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NCSoft Drops GameGuard From Western Launch of Aion

Posted by Soulskill on from the they-can-be-taught dept.

chalkyj writes "NCSoft has announced that they will be dropping GameGuard from the western launch of their upcoming MMORPG, Aion. The flawed Korean anti-cheat software has been heavily criticized for employing root-kit like techniques and conflicting with many hardware configurations. The final straw is thought to have been the stability issues experienced by players during open beta and the community outcry it caused. The decision makes Aion, which recently announced over 400,000 western pre-orders, a real contender in the western MMO market."

104 comments

  1. That's nice by MacAnkka · · Score: 5, Interesting

    A company is actually listening what their customers have to say? Thats quite refreshing to hear during these days.

    1. Re:That's nice by sopssa · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Nice thing about MMO's is that the companies actually *have to* listen to customers or they will stop playing and paying. Blizzard alone has 2500+ people working on customer support related jobs.

      You of course cant listen to or adjust the game by every single person, but you have to listen to the larger group. This is true even more because Aion is NCSoft's try to create real competitor in the western markets.

      And the game does look good with its Crytek Engine and with some of the gameplay mechanics. I haven't played it myself, but some friends have been playing the beta and say it is quite fun. However I will wait for more reviews first, as I cant concentrate on WoW that much either. What I'm worried about is that it will have lots of grinding like WoW, specially because thats even more common in Asian games.

    2. Re:That's nice by Smooth+and+Shiny · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      Blizzard has 2500+ people working POORLY in customer support related jobs. They make decisions based on hearsay and ban without even doing a thorough investigation into the matters at hand. It's beginning to cost them in playerbase (I know, they still have a lot of players) just as it did with SOE and EverQuest when WoW was initially released.

      Now take that above and toss nerfs into the mix. Not just item nerfs or class nerfs, but CONTENT nerfs. Making "epic" raid encounters so trivial that almost any casual guild with all green gear and ventrilo can take out most of the upper-tier content. Then mix that all together with a healthy dose of balancing classes mostly around PvP, thereby hurting PvE and you have nothing but a foul tasting mix of crap left.

      I played WoW from early betas until about 7 months ago (I quit to wait for Aion) and, honestly, the game was much more fun in the early days... until PvP balance became much of the designer's and developer's main focus. I mostly did PvP with my rogue and not to float my own boat, but I was good at it. Then some warlock made a video that showed his poor class playing ability and how rogues were somehow so uber they needed to be nerfed to Hell and back. It got to the point where every PvP nerf they gave me hurt me in PvE high-end raiding content. Even with tier 7+ gear it was hard to do what a rogue SHOULD do - damage things better than the tank at least.

      Yes, I am bitter toward WoW and Blizzard. In fact, I hope WoW dies a horribly, slow burning death. I hope it falls from grace FASTER than EQ did when WoW took the throne. Hopefully the players who want a challenge in PvP and PvE (combined, mind you) will make the switch to Aion and find what I found during beta: fun in an environment that isn't so easy to conquer as WoW has become.

      Sorry for the rant, but Blizzard took over 4 years of money from me, only to turn their game into a mess. I will go now. Oh... and sorry to the WoW fanboys who will be hurt by the truth above.

    3. Re:That's nice by DreadPiratePizz · · Score: 1, Flamebait

      Most customers are idiots, and the influx of casual and dumbed down game that we are getting today is the result of studios 'listening to their customers'.

    4. Re:That's nice by bemymonkey · · Score: 1

      "Blizzard has 2500+ people working POORLY in customer support related jobs. They make decisions based on hearsay and ban without even doing a thorough investigation into the matters at hand. It's beginning to cost them in playerbase (I know, they still have a lot of players) just as it did with SOE and EverQuest when WoW was initially released."

      I can confirm that. Bought a copy of Diablo II LOD about a month ago, played for two weeks, tried to log on again today, and found out my CD key's been disabled/banned. The funny thing is, I actually have no idea what's going on - unless "Third party applications and/or hacks" includes Winamp, my account should be clean as a whistle.

      Conclusion: Whoever's in charge of bans at Blizzard is a f***ing idiot.

    5. Re:That's nice by Unoti · · Score: 1

      I mostly did PvP with my rogue... I was good at it. Then... nerfed to Hell and back...It got to the point where every PvP nerf they gave me hurt me in PvE high-end raiding content...

      I hear you. But you're way behind on current events! If you want the best DPS class, roll a retribution paladin!

    6. Re:That's nice by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you, as a rogue in tier 7 gear, cannot outdamage the tank in equivalent gear, you are geared incredibly wrong(did you raid in pvp blues, perhaps?), or you lack any semblance of skill. My guild's rogues routinely placed in the top 5 spots on damage meters. Also, I play a warlock: Your tears fuel my rage. Enjoy the nerfs, it's been a long time since clothies could stand up against a rogue.

      (Fear. Cloak of Skill! Fear. Will of the Forsaken! Fear. Trinket! Fear. Nah-uh, immune! Oh, dead warlock, ho-hum.)

    7. Re:That's nice by bemymonkey · · Score: 1

      I actually read all of those support pages and wrote a few e-mails to Blizzard before coming here to complain ;)...

      As for the comment about the CD key generators - are you sure? Are companies actually dumb enough to generate their keys with such an easily duplicated algorithm? I find that a bit hard to believe.

      As far as I can tell, Blizzard screwed up.

