The latest plea for official Proton support started on Reddit, where Scout339v2 shared their screenshot of Rust running “on a server with EAC disabled to show that the game already works perfectly on Linux.” Disabling Easy Anti-Cheat (EAC) is the key factor here, and part of a broader conversation where Facepunch and its Linux/Proton userbase don’t see eye-to-eye.
While it’s true Rust runs on Proton, you can’t join official servers, and most unofficial servers, with EAC disabled. Facepunch considered changing its stance in 2022 when the Steam Deck launched, but didn’t end up introducing official Proton support. COO Alistair McFarlane said at the time that Linux is “safer for cheat developers,” and that trying to support EAC on another platform could reduce the team’s ability to support Windows.
It’s interesting how gamers are supposed to have a problem with people cheating in a video game, but not with their computer being compromised by bad actors.
True and usually hackers find a workaround.
Then I have ‘no plans’ on ever giving them money for their shitty designed game
Oh, this is about that shitty survival game‽ I thought it was talking about the rust language. I was so very confused.
Honestly, that initial confusion probably boosts this topic’s popularity on the fediverse.
Games that have no plans for Linux are not serious about gamers.
If ring-0 access is the only way you can stop cheaters, your game must be poorly programmed.
Nah, cheating is just absurdly hard to stop. Even ring 0 anti cheat doesn’t stop it entirely. At some point, I feel like the answer is similar to piracy, in that you must accept that there’s going to be some amount of it, and then find a way to mitigate the damage. Because there are solutions to both of them that both go too far.
You can use analytics to detect cheating effectively. Companies don’t do this because it hurts their bottom line (stopping cheaters). Companies pay lip service to cheating and play stupid games of cat and mouse.
Cheaters should not be banned, they should be forced to play against other cheaters. If you are so inhuman that you are the living embodiment of “got gud” then you get to play with cheaters.
Everyone is happy except for the cheaters and that one got gud guy. Waiting for the first brave company to implement this.
You could argue this would hurt competitive gameplay but it is obvious it is already hurt and the other answers (giving complete control of your OS) are a non-starter for me.
I think the way that CS does it is really the best one. Prevent the simple cheats, record games and let people handle the edge cases based on reports and suspicious activity.
While I agree that this is usually enough, you end up with the issue that with volume the process becomes bogged down to the point of inefficiency. The best bet is to implement this system with a much more robust server side cheat detection, and ideally not send occult information or recieve bad information from the clients to minimize the damage that can be done with a cheat.
I didn’t know CS did this, but yeah, at a high level, that’s how I’d address it, too. It’s probably not a solution that scales super well due to the manual review required, and I know that game has a reputation of people still being annoyed by cheaters, but it might be the best we can do without being very invasive, like the ring 0 stuff.
they do also have an AI system now called VACNet which doesn’t ban players but can prioritise which cases to review first, and can match suspected players against each other instead of the general pool via a system called trust factor
Curiously, we had a better system and it was taken away for profit.
Community servers.
Where usually there was at least a mod or admin available who was able to get rid of the cheater in minutes.
Now we report and have to wait until some arbitrary ban wave and hope they hit them.Doesn’t Counter-Strike still have this? It serves a different use case than a proper ranked mode, usually, though I’ll admit I’m long out of the loop on Counter-Strike.
Counter strike does have this, and even has third party matchmaking services that rely on it (FaceIt, ESEA, Renown)
No idea, I don’t and never have played CS.
I know TF2 and L4D still have them, but I meant recent games, it’s rare for a non-indie game to provide the server files to host your own.
Reminds me that DRM used to run Kernel Side until software side drm was the safest/less sketchy option.
This always screams of a person that thinks their views are the default views of reality. Really shows how self centered he is.
Well, I for one am serious about anti-cheat: if the company making the game makes it more important than the game itself, I make game not important for me
I remember previous outbursts from facepunch. This has nothing to do with anti-cheat, they have been staunchly anti linux for some time now. They have floated the idea of removing linux support for garrys mod for years.
I bet there’s some kind of kickback from Microsoft involved here. Maybe indirectly. Because the only reason I still have a Windows PC (just one left) is to play Fortnite with my kiddo. Every other PC and tablet is running Linux since October.
Rust isn’t serious about anti cheat though…
beat me to it
Actually, games that force kernel level spyware on users to combat cheating when the company literally controls the servers the game runs on and can afford to pay for moderators are not serious about catching cheaters.
Unsurprising, Facepunch were hostile in the past to the idea, temporarily played around with the idea, and always will be ambivalent. Given the direction that Windows is heading, it would be a time to consider cultivating fans on different operating systems. As Microsoft is messing up in a huge way these days.
Let me tell you, the average Rust player doesnt care and Facepunch know it.
Without a doubt, as long as these players get their Rust fix, they couldn’t care less about Linux or the state of Windows.
The irony of it all is the best cheats of which I won’t discuss bypass all anticheat including theirs. Their concern is only for the low hanging fruit for appearance only.
Oh no, where will I go now to have 12 year olds tell me to kill myself while shouting racial slurs at my base.
What a stupid excuse. It is possible to detect cheaters without even touching memory or cpu. You could do the magic on the servers, if you are really serious about anti-cheat.
And I actually liked facepunch, especially what Garry was doing.
Edit: Checked who Alistair McFarlane is. Just a producer. Has no idea about technical stuff. So why the fuck do they let them speak about technical topics if he clearly has no clue about them?!
Seems I correctly assessed that game as sketchy bullshit
It’s been a cash-in on DayZ for what, 13 years now?
Those who don’t support them are not serious about software quality.
