Doom Eternal's Controversial Anti-Cheat Is Being Removed

After a deluge of complaints and comments from Doom Eternal players, Id Software is planning to remove the recently implemented Denuvo Anti-Cheat in the game's next update.

Doom Eternal executive producer Marty Stratton broke down the decision in a post to the Doom subreddit on Wednesday, saying that "feedback from players has made it clear that we must re-evaluate our approach to anti-cheat integration."

Id Software's first update for Doom Eternal brought a number of changes, including Denuvo Anti-Cheat, which uses a kernel-mode driver that can access your operating system. While patch notes tried to quell player concerns, the community was not happy with Id Software's decision to add what they consider an invasive anti-cheat tool. Player reactions since the update have been severe, including many negative reviews on Steam.

Stratton said the studio plans to reevaluate how it approaches cheating in Doom Eternal's online multiplayer in the future.

"As we examine any future of anti-cheat in Doom Eternal, at a minimum we must consider giving campaign-only players the ability to play without anti-cheat software installed," he wrote. "As well as ensure the overall timing of any anti-cheat integration better aligns with player expectations around clear initiatives, like ranked or competitive play, where demand for anti-cheat is far greater."

Stratton said that the decision to include the Kernel-level integration was based on the idea that they are "typically the most effective in preventing cheating" and that Id Software wanted to act quickly after not adding anti-cheat to Doom 2016 soon enough.

He also addressed community concerns that the anti-cheat system had been causing performance issues in-game. "Many have unfortunately related the performance and stability issues introduced in Update 1 to the introduction of anti-cheat," he said. "They are not related."

"We believe the performance issues some players have experienced on PC are based on a code change we made around VRAM allocation," Stratton continued. "We have reverted this change in our next update and expect the game to perform as it did at launch."