Fallout 4 PC DVD Requires Steam Due to “Piracy”

The majority of retail PC games utilize Steamworks as a form of copy-protection and customers often enjoy the various benefits of the Steam client. However, there are still a number of PC gamers who prefer DRM-Free editions and like to own a physical copy. The Vice President of Marketing at Bethesda has confirmed Fallout 4’s retail copy will require Steam and doesn’t even contain all the data files:

Sadly, the reply is a little ambiguous so it’s difficult to deduce how much of the game is actually stored on the disk. Perhaps, the disk is authenticated before downloading a few verification files.

Hines also explained why the Steamworks DRM is included and simply responded with “piracy”. While piracy is more common on the PC, it’s also quite prevalent on consoles. As a result, I don’t understand his reasoning and the DRM will easily be cracked by major piracy groups. On another note, the PC’s user base is becoming more popular and Steam has clearly encouraged pirates away from illegally downloading games. As Gabe Newell once said, piracy is a “service problem”.

Personally, I don’t see Steamworks as a major issue given the benefits of cloud saves, achievements and an organized library. However, the piracy reasoning does become irksome and doesn’t paint a completely accurate picture. Piracy isn’t a problem on the current console generation but the X86 architecture could be prone to easy modifications. Although, the large size of games is a deterrent.

Do you think piracy is solely a PC problem? If not, why hasn’t Bethesda used DRM on console copies?