[Crack Watch] Beginners Guide to Crack Watch

We would like to welcome all newcomers to our community. We are a piracy news community where we inform the latest news related to video game piracy, including major scene and P2P releases. Before you make a submission, we would like you to read our rules. If you are still not sure if you should post on our subreddit, then please read our FAQ before making a post, as well as our posting guidelines. You can also message the moderation team here.

FAQ:

Q: Hello, I am new to this subreddit, how does this work?

Very simple. If you are wondering if a game is cracked, then you can use a search bar and type in a game. If it doesn't appear, you can still post a question in the weekly question thread, or r/cracksupport. Please do not make a separate question post, because it will be deleted and you will be warned.

How is this sub related to r/CrackStatus?

CrackStatus is considered to be the predecessor of Crack Watch. In the end of September 2016, group of CrackStatus mods were demoted due to the trust issues that the owner had with those mods. The same mods made r/CrackWatch. Few days later, r/CrackStatus was shut down by the owner, and r/CrackWatch took its place. Now, it's used as an archive of previous posts.

Do you guys deal with piracy in general or only video game piracy?

Only video game piracy.

Where are the download links? All I see are NFO's.

We cannot share download links to illegal content, because it's against reddits global rules. We can give you a list of domains where you can get your desired content, but after that, you are on your own. We also ask you to not share these download links with others, because we will delete them and most likely ban you. We take this rule very seriously.

What is an NFO?

NFO's are like readme.txt that scene makes. It gives you instructions, a general description of the game and some additional information.

What is the Scene? And what is P2P?

The Scene is an underground community of people who crack and share copyrighted material. They have strict rules that all scene members have to abide. P2P are independent crackers who don't follow the scene rules.

Where are the Scene rules?

https://scenerules.org/

How does Scene work?

You can read about it here. Thanks, u/MiSFiT203

Can I request cracks?

No. This subreddit is about informing people on cracks and piracy news. We don't take requests. You should try finding your answer in cs.rin forum.

Do you guys know if X game will be cracked or will X game use Denuvo?

No, nobody knows. Don't get your hopes up, scene members won't answer your questions.

Why doesn't the Scene crack games that community wants?

Scene groups don't care about the community, they crack for fame.

Does the Scene have an official website?

No

Can I support the scene in any way?

No, just give money to the devs who deserve your money

HOODLUM releases contain miner/trojan/worm/virus! Why aren't they untrusted?

Any official Scene release containing malicious content would have been instantly nuked by the topsite moderators. HOODLUM would have been kicked out from the Scene and all of their releases would be nuked, then you wouldn't see HOODLUM releases coming at all. The nukes would also provide reasoning of their nukes. So no, because they are still in Scene and no major forum has reported that their releases are malicious, we will continue considering it false positive.

Why is IGG untrusted? I used them for years! Never got a virus!

IGG has been in a lot of controversies lately. They are held responsible for shutting down one of the best piracy websites Good Old Downloads by doxing the owner and threatening to call the police on him. On top of that, they add their own DRM in their uploads, which is ironic itself. While IGG releases themselves are not malicious, their actions are the reasons why they go to untrusted list.

Why is piratebay untrusted?

Piratebay is no longer the same piratebay it once was. Their torrents are unmoderated, which means malware releases are very common and there are also reports that ISP's use them to bait the users into catching them downloading torrents then striking/fining them. There are much better websites than piratebay, see bellow the Scene group list.

When is X game going to be cracked? What is the current progress on X game?

Impossible to know. We don't have any contact with any of the scene members, and even if we did, they wouldn't tell us.

If a certain Denuvo game was already cracked, does that mean all future DLC's and updates are going to be cracked as soon as they release?

Unfortunately no. When a Denuvo game gets an update, the entire Denuvo build changes within the game. The game would have to be re cracked from the start all over again. This is why they dont get a regular update like with other games.

Where can I see status of a certain Denuvo game?

The main page of this subreddit has a stickied post called "[Crack Watch] Games". It is frequently updated

I need to find a torrent for a specific game, can you guys help me?

No. Try cs.rin.ru

Do you guys think X game will be cracked, what's your opinion on...

Please refrain from posting threads like these and instead use other subreddits like r/Piracy if you are going to make empty speculations or opinion-based threads.

Why can't I comment or post?

You need 5 comment karma. You can easily acquire it by posting on other subreddits through Reddit, like r/cracksupport. It takes 5 minutes.

What are seeders and leechers?

A Seeder is someone from whom you can download a piece of file. Hence they affect the overall availability of files on P2P network.

A Leecher is someone who has downloaded a file but is not sharing it back to P2P network. Hence, the overall availability of file decreases.

What is a repack?

A repack is a compressed pirated game using various compression software in order to lower the size of the game. It's most commonly used by people with limited bandwidth or people with low download speed.

