Announcing Ricochet: A New Anti-Cheat Initiative for Call of Duty

RICOCHET Anti-Cheat fights unfair play across Warzone and Vanguard; new kernel-level driver coming first to Call of Duty: Warzone

[Jin_Sakai]

“While the kernel driver, which is only a part of RICOCHET Anti-Cheat, will release to PC, by extension, console players playing via cross-play against players on PC will also stand to benefit.”

I remember the days when crossplay didn’t exist with PC and console players just played and enjoyed games. Good times. Now you have to deal with the cheating PC crowd.

[Garethvk]

I just did radio on this and said we have seen Anti-cheats for years. They always find away around them so we need this to be more then lip-service and actually address the issue and be updated and supported to address the inevitable ways people find to get around it and cheat.

[Tacoboto]

The problem isn't the feature but the implementation.

Cross-Play was implemented illogically in certain titles. 343 attempts to do well in MCC with certain playlists filtering by input method. I believe there is a setting for it too for the user. But there isn't a specific PC/Xbox filter.

Other companies don't attempt input method filtering but have an all-platforms or nothing approach. Some have different Cross-Play for Switch than other platforms.

At the end of the day, developers should allow users to choose their own pool. Controller-using PC players and KB&M console players should be allowed to mix if they want, and if they play by the rules.

[MadLad]

I don't know. I remember trying to go back and play games like World at War on 360 a few years after it came out and finding a whole bunch of hackers.

Damn cheating console crowd.

[Tacoboto]

OG Halo 2 was such a cheat fest. The game had huge host boons. They would be first in the match and could tell from pressing Select and seeing everyone else as a red X. They would receive an extra floating boost from a grenade explosion.

And that's how they knew they could press the Standby button on their modem and get away with it as everyone in the game lags but them... jerks.

[porkChop]

Really? Because I remember dealing with plenty of cheaters on consoles. Yeah, it's more common on PC. But consoles have always had problems with cheaters. Even on PS3 and 360 online games were littered with cheaters.

The problem was there in full force before cross play ever came around, so let's not use that as a scapegoat.

[FPS_D3TH]

I’m amazed at how many console players are willfully ignorant to cronus zen and the recent machine learning ai hack made available to consoles. Likely since most people here don’t try to play gamebattles or something similar but I can tell you for a fact that cheating on console does in fact exist lol

[MadLad]

For a console only player, everything is PC players fault.

There's obviously no hacking on console. Just PC.
All PC gamers are pirates, despite having multiple successful storefronts on PC. Would love to sit down and ask them why the used game market is so large. Neither help out the devs or publishers, so I'm not seeing the difference here.

Mods destroy the developer's creative vision.
Though the few games on console that allow for mods .... people use them. It's also funny that this is a mostly console centric site, but anytime that a nude mod gets revealed it quickly becomes one of the biggest stories of the day, the comments section is filled with people bashing PC gamers as pervs though, in most cases, they're some of the least downloaded mods on offer.
Says more about your average console gamer than PC gamer.
All you see is "nude mod" and you click it into one of the biggest stories of this site. We all know half the people berating its existence would be downloading it if they had the chance.

Small tangent. I apologize.
This site is just silly at times.

The list could go on and on, honestly.

[Sunny12345]

It's more blatant on pc. On console it's limited, more over cronous max only works on old gen controllers. It's nothing compared to whats there on pc. I talk from experience in warzone It's impossible to play with crossplay on. I have 115 wins, and 110 of them came on crossplay off. Wallhacks, aimbot. On console It's increased aim assist, which s good player will counter anyway.

[NeoGamer232]

Personally, me and friends often play using different platforms and we find it fun. Once cross-play becomes a non-issue, it benefits gamers because we will be free to buy whatever device we prefer but still play together. I don't understand why it would be preferable to only play with players on the same platform. Forcing gamers to game on the same platform is not consumer friendly and divides the gaming community.

Sure it has growing pains, but, it will be better once we get there fully. And the same can be said for multi-player at the start. It was often rocky, but now most games do it well. We don't avoid doing something because it isn't going smoothly, we do things to benefit gamers in the long run as well.

[FPS_D3TH]

Exactly why I’m for it too for the most part

[medman]

My time that I can spend gaming over the years has decreased, so I focus on great single player experiences that I can pick up and play at my leisure, no matter if I have 20 minutes to play or three hours. I don't miss multiplayer at all. That said, if Naughty Dog ever gets around to delivering TLOU II multiplayer, I will give it a go.

