PunkBuster
PunkBuster wurde eine Zeitlang für UO in Betracht gezogen. Es ist (war) ein Programm, welches Unregelmässigkeiten beim Spielen hätte überprüfen sollen, und als eine Art "Cheat-Verhinderer" fungieren sollen. Nach langem Überlegen kam die Software dann doch nicht zum Zug was für viele Spieler eine grosse Erleichterung darstellte.
Developer Kommentare
Busting inaccuracies and myths about PunkBuster
Jun 21 2006 1:02PM
Another day, another round of questions and concerns about the new hot topic in Britannia. Here are some facts that I hope alleviate more of your concerns and answer more of your questions...
PunkBuster can’t read English, decipher a tax return, or tell a financial document from a picture of your dog. It looks at blocks of data and compares them to blocks of data known to be in cheat programs. That’s it.
It doesn’t transmit any user data to any server. It merely sends a message that says: "This person has something we suspect to be a cheat program running. This is what program we think it is." When this happens in UO, in most cases it will keep you from playing until you turn the cheat program off. In some cases, it could flag a GM and a GM will investigate what’s going on with the player.
If you are concerned about the language in the PunkBuster license, you should read over the terms of service and licenses for any other MMORPG you play, as many of them have extremely similar language. You should also review what virus protection and spyware prevention programs do. Both of those work a lot like PunkBuster.
As I’ve said... We will be entering public beta in mid-July and will test for a month or more. If performance issues arise, we will either solve them or not use PunkBuster. I do know that ICQ, voice chat programs, UOAssist, UO AutoMap, internet browsers and various other programs UO players use while playing take up far more CPU cycles and bandwidth than Punk Buster.
UO Assist and UO AutoMap will not be flagged as cheat programs, nor will any program on the approved-for-use list. In fact, many programs that are basically harmless won’t be flagged. We are looking for programs that automate processes that shouldn’t be automated and programs that make your character faster, stronger or better than anyone else’s.
We do definitely need to improve UO’s macro system to take some of the unneeded drudgery and repetition out of certain tasks. That is something we are planning for a future update.
And yes, PunkBuster has been on my personal home PC for years. I’ve played 90 percent of the games PunkBuster supports and not once has PunkBuster gotten in my way. In fact, I simply won’t play on an open server. It’s just not fun to lose to cheaters.
As for what shard will be PunkBuster free, here are the options on the drawing board:
- Test Center. (TC would still be occasionally wiped and would still get various rule sets depending on what we are testing.)
- Siege and Mugen, and scripting would still be illegal and enforced by GMs. (Some rule modifications might have to be made to Siege if we did this, like restrict the use of bags of sending.)
- Launch a completely new shard, where scripting would be legal. (This shard would be one you could transfer to for free, but never leave. We have been calling it Devil’s Island.)
The decision depends on how much demand there is for a non-PB server and what player feedback we get.
As an occasional Siege player, I kind of relish being able to hunt scripters for fun, but then again, if a large amount of non-PB players want to play with the regular rule-set, a new shard would make the most sense. I want to see what the beta test reveals before making that decision.
See you Sosaria,
Darkscribe
Concerning the concerns about Punkbuster
Jun 20 2006 12:23PM
We thought this announcement would incite quite a discussion, and yes, indeed, it did. There are some misconceptions I want to clear up and some key questions I want to make sure are answered. As you think about this change, please keep these items in mind (and I’m going to re-state some things I’ve already stated elsewhere)...
I completely understand concerns about computer security and privacy. I wouldn’t put PunkBuster on my own machine at home (yes, the one with all my financial and personal records) if I didn’t feel safe about it. PunkBuster has been around for 10 years and almost single-handedly saved the multiplayer shooter genre from being torn apart by hackers and cheaters. In that time, we can’t find one instance of someone’s privacy being violated. EA has sold millions of copies of the Battlefield franchise all over the world, and 90% of BF players play on PB protected servers. In all that time, not one person has submitted a valid customer service complaint about a privacy or security violation.
Everyone concerned about privacy should read PunkBuster’s privacy policy at...http://www.evenbalance.com/index.php?page=privacy.php. Keep in mind that if PunkBuster betrayed even one gamer’s trust, people would stop using it, game makers would stop supporting it, and it would be the end of that business. It is in PunkBuster’s best interest to protect the privacy of its players. They have been doing that for 10 years now with millions of satisfied customers.
- UO’s subscription fees will not be going up.
We haven’t decided what shard or shards will be non-PunkBuster yet. We want to see the results from the beta test first, as well as collect feedback.
As for performance, let me re-state... If beta testing proves that PunkBuster has performance issues for a large number of players, we will consider another anti-cheat solution. Beta testing should start in mid-July.
As for the screenshots, it will only take shots of the actual game screen window, not anything else on your desktop. And, it does that only rarely. This feature of PunkBuster is mostly used to verify cheats that turn walls invisible or somehow alter the battleground to the cheater's advantage.
I hope that alleviates some of your concerns. I’m sure discussions and debate will continue, and we will continue to answer questions about this as often as we can.
Meanwhile, as for that other announcement, the in-game story cycle is getting very close to the moment of revelation. The last few steps will be challenging, but I’m betting players see the future before the end of June.
See you in Sosaria,
Darkscribe