    8. Re:That's nice by sopssa · · Score: 1

      Nope. They are obviously all generated on server-side, so theres no cd key generators. However, there are lots of malware that claim to be "WoW cd key generators" that just steal accounts for their owners.

    9. Re:That's nice by Smooth+and+Shiny · · Score: 1

      Oh, I know that, hehe. I may not play anymore, but the wife does and she plays a paladin. It was insane how much they got buffed. I won't cry, however. Paladins needed more damage output in the retribution tree, though they may have gotten too much. Druids, on the other hand... man, talk about easy mode. Every tree is a freaking walking disaster area. You so much as go NEAR a druid in PvP and you are dead almost instantly! And most people playing druids simply roll their faces on their keyboards to make death happen!

    10. Re:That's nice by Smooth+and+Shiny · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Any real evidence behind this assertion, or are you just basing this on, well, hearsay? I've played the game since launch, and ALL of the bans & suspensions that I have seen happen have all been more than merited by the players' conduct. So unless you have some sort of evidence or even an anecdote that might support this claim, this sounds like an angry, bitter rant from someone who got banned/suspended, or had a friend get banned/suspended for good reason. Given said angry rant, I would imagine that it was well deserved. :)

      I was on the forums one day and saw a post about "sex toys." I clicked to view the post and it was rather nasty. I replied to the post, simply saying; "This will probably get you banned for sexual harassment and various other reasons." I then left for work. When I came home, I tried to log back into the forums (I used to post helpful information for people, true story) and a message saying - "You have been banned from the forums for the following reasons: Making threats, demeaning someone for their sexual preference or making inappropriate remarks concerning race, sexuality or ethnic background." - Naturally, I was thinking "WTF?!" So I checked my email and, sure enough, there was a letter in my inbox stating the same. I wrote to Customer Support, asking for a review and giving them solid proof of what I had actually said in the post. I showed them screenshots AND gave them direct links to my comments (mind you, the OP in the thread was still posting to it when I checked on my wife's account). A day later, they got back to me and said "after further review, we see that you have done nothing wrong, but the ban will remain in effect."

      Good enough for you? Yes, I _am_ bitter for that. But then it goes on... my account received a suspension (I couldn't play the game for 72 hours) after someone told me that I had sex with my sister. *I* was BANNED for being insulted by someone.

      If you're talking about the guild(s) that completed Naxxramas when WotLK launched, they completed it in TBC epics and greens that were better, in some cases, than said TBC epics, much like the greens in TBC were better than some vanilla WoW epics (just do the maths, it makes sense). And judging content 'nerfed' because the best of the best players can complete it in a few days isn't really fair, given that those players pounded said content on the PTR and beta enough to ensure that they would be able to plow right through it. Not to mention that this was Naxxramas 2.0, they already KNEW all of the basics of the encounters, and only had to figure out what had changed this go 'round.

      No, not talking about those people. I am talking about the new guilds full of Blood Elves in which almost 90% of the guilds were totally new to the end game in WoW. People who were super casual before the remake of Naxx. THEY are now destroying that content (well, back before I quit) and having a much easier time than the established end-game population. Most of the content was nerfed really hard (this one has 1 million fewer hitpoints and his DoTs only do half the damage they did before). That is really like saying: "Here you go, raid this and get easy epics."

      Even with all the PvP nerfs hurting PvE (and here is one area where I agree with you), if you were doing less DPS on a boss than the tank... then your spec was poor, or your gear was poor, or your rotation/ability use was poor. If you are talking about trash, however (particularly in Naxxramas), then of course tanks will do more--all they're going to do is AoE. Paladin, druid, and DK tanks can pour out a ton of AoE damage when tanking trash, so it's certainly possible that they out-DPSed a rogue on trash, as all rogues have is one ability that can't compete with other, more AoE-centric classes such as mages and warlocks.

      Nah, my rotations were always good as was my build and gear. My point was that rogue DPS output was really affe

    11. Re:That's nice by idiot900 · · Score: 1

      But the idiots are apparently the ones who pay the bills, so they get what they want. What's wrong with that?

    12. Re:That's nice by trytoguess · · Score: 1

      Don't be too happy. They're going to have to install some short of anti-cheat software, since most customers will demand it. Considering how far people will go to get ahead the software will have to be an invasive one... But lucky for us it aint gonna be GameGuard! Wee...

    13. Re:That's nice by murdocj · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Blizzard has 2500+ people working POORLY in customer support related jobs. They make decisions based on hearsay and ban without even doing a thorough investigation into the matters at hand. It's beginning to cost them in playerbase.

      The few times I've had to contact GMs, the experience has been uniformly positive. And I know of a number of people who were hacked and had their stuff ripped off. Each of them got their gear back in a few days. I don't know of anyone leaving the game due to customer service. I played Everquest for years, and WoW CS is head and shoulders above SoE.

      Now take that above and toss nerfs into the mix. Not just item nerfs or class nerfs, but CONTENT nerfs. Making "epic" raid encounters so trivial that almost any casual guild with all green gear and ventrilo can take out most of the upper-tier content.

      I used to be upset about reducing the difficulty of content. However, it's actually a really good move on Blizzard's part. Unless they do stuff like that, the game becomes a filter where fewer and fewer players get to see the content. Once the hard core "uber" players have seen some content, what's the problem with easing the encounters so other players can see it?

