Cheating has reached new heights in gaming. However, bans on Steam are swift – over half a million players were affected in December.
When it comes to cheats and unfair advantages, most gamers don’t find it funny – fortunately, Valve, the developer behind the Steam platform, doesn’t either. This led to more players being banned in December than ever before. They were exposed as cheaters under the VAC system.
Bans came in several waves: Over the course of December, there were a total of five “waves” of VAC bans. Adding the numbers together results in just over 600,000 players who will no longer be able to play on VAC-protected servers in their games.
What is VAC? VAC is short for “Valve Anti Cheat,” a protection system from Valve that automatically identifies various cheats and frauds and bans accounts for the respective games. Not only Valve games use VAC, but also many other games from different developers on Steam (such as ARK: Survival Evolved).
Why are there so many cheaters? In recent years, competitive games have become very popular again, which is why cheats and frauds are experiencing a renaissance. With popular games like CS:GO, which has just recently reached the milestone of 20,000,000 players, and the popular “Battle Royale” games, cheats are more sought after than ever. This also leads to an increased number of account penalties.
Cheaters still an issue: Despite the numerous account penalties, cheaters remain one of the biggest complaints, especially in CS:GO, as can be read repeatedly in Steam reviews. This has significantly increased since CS:GO became free to play.
Do you know anyone in your circle who has been affected by a VAC ban? Or are they all decent gamers who would never cheat?
