Saturday 10 February 2018

Bad Design: Unenforced Laws

It encourages crime.

[Part of the Design Folder]

Cheaters in games are not a new thing. There are always people looking for ways to go one-up on the rest of the population. While my own description of cheating probably encompasses things others might gloss over, I'm pretty sure we can all agree that having unauthorized, near admin rights for around 3 years is one of those no-no's.

As reported by MassivelyOP, this is the case with Ark. Even though I don't play that game, I can guarantee that I won't even bother trying anything from that developer: Studio Wildcard. Why? Because after finding these cheaters their decision is to simply not do anything to them. No bans, no wipes, no rollbacks.

There is no point in making rules that you don't / won't enforce, regardless if the criminal number is 1 or 100% of your player base. Granting amnesty just shows a lack of spine, and would probably serve only to encourage more cheating. That's not an environment I'd like to experience.

I imagine this will be their stance in all their games henceforth, and even if it isn't "officially" - the fact they've done it once removes -all- doubt in my mind that they will do so again. Good luck Ark, may the best cheater win.

3 comments:

  1. That just boggles the mind.

    I occasionally see cheaters on platforms you never expect, such as Mario Kart 8*, but someone with admin rights having little to nothing done against them? Yeah, that's a majorly screwed up situation. Why on earth anybody would want to play in that little slice of hell, I've no idea.


    *Yeah, when you see 10 bombs dropped in a row just after you start a race, you've found a cheater.

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    1. Some people just like to punish themselves I guess? :P Also, really - people need to cheat in Mario cart? That's sad.

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    2. I thought the same thing. Of all the games, cheating in Mario Kart is kind of ridiculous. On the bright side, however, the cheater didn't win in that race of Mario Kart; I did because I avoided the tons of bombs on the final lap and at least one ricocheted back into the bomber, setting off a chain reaction of several bombs in a row. Still, my wife and I dropped once the race was over because we weren't dealing with that guy's crap.

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