      I mostly did PvP with my rogue and not to float my own boat, but I was good at it. Then some warlock made a video that showed his poor class playing ability and how rogues were somehow so uber they needed to be nerfed to Hell and back. It got to the point where every PvP nerf they gave me hurt me in PvE high-end raiding content. Even with tier 7+ gear it was hard to do what a rogue SHOULD do - damage things better than the tank at least.

      So they nerfed your class and then you got pissed off and decided to stop playing. Well, guess what, every MMO is going to need rebalancing, and that may include nerfs. I was seriously annoyed when they nerfed fear ward on my priest, but that's just the way it goes.

      Yes, I am bitter toward WoW and Blizzard. In fact, I hope WoW dies a horribly, slow burning death

      It's a game, it's not worth getting that pissed off about. Play a different game. Go outside and see the ball of yellow light in the sky.

    14. Re:That's nice by thejynxed · · Score: 1

      Actually, the key generators for Diablo 2 are a mix of both - real and malware. Groups like Razor1911 cracked that many moons ago, and it's never been fixed by Blizzard. Why should they bother anyhow, the game is 'ancient' in software years. You should have seen the havoc caused when people were buying the Diablo Battlepack when it was first new and finding their legit keys banned right off the bat - because they used the same system for the 'new' Battlepack as they did for the original Diablo 2/LOD. THAT had already been cracked by pirates for WELL over a year.

      It took quite a bit of sending in photos of individuals holding boxes, copies of receipts, etc to get that problem resolved for more than a few people.

      --
      @Mindless Drivel: 100% of Twitter posts ever Tweeted.
    15. Re:That's nice by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I really hate to point out the bleeding obvious, but the problem is that THE GAMES SUCK.

    16. Re:That's nice by _Sprocket_ · · Score: 1

      Now take that above and toss nerfs into the mix. Not just item nerfs or class nerfs, but CONTENT nerfs. Making "epic" raid encounters so trivial that almost any casual guild with all green gear and ventrilo can take out most of the upper-tier content. Then mix that all together with a healthy dose of balancing classes mostly around PvP, thereby hurting PvE and you have nothing but a foul tasting mix of crap left.

      Yeah - it's awesome. Everyone gets a chance to experience all this content Blizzard has created. It's no longer some private club for the elite. I'm sure it makes hanging around outside the bank in your matched gear a lot less fun when some casual walks by in the same kit on their way to doing something other than hanging around outside the bank. But hey - the elitist's lost is everyone else's gain. And by definition - that's a gain for a lot more people.

      Blizzard has been GIVEN 4 years of my money - for multiple accounts in my household. It's been worth (almost) every dollar. I've had 4 years of continued entertainment. I've even gotten a chance to go back and see most of the old content that used to be club-houses for elite raiders. Pitty I missed out on it all when it was a challenge. We were busy defending cities and running lower-end content (and defending cities has never really had much a pay off besides the thrill of world PvP). But at least I've seen things that I've missed. And I'm not missing out on as many things these days - even if I couldn't even begin to tackle all the hard modes that produce the nifty mounts that elitsts use to hang out and over around the landing pad so that they can look different than all the casuals mounting up and flying off to do something.

    17. Re:That's nice by vikstar · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Actually, no...

      We will however continue to pursue ways to effectively utilize GameGuard within Aion in the future.

      So once you've payed for the game, they'll bring it back.

      --
      The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than the question of whether a submarine can swim.
    18. Re:That's nice by Talgrath · · Score: 1

      Yeah, when I wasn't able to run the game at the lowest settings in the open beta when I beat the recommended settings by quite a bit, the reply was basically "yeah, this is a game guard problem", I was thinking that I wouldn't pick up Aion. No point in buying a game you can't run (when you beat the crap out of the requirements), but now I will probably pick it up.

    19. Re:That's nice by ShakaUVM · · Score: 1

      >>So they nerfed your class and then you got pissed off and decided to stop playing.

      Thanks to this thread, it reminded me to cancel my account. 50 DK nerfs was enough for me. Thanks! =)

    20. Re:That's nice by murdocj · · Score: 1

      DK nerfs???? I started a DK a month or two ago to play with some friends and after leveling a priest and a hunter to 80 and a rogue to 70, the DK was so overpowered it was ridiculous. If the DK is nerfed now, it must have been insanely powerful before. If "DK nerfs" are why you are quitting, you just need a game with an "I win" button.

    21. Re:That's nice by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have been playing linage 2 for about 5 years. The playerbase is nowdays 98% bots so i dont know what Gameguard does other then preventing from playing on linux, using Razor mouse functions and playing "private servers". I would personaly never start playing a NC soft game again.

    22. Re:That's nice by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I played a warlock before I quit, rogues DID need to get nerfed to hell and back. Go ahead and mod me -1 troll.

  2. gameguard by proxy by girlintraining · · Score: 0, Redundant

    I have a friend who was part of the closed beta for this game. Besides the game looking awesome, it was a frequent source of problems for the testers, who often couldn't get into the game, or register new characters, or in some cases the game just flat out refused to run, no errors. Apparently, NCSoft got enough of these complaints to drop it from the release version.

    --
    #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
    1. Re:gameguard by proxy by SBFCOblivion · · Score: 1

      My cousin and a few other friends were in the beta as well. While my cousin experienced no real issues my other two friends would actually have their computers restart randomly while playing Aion.

    2. Re:gameguard by proxy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      9Dragons has the same problem. I've been running it on Win2k and as long as I don't fill up my hard disk with screenshots (so the gameguard db can't be written to, and the game crashes) I haven't had any issues. My friend however after update 80 has found her game BSODing her computer every couple of hours on WinXP SP3. Given that she hadn't updated anything other than the game in the past 4ish months it seems to be related to the gameguard updates.

