Its easy to point the finger at Battlefield 3′s anti cheat software Punkbuster. But in the scheme of things is it really their fault that cheats and hacks have taken over Battlefield 3? Now before you skip the rest of this article to hate on my initial statement lets reflect on DICE’s past decisions and try and put our selves in Punkbuster’s staffs shoes. First off it seems as though DICE didn’t plan well for the obvious problem Battlefield 3 is having with cheaters. If memory servers Battlefield 2 was full of cheats. If memory still serves Punkbuster failed them then as well. Well instead of flaming on Punkbuster who obviously cant keep up with the coding to protect the game that they are contracted to, they should already been fired. If they are under contract then DICE should have taken the loss and breached contract. Any company who cares about their loyal fans would have done such a thing. See, I like to picture Punkbuster as a small child without arms or legs asked to run a marathon. It just seems cruel and pointless. Or maybe look at it like this. Setting: Courtroom, DICE is called to the stand. DICE sits down in front of its piers and begins to be questioned by the lawer representing Battlefield fans. BF3 Lawer: DICE, you do go by DICE correct? DICE: Yes BF3 Lawer: DICE do you know why you are here? DICE: Because the BF3 fans are angry about hackers in their game? BF3 Lawer: Correct. Are you responsible for the hacking and cheating in BF3? DICE: Of course not, thats why we hired Punkbuster. BF3 Lawer: Ah! But haven’t they failed you in the past? DICE: Yes but… BF3 Lawer: See DICE you knew you weren’t able to code the game well enough to stop the cheating in the time you allotted yourself. You thought that if you waited any longer to release BF3, your fans would move on to other modern warefare games. So what did you do? You said, “no worries, if people figure out a way to cheat we will just lay the blame on Punkbuster”. Didn’t you? DICE: …. BF3 Lawer: DIDNT YOU! DICE: YES!!! The above is obviously an extreme exaggeration . But you can understand where I am coming from. I believe DICE knew Punkbuster wasn’t capable of stopping the cheaters, they just didn’t care. Recently an article was posted about how DICE was reported to have said that they would deal with the cheaters of BF3. In the article DICE is claimed to have struck several hundred cheaters along all platforms with the ban hammer. It was also stated that DICE would only step up their efforts as time goes on. And so it goes. Instead of being proactive DICE has decided to be reactive. As of now NNG is a strong supporter of Battlefield 3. Yet we cannot emphasis enough that we are not a BF3 platoon. We are a gamming community! So long after Bf3 is dead and gone, we will have moved onto bigger and better games. Don’t give up on Bf3 though. There is still hope! NNG’s servers are not going anywhere. Having two conquest servers and one dedicated rush server. There will always be at least one place to play BF3. In the end it will be your decision on whether you want to deal with cheats or play in a sever that doesn’t put up with nonsense. Continue reading...
