It was annoying after buying Rust to learn that you can't play on official servers on Linux. The game runs fine on Linux, the devs just don't allow it.
https://www.pcgamer.com/games/survival-crafting/rust-develop...
Apex Legends went through the same issue when they enabled Linux support, cheaters swarmed to Linux en-masse because it was so trivial to evade detection even with free/public cheats, and after a year or so the devs threw in the towel and blocked Linux again.
They're not doing this out of spite, they'd be happy to take your money if there were no downside, but unfortunately it is a trade-off for games which are sensitive to being ruined by cheaters. At least for now.
I don't think cheaters are swarming to Linux, but part of the issue with Apex Legends is that Linux support is done through Proton, through the Windows version of the game, because there no Linux version of Apex Legends. So now you've got a backdoor for everyone on Windows to run the less secure anticheat.
Solvable maybe by having a separate Linux version of the game, but that's also more supported needed.
As someone who would play on Linux then, it doesn't sound like a solution at all. The separate version would just be filled with cheaters then, would almost be like an punishment for Linux users.
That way you don't need a backdoor in the Windows version of the game for the weaker Linux anticheat that runs through Proton. You would just have a native Linux version of the game with native anticheat.
But EAC has a kernel driver and there's no real native way of doing that on Linux that's stable as Linux has no stable kernel API, and measured boot isn't widely adopted so a custom kernel can just lie to the anti-cheat module.
I really hope Valve work on this, whilst it would mean perhaps online play only run on SteamOS in an optional locked down mode, it's better than the status quo.
This is exactly the problem. Users connecting via Linux are more likely to be cheaters, since the anti-cheat is weaker on Linux, so in order to protect the user-base at large (Windows users), they don't allow Linux clients at all. Allow the less protected Linux clients to connect goes against the very change they did.
It was bad enough that we had to put up with nvidia's proprietary nonsense if we wanted hardware acceleration. Things have finally started to improve. They have finally started open sourcing things. Now that things are finally getting better this anticheat nonsense shows up. You gotta be kidding me.
Nobody needs a bunch of game companies feeling entitled to full access to our computers. You'd have to be nuts to let game companies run ring zero code on your system. You want their nonsense absolutely contained and isolated, not deep in your kernel.
Here's a thought: they don't own our computers, we do. We own the CPU. We own the RAM. We own the motherboard. If we want to edit their game's memory while its running, it's our god given right as the owners of the machine the game is running on. Any attempt to stop us from doing so is an affront to our freedom. The mere attempt to do so with "anticheating" kernel malware is offensive. The audacity.
Cheating at video games is an exercise in computer freedom. I realize I'm defending scoundrels here and it doesn't matter in the slightest. Our computing freedom is orders of magnitude more important than video games. I want them to suck it up and accept it. That is the price of freedom. If they want to be on Linux, it should be on our terms.
Don't care about this ideological stuff? Here's the sort of risk you're accepting when you opt into this bullshit:
https://www.vice.com/en/article/fs-labs-flight-simulator-pas...
Corporation thinks its the FBI and starts shipping a browser stealer to users to "catch pirates". Bonus points for exfiltrating the data on an unencrypted channel!
https://old.reddit.com/r/Asmongold/comments/1cibw9r/valorant...
https://www.unknowncheats.me/forum/anti-cheat-bypass/634974-...
Screenshots your screen and exfiltrates it to their servers.
https://www.theregister.com/2016/09/23/capcom_street_fighter...
https://twitter.com/TheWack0lian/status/779397840762245124
https://fuzzysecurity.com/tutorials/28.html
https://github.com/FuzzySecurity/Capcom-Rootkit
A literal privilege escalation as a service "anticheat" driver!
Game companies give negative amounts of shit. If you trust them you're out of your mind.
Sacrificing freedom for security? I don't agree with it but I can at least understand where the impetus comes from. Sacrificing freedom for fun? For video games of all things? That's pretty disgusting and I want people to be better than that.
Accept this, and you also indirectly accept corporations regulating "your" computer's ability to copy, as well as governments regulating "your" computer's ability to encrypt.
> Sacrificing freedom for fun? For video games of all things? That's pretty disgusting and I want people to be better than that.
What is the point of freedom if you have a joyless existence?
> no one is making you install anti-cheat software
You don't see the irony here? You don't see the trillion dollar corporations dangling "joy" in front of us and conditioning access to it on acceptance of their bullshit non-negotiable take it or leave it contracts where "we own your computer now" is a clause?
The powerful choice is to reject the silly binary choice they offer you and take a third option. Refuse their deal and refuse your so called "joyless" existence.
Enjoy your games while also keeping control of your computer. If they try to usurp control of your computer, stop them from doing so. Only malware would try that, treat them accordingly. If you must associate with cheaters and pirates in order to acquire the necessary technology and know-how, then so be it.
It's the same thing with DRM, it's the same thing with ads, it's the same thing with pretty much everything. They give you some bullshit choices, but you can take a third option because you own the machine. That's the power they would take away from you.
But anti-cheat software is not doing this? You are free to do whatever you want on your computer as long as it doesn't interfere with the game process. Most, if not all, anti-cheats will also not do anything when the game isn't open.