      But on the other hand, at least we aren't paying 15/mo to play :)

  3. Awesome by Dyinobal · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Now if they promise not to 'include it' in future patches that would be swell. I might actually considering trying it.

    1. Re:Awesome by girlintraining · · Score: 0

      Now if they promise not to 'include it' in future patches that would be swell. I might actually considering trying it.

      Yeah, that really stopped people from buying World of Warcraft.

      --
      #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
    2. Re:Awesome by S77IM · · Score: 4, Informative

      No, they basically say the exact opposite.

      The entirety of the relevant text from The Full Article:

      After analyzing our open beta test results Aion will not feature GameGuard at launch. We will however continue to pursue ways to effectively utilize GameGuard within Aion in the future. Right now we're focused on providing players with the best possible Aion experience.

      Essentially, they're saying that the implementation is flawed, not the concept.

        -- 77IM

      --
      Student: Is it true that the foundation of the universe is paradox?
      Master: Well, yes and no.
    3. Re:Awesome by sopssa · · Score: 1

      I hope they work with GameGuard to make their system less invasive. Some anticheat protection is needed in online games, just to stop the kiddies getting hacks and ruining the game for every one. Those who make private hacks will always know their way around, but on the other hand they also know how to use them and wont ruin the game for everyone (for leveling or fishing or whatever - but they wont be running around killing people with hacks for fun, because they know that'll get them banned by gamemasters).

    4. Re:Awesome by Dr.+Impossible · · Score: 1

      Just don't get it through Steam, because the Steam version is dead on arrival. Doesn't work. I'm re-downloading the game directly from NCsoft and hoping that my CD-key for the game is not somehow tied to Steam.

    5. Re:Awesome by geekboy642 · · Score: 5, Informative

      Except that Blizzard has made their own DRM/antihack software invisible to almost all of their players, and that's the important difference. Anecdotally, I've never met anyone who was unable to play because of it. I've met several unwilling to play because of a healthy paranoia about spyware, but even as spyware it's quite technically competent.

      --
      Just another "DOJ fascist authoritarian totalitarian bootlicker" -- Zeio
    6. Re:Awesome by Megane · · Score: 4, Interesting

      It's not just the kiddies who want to go run around griefing, it's the gold farmers who want to ruin your game's economy for profit, and their bots overcamping the stuff you need to kill.

      --
      #naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
    7. Re:Awesome by Rogerborg · · Score: 1

      Some anticheat protection is needed in online games, just to stop the kiddies getting hacks and ruining the game for every one.

      Sure, and that protection should be "design your server on the basis that every client is a bot". Every one of these dumbfuck companies makes the same fundamental mistake - trusting the client - and even outfits that commit to burning resources playing an never ending game of Whack The Hack always lag behind the exploits.

      --
      If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
    8. Re:Awesome by sopssa · · Score: 1

      They aren't trusting the clients just for fun. Current technology has to put lots of things on the client so it works good. I surely hope this will, and probably does, change in the future but currently it's not applicable.

    9. Re:Awesome by joaobranco · · Score: 4, Informative

      Now if they promise not to 'include it' in future patches that would be swell. I might actually considering trying it.

      Yeah, that really stopped people from buying World of Warcraft.

      Notice that the WoW Warden is much less intrusive than GameGuard (it even allows for playing WoW on Linux using wine, which means it is very much standards compliant). Big difference here.

    10. Re:Awesome by compro01 · · Score: 1

      The difference being that blizzard's warden actually works properly. Gameguard is a buggy, ineffective piece of crap. It gets rebroken within days (if not hours) of being updated and causes frequent BSODs when it screws up.

      --
      upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
    11. Re:Awesome by Skuld-Chan · · Score: 1

      I talked to one of the guys who maintains warden at last years blizzcon - he said its main purpose is to detect people using well known hacks/cheats (its not even a rootkit). That the vast majority of their policing effort is based off server side reports, user reports and gm efforts.

    12. Re:Awesome by Rogerborg · · Score: 1

      "Has to"? That's surrender monkey talk. Trusting the client is quicker, easier. I'll grant that in an FPS, it's very nearly a requirement, but in an MMO? Not even close. It's lazy, defeatist design that's planning for failure.

      --
      If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
  4. Poor Summary by Lulfas · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Nothing about the decision to drop GameGuard makes it a competitive MMO. The preorders numbers were given before that decision was made public. While I'm very glad they are dropping the horrible DRM program (I might pick it up myself now), it really has nothing to do with it's success or failure.

    1. Re:Poor Summary by Savior_on_a_Stick · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's not DRM.
      It has nothing to do with DRM.

      It was used previously in FreeToPlay games like 2moons to prevent cheating via game hacks.

      It failed utterly in that regard and was dropped.

      If Aion was relying on it as an anti hack measure - and "may introduce it later" - the game is already doomed.

    2. Re:Poor Summary by sopssa · · Score: 0, Redundant

      I agree. Seems people just like to throw "DRM" word around because of its bad image here on slashdot.

      GameGuard is anticheating software that protects the game from various hacking tools and methods same way that PunkBuster and VAC are. It's just a lot more invasive and is mainly used in Asian games.

      WoW and other gamers are quite easy to make hacking tools to too, but players reporting cheaters to gamemasters and the fact one account costs whole new game limits it goodly.

