When Far Cry Primal launched on PC in March 2016, Ubisoft protected the game using a combination of their proprietary Ubisoft Connect platform (then Uplay) and Denuvo Anti-Tamper. At the time, Denuvo was considered nearly uncrackable, often keeping games secure for months or even years.

The "upd" (update) history for Primal is defined by one major evolution that completely changed the gameplay experience: