RANDOM VIDEO GAME NEWS

[Keyrock]

In fairness, item duplication infinite money exploits are a staple of the RPG genre.  There are dozens of RPGs that have had such an exploit.

[Orogun01]

In fairness, item duplication infinite money exploits are a staple of the RPG genre.  There are dozens of RPGs that have had such an exploit.

Most of them made by Bethesda.

[Hurlshort]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2014/04/18/the-elder-scrolls-online-hit-with-first-major-bug-the-infinite-dupe/

 

Weird, I've been playing the game like crazy and I haven't heard anything about this.  Although the guild banks have been down a lot over the last week.

[TSBasilisk]

 

In fairness, item duplication infinite money exploits are a staple of the RPG genre.  There are dozens of RPGs that have had such an exploit.

Most of them made by Bethesda.

 

Except, y'know, this game isn't made by Bethesda. It's made by Zenimax Online Studios, which was created by Beth's parent corporation to handle MMOs.

[Volourn]

Same crap different pile.

[BruceVC]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2014/04/18/the-elder-scrolls-online-hit-with-first-major-bug-the-infinite-dupe/

 

 

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2014/04/18/the-elder-scrolls-online-hit-with-first-major-bug-the-infinite-dupe/

I don't know that anybody expected TESO to be bug free and now we have evidence why: Bethesda are hacks.

 

 

This is a very interesting article and has serious future consequences if not addressed

 

I have solution. You wipe every item and all currency from every player, you leave each player with a few basic items and 100 coin. This applies to every player, no exceptions.

 

This may sound draconian as the obvious argument is " why should a player who hasn't exploited the system be punished ". But to be honest you can gain the items again. The reality is I don't know now how they are going to fix this imbalance. Its much harder to address then people may think

 

And if they just leave it  then it will start utterly destroying the game economy as time goes on, so rather do something now that may sounds drastic but will fix the problem

[Bos_hybrid]

Dynasty Warriors 8 coming to PC in May

 

Empires next please.

Edited April 19, 2014 by Bos_hybrid

[marelooke]

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2014/04/18/the-elder-scrolls-online-hit-with-first-major-bug-the-infinite-dupe/

 

 

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2014/04/18/the-elder-scrolls-online-hit-with-first-major-bug-the-infinite-dupe/

I don't know that anybody expected TESO to be bug free and now we have evidence why: Bethesda are hacks.

 

 

This is a very interesting article and has serious future consequences if not addressed

 

I have solution. You wipe every item and all currency from every player, you leave each player with a few basic items and 100 coin. This applies to every player, no exceptions.

 

This may sound draconian as the obvious argument is " why should a player who hasn't exploited the system be punished ". But to be honest you can gain the items again. The reality is I don't know now how they are going to fix this imbalance. Its much harder to address then people may think

 

And if they just leave it  then it will start utterly destroying the game economy as time goes on, so rather do something now that may sounds drastic but will fix the problem

 

And do this every time something like this happens? Because, trust me, this is the first, but it won't be the last time (and no, not because it's Zenimax, but because MMOs are complex software, even EVE has had it's fair share of similar issues and they take their in-game economy *very* seriously).

 

If you can't detect it after it's happened you're stuck with it imho and you need to find a more creative way to deal with it. And Zenimax should probably do some serious auditing as to why such a game-breaking bug that was apparently *known* made it into production. Wouldn't be surprised if heads are gonna roll on this one (whether it's the right heads that will roll is another matter entirely).

 

If they do go ahead and roll back *all* accounts (which I think would be a big mistake) they should at the very least compensate all players with a free extension of their subscription for their (Zenimax') ****up.

[BruceVC]

 

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2014/04/18/the-elder-scrolls-online-hit-with-first-major-bug-the-infinite-dupe/

 

 

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2014/04/18/the-elder-scrolls-online-hit-with-first-major-bug-the-infinite-dupe/

I don't know that anybody expected TESO to be bug free and now we have evidence why: Bethesda are hacks.

 

 

This is a very interesting article and has serious future consequences if not addressed

 

I have solution. You wipe every item and all currency from every player, you leave each player with a few basic items and 100 coin. This applies to every player, no exceptions.

 

This may sound draconian as the obvious argument is " why should a player who hasn't exploited the system be punished ". But to be honest you can gain the items again. The reality is I don't know now how they are going to fix this imbalance. Its much harder to address then people may think

 

And if they just leave it  then it will start utterly destroying the game economy as time goes on, so rather do something now that may sounds drastic but will fix the problem

 

And do this every time something like this happens? Because, trust me, this is the first, but it won't be the last time (and no, not because it's Zenimax, but because MMOs are complex software, even EVE has had it's fair share of similar issues and they take their in-game economy *very* seriously).

 

If you can't detect it after it's happened you're stuck with it imho and you need to find a more creative way to deal with it. And Zenimax should probably do some serious auditing as to why such a game-breaking bug that was apparently *known* made it into production. Wouldn't be surprised if heads are gonna roll on this one (whether it's the right heads that will roll is another matter entirely).

 

If they do go ahead and roll back *all* accounts (which I think would be a big mistake) they should at the very least compensate all players with a free extension of their subscription for their (Zenimax') ****up.

 

 

If they follow my idea they need to fix the issue and then publically apologize to the players for the loss of  items. A month or 2 free subscription may be offered due to the inconvenience. Some players may resign in protest but end of the day the issue would be resolved. I could live with that knowing the economy of the MMO was working properly

[Drowsy Emperor]

 A PR representative at Zenimax told PC Gamer, "Yesterday, we identified an item duping bug in ESO that some players chose to exploit. We acted quickly, and have since fixed the issue. We have a zero tolerance policy when it comes to abusing exploitable bugs, and those who were found doing so will have their game account permanently banned."

 

 

Players are banned because Zenimax can't do its job properly? 

[Malcador]

Usual practice, it's like robbing someone who leaves their door unlocked. Sort of.

[Drowsy Emperor]

You guys have probably seen this but:

 

 

[Orogun01]

This is a very interesting article and has serious future consequences if not addressed

 

I have solution. You wipe every item and all currency from every player, you leave each player with a few basic items and 100 coin. This applies to every player, no exceptions.

 

This may sound draconian as the obvious argument is " why should a player who hasn't exploited the system be punished ". But to be honest you can gain the items again. The reality is I don't know now how they are going to fix this imbalance. Its much harder to address then people may think

 

And if they just leave it  then it will start utterly destroying the game economy as time goes on, so rather do something now that may sounds drastic but will fix the problem

You're eating at a restaurant, the staff gets a few order mixed up making so a few expensive meals go to wrong people and they have begun to eat them. Then they take the food from  away from everyone and start the meals again. 

Bet that will go over well with the customers, the management and their pockets. The players; even those that exploited the bug, might not feel that they are at fault. After all they weren't using a cheat engine, they were exploiting a failure in the product, so the onus lies with the maker.

[marelooke]

 

This is a very interesting article and has serious future consequences if not addressed

 

I have solution. You wipe every item and all currency from every player, you leave each player with a few basic items and 100 coin. This applies to every player, no exceptions.

 

This may sound draconian as the obvious argument is " why should a player who hasn't exploited the system be punished ". But to be honest you can gain the items again. The reality is I don't know now how they are going to fix this imbalance. Its much harder to address then people may think

 

And if they just leave it  then it will start utterly destroying the game economy as time goes on, so rather do something now that may sounds drastic but will fix the problem

You're eating at a restaurant, the staff gets a few order mixed up making so a few expensive meals go to wrong people and they have begun to eat them. Then they take the food from  away from everyone and start the meals again. 

Bet that will go over well with the customers, the management and their pockets. The players; even those that exploited the bug, might not feel that they are at fault. After all they weren't using a cheat engine, they were exploiting a failure in the product, so the onus lies with the maker.

 

Especially if the maker was aware of the mixup before the food actually got served to the customers.

[Drowsy Emperor]

Now they're going to be thrown out for eating a little free lobster.

[Endrosz]

There is an EULA you sign, and it states LOUD AND CLEAR what the consequences are for exploiting. and what exploiting means. If you come across an exploit, it's your DUTY to report it immediately, similar to reporting felonies as a citizen. Abusing it just adds to the offense, but not reporting it is already an EULA violation. There is even a damn button for reporting in modern MMOs, you don't need to go to a support site outside of the game.

 

When a similar thing happened in Guild Wars 2 during the first Wintersday in Dec '12, they made a quantity split to offer some leniency over what's written in the EULA: players who created less than 500 duped objects were only banned for 3 days. Perma-ban was only for more than 500 dupes. At that level of loophole abuse, you can't really defend with 'oh I didn't know what was going on, I was just trying it for funsies!'. You knew perfectly well what was going on, and that's why you did it over and over like a Duracell bunny.

 

Re: Zenimax didn't do its job, it's their fault!

 

Putting the EULA aside for a moment, It is absolutely unreasonable to expect a game with a source code upwards of 10 million lines  -- that is to say, MMOs -- to be exploit-proof. From what I hear (I don't play it myself), compared to Skyrim, ESO is in a pretty good place when it comes to bugs and exploits.

[Hurlshort]

A complete rollback would be ridiculous.  The vast majority of players have not exploited the game at all.  I've put in a pretty big chunk of hours in the first few weeks, I'd probably walk away from the game if they did that.  

 

Not that they will.

[HoonDing]

Let's just continue posting more bad analogies.

 

It's like getting a divorce after accidentally sleeping with your wife's twin sister.

[sorophx]

"accidentally" 

[Sarex]

Harem route incoming.

[Guest Slinky]

Re: Zenimax didn't do its job, it's their fault!

 

Putting the EULA aside for a moment, It is absolutely unreasonable to expect a game with a source code upwards of 10 million lines  -- that is to say, MMOs -- to be exploit-proof. From what I hear (I don't play it myself), compared to Skyrim, ESO is in a pretty good place when it comes to bugs and exploits.

Yeah, sure, but in this case the exploit was apparently reported well before the game even launched and Zenimax failed to do anything about it. You reap what you sow, both the exploiters and Zenimax.

[Humanoid]

A case where the TES policy of keeping entertaining bugs in (like Giant physics in Skyrim) might not be for the best. Frankly I'm amazed they launched with something as fundamental as the random disappearing horses bug unresolved. And stand-in voice actors for last minute plot overhauls? Wow.

 

But yeah, manual account bans are probably the way to go. It's not like it's a competitive multiplayer game where ensuring 100% is critical. Account bans will probably be somewhat less effective once the game goes F2P though.

[Volourn]

"There is an EULA you sign"

 

EULAs are not really worth the paper they are printed on. I'd like to see them being aggressively attacked in a court of law. They'd likely have large parts of them thrown into the garbage can. The only reason they still exist is because it's rare for anyone to put up a fight and they are rarely used to do anything anyways.

[BruceVC]

Let's just continue posting more bad analogies.

 

It's like getting a divorce after accidentally sleeping with your wife's twin sister.

 

dude...you seriously make laugh

 

 

I see everyone disagrees with me so I'm prepared to concede the item wipe doesn't sound like a good idea. It also failed the much respected " Hurlshot Good Idea Barometer Test" so that only reinforces the bad concept

[213374U]

I see everyone disagrees with me so I'm prepared to concede the item wipe doesn't sound like a good idea. It also failed the much respected " Hurlshot Good Idea Barometer Test" so that only reinforces the bad concept

Even if Hurlshot agreed with it, collective punishment is still against the Geneva Conventions.

 

More seriously though, it's doubtful they would do anything that would antagonize the entire player base. The game is still pretty new, the economy can recover. Uber items that have been duped will be phased out as new content is added, etc. It's not even this sort of clear exploit that threatens MMO economy imbalances—stuff that is harder to fix such as runaway inflation is a bigger threat long term.