    3. Re:Poor Summary by The+Analog+Kid · · Score: 3, Interesting

      WoW and other gamers are quite easy to make hacking tools to too, but players reporting cheaters to gamemasters and the fact one account costs whole new game limits it goodly.

      WoW also has Warden to detect cheating programs and bots. I don't know how effective it is, but unlike some other anti-cheat programs, it shuts off when WoW does, and it doesn't stay on the system if you were to uninstall WoW.

      It's also been reported that Blizzard is suspending accounts that are played on machines that they detect have spyware on for 24 hours. It's started happening when they began collecting "Non-identifiable system information" again. They don't won't suspend the account though if you have an authenticator attached to your account.

    4. Re:Poor Summary by SanityInAnarchy · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Seems people just like to throw "DRM" word around because of its bad image here on slashdot.

      Anti-cheat software, however, employs similar tactics and has similar effects. Example: Blizzard's Warden checks for certain programs running in the background. SecuROM does the same thing. Only difference is, SecuROM doesn't like DaemonTools, while Warden probably cares more about Glider (if it still exists).

      The biggest difference between DRM and anti-cheat in general is motivation -- legitimate players actually do benefit, much more directly, if the anti-cheat software works, whereas if DRM could ever work, legitimate players would be no better off than with no DRM at all.

      However, in the bigger picture, you still have the same problems -- false positives and general headaches (rootkit-like behavior, anyone? Hello?) for people forced to use anti-cheat software, which are the same problems as people forced to use DRM.

      So while it may not be technically accurate, it does make sense.

      --
      Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
    5. Re:Poor Summary by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      GameGuard is anticheating software that protects the game from various hacking tools and methods same way that PunkBuster and VAC are.

      So? It's software explicitly designed to disallow players to do certain things with the game they bought. Like, say, write their own mods ("hacking"). Sounds like DRM to me.

      Online multiplayer game designers should just stop trusting the client so much. If something is not legal in the game, make sure it's impossible in the protocol, instead of trying to fight it by installing rootkits on the player's machine. I wouldn't accept a rootkit from my bank to do my online banking, why the hell would I accept a rootkit for playing a freaking video game?

    6. Re:Poor Summary by sopssa · · Score: 1

      I wouldn't accept a rootkit from my bank to do my online banking, why the hell would I accept a rootkit for playing a freaking video game?

      I hope you understand the technical differences between online banking and an online multiplayer game. Because of latency, internet connections, servers still not as capable and so on, its still not possible to let the server control process everything. For example player movements are not send to the server, but only their x,y coordinates. Then server doesn't need to calculate everything, but client can handle it. On the other hand, server can still make some calculations based on movement speed (I think I read WoW allows up to 1.40x "too much speed" because it could be from latency, anything over that and player is cheating).

      Only hackproof* way is for the server actually process keyboard and mouse commands and send the image back to client ( New Service Aims To Replace Consoles With Cloud Gaming ), but that still has a lots of problems (and then there would be crying about "I bought this software, why cant I actually have it?!?!?")

      Currently the only good system is to make antivirus like signature scans for public hacks that get updated by the MMO team and doing basic checks on the server. Now this wont stop all the hacks, but it will stop "casual hacking" and those players who are hacking just to ruin others game.

    7. Re:Poor Summary by rpillala · · Score: 1

      Dropping gameguard doesn't make it a better game, but as you yourself said, you are more likely to buy it now. Combine that with people who would have spent the "free" month fighting gameguard instead of players and mobs, and I think maybe it is more competitive.

      --
      When the axe came to the forest, the trees said, "Look out - the handle was once one of us."
    8. Re:Poor Summary by Jestrzcap · · Score: 2, Insightful

      If the program rootkits your system and prevents you from running certain software... well that sounds like DRM to me. I'd be happy to use a different term if you have something that's more accurate while conveying the same information.

      --
      "I have great faith in fools: Self confidence my friends call it." ~Edgar Allan Poe
    9. Re:Poor Summary by Rogerborg · · Score: 1

      Bingo. If they trust the client - which they apparently do - then the game is Epic level fucked from the get-go.

      At this point, the best outcome they can hope for is that the game is so unpopular that nobody bothers owning the client. Talk about lose-lose.

      --
      If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
    10. Re:Poor Summary by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      but does nothing to stop the hundreds of chinese robots from ruining the game. Gamegaurd doesn't work at all in this respect. Both Maple Story, and Mabinogi have it, and it does absolutely nothing to stop the most damaging from happening.

      Here's where MMO's really need to change:
      Keep a copy on the server and the client of the player state. Neighboring players also keep a copy of their own state. When anything happens, movement, battle, poses, etc, the server conducts the dice roll, and sends everyone the result. The client(s) then send back their own results, and that of their neighboring clients. If one client among dozens in an area sends back information different than the rest of the clients, that dude is cheating.

      A simple generalization would be your GM and 3 people playing a Pen and Paper RPG. The GM rolls the dice, and asks each person what number they see, and what action their neighbor said they were taking. If Bob and Joe (players) both say they see a 4, and Jane says she sees a 6, then Jane is told it's a 4 by the GM. If Jane then storms off, who gives a damn.

    11. Re:Poor Summary by Imrik · · Score: 1

      The client will still be responsible for creating movement data (for example) and sending that to the server and the other clients, everyone will see what the cheater wants rather than what should actually happen. Roughly equivalent to weighted dice in your example.

