Free to download? - Page 4

Xyntech · 2011-12-23, 09:59 PM

Originally Posted by Rumblepit

anybody on these forums play any f2p games ever?????????????
warrock , combat arms, cross fire,counter strike,apb????

the reason i ask, is that all these f2p fps games are ran by hackers. you can only play when the hackers allow it. they run these games,not the admin... what makes you think they are gonna let the almighty admins of soe run ps2????????????????

Nice AAA titles you mention there

How about TF2? It's about the only high production value FPS I can think of that's gone completely F2P (free to play, free to download, no verification needed). There were hackers in it before it went F2P and there are hackers afterwards, but it hasn't really gotten any worse. No more hackers than any other popular FPS out there.

Hacking happens the most in poorly made games with easily exploited code. High end titles that have a proactive development team and well written code to start out with have much fewer problems with hacking.

Look at PS1. Forget the free play reserve shit, there were hackers/exploiters/cheaters the entire time. It didn't matter that the game was pay to play, because a lot of the cheaters kept it subtle enough to avoid getting caught. The problem was Planetsides buggy code. A lot of shooters never would have had the potential for half the problems in PS1.

Hacking and cheating is a real concern and being F2P certainly makes it that much more important, but real prevention has to come from the coding side. Banning players has always been a band aid solution to help cover the gaps, but it is only the last line of defense.

Coreldan · 2011-12-24, 03:33 AM

I've played APB some combined 1100 hours by now and still playing and enjoying it. The amount of cheaters has always been much lower than the district chat would make you think. Most hackusations are baseless. Yes, there are cheaters, always has been, but currently the situation isn't all that bad. I also only play in organized clan teams, so a single cheater can't do all that much. Overall speaking the fact that you were guessing a cheater-legit player ratio to be 60-40 or something like that in your original post shows how you are clearly one of those who hackusate anyone who kicks your ass

According to half of APB community, my clan is a "known hacker clan", yet the few last big banwaves have caught just about every cheater at least once by now. Now the problem is that the cheaters can come back right away, but the point was that out of over 100 members on Patriot-server in APB, we've had 3 members banned and the rest of us are still sporting our mains and unbanned. And I can guarantee you every single of those remaining members have been accused of cheating too

TLDR form: the paranoia for cheating is much worse in APB than cheating itself.

As for TF2, in this context you can pretty much compare it cos it has to do with cheaters, but don't try to put it as if TF2 was true F2P game, it started off as pay2play. That said, like every other game with community run servers, the server admins can do so much to keep the game cheaterfree. That is not a similar case in PS2 when the servers are run by SoE, thus all enforcement needs to come from them and that costs money and staff.

And, once again you really can't compare any game that isn't a shooter in terms of f2p and cheating. While DCUO probably has cheats as shown earlier, it is nothing like being able to aimbot and wallhack in a shooter.

As for PS2 future. Do note that these "shitty hackfest F2P games" of for example Gamersfirst has kept the company afloat for well over 10 years now. Warrock still has a solid playerbase up to this day, no matter how crap or cheating infested the game is

Especially with the whole industry going towards F2P, there are no other games you can resort to in the future, when they are all equally f2p and infested by cheaters, "yay!"

Crator · 2011-12-24, 08:50 AM

Good comments Coreldan. I think the OP was referring to the Reservers free-to-play program that PS1 had for a while. The kinds of hacks that were being used were making the game unplayable. Especially the speed-floating hacks. One person could use this hack and fly around in the air/move around on the ground at super fast speeds. Also in combo with wall hacks one person using them could disrupt an entire continent. It was truly game breaking. Hence the reason SOE had to stop allowing F2P in PS1.

ThGlump · 2011-12-24, 09:06 AM

Now if there will be any bug (there will be no program is without bugs) that would allow such a exploit, it could take few weeks or month(s) to fix it. So without any consequences in f2p ps2 will be unplayable for that time.

Rumblepit · 2011-12-24, 10:03 AM

the f2p model is a money maker..... its been proven time and time again. but at what cost?
hackusations will fly and the community will crumble, and the admins will be hated. this happens in every f2p game. i was a leader of the thk clan in warrock, we were the top UO clan in that game, not a day went by we were not called hackers. i know all about hackusations.i have been banned from the warrock forums more then any 2 people combined, because i would refer to the admins as lazy, worthless, asshats. they would add more content, new events, but never did anything about the hackers. because they couldnt do anything about it. this is f2p gaming. i see these people as the slumlords of the gaming industry. they dont care about their product, they dont care about their costumers , they only care about making money. this is why f2p will always gets a bad rep.

Crator · 2011-12-24, 10:27 AM

No one has mentioned gold farmers... They are a possibility too sense PS2 will have a resource system, no?

Rumblepit · 2011-12-24, 10:32 AM

Originally Posted by Crator

No one has mentioned gold farmers... They are a possibility too sense PS2 will have a resource system, no?

gold farmers= power levelers ,and many keyloggers for a f2p planetside2.

accounts will be stolen ,scammed, and sold.

why pay for something in the item shop when you can buy a lvl 40 account for 50 bucks that has access to all the items in game

Coreldan · 2011-12-24, 12:41 PM

Gold farmers are a minor annoyance compared to cheaters.

Sure, they are nasty and all that, but cheaters can actually ruin the gaming experience itself.

fuzzehthehydra · 2011-12-24, 01:22 PM

Wow, way to derail a genuine question into a doomsday thread guys

.

