11 ms·

Good, the sooner devs realize they need to do server side properly, the better

forgetfreeman 2y ago
Aaany day now...
teen 2y ago
I think most of these companies do do the server side properly. There are plenty of hacks that just make a client play ungodly well. Like macros, aimbots, cooldown tracking, auto-hex
- plopz 2y ago
  I'm not sure about that first part, some of the biggest games like gtav is an embarrassment in the concept of never trust the client.
  - Matheus28 2y ago
    GTA V is an exception because it's so easy to cheat in. I believe it's peer-to-peer with no verification among peers that what happened should actually have happened. It's basically impossible to secure that.
    - Cthulhu_ 2y ago
      I suppose that was an intentional choice, I can imagine running the amount of worlds that GTA has (iirc you only have up to 32 or so players in a world? Something like that) doesn't scale well cost-wise. IDK if AWS and co were up for the task yet back when. But since you earn in-game currency, not having a central authority check these things is... an interesting choice. I suspect GTA VI may improve on these things and have centralised/dedicated/anti-cheat-guaranteed servers. Then again, it never impacted their profit margins so idk.
arp242 2y ago
It's impossible to prevent cheating from the server-side only. Something like an aimbot can operate purely on information you need to have as a client (to render the other players on the screen), and still be a huge advantage because it can respond faster than any human can.
- baseballdork 2y ago
  Shouldn't that be detectable?
  - heromal 2y ago
    Without kernel level anti cheat you can detect (some) other usermode cheats, but not kernel level cheats. With kernel level anticheat, you can detect the vast majority of other kernel level cheats. Vanguard is effective enough that most successful cheaters are using external devices and DMA to bypass the kernel altogether (or they just use Macs because Apple doesn't allow Vanguard). And despite Riot's insistence to the contrary, they have not "detected" DMA cheats.
    - coretx 2y ago
      Advanced DMA/IOMMU attacks are hard, soft and firmware specific. In order to detect it, you'll have to do a ton of very expensive work all the while you risk destroying the customers soft, firm and hardware. Good luck explaining the judge what you did.
  - Cthulhu_ 2y ago
    It should be - if a server firehose streams all players' network data to an analysis thing, it should be able to detect patterns of impossible accuracy and response time, even though there is some margin for error due to e.g. lag and packet loss (iirc intentional lag / packet loss are some strategies cheaters use to obfuscate things like aimbots, e.g. generating movements that shoot someone in the head but holding them back for a second or so so that in theory a competent player could have done the required motions within a second instead of 1/100th thereof)
  - 2y ago
hypeatei 2y ago
What? The current PC gaming model where things run on a machine controlled by the user is fundamentally against solving the issue of cheats. You can't prevent everything server-side.
- throwaway48476 2y ago
  It's not about prevention, but detection.
  - cobalt 2y ago
    and it is a cat and mouse game between cheat and game devs
  - hypeatei 2y ago
    I'm not sure what point you're trying to make but in this context there is no difference. If you know someone is cheating, you prevent further cheating by banning them. Now I'll ask: how do you detect someone wall hacking automatically? No human review and no false flags. Go!
    - JoshTriplett 2y ago
      > how do you detect someone wall hacking automatically? You don't tell the client the location of anything they can't see.
      - babypuncher 2y ago
        This doesn't work well in real time games. The client needs to know another player is on the other side of that wall so it can * Play sounds from their actions * Actually be able to render them when either player comes around the corner without them obviously materializing out of thin air.
      - daedrdev 2y ago
        Far easier said than done
veunes 2y ago
It could eliminate a lot of these issues theoretically

Aaany day now...

teen 2y ago

I think most of these companies do do the server side properly. There are plenty of hacks that just make a client play ungodly well. Like macros, aimbots, cooldown tracking, auto-hex

plopz 2y ago
I'm not sure about that first part, some of the biggest games like gtav is an embarrassment in the concept of never trust the client.
- Matheus28 2y ago
  GTA V is an exception because it's so easy to cheat in. I believe it's peer-to-peer with no verification among peers that what happened should actually have happened. It's basically impossible to secure that.
  - Cthulhu_ 2y ago
    I suppose that was an intentional choice, I can imagine running the amount of worlds that GTA has (iirc you only have up to 32 or so players in a world? Something like that) doesn't scale well cost-wise. IDK if AWS and co were up for the task yet back when. But since you earn in-game currency, not having a central authority check these things is... an interesting choice. I suspect GTA VI may improve on these things and have centralised/dedicated/anti-cheat-guaranteed servers. Then again, it never impacted their profit margins so idk.

arp242 2y ago

It's impossible to prevent cheating from the server-side only. Something like an aimbot can operate purely on information you need to have as a client (to render the other players on the screen), and still be a huge advantage because it can respond faster than any human can.

baseballdork 2y ago
Shouldn't that be detectable?
- heromal 2y ago
  Without kernel level anti cheat you can detect (some) other usermode cheats, but not kernel level cheats. With kernel level anticheat, you can detect the vast majority of other kernel level cheats. Vanguard is effective enough that most successful cheaters are using external devices and DMA to bypass the kernel altogether (or they just use Macs because Apple doesn't allow Vanguard). And despite Riot's insistence to the contrary, they have not "detected" DMA cheats.
  - coretx 2y ago
    Advanced DMA/IOMMU attacks are hard, soft and firmware specific. In order to detect it, you'll have to do a ton of very expensive work all the while you risk destroying the customers soft, firm and hardware. Good luck explaining the judge what you did.
- Cthulhu_ 2y ago
  It should be - if a server firehose streams all players' network data to an analysis thing, it should be able to detect patterns of impossible accuracy and response time, even though there is some margin for error due to e.g. lag and packet loss (iirc intentional lag / packet loss are some strategies cheaters use to obfuscate things like aimbots, e.g. generating movements that shoot someone in the head but holding them back for a second or so so that in theory a competent player could have done the required motions within a second instead of 1/100th thereof)
- 2y ago

hypeatei 2y ago

What? The current PC gaming model where things run on a machine controlled by the user is fundamentally against solving the issue of cheats. You can't prevent everything server-side.

throwaway48476 2y ago
It's not about prevention, but detection.
- cobalt 2y ago
  and it is a cat and mouse game between cheat and game devs
- hypeatei 2y ago
  I'm not sure what point you're trying to make but in this context there is no difference. If you know someone is cheating, you prevent further cheating by banning them. Now I'll ask: how do you detect someone wall hacking automatically? No human review and no false flags. Go!
  - JoshTriplett 2y ago
    > how do you detect someone wall hacking automatically? You don't tell the client the location of anything they can't see.
    - babypuncher 2y ago
      This doesn't work well in real time games. The client needs to know another player is on the other side of that wall so it can * Play sounds from their actions * Actually be able to render them when either player comes around the corner without them obviously materializing out of thin air.
    - daedrdev 2y ago
      Far easier said than done

veunes 2y ago

It could eliminate a lot of these issues theoretically