    12. Re:Poor Summary by _Sprocket_ · · Score: 1

      It's also been reported that Blizzard is suspending accounts that are played on machines that they detect have spyware on for 24 hours. It's started happening when they began collecting "Non-identifiable system information" again. They don't won't suspend the account though if you have an authenticator attached to your account.

      What I find especially interesting is that initial reports claim Blizzard will not tell the customer what Warden found. Warden reports a keylogger - you're disabled for your own protection to give you a chance to clean up your system before gold sellers liquidate all your (and your guild bank's) gear. Good luck.

      The big question is why not note what was found? I'm wondering if this reveals that Warden truely does not report any sort of details at all about what it's crawling. My guess is that they added hash signatures to known keyloggers. And while they can detect the existence of a suspected keylogger, they don't have enough information to really let the customer know what they found.

      Now - even as I make this argument, I can't help but question it. While they may not be able to identify the details of where a keylogger was located, they could at least note that they found Keylogger X or Keylogger Y. So either the alerting method isn't that granular or they're also detecting using something more general - such as an unexpected attempt to hook in to a function.

    13. Re:Poor Summary by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The thing that many people miss about these crappy anti cheating rootkits is that they're actually necessary to provide players with certain types of networked games using today's technology. Ideally, the client would just be a state viewer and almost everything would run entirely on the server. Unfortunately, due to technical limitations (imperfect network connections, and situations where high latency can cause a problem), certain types of games would be nearly unplayable (or at least really unenjoyable) if they did not offload certain aspects of processing onto the client. This situation clearly sucks, but apparently no one has been able to find a more acceptable solution.

    14. Re:Poor Summary by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Actually, Maple Story have switched to Hackshield months ago.

    15. Re:Poor Summary by tacarat · · Score: 1

      Saying what was and wasn't found would allow programmers to vet their newer creations against Warden. "X was found, but not Y or Z. Let's work on those angles for now".

      --
      "Common sense will be the death of us all"
  5. Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

    Just like rootkitting is okay for sptd to hide my emulated cd from game copy protection software.

    If the anti-cheat software causes problems or doesn't provide a completely clean uninstaller, you have valid arguments.

    But any good anti-cheat system will HAVE to behave as a rootkit to be any good. And online games without anti-cheat systems are truely useless.

    1. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by fatalwall · · Score: 1

      this might be completely stupid but.... why not build the anti cheap system into the game instead of installing a global rootkit that can impact the performance of a computer while the game is not in use.

      or maybe these mmorpgs are relying to much on your cpu. Only way one should be able to cheap in a well built game is a bot. Bots can often be detected based on how they act and the amount of time they are logged on. So you can also catch bots if your smart enough with statistics

    2. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by Bieeanda · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Bullshit. It's an MMO, not some rinky-dink peer-to-peer setup like original flavour Diablo. If there's something important enough that you don't want it hacked, you don't let the client handle it.

    3. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You mean like control the client display on the server?

      What about aim bots, turning the world into wire-frame to see enemies.

      Maybe not as useful in MMO, but BF2 type games need to protect the client every bit as much as the server.

      And those type games are useless without protection as too many people would cheat rather that just have fun and play fair.

      Note: I demand that such systems do not intrude on the rest of the system or decrease reliability, but something that could be described as a rootkit is the only way to do it.

    4. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If there's something important enough that you don't want it hacked, you don't let the client handle it.

      Not counting, of course, the broad area of game development which is about user input. Whether it is the player typing their password or using a keyboard and mouse, the server has very little control over user input.

      Case in point, FPS aimbots. It's a cat and mouse game. If you can have a server-side algorithm to detect aimbots, you can have a client side update to make the aimbot "less accurate" and appear "more human". Eventually the upper end of human performance will fail the bot tests, and the lower end of bot performance will appear as valid input.

    5. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by Animaether · · Score: 1

      But if upper end players are failing the bot tests (determined to be a bot, by some process), then maybe that'd be okay - just move them over to a server with other upper-end players and, yes, those bots. They've clearly gotten too good for mere mortals anyway, might as well let them brag about how they pwned the latest aimbot? :)

    6. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by drsquare · · Score: 1

      You clearly know nothing about MMO design. You have to trust the client for many things, or the game will be unresponsive or unplayable. Anti-cheating software is absolutely necessary.

    7. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by Mashiki · · Score: 1

      What you mean like warden? It looks for hooks, but doesn't root. And operates from within the game.

      --
      Om, nomnomnom...
    8. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by loufoque · · Score: 1

      But any good anti-cheat system will HAVE to behave as a rootkit to be any good. And online games without anti-cheat systems are truely useless.

      Wrong.
      A game that needs to prevent cheating on the client side rather is just broken by design.

      Just make the server check each action requested by any client is valid according to the game rules. That's not nearly as expensive as people like to believe, assuming the developers knew a bit about algorithmics.

    9. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Near as I can tell, EVE and WoW both don't trust the client AT ALL except for entering in commands to the UI. If there's latency between me and the server, every action in the game is delayed accordingly. Picking up items, moving them in my bags, equipping, buying & selling, any attacks and even my true position in the world is all verified on the server before it really shows up on my end.

      The only thing anti cheating software does in a properly designed MMO is checking for a poor dumb human to be the one using the UI, not a bot.

    10. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by Imrik · · Score: 1

      And even with that little trust WoW still has teleport hacks and people mining from under the world.

