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Shadowbane Servers Hacked, Chaos Ensues
Vanguard(DC) writes "There was a major hacking incident last night on the servers of Shadowbane, a newly released MMORPG by UbiSoft/Wolfpack. The attackers wreaked havoc on at least one game server, with apparent god-like capabilities in-game. There's already an official statement on the forums - 'Ubi Soft and Wolfpack Studios are now working with law enforcement, and we promise all of you that these individuals will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.'" There's a little more information via a post on the SBCatacombs messageboard - apparently the carnage (including many less powerful players getting killed) involved "..teleporting people all over the world, teleporting hostile guards into the safe-holds, bringing in hordes of special event monsters, and teleporting everyone to a city at the bottom of the sea."
As one of the many people who betaed this for years; I have to say this doesn't come as surprise in the least.
This is probably just an exploit from in the game, rather than someone r00ting the server or anything remotely interesting. I had many instances where the server accidently gave me dialogs with GM powers, I imagine that's just what happened here. The culprit(s) may have figured out how to gain access to the GM dialogs dilberatly, but that's about the extent of the "hack" here.
SB was so buggy in the last few weeks of beta that I was finnaly convinced it would not be a worth while game in retail. I likened it to being slightly less bug riddled than UO, and now it appears I was correct. I will say though that OSI never prosecuted (or even remotely punished) me for exploiting their game to "House Loot", because at the time they had the sense not to sue fans for their own mistakes.