the player posted. “‘Internal Protection Error, please contact the author!’ Seems like it’s this.”
In October 2023, Capcom released a presentation regarding anti-cheat and anti-piracy measures for its games on PC. DRM is designed to prevent or limit cheating and piracy in games, and is used by many studios including EA, Sega, and Ubisoft. In its video, Capcom made a comparison between community mods and cheats. “All mods are defined as cheats, except when they are officially supported,” the developer said. “Mods no different than cheats affect the product.”
“It is undeniable that third-party protection software is very powerful,” the company said. “We will take the conversation toward the symbiosis of third-party and in-house protection software.” Capcom’s presentation contained recommendations for using both bespoke and third-party protection in conjunction.
Following comments posted by Resident Evil Revelations players on Steam’s forums, Enigma, the creator of the DRM software allegedly added to the game, responded to a question on its own forums.
“Capcom has implemented your product on their back catalogue of games and it’s causing performance drops, crashes, and has broken many popular mods people use to make these games run better,” one user, ‘JohnMatthias,’ wrote on the Enigma site. “You should be aware that there is likely a huge negative PR storm coming your way and possibly offer Capcom advice on how to implement your product properly as you’ve angered a lot of people.”
“Curious, what action do you need from us?,” an Enigma representative states in a now-deleted reply. “And why do you blame us that someone uses our software? Someone uses, we do not push to use it. What is our guilt you think? And why are you so sure that all that you reported belongs to our software? Maybe you are so angered because you can’t use the cheats any more?”
Capcom has also posted a short statement on the Resident Evil Revelations Steam page, explaining that a recent update has been “reversed,” but will eventually be re-released. “Due to an issue observed with the latest update released, we have reverted the corresponding update,” the developer says. “We apologize for the inconvenience caused, and once the issue is resolved, we will re-release the update. Thank you very much for your patience and cooperation.”
196 negative Resident Evil Revelations reviews have been posted on the game’s Steam page since January 10, and the game is now rated ‘mostly negative’ based on recent feedback. Its overall rating, however, which is based on lifetime player responses, is ‘very positive.’
PCGamesN has contacted Capcom and will update this story with any further information or comment.
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