    11. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by ZorbaTHut · · Score: 1

      Actually, WoW does all player motion on the client, which is why speedhacks and flyhacks and all other sort of movement hacks work. It's been a recurring problem for them with regards to cheat protection - as far as anyone can tell, the WoW servers do absolutely no position verification of any sort, and people can fly around at supersonic speed for quite a while before the GMs catch on.

      EVE does indeed bounce every command off the server - the client is little more than a dumb terminal (with, admittedly, a complicated buggy window manager attached.)

      --
      Breaking Into the Industry - A development log about starting a game studio.
    12. Re:Rootkitting is a-okay for cheat protection by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 1

      You clearly know nothing about MMO design. You have to trust the client for many things, or the game will be unresponsive or unplayable. Anti-cheating software is absolutely necessary.

      I'm a professional game programmer, currently working on an MMO. Please believe me when I say, you trust the client with NOTHING. You allow the game to render the world, play sounds, and process input which is then send to the server for validation and processing. You only send the client what it absolutely has to know in order to render the world, and nothing else.

      Many people mistakenly think that the client is responsible for movement. This is not the case (unless the developers are unbelievably incompetent). The client moves your avatar locally, yes, to prevent the appearance of lag, but the game server performs all movement authentication based on the input data the client sends. If the client and server positions don't match, the server is considered the authority, and the client must reset its position. This is nothing more than client-side prediction, and has been a staple of networked games for over a decade now.

      Companies use client-side scanning software because it's *easier* than doing server-side analysis.

      --
      Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
  6. Any word on Exteel? by Bieeanda · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Not that it's a particularly good game (because it's not), but that pile of crap Gameguard is the reason I dropped out of that beta a week in. Stupid thing turned my uninterruptible power supply service off every time the game started, and I can only guess at what else it was doing behind the scenes... rather than preventing hacks, which it apparently wasn't worth shit at.

  7. Why rootkit this kind of MMORPG model? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The game -requires- a user account to be played. A user account is only obtainable through purchasing a legit copy of the game (read: a "cd key"), and consequently has to be maintained by a monthly fee. Illegitimate copies of the game are useless. WHY rootkit the software? What dumb-ass suit made this call, and for what reason?

    1. Re:Why rootkit this kind of MMORPG model? by sopssa · · Score: 1

      What does requiring an user account and illegitimate copies have to do with an *anticheat* program?

    2. Re:Why rootkit this kind of MMORPG model? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Woosh

    3. Re:Why rootkit this kind of MMORPG model? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What is there to Woosh?

    4. Re:Why rootkit this kind of MMORPG model? by Savior_on_a_Stick · · Score: 2, Funny

      absolutely nothing

      He saw the letters DRM in someone's post and his brain crashed

    5. Re:Why rootkit this kind of MMORPG model? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The fact that the GP had no idea what GameGuard was used for and assumed it was used to prevent piracy. It's an anti-cheat program, not some DRM that makes sure you didn't pirate the game.

  8. GameGuard doesn't cause any problems by S77IM · · Score: 4, Funny

    I was in the open beta (hey, free game!) and I think the accusation that GameGuard introduces security vulnerabilities into your system, which linger after you uninstall it, are an exaggeration.

    No-one wants to hack my desktop, anyway.Being well-endowed is the biggest gift the nature can give to a man. You are ashamed to take shower in public pools and gyms because of your tiny pecker? Now you can leave all your inhibitions behind as we know how to help you enlarge your instrument. Widest selection of desire lifters for men and women! We sell products for making your nights perfect!~

    --
    Student: Is it true that the foundation of the universe is paradox?
    Master: Well, yes and no.
  9. examples by ILuvRamen · · Score: 1

    Gameguard is used in Maplestory and I believe SRO also. It didn't stop any glitching or vac-hacking in Maplestory and it didn't stop botting AT ALL in SRO. In fact, over 50% of all registered players were bots. It's useless crap!

    --
    Google's Super Secret Search Algorithm: SELECT @search_results FROM internet WHERE @search_results = 'good'
    1. Re:examples by Auxis · · Score: 3, Informative

      It was also used in Lineage 2. Bots/hacking programs in that game are ridiculously easy to use and get working.

    2. Re:examples by sethstorm · · Score: 1

      They're even easier to kill.

      --
      Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
    3. Re:examples by PhoenixFlare · · Score: 1

      And GunBound - wanted to try it again after having played several years ago...GameGuard made my system immediately BSOD and reboot every single time I tried to start the game.

  10. From the TFA by velen · · Score: 1

    AION LAUNCH VERSION!
    September 17, 2009 4:34 PM
    Greetings!

    As we draw closer to tomorrow I wanted to give everyone a brief update on the progress of our live version. We are excited to announce that we will be serving out the final update for you to patch within the next few hours. You will be able to use this version for both our Preselection and our Head Start. We are very excited with our final product and think that you will be as well! Below are the release notes for the patch you will see later today:

    - Aion now features all three languages French, German and English. To select your language simply right click on Aion within your launcher and go to Properties->Language Options. Please select which languages you wish to download and which you wish Aion to display.

    - After analyzing our open beta test results Aion will not feature GameGuard at launch. We will however continue to pursue ways to effectively utilize GameGuard within Aion in the future. Right now we're focused on providing players with the best possible Aion experience.

    - The level cap is now level 50 (previously 45).

    - Players will be able to reserve 2 character names during Preselection and create 8 characters in total once Head Start begins and beyond.

    - Channels will be set to 10 instances for the beginning 2 zones of each faction. Please note that these will be lowered as characters progress and spread throughout Atreia.

    Xaen
    Aion Producer

    ----------

    So they will introduce it in the future.

