And we all saw that coming. When SEGA announced that Sonic Mania would be using the Denuvo anti-tamper tech, a lot of PC gamers got frustrated, especially since this was not indicated on the game’s Steam store page prior to its release. And while SEGA has not removed this anti-tamper tech from its title, pirates have managed to crack the game.

This basically means that the pirated version of Sonic Mania is currently the definitive version. That version packs all the fixes and updates that the official version currently features, allows offline mode, and is not plagued by the Denuvo anti-tamper tech. And that really sucks for all legitimate owners of the game.

Now while Sonic Mania was cracked really fast, it’s not the fastest Denuvo-cracked game. That honour goes to TEKKEN 7 which was cracked in just four days (and to RiME and Resident Evil 7 that were cracked in five days).

In RiME’s case, Tequila Works removed the Denuvo anti-tamper tech once the game was cracked. Similarly, id Software, IO Interactive and BioWare removed Denuvo from DOOM, Hitman and Mass Effect: Andromeda.

It will be interesting to see whether SEGA will remove the Denuvo anti-tamper tech now that the game has been cracked. It’s worth pointing out that the Sonic Mania team had no say in the implementation of the Denuvo anti-tamper tech.

As always, we won’t allow links to pirated content, and those who share such links will most likely get banned.

Oh, and we do have to share this amazing tweet from GOG regarding Sonic Mania’s DRM controversy.