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Killing The Fun - Cheating In Online Games
Thanks to the San Jose Mercury News for its story discussing the ever-present problem of cheating in online games. One of the issues discussed is cheating on Xbox Live using Action Replay-like devices, with a Microsoft spokesperson suggesting: "We didn't go into this with the idea that no one's ever going to be able to exploit this... But we absolutely take this stuff seriously and are taking action on it every day." However, noted FPS player Dennis 'Thresh' Fong laments an unfortunate side effect for the dextrous: "Because there is this perception that everybody cheats, people that are good are not recognized for their skills. When I play online, I'm always accused of being a cheater."
I thought the word for someone who didn't cheat was "n00b"
Jay | http://oldos.org
Take for example the olympics. The "arms race" to build the ultimate undetectable performance enhancing drugs closely mirrors the battle between online game cheaters and cheat detection.
It's a sad fact that when the more there is at stake, the greater people will be willing to go in order to obtain a win.
However, noted FPS player Dennis 'Thresh' Fong laments an unfortunate side effect for the dextrous: "Because there is this perception that everybody cheats, people that are good are not recognized for their skills. When I play online, I'm always accused of being a cheater."
Did you ever think people might cheat because they might not want to deal with the "dextrous" players who play 4-50 hours a week?
Online gaming needs match making and player rankings built into their in game browsers.
As someone who released the first aimbot for unreal tournament, and coded a few different cheats I can tell you why I, cheated. To grief people. I never cared about looking 'uber'. I was a good player in my own right. I cheated just because I wanted to grief the mindless, shitball, cliquey clannie fuckheads that played that game. I *liked* the fact that they knew I was cheating.
Other people in my clan/grief group botted for other reasons. One guy just liked looking uber to noobz. Another just throught it was funny.
Seriously, if you're so good at a game that you're consistently being accused of being a cheater, just laugh it off and say to yourself "damn, I'm good". Don't get me wrong, it sucks to have people not trust you, but in the end YOU know the truth, so how much should you really care about some insecure loser's paranoid opinion?
Why is it so easy to cheating at online fps games? Can some of you l33t h4x0rz put some effort into cheating in online casinos. Make that roulette wheel show up 00 every time. I'll split the winnings with you halfway. With that kind of money you can hire the world champion of counter-strike to play for you. Win without touching the mouse even!
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
I'm also wary of MMORPGs for the same reason.
Cheating being possible at all is a side effect of having the client know too much about the game state -- the position of other players, collision detection, etc. This is presumably done in an attempt to work around the lag introduced by the network. This means only real-time games are susceptible to cheating; turn based or casino type games cannot be cheated in. It also means that faster networks should enable game makes to validate inputs and make more of the decisions on the server side, thus making cheating obsolete even in FPS games. Until then, anything you do to stop cheaters is just a temporary stop-gap in a never ending arms race.
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
Simple solution... ever play Yahoo games? There are beginner, intermed and expert rooms to choose from. This might be something to consider in games. I find that the rooms are pretty honest in skill level. Sure, someone could troll the beginner rooms if they're good, but, from the Yahoo example, it doesn't happen (much). If you're #4 ranked, but in the beginner level, that's not much respect.
But that isn't a reason to cheat is it? How many "casual" gamers do you think cheat? If I had to make up numbers, I would guess that most of the cheaters, hell I would guess a vast majority of them play the game in question as much as the ubber-1337 players do. There is this tendency for people to assume that people that cheat suck or have no skills and that is why they cheat, I think this is just something we tell ourselves when we lose to a cheater ("if he wasn't cheating I would own him!") People that cheat are people that either don't want to lose, or they are doing it just to ruin the game experience of others. I would be very surprised if you could find me a below average player that uses a couple of cheats to level the playing field.
I see what you are saying, but I am not sure that there is really any relevance to the subject at hand here, I mean I don't think its fair that I own a crappy car, but does that mean you could empathize with me if I robbed a bank to buy a better one?
On Wall Street they say "buy low, sell high" On the pad we say, "buy high, sell high" Isn't that somehow better?
Dennis Fong misspelt "m4d sk1LLz".
Call of Duty multiplater games show instant replays every time you get killed from the other player's perspective/view. I think this is a cool idea. It would be nicer if you can record that too.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Its not like the cheats are a handicap where you can give yourself 30% extra life or money or something... They are all or none.
