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New hack, players being forced to spend millions on Market Board
fascism
Member UncommonPosts: 428
Gil has to be on you, no Gil being taken from retainers.
Comments
over 20 years of mmorpg's and counting...
Supposedly it is patched already, and game is back up. It was fast action on SE's part. Hopefully it is really fixed and they don't have to do a general rollback.
man that suuuuucks. bunch of rmt jerks just cant stop messing with a stupid video game.
Its kind of funny when this stuff happens because it seems so obvious that it is going to get you banned. I have to imagine they keep logs of transactions and can fix this and ban those who did it. If they don't then well that is a poorly made market system~.
Geeez. The game is under attack. Scary stuff when you think about the future if mmorpgs.
My question is what happened between the launch and the relaunch clients with respect to secure code?
Most likely nothing changed in the code. However, the game relaunched and attracted a large number of new players.
It seems that "large number of new players" = "large amount of RMT customers" in modern MMO's. So the RMT hackers hit FFXIV hard and fast to get the maximum sales while the game is new and has heaps of players that want to reach level-cap "as fast as possible at any cost".
No doubt many RMT specialists have had plenty of opportunity to practice and refine their skills and techniques on the 100's of F2P MMO's that have sprung up in the last few years.
So any new MMO that launches can now be targeted on multiple fronts:
The efforts of these criminals are becoming more sophisticated as their experience and knowledge increases. Most gamers know that gaming generates huge chunks of revenue. Criminals know this too. They also know that they can operate with almost complete impunity. The worst thing that can happen to them is that they don't make any money for their efforts. Punishment for getting caught ? ROFLMAO...
SpottyGekko is probably right in that new launches now are going to have to face this sort of thing. So not only will they have to deal with all the traditional launch issues, but they will have to deal with this new layer of crap.
I think SE wasn't quite prepared. FFXI launched "back in the day" so it's not like they had recent experience to prepare them for what to expect. It seems to be a fairly new phenomenon. We didn't see this sort of thing when Rift launched.
Yeah it sucks because it hurts both the gamers and developers. People are less inclined to try a new game if they feel like their personal info is not secure. Im not sure what the pattern is. Maybe its too much info being stored client side that allows hackers more freedom to do different things.
Why should I try ANY new MMO anymore with these kinds of launches? This is why most people wait 2-3 months...
But a game can't be sustained for a long time without those subs. So it's a double edged sword.
That anyone would think this is acceptable is just... beyond me.
Maybe this is a result of beta tests not really being beta tests anymore and more about marketing and securing pre-orders. I know it can't be all that simple but it could be part of the problem. But you'd think if they had more rigorous testing some of these game breaking hacks could have been spotted.
More testing takes more time, delaying launch AND costing the developer more money.
More secure code and systems take more time to design, build and test, delaying launch AND costing the developer more money.
More security routines and encryption in the game code adds overheads and server load, which could have negative effects on game performance.
There's very little a developer can do to change player online-security habits, short of forcing them to use authenticators. But authenticators sometimes go wrong, so there has to be robust Customer Service to deal with those issues. Again driving up costs for the developer.
Ironically, it all comes down to money in the end. If the game developer can secure the game AND still make a decent profit AND not ruin the game play experience in the process, then that will be done. But it will most likely only happen once RMT activities render a few MMO's unplayable.
More testing takes more