Hey guys,
While checking Craban's twitter (Cipsoft product manager) I've seen his latest tweet..
"Now getting ready for another conference call with that possible partner for bot detection, still all in evaluation stages though."
https://twitter.com/Crabans_Beak/sta...08555102830592
What do you guys think about it? What "options" have they got?
Let's discuss
Last edited by szulak; 09-12-2013 at 08:37 AM. Reason: typos
Their options are primarily to farm data (which they admitted in the latest monthly article that they have been doing for years) or to try to detect using hidden information in the transfer protocol. Chances of them using hidden information are slim, since someone would have seen and caught on to it. Beyond that there are issues around the legality of acquiring information without the consent or awareness of the end user (potentially massive law suits, these have been brought against most gaming companies and the majority fail, but it all boils down to the size of the company involved. A company such as Blizzard has a large team of lawyers who cover their arses. Tibia just has it's 40 employees (just a guess, not a clue in reality, haven't checked in so long) and probably a contracted solicitor who drew up the current terms and privacy policy for them.
Data farming is the most likely method. That doesn't mean to say that performing any action a large number of times is the cause, but what it means is that performing X, Y, and Z actions a ridiculous number of times in an identical fashion will most certainly raise the alarm. Beyond that it's down to what the actions in question are, how they are determined to have been so fast or repetitive, and if they could be proven to be incorrect by a feasibility study (the one part where data mining falls apart is when that one solicitor who plays the game gets banned and works to get back at the company).
@XtrmJash
Data farming might be their choice as you said, but why would they contact another companies in this purpose and not implement it on their own?
IMO, they will not implement any client-side detection (bot creators has proven that they are able to reverse the whole Tibia client on small pieces), and could easily bypass such thing. Solutions like GameGuard wouldn't change anything at all, there are already know methods how to bypass such software.
Originally Posted by szulak
That's a very loaded assumption, though. If they are contacting a company, they might be seeking a fresh implementation of bot protection from RE professionals. I can promise you that, if CipSoft hired someone with my skills level who was serious, they could easily make it very hard to touch the client. CipSoft may not have the skills as their dev team is programmers, but someone who actually focuses on RE based development can definitely make some huge craters.
Looking on the Cipsoft way of 'solving' things they will most likely use something what's checked & proven, like GameGuard (or something). I didn't mean that hiring RE professional wouldn't solve this problem, of course it would. Some time ago Valve was in the same shoes with cheaters - they took their own way and implemented VAC.
imo, there are two main options to cipsoft:
- Cut bots out of the game and try to save the game (using some serious anti-bot professionals / tools and alike)
- Keep Tibia how it's actually (conniving to bots, deleting them slowly) and watch the game die slowly as we are seeing year-by-year.
But honestly, I think that Tibia's decline is not only caused by bots, it's deeper in how it has been designed each update. For example, each update CipSoft turns Tibia's pvp even worse, they don't listen to its users community about their taste at all, etc, etc, etc.
@Blequi
But do really 100% removing bots would make Tibia get more players? I don't think so, with or without bots Tibia is slowly dying, removing them (us) Will just decrase the count of players, i don't think ppl will start playing Tibia becouse bots are gone. People who played the game when it was on it's best in 06'-07' are growing up, and new players are not starting play it cause the standards has changed and now there are games like GTA V, LoL, etc, etc. whitch attracts kids now.
IMO, dropping the count of players by cutting off botters and its community is a short-time impact in their user base (and could be a fatal decision in their business, but any business must make critical decisions... in the current state tibia will definitely die in years, it's a fact), but it's a safe strategy for any long-time game, because in the point of view of a fair player (the main target of any game), why would I (hypothetically a fair player) play a game where everybody needs to cheat in some form (PvP, leveling up, growing in any aspect) to have fun?
if I would part of CipSoft team with full decision power, for sure I have had stick to kill botters definitely, assuming the risk to kill the game.
IMO, it's a poor business strategy to watch your own business die slowly without doing critical changes, masking the bot problem like they are doing: "hey fair players, we are deleting 1k - 4k botters per update, are you all ok?" when it has been shown by years be the worst option because fair players already noticed and know well that Tibia is conniving with bots.
They should firstly check how many percent of players are using bot (IMO it's around 25% of community). Cutting 25% of user base will also cut their income about this amount, and if their finance are able to handle such drop of income, they will make more profit in long way. As far as I can see they are following the easier way (for example creating flash client instead of desktop app on mac, or even using frameworks like Qt to make it cross-platform.
If you think it is only 25% I have some bad news for you..
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