Some games (including Rust) give you the choice to play with no anti-cheat, too. You'll only be able to play on servers that allow players to join with no anti-cheat but you are not blocked from the game.
I would be more worried about computing becoming more phone-centric where Apple and Google are in control of what you can and cannot do.
You are not free. "Your" computer is not actually yours. It doesn't do what you want.
> Most, if not all, anti-cheats will also not do anything when the game isn't open.
Stop believing this. For god's sake I just posted an example of a corporation that thought it was perfectly justified in hacking their customers and stealing their browser passwords. There is no line they wouldn't cross.
They could be doing literally anything and you know it. There's no way for you to know unless you reverse engineer the software, and if you try they are only too happy to label you a cheater and permaban your account or whatever it is that they do.
> I would be more worried about computing becoming more phone-centric where Apple and Google are in control of what you can and cannot do.
This is the exact same issue.
Apple, Google, Disney, Netflix, Hollywood, the games industry, the copyright industry, all the governments the world over are all battling for control over our machines.
This anticheating nonsense is just the tutorial boss.
Literally anything you run on your computer (running Windows) can take screenshots of your desktop, pull passwords saved in your browser, etc. without running in kernel mode. Even applications that aren't running as Administrator.
Knowing and accepting these risks is a big reason why we run Linux with free and open source software sourced from trusted software repositories.
We put effort into this because we want to control everything that happens on our machines, so that we are not affected by stupid nonsense like that.
Recall what I said in my original comment:
> You want their nonsense absolutely contained and isolated, not deep in your kernel.
We don't want unknown uncontrollable proprietary idiocy running on our computers, least of all in kernel mode.
Ideally that stuff would not even exist to begin with, but since it does we move on to the next best thing: containing and isolating it to the fullest extent. The ideal setup is a VFIO configuration where the host is a Linux system where we have full control and the virtual machine is fully isolated and controlled.
As such we really don't need idiotic "anticheat" software taking issue with perfectly good technologies like virtual machines and hypervisors. Cheaters are using this stuff? I don't care. Just accept it.
What a strange hill to want to die on.
It doesn't matter what's written in their silly EULAs which nobody reads. I couldn't care less if it ruins the games or costs them billions in profits. You are morally justified in defeating their silly anticheat nonsense in order to enjoy games on your terms without them pwning your computer. You are only morally wrong if you actually cheat.
And it's not at all some "strange hill to die on". This is a fundamental computing freedom issue. It's about who owns the keys to the machine. It's the exact same issue Android users face when they install GrapheneOS only to discover their bank doesn't support it just because it's not owned by Google. In my opinion this should be literally illegal.
More on topic, I agree that you should be allowed to do with your computer what you want. That includes defeating their anti-cheat measures. Your computer, your rules. In return, they can refuse to support you or ban them from their servers. Their stuff, their rules.
But this idea that you are entitled to tell them they have to provide you with a version that does not have their anti-cheat measures, that is pretty far out there. That is where most people will stop following your reasoning.
YMMV.
If I come off as aggressive, it's only because of my exasperation due to people sacrificing freedom for video games of all things. Online games that will be dead after a couple years. What a colossal waste.
Anyway, I'm no politician. I'm actually very close to giving up on these so called "causes", precisely because people refuse to listen. There's no point. Being polite doesn't make them listen. Nobody listened to Stallman. Threaten their convenience, their fun and games, and they're gone.
If they won't listen, then they deserve the consequences. One day all the corporations and authorities will start turning the screws on them. Only then will they start caring about this stuff. Nobody will listen to them either.
> But this idea that you are entitled to tell them they have to provide you with a version that does not have their anti-cheat measures, that is pretty far out there.
No.
https://www.bitsaboutmoney.com/archive/optimal-amount-of-fra...
The optimal amount of fraud is non-zero. You could have zero fraud by ramping up the requirements before you trust someone enough to transact with them. That will result in very few purchases though. Decreases profits. So what they do is they let it happen and eat the costs. Fraud isn't a crime, it's an expense. Accounted for.
The optimal amount of crime is non-zero. You could virtually eliminate crime by implementing an orwellian dystopia where everybody is surveilled at all times. Nobody actually wants to endure such a subhuman existence though, so we're forced to accept the risk of crime. Tolerating some amount of crime is the price of our basic human dignity.
Same logic generalizes to online games. The optimal amount of cheating is non-zero. They could eliminate it by taking the computer away from us. That's an affront to our dignity as the owners of the machines. So we have to tolerate some cheating in order to keep our dignity.
These considerations are accounted for in society as a whole. It's no different here.
Something has to change to move away from these rootkit antivirus like apps looking for exploits.
This has been the winning move for about a decade now.
That is the main problem here. If you only give players the data they can see (zero trust) - then they will walk around a corner and just see a black screen, because the information is not there yet (server needs to calculate and send back info in time).
My approach would be rather better moderation tools.
Meaning .. community run servers, who will just kick and ban cheaters in time.
One can see that clearly in battlefield for example which has (sort of) both.
The public servers are often not enjoyable, if one does not like headshots across the map. The community run are clean.
The native Linux build never worked that well. Something was always broken because Unity's Linux support is/was spotty. Upgrading Unity versions would break random things.
Anticheat is the issue holding back Proton support, though.