What happened to Voksi? Why did he suddenly stop cracking Denuvo?

On July 25th, 2018, Voksi's computer was seized by Bulgarian cybercrime police. He was sued by Denuvo's parent company, Irdeto. Voksi has stated that his cracking days are over and that he is currently focusing on Irdeto's lawsuit against him.

What are the risks of downloading a torrent containing cracks?

It depends on a lot of things: Where do you live, how strict are copyright laws in your country and how much does the government enforce these laws. Countries like France, Germany and UK are known to have extremely strict copyright laws where they will usually heavily fine you if you are caught downloading pirated content. If you live in a country where copyright law is enforced heavily, you might need to get yourself a VPN, and unfortunately, you will also have to invest some money in getting a good VPN to protect you, because free VPNs rarely work.

How is this subreddit not shut down?

The same reason r/Piracy is not shut down. There is nothing illegal on this subreddit and nothing that breaks Reddit's Terms of Service. If there is, we encourage users to report it to us so that we immediately remove it.

Are you related by crackwatch.com website by any chance?

No

Where else can I find CrackWatch community?

We have discord (linked in the sidebar), Twitter (@realCrackWatch), and a backup sub on saidit.net (https://saidit.net/r/crackwatch).

List of video game scene crackers:

• CPY/Conspir4cy
• CODEX (Retired as of 2022.02.23)
• RELOADED
• SKIDROW (Has tendency to steal from P2P crackers ocasionally)
• STEAMPUNKS
• DARKSiDERS
• CODEPUNKS
• SiMPLEX
• PLAZA (Retired as of 2022.02.24)
• TiNYiSO
• OUTLAWS
• BAT
• Razor1911
• WaLMaRT
• PROPHET
• SMACKs
• ACTiVATED
• ALiAS
• F4CG
• DELiGHT
• Unleashed
• HI2U
• I_KnoW
• ZEKE
• HOODLUM
• PARADOX

All scene groups are considered trusted

Trusted sites:

• small-games.info (Russian)
• kaoskrew.org
• otxataba.net(Russian)
• blackboxrepack.com
• fitgirl-repacks.site
• cs.rin.ru/forum (Russian crack forum, excellent source of information)
• zamunda.net (Bulgarian)
• rarbg.to
• rutracker.org (Russian)
• 1337x.to
• rlsbb.ru
• ovagames.com
• compucalitv.com (Spanish)
• rihnogames.com
• dlfox.com (Persian)
• downloadha.com (Persian)
• torrminatorr.com
• elamigos.site
• gog-games.com
• online-fix.me

Relevant subreddits:

• r/cracksupport - CrackWatch's sister subreddit, used for helping people with their pirated game copy
• r/crackstatus - CrackWatch's predecessor, now under CrackWatch's ownership, used as an archive of previous posts
• r/piracy - General piracy discussion and news
• r/piratedgames - Pirated games discussion
• crackedsoftware - Subreddit dedicated to software piracy Banned by Reddit, no longer accessible
• r/denuvotrading - Subreddit used for trading offline denuvo activation with others
• r/torrents - Torrent discussion
• r/OpenSignups - Subreddit used for announcing when private trackers release invites
• r/trackers - Private and public tracker discussion
• r/CrackForecast - for those people asking when will next game be cracked

Not trusted sites:

• cpygames
• oceanofgames
• NoSteam
• steampunksgames
• crackia
• thepiratebay
• games4up
• igg-games
• skidrowreloaded
• skidrow-games
• cracked-games (IGG related)
• cpyskidrow
• fitgirlrepacks.co (Fake fitgirl website)
• fitgirl-repacks.website (Fake fitgirl website)
• kickasstorrents

Trusted P2P crackers:

• Baldman
• ALI213
• c000005/EMPRESS
• osb79
• LOOTBOX
• Steam006
• Potato_Of_Doom
• Voksi/REVOLT/RVT (No longer active, apprehended)
• Mkdev
• T0x1c
• Fisher
• 3DM (Recently stealing from scene/P2P crackers and crediting themselves)
• Mr. Goldberg

Untrusted P2P crackers:

• NoSteam
• The_Duck1
• MPC-G/EAC-G
• FARTMED-DARKMED
• ZLOfenix

Trusted Repackers:

• ElAmigos
• Kaos
• RG Mechanics
• Fitgirl
• MrDJ
• xatab
• Dzrepackteam
• REALiTY
• Darck
• NORO
• x.X.RIDDICK.X.x
• DODI
• Masquerade

Untrusted Repackers:

• Seyter/Qoob (miner in repacks)
• Corepack (Backdoor malware found in one)
• BBRepack
• xGIROx

Special thanks to:

-/u/yousmellfunky