Cheating David Hinton ITCS-4230

Overview When does it matters? Types of cheating Solutions to cheating

When does it matter? Single player –Choose to cheat or not –Doesn’t effect others playing the game Multiplayer –Effect other players –Success of the game depends on it

Types of Cheating Control Augmentation –Proxy server –Automated playing / assistants Authoritative Clients –Whatever the client says is true –Single-player based games Information Exposure –Passive –RTS

Types of Cheating Compromised Server –Modified game servers –Not always cheating Bugs and Design Loopholes –If it is there they will use it –Age of Empires farms –MMOs Environmental Weakness –Operation condition

Solutions to cheating Control Augmentation –Encryption Authoritative Clients –Command request instead of issued –Synchronization Information Exposure –Encryption significant values –Never access significant values from outside the class

Solutions to cheating Compromised Server –Give warnings Bugs and Design Loopholes –Fix them with patches Environmental Weakness –Extra validation

Summary Why it is important for multiplayer games Different ways players cheat Ways to combat the cheaters Questions or comments?

Sources / /pritchard_pfv.htm php um/