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Cheating in StarCraft II is Serious Business

by VGChartz Staff, posted on 14 September 2010 / 849 Views

Blizzard sure doesn't mess around with cheaters. Not only will they ban you for backstabbing in StarCraft II, but they recently amped up the language for cheating in their recently released title as well.

According to a recent Blizzard press release, these bans could include a total and permanent ban of Battle.net. That means unauthorized modifications to the client could stop you from playing the game entirely.

"Blizzard Entertainment has always taken cheating in any form in Blizzard games very seriously, and that's no different for StarCraft II. If a StarCraft II player is found to be cheating or using hacks or modifications in any form, then as outlined in our end user license agreement, that player can be permanently banned from the game. This means that the player will be permanently unable to log in to Battle.net to play StarCraft II with his or her account."

That is certainly no small matter to contend with. While it is certainly agreeable that cheaters ruin the online environment for people, how do you all feel bans applying to "offline" modes of the game as well?


5 Comments

SONYisBP
SONYisBP (on 06 May 2011)

a good policy. another option would be to put the word CHEATER across any avatar that account has, so when they join a game they have been marked and you know who they are.

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hagelt18
hagelt18 (on 15 September 2010)

If it would be legally possible to have all cheaters assassinated...I'd approve.

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Ail
Ail (on 15 September 2010)

you can play the solo campaign without a battle net connection so no need to get your panties in a knot thinking about a lawsuit....

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Draqonic
Draqonic (on 15 September 2010)

accessing offline mode is still able to occur through guest mode... achievements will not be obtained but the online is removed, so thered be no reason to unlock anything anyway.

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Squeakthedragon
Squeakthedragon (on 15 September 2010)

I hate to say it but unless I am missing something this is indefensible. Hackers and cheaters ruin online games for everyone, and I have no problem banning them from online services if they break the rule. But people should be free to do whatever they want to their own games in their own time - such as offline and single player games. What we're seeing here is a dark side of a service like Battle.net 2.0. Blizzard, with the DRM authentication of the new Battle.net, now has complete control over what you do with your game... including its offline usage. I realize that they're probably trying to scare potential cheaters into not screwing around with this, but it's a bad PR move all the same. Plus it opens the door for further abuse down the line (let's not give Ubisoft any ideas here). It unfortunately highlights how even companies perceived as "the good guys" such as Blizzard have eagerly embraced the age where nobody owns anything but merely licenses it from the publisher... and is at the publisher's mercy when it comes to what they can do with the product they bought and paid for. This is also one of the consequences of LAN play being removed from Starcraft 2 - now multiplayer is entirely locked away behind the wall of the licensor, another element they can bully and leverage the customer with. If Blizzard does begin banning people from Battle.net on the grounds of online multiplayer hacking in a way that precludes them playing the offline and single player, you can bet a lawsuit will follow not soon after - or a number of them.

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