Guild Wars 2

I would like to share the idea of using a hack/cheating detection service in line with GW2. I, like many people, hate cheaters. They detract from the gaming experience and tend to gain an unfair advantange over honest players who wish to play a game for what it is. May I introduce to you PunkBuster? Due to the fact that I am of no relation to the organization, I will let Even Balance, Inc. explain its product. The following information has been taken directly from http://www.evenbalance.com/index.php?page=info.php, and further information can be found at www.evenbalance.com.

Even Balance, Inc. spearheads the effort to fight cheating in the online multiplayer gaming industry. Our flagship product, PunkBuster™, spawned the Anti-Cheat movement in online gaming several years ago and was the first system proven effective against cheating in online games.

Our PunkBuster™ Anti-Cheat software technology and services combat online cheating in some of the most popular games being played over the Internet today. We also serve the online gaming communities that surround the games we support by keeping in direct contact with players, server administrators and league officials always watching for new developments in the “online game cheating world”. We understand and appreciate the tremendous number of resources that game developers allocate toward game balance during game design and implementation. We take on the often burdensome task of protecting that balance out in the real online world where dishonest players (we call them punks) hack and wrongfully exploit the published game for their own benefit at the expense of the honest player who expects and deserves fun, fair competition. Too many online games and related communities have been destroyed by cheating activity over the past few years. Now, honest players have someone on their side … PunkBuster™!

Major Features in PunkBuster™
(some editions of PunkBuster™ do not have all of these features)

- Real-time scanning of memory by PB Client on players’ computers searching for known hacks/cheats
-Throttled two-tiered background auto-update system using multiple Internet Master Servers to provide end-user security ensuring that no false or corrupted updates can be installed on players’ computers
- Frequent status reports (highly encrypted) are sent to the PB Server by all players and the PB Server raises a violation when necessary which causes the offending player to be removed from the game and all other players are informed of the violation
- PB Admins can also manually remove players from the game for a specified number of minutes or permanently ban if desired
- PB Servers can optionally be configured to randomly check player settings looking for known exploits of the game engine
- PB Admins can request actual screenshot samples from specific players and/or can configure the PB Server to randomly grab screenshot samples from players during gameplay
- An optional “bad name” facility is provided so that PB Admins can prevent players from using offensive player names containing unwanted profanity or racial slurs
- Search functions are provided for PB Admins who wish to search player’s keybindings and scripts for anything that may be known to exploit the game
- The PunkBuster™ Player Power facility can be configured to allow players to self-administer game servers when the Server Administrator is not present entirely without the need for passwords
- PB Servers have an optional built-in mini http web server interface that allows the game server to be remotely administered via a web browser from anywhere over the Internet

Now back to my thoughts. Mind you, I do not know if the services provided by Even Balance would support GW2. Nevertheless, I think it would be a good idea for ArenaNet to look into the possibility of using a service such as PunkBuster.