[MrCrimson]

There was always cheaters my guy. You just didn't care because you didn't just spend 35 minutes playing a match before finding out.

[Aussieguy]

I dont understand why devs can't just make it cross play between console players only, why do we got to play with PC players? I wouldnt mind playing against just playstation users or even switch in certain games, but definitely not against PC players.

[ActualWhiteMan]

In COD there are Console Hackers too FYI. The top 1000 in the leaderboards on every game are 97% hackers from consoles... The issue is Activision and their terrible software coding that they refuse to fix from game to game so the same hacks work on every new game.

[Orchard]

I'm disappointed this announcement wasn't a sequel to Ricochet from VALVe.

[execution17]

Interesting since warzone might be playable since it's not fun getting beamed from far away without any sights or having someone track you from the other side of a hill or building

[Garethvk]

I have not been a fan of Battle Royale as I do not like the one and done style games. I did like Blood Money and some modes where you could respawn but you would see some players have amazing abilities. Ran over a team with a vehicle and all died save for the one in the middle. He took multiple grenades and a full clip from three players on the team and stood their taking it and one shot killed two of my team before he went away and I think he just logged off.

[Bladesfist]

Beaming someone with no sights long distance with certain warzone weapons like the M13 is easy with a mouse, it's hard to know with that weapon if someone is just good at compensating for recoil or is hacking. When you see it with the AK then something is wrong. But none of this will stop someone with a modded controller from downloading a recoil compensation pattern and beaming you with anything.

[execution17]

Like getting beamed when you're not even visible on their screen when you see the kill cam

[Hikoran]

I'm not solicitor/lawyer but doesn't Blizzard sue people for doing that in WoW and Overwatch? Can't they just start slapping lawsuits on people?

[Rachel_Alucard]

There's a device called a cronus zen that allows you to quick scope, remove recoil, and many many other functions on many games all while using a controller or KB&M. It is impossible to detect since it acts as a macro for inouts rather then altering any internal files. This ricochet thing looks like it only affects software on PC rather then anything that uses hardware on console or PC.

[VoiceMale]

This is my concern as well ... They should go after the company producing these things ...and force them to have to make their usage apparently known and not hidden away at the macro level to prevent cheating online ..fine if u want to use it for single player games but online games should not be allowed against other players

[THAT-GAMER]

Cheaters are creative they will bypass this soon....they might even use this to create more cheats

[Bruh]

How about letting me cross-play with just consoles and not those sweat PC cheats?

[staticall]

Kernel-level driver for a game, why is that ok? There are literally zero guarantees that it will have zero bugs and have bulletproof security, from any hacking attempts (they promise that they tested it, but no guarantees, just «RICOCHET Anti-Cheat team is committed to continued testing and is committed to iteration after launch», whatever that means).

According to FAQ, (i quote)
«The PC kernel-level driver monitors and reports applications that attempt to interact with Call of Duty: Warzone, allowing the RICOCHET Anti-Cheat team to determine if a machine is utilizing unauthorized processes to manipulate the game.»

It will report (to some undisclosed location) anything it deems «suspicious» or anything that «may attempt to manipulate Call of Duty: Warzone game code». That might be cheats, but also that might be your personal files, software you're running or have installed, anti-virus, whatever. And they didn't show what exactly it will be sending, it might be file name, hashes of executables, pieces of changed code, HDD/SSD contents, personal information, documents, list of your PC devices, drivers, IP and such, you just have to trust them.
It's a gray area, of course, but i don't want my games installing kernel-level drivers (or other shady stuff) just to run them, it's a huge red flag in my book.

[AuraAbjure]

I don't install any game that modifies my PC's kernel. Console is fine though.

[Father__Merrin]

Just turn cross play off let pc cheats play amongst them self's

[Bladesfist]

Let all cheaters play against themselves, just put them in a separate matchmaking queue when identified

[lnfiniteLoop]

so Console cheats/hackers get to still play cheat and hack...

[Bobertt]

I forgot who it was but they predicted this they said hackers have developed more sophisticated ways to bypass anticheat and are using AI to develop new cheats so in response the developers will start to have to use their own AI and it will keep escalating to see who has the better AI.

[AuraAbjure]

Why is it so difficult to detect cheaters and ban them quickly?

[csreynolds]

Pretty sure I read that hackers have already broken this. So cheaters will still be a thing - yay.

Anyone else miss the days where people just, y'know, played games and had fun without ruining things for others?