  11. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  12. Wine? by Grimnir512 · · Score: 1

    So I've looked at the Wine appdb entry for Aion and it says that it won't work because of GameGuard due to GameGuard requiring the Windows kernel. Hopefully I should be able to run it on Linux now :D

  13. Gameguard Problems by meerling · · Score: 1

    In my case, Gameguard wouldn't let Aion run unless I disabled some basic and horribly common online security measures.
    I did not like that, especially when I've ran games before that used Gameguard and that action wasn't necessary with them.

    I don't mind the idea of Gameguard, I just don't like it's implementation and lack of effectiveness.
    (Especially when it won't play nice with my security.)

  14. Mu online by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    uses gameguard and has been for several years and every patch they have there is a bypass released within a week, so users who are honest have to deal with crappy anti-hack app that has memory leaks and ridiculous conflict issues with even the simplest things such as having a torrent open at the same time th gameguard launches etc.. and the hackers just bypass this with no problem/no headaches.. its not that its completely broken, but more that its completely useless and probably less expensive for them to develop some sort of anti-hack themselves then continue to pay for a worthless license if they actually pay for that crap.

  15. Preorders not an indication of MMO success by ZachPruckowski · · Score: 1

    Large numbers of pre-orders are not an indication that a game will be successful in the MMO market. Lots of games get massive amounts of pre-orders, but few people who subscribe past the first month. Unlike console games or games without a monthly subscription, MMO business plans commonly depend on having subscription revenue, so pre-orders (while nice) are not guaranteed sales (because the preorderer might bail a month in). Further, if a lot of pre-order people bail, you wind up having to do server consolidation, which is both embarrassing to the company and disruptive to gameplay.

    1. Re:Preorders not an indication of MMO success by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Age of Conan had more pre-orders (I think it was about 600,000, and they wound up selling close to a million), and it was a spectacular flop. They are barely managing on to hold to their existing base of approximately 100,000-150,000 remaining players a year later.

      Warhammer Online had about the same number of pre-orders, sold close to 750,000 units, and they have about the same current number of users as Age of Conan.

    2. Re:Preorders not an indication of MMO success by Xest · · Score: 1

      The game has been out in the Asian market quite a while already where it really has been a big success so far. The pre-order numbers are just for the Western market, so that's actually a really high pre-order figure compared to even past MMOs that have had high pre-orders but then still failed.

      I think it's that- the extraordinarily high pre-order, coupled with the fact it's already a success in Asia that has people wondering if maybe this time we really are seeing the arrival of the next big MMO.

  16. Bad conclusion by chrisG23 · · Score: 1

    "The decision makes Aion, which recently announced over 400,000 western pre-orders, a real contender in the western MMO market."

    I think having over 400,000 pre-orders in the western market makes it a contender, not the decision to remove their DRM. But hey, I don't assume the general population has the same slashdot groupthink mentality that I may have.

    1. Re:Bad conclusion by Tridus · · Score: 1

      No, that number is lower then both AoC and Warhammer by a good deal. You call either of those a "contender" these days?

      The number of people still playing in six months is the only indicator of success for a MMO. The number of people who pre-order is a function of hype generation and has nothing to do with the long term success of the game.

      --
      -- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
  17. GameGuard thinks battery backups are for cheaters by zorg50 · · Score: 2, Informative

    GameGuard disabled my computer's USB connection to my UPS (battery backup). I'll at least consider trying Aion, now that they've dumped that piece of shit.

  18. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  19. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 3, Informative

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  20. Misleading by mmmmbeer · · Score: 1

    From the Aion home page: "We will however continue to pursue ways to effectively utilize GameGuard within Aion in the future." Sounds like the removal if GameGuard is temporary, and you should expect it to return at some point in an update.

  21. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  22. They dropped a feature to meet the launch date. by genner · · Score: 1

    If this is anything like World of Warhammer they'll never get around to adding it back in.
    We can only hope.

  23. better example by aepervius · · Score: 1

    Securom and processexplorer. There is a legitimate reason to have process explorer running (it is like taskmanager but far better, allow you to see the process structure for example). Securom refuse to run with processexplorer, and the only "solution" is to close it. Additionally some DRM refuse to run if tehre is a DVD simulator.

    --
    C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
    http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
    visit randi.org
  24. Easy to get around by RobXiii · · Score: 1

    The funniest part was that you could get around it by downloading a 14k sized file. I had to do this to play during Beta, VERY glad they listened and removed it!!

  25. What about beta testers? by antdude · · Score: 1

    Can we safely remove GameGuard now or do we need to wait for something? Also, will the final game will have trial? I haven't had time to try the game out due to my busy life. :(

    --
    Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
  26. This is Korea after all by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    In Korea this is perfectly acceptible. Their idea of "security" online is that the site or app needs a special Windows application installed to provide that security. This has caused a culture where just clicking on "accept" whenever an ActiveX control wants to install itself. No wonder they are the number one nation when it comes to botnet participants.

    As an example: Here is the main web page of one of the larger banks in Korea: http://www.kdb.co.kr/

    Please do try to even see their front page without installing that ActiveX control.

  27. gameguard circumvention is easy by blueworm · · Score: 2, Informative

    As Auxis alluded to below, you can simply write a hack to tell the game that gameguard is running when it's not. These hacks are readily available for Lineage II (and I suspect almost every other game popular enough to warrant them), so all gameguard does is treat the gamer like a criminal while doing little to actually prevent unauthorized use.