[dleslie]

The snags arise when playing games that use specific anti-cheat measures. Which is particularly annoying these days because developers are forcing them to be active when you're playing single player.

https://areweanticheatyet.com/

[sph]

Yes, but it's the usual suspects. If you literally do not play those, admittedly very popular 5 or 6 games, it's a smooth sailing.

There's an entire world outside of AAA FPS games-as-a-service that require kernel-level anticheat.

[SV_BubbleTime]

The shortsightedness of this comment makes me think that there are hundreds of comments, exactly like yours that talked about dedicated GPU’s or direct X or any other technology that was dismissed as Dan don’t worry it’s only the big guys using it.

Do you know how valve used to make games and now it makes money? What happens when EA comes up with an amazing amazingly effective and cheap anti-cheat solution? And they offer it effectively for free to all indie developers, and it just works?

I don’t care, because I switched over to console for effectively this and other reasons. But Colonel level anti-sheet absolutely must be rejected.

[bigstrat2003]

What exactly do you want people to do? I already don't buy the games that require kernel anti-cheat, which is the only power I have over the situation. I don't like that it exists either, but the reality is that unless someone reading here is a bigwig at a game publisher (unlikely), they can't reject these methods any more than they already are.

[sph]

I'm not sure what you're saying here, and why you're criticising my comment as short-sighted. The hegemony of Valve isn't eternal? What's that got to do with gaming on Linux today?

[bitwize]

Microsoft will eventually be able to build attestation services into the kernel that will allow third-party software assurance that no unauthorized software is also running on the same machine, obviating the need for third-party kernel-level anticheat. For security, of course.

[tombert]

I love when companies institute a policy that is super beneficial to them for a dozen reasons and is plainly anticompetitive and claim it’s “for security”.

Why stop there then? I could pound a nail through my SSD and now it’s even more secure…it won’t even have the opportunity to write compromising data!

For that matter, instead of wasting all this money on transistors and metal and whatnot, why not just have a piece of paper that has the word “computer” written on it? Don’t get much more secure than something that doesn’t even execute code.

[bitwize]

But those solutions don't allow Microsoft to take your computing capabilities away and then sell them back to you piecemeal.

[Eggpants]

The whole windows game mod scene shows just how much of a toy operating system windows is. Game mods are changing memory values on the fly on running programs and the OS allows it. These mods can just as easily read/modify Excel spreadsheets to get business health data. This is why corporate windows machines lock everything down. Crazy.

Originally anti-cheat was to detect the running of the mods but of course now are phoning home every thing you are doing on your computer.

When the next window image manager claims windows is secure ask them to turn off the virus scanner. They will look at you like your nuts.

[wing-_-nuts]

And mods. Yes there are work arounds to get various mod managers working on linux, but they're honestly jank. Also any mods that are windows executables (version downgraders, engine optimizers, etc) don't work, even trying to run them through wine / proton.

So now my annoyance at windows does battle with my love of mods. I know the nexus folks are working on a new cross platform mod manager, but they have yet to support bethesda games (I suspect for some of the same reasons I had issues).

[tombert]

The only games I have modded significantly are Minecraft and Lethal Company, neither of which gave me much issue on Linux. Haven’t tried modding any Bethesda games though.

[shantara]

I usually deal with the mods and fan patches by using Protontricks, which allows running executables within a game’s existing Proton prefix.

[wing-_-nuts]

I'm gonna have to look into this for sure.

[tombert]

Yeah, I don’t really play any multiplayer games outside of Minecraft and OG Doom on my own server, so it’s never been an issue for me but I realize I am a weird case.

Always-online single-player is supremely bullshit though.

[hyghjiyhu]

> are we anti cheat yet

While anti cheats have obvious benefits and are a dealbreaker for some, be careful what you wish for. It's a slippery slope. One chess streamer famously had to set up multiple cameras pointing at him from different angles to combat cheating accusations.