Cheaters are bad. But they are NOTHING compared to TKs.
At least cheaters you kick and they go cheat somewhere else. TKs keep coming back cause they enjoy it too damn much. Not to mention TKs have a sad history of coming back with different name.
At least cheaters are wanted by one team. TKs are hated by everybody. The team that win gets an unsatisfying victory. The team that lose gets abused.
As someone who released the first aimbot for unreal tournament, and coded a few different cheats I can tell you why I, cheated. To grief people.
So in other words, you're a sociopath. You derive pleasure from antagonizing others in a way that leaves them no recourse.
Let me guess - pulling the wings off of flies and burning ants with a magnifying glass are among your cherished childhood memories. Maybe you had "fun" with firecrackers and the family pet?
I'd hate to run afoul of Godwin's Law, but the senseless sadism exhibited by cheaters seems like it would fit right into some sort of guard/prisoner dynamic.
Back in the days of Diablo (1), one of the most cheated-in games ever, a few of my close friends from school decided to limit our gameplay amongst ourselves so we wont be affected by the cheating going on in the "real world". We managed to enjoy the game a great deal, none of us cheated. It's based on trust, really. If you can find a few people that you trust and play with them, it increases the enjoyment of the game enormously.
Same goes for first person shooters or any other game. Find yourself a clan with trustworthy members, and play.
Just because everyone else cheats, doesn't mean you have to expose yourself to their damnation.
- shazow
There have been cracks out that defeat punkbuster since a few days after it was released on bf1942. A few of the hacks include:
There will always be some cracks, but Battlefield certainly became better off it, as it was kinda booming.
Either way, people will always cheat in some way or another, the thing is you just have to keep on fighting it. Blizzard is one of the examples who have a strict anti-cheat policy and don't shy away from banning people's accounts and the like.
So with starcraft and Diablo I play on battlenet to ensure not only I am watched but my opposers as well, and with battlefield I play on official EA servers.
They won't catch all, but at least it happens alot less then on non-controlled servers.
Dre
Cheats can be quite effective, especially to police those that DO cheat. Back in the ol' CS days, on my friend's server we had always suspected this one guy who frequented his server of cheating. Needless to say I found one of these "wall hacks" to monitor his actions and the way he played (just from ghosting around and observing through walls.)
It was quite effective to watch as he was able to predict exactly where everyone was (ie shooting through doors or being rather hesitant when going up or down the sewers..etc etc, I think if cheating is such an issue, there could be designated "Watchers" who get the ability to see through walls and observe, just there to monitor the play like referees at a sporting event. Fighting fire against fire so to speak.
But from what I remember anti-cheat software (is punkbuster still around??) has really progressed in the past few years, I guess the same can be said about cheaters tho.
*604x
I'm a good CS player - and by good I mean that I frag at least twice as much as I die and play by the rules (camp as CT and rush as T on de_ maps). I've also commited to memory most of the popular maps and know where people camp (and how to get them). I've also learned that walking is the best way to play (Ninja Mode as I call it).
Anyway... I've never used a cheat in my life and now, in CS 1.6, it's really hard to cheat yet I've been banned from servers because I "cheat".
If I had learned to cheat, I would have never learned to play well, I can hold my own against most clanners in lan houses and I'm respected as a gamer despite being "old". Mind you, I play about an hour a day (when the wife lets me).
Cheating sucks, it really, really does.
Ash nazg durbatuluk, ash nazg gimbatul Ash nazg thrakatuluk agh burzum-ishi krimpatul
At its heart, I think this and similar issues (such as baseball and steroids, which I believe someone brought up above) are really just a reflection of our culture.
Somewhere along the line there's been a paradigm shift, and maybe it occured so gradually that no one noticed it was happening at the time. Winning has become more important than anything; this is a generally accepted value.
It may seem like splitting hairs, but I think at some point, the cultural value was more that you wanted to be the best (at whatever). Winning wasn't the goal, per se; it was just the natural consequences of being the best. Somehow that middle step of excelling has been lost, has become a vague ???? not unlike a failed dot.com business plan. Once upon a time working hard and becoming good at your chosen endeavor filled that gap, now whatever means that seems most expedient (including cheating) is permitted to suffice.
How or why that happened, I couldn't say.