Edit: The GNU Testament is here! The GNU Testament supersedes the original guide so read that instead
I think this instance has a 10k character limit on posts, and as luck would have it my post is almost exactly 10k characters. Hopefully I don’t need to add any extra info later.
(Bonus meme: After you get in the rhythm of using these tools, it becomes very funny when piracy groups drop releases like
-XKILLDEATH STRIKES AGAIN! THE UNRELENTING FORCE! RESPECTED BY ALL...and what they’ve actually done is put a generic steam emulator into the folder and changed an app ID. Making the NFO probably took 20x the effort)Thanks for writing this out! This is one to save for posterity.
Wow thanks for this post, OP, very well written and informative for the community.
thank you!
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Tx 4 the post op. Ur awesome. Any easy beginner game/s we can practice?
That is a really fun idea. If you want to practice for personal gain, I would start with Steamworks API. If you can figure out how to configure goldberg’s emulator, you can play 95% of new games nowadays without needing anyone else’s help. Your goal is to get these games running, and probably load into the game once to move around for good measure. Grab the following games from a steam/origin source if possible, not a DRM-free/Epic Games one or etc (cs.rin SCS forum)
SteamDRM (Windows variant): Call of Duty - World at War, TES IV: Oblivion, Mirror’s Edge, Star Wars - The Force Unleashed 2. A quick check to make sure your steamless is calibrated properly: The MD5 sum for World at War’s
CoDWaW.exewhen SteamDRM has been stripped off is354273f626af97142fd9797936332663SteamDRM (Linux variant): Binding of Isaac: Rebirth (+Steamworks API). There’s a linux copy available to test with on the game’s cs.rin thread, page 84, uploaded by zTG. If you don’t strip the SteamDRM correctly, it will try to launch your system’s Steam app. If you do it correctly, it will launch right into the game.
Steamworks API (Windows/Linux): basically any steam game you download today will be protected with this. This is your bread and butter bypass for most things. The following games can be cracked with Goldberg on their windows and linux versions (try both!): Bastion, Inscryption, Pyre, Rimworld, Shapez.io
Epic Online Services: any epic game that you can source probably. This is very similar to Steamworks API in that it’s a generic protection applied to pretty much anything you download from epic.
Origin: Battlefield 4, The Sims 4, Mass Effect 1/2/3 Legendary Edition. For ME1/2 you need to put the following as a launch option:
-NoHomeDir -SeekFreeLoadingPCConsole -Subtitles 20 -OVERRIDELANGUAGE=INTFor ME3 you need to use-NoHomeDir -SeekFreeLoadingPCConsole -Subtitles 20 -language=INTUplay r1: Assasin’s Creed Unity (+Steamworks API), Assassin’s Creed 3 Remastered (+Steamworks API), Assassin’s Creed IV Black Flag (+Steamworks API)
Securom (tough): Mercenaries 2, NFS Shift (+SteamDRM, winetricks physx required)
CEG (tough): Call of Duty Black Ops 1 (+Steamworks API, winetricks xact for sound), Call of Duty Black Ops 2 (+Steamworks API), GRID 2 (+Steamworks API, careful of NVAPI crashes on this one)
Older GFWL (tough): Fable III (+Steamworks API, +Securom, winetricks xact, don’t use goldberg experimental version) (this one’s infested with DRM, good luck)
Newer Xbox Live: Forza Horizon 4 (winetricks vcrun2019), Halo Master Chief Collection (+Steamworks API, +Custom DRM, requires a crack from dremor81 at cs.rin to bypass the custom DRM last I checked).
Extra credit:
Guess and crack the DRM:
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Hotline Miami 2
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Outer Wilds
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Titanfall 2
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Far Cry 4 (may require a specific wine release to run)
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Fallout 4
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Star Wars Jedi - Fallen Order (Oddly, IIRC SwGame-Win64-Shipping.exe is just fully DRM-free. Try cracking starwarsjedifallenorder.exe)
Misc:
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Left 4 Dead 2 (Linux) (+Steamworks API and it requires runtime-installer.sh usage)
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Far Cry 5 (CODEX denuvo-cracked release. Switch from the CODEX Uplay r1 emulator to LumaPlay instead)
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Build this tool on linux: https://github.com/oureveryday/Goldberg-generate_game_info and get an info dump from it for a goldberg-enabled game (Generate and use your own steam API key if xan105’s is not working)
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Use the experimental goldberg build with the game info dump from the last item, and get achievements to show up in game (Shift+Tab to show the overlay)
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Stellaris (+Steamworks API. Unlock the DLC ingame by configuring Goldberg’s emulator. Hint: You need to configure DLC.txt. Try this tool on Stellaris’s SteamDB to get a DLC list, or use the generate-game-info tool from above)
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Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor (Linux) (+Steamworks API and runtime-installer.sh. Get the DLC working ingame by configuring Goldberg’s emulator. Hint: you need to configure Depots.txt and DLC.txt. Use SteamDB to find depot IDs)
Ur a legend! Ty ty. I have some h.w. to do. Ty again 🙏🙇
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Amazing post! Thank you for sharing this!
Finally a good piracy post. Thank you OP
Any notes on, say, visual novels from DMM using SoftDenchi, Buddy Launcher, or DMM Game Launcher? I’d like to one day play some of the games I bought.
I don’t have any notes on those - do you have an example of a game that I could easily source from cs.rin to give a look?
Ah, well, that’s a little trickier. Visual novels tend to have a lot of different releases, so if I gave you a suggestion of one that was on DMM, you might also be able get it from DLSite with PlayDRM, which does work through WINE. It could also be a physical release that comes with no DRM at all. Even if you wanted to buy the game from DMM, you need a Japanese IP address, so you’d need to get a VPN…these guys don’t make it easy.
There’s this version of Maji de Watashi ni Koishinasai which is supposedly exclusive to DMM: https://vndb.org/r44104
I know the download edition of Flyable Heart is encumbered by SoftDenchi on both DLSite and DMM: https://vndb.org/v1179
The download edition of Aiyoku no Eustia is only on DMM, and it uses DMM Game Player: https://vndb.org/r37403
However, I own the physical edition of Aiyoku no Eustia (it cost about…$150), and it is encumbered by AlphaROM. That DRM actually has a legal bypass because it’s apparently so dodgy it fails to work for some Windows users, so I managed to wrangle it to work through WINE by getting a file from the DRM company. If you get a “No disc” error, then you’re running the AlphaROM version.
Nonetheless, thanks for the offer anyway if this sounds like far too much effort to wrangle some eroge.
I found a copy of flyable heart on rutracker, but when trying to run it the font is garbled and after clicking OK on the textbox at 1:21 in this video nothing happens. Nothing useful in the log. I’m not sure whether the crack (I think one is included?) or wine is having a problem with it. I think you’d probably be a lot more of an expert in this area than I am, unfortunately.
Ah, yes, you do need to configure WINE to display Japanese characters before you can run most Japanese visual novels.
You’ll want to make sure
ja_JP.UTF-8is uncommented in/etc/locale.genand that you’ve runlocale-genafterward. You also need some Japanese fonts installed to display the characters: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Localization/Japanese#FontsUse
LC_ALL=ja_JP.UTF-8when invokingwine.That’s probably all you need at a basic level to get characters displayed, but there’s a more complete setup here: https://learnjapanese.moe/vn-linux/
Yes, I suppose this is somewhat obscure. Oh well - I can get the DMM games working in a Windows virtual machine, and most visual novels run slow, but otherwise mostly fine without dedicated graphics.
