Sticking to the rules and playing fair has always been seen as the utopia of gaming: a level playing field so that everyone can partake in a game and have fun. Unfortunately the human genetic code is flawed in some aspects because we’ve never been able to achieve that and there’s a simple reason for that.
Cheating has never not been frowned upon, from the times of the Ancient Greeks throwing loaded dice to decide who goes home rich to the modern era where a few lines of code augment your character ensuring you never lose in a game. Not only has the method of cheating a game evolved through the centuries but so has the title for the person who employs such methods. What once was called a “slippery fingered eel” has now morphed into something far more sinister sounding: “hacker”.
These modern thieves patrol the internet’s highways, indulging in wickedness and preying off the hard work of other players. And since all this is happening in a world of ones and zeroes it’s not easy to track every single hacker and ensure they face justice. The justice they deserve is also something of a conundrum, while physically beating a person to within an inch of death may have seemed adequate punishment for cheating, such a method is now frowned upon and deemer politically incorrect (a notion many victims of hacking say is criminal in itself). So what happens when you catch a modern internet gamer hacking? Does he merely get a few black points, a warning and the promise that he’s no longer on Santa’s list of good people?
When the Head of Security at Arenanet Chris Clearly was sent multiple videos of a player called DarkSide hacking in Guild Wars 2, the MMORPG the company created, he decided to make an example of it. The multiple videos showed DarkSide being able to teleport, deal massive amounts of damage and survive coordinated attacks from fellow players who tried to bring his tyranny to a stop. In the face of such overwhelming evidence, Arenanet, through Chris Clearly, acted.
The first thing Clearly did was take control of the player’s entire account, which included the character DarkSide amongst other characters. From this point on The Head of Security started recording his actions, he then proceeded to strip the character of all armour and clothes (in game) and subsequently made the character jump off a bridge in Divinity’s Reach, one of the game’s cities. The character was then subsequently deleted, along with the account and the player was ultimately banned. To further commemorate the moment, many players of the game have suggested Arenanet to create a NPC based on the character with a sign saying “cheater”.
As a player of Guild Wars 2 I’m glad an example has been set but I do wonder if it’s enough to deter hackers from exploiting the game. Suffice to say, other undetected hackers of the game are probably sweating and trying to come clean.