Regardless, the fact is that the game will- whether you like it or not- be F2D/F2P. And you know why? It works, and more than that it has been proven to be one of the most viable business models for gaming since digital distribution. Farmville. Team Fortress 2. Both of the above are success stories, and they are making millions of dollars (the hat economy in TF2 alone is valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars). What kind of sensible company wouldn't try to capitalise on an opportunity like that?

Hackers only ruin a game if both the Devs and the community let them. Anti-cheats, if used efficiently, are brilliant at stopping griefers in their tracks. Sure, they can make a new account if you just ban that individual account. But there's this brilliant thing called an IP-ban, or failing that, a hardware ban. No doubt that won't stop every hacker out there, but deterrence can be a powerful force and a large percentage of cheaters will stop when there are easier targets to pursue.

As for accusations of corruption and cheating? If you're the best in your particular field, such cries of foul play are natural from those too jealous and spiteful to accept that they cannot reach those heights themselves.

Ironically, the one thing that will damage the game more than anything else is a defeatist, negative community, and frankly that's the one thing we are really in danger of possessing.

Nephilimuk · 2011-12-24, 01:31 PM

Wow, way to derail a genuine question into a doomsday thread guys .

Regardless, the fact is that the game will- whether you like it or not- be F2D/F2P. And you know why? It works, and more than that it has been proven to be one of the most viable business models for gaming since digital distribution. Farmville. Team Fortress 2. Both of the above are success stories, and they are making millions of dollars (the hat economy in TF2 alone is valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars). What kind of sensible company wouldn't try to capitalise on an opportunity like that?

Hackers only ruin a game if both the Devs and the community let them. Anti-cheats, if used efficiently, are brilliant at stopping griefers in their tracks. Sure, they can make a new account if you just ban that individual account. But there's this brilliant thing called an IP-ban, or failing that, a hardware ban. No doubt that won't stop every hacker out there, but deterrence can be a powerful force and a large percentage of cheaters will stop when there are easier targets to pursue.

As for accusations of corruption and cheating? If you're the best in your particular field, such cries of foul play are natural from those too jealous and spiteful to accept that they cannot reach those heights themselves.

Ironically, the one thing that will damage the game more than anything else is a defeatist, negative community, and frankly that's the one thing we are really in danger of possessing.

QFT!

Rumblepit · 2011-12-24, 01:54 PM

Originally Posted by fuzzehthehydra

Wow, way to derail a genuine question into a doomsday thread guys

.

Regardless, the fact is that the game will- whether you like it or not- be F2D/F2P. And you know why? It works, and more than that it has been proven to be one of the most viable business models for gaming since digital distribution. Farmville. Team Fortress 2. Both of the above are success stories, and they are making millions of dollars (the hat economy in TF2 alone is valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars). What kind of sensible company wouldn't try to capitalise on an opportunity like that?

Hackers only ruin a game if both the Devs and the community let them. Anti-cheats, if used efficiently, are brilliant at stopping griefers in their tracks. Sure, they can make a new account if you just ban that individual account. But there's this brilliant thing called an IP-ban, or failing that, a hardware ban. No doubt that won't stop every hacker out there, but deterrence can be a powerful force and a large percentage of cheaters will stop when there are easier targets to pursue.

As for accusations of corruption and cheating? If you're the best in your particular field, such cries of foul play are natural from those too jealous and spiteful to accept that they cannot reach those heights themselves.

Ironically, the one thing that will damage the game more than anything else is a defeatist, negative community, and frankly that's the one thing we are really in danger of possessing.

farmville????? rofl ...... i just wont elaborate on this game at all.
team fortress was not f2p when it was released. they went that direction when numbers were low.

as for ip and hardware banns . well a ip ban will keep a hacker out for 5 mins.
hardware bans???? not sure if any hack prevention programs even use this tech. if they did i would no about it, heck we all would .

i gather from your post that you have never played a f2p game.

duomaxwl · 2011-12-24, 02:10 PM

Battlefield 2 used hardware bans based on HDD serial numbers iirc.

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Rumblepit · 2011-12-24, 02:14 PM

Originally Posted by duomaxwl

Battlefield 2 used hardware bans based on HDD serial numbers iirc.

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problem with that is they can be changed aswell.

Hobitt · 2011-12-24, 02:18 PM

Originally Posted by Rumblepit

problem with that is they can be changed aswell.

An avarage cheater wouldn't bother anymore

Coreldan · 2011-12-24, 02:20 PM

Originally Posted by Hobitt

An avarage cheater wouldn't bother anymore

Average cheater won't bother yes, unless the cheat devs actually write up a piece of code that does it for you with just running one executable. Most commercial cheats require monthly subscription and this kinda stuff is quite basic for many of the cheats. Some even go as far to provide another copy/serial for the game if you get detected using their cheats in a pay2play game.

I don't wanna be the negative nancy around here, but playing APB as my main game, I know the risks of going f2p in a game like this. TF2 isnt comparable due to the community run servers (nor is any other game that has community run servers). Global Agenda has managed well with cheaters, but I'm still not sure whether it's good handling from HI-Rez or just so crappy of a game that even cheaters dont really bother.

It is gonna require a crapton of nonstop work from SoE, let's hope they are up to the task. Good thing is they seem to be fully aware of what going f2p in a game like this brings with it, so at least they arnt caught by a surprise. It's just hard work and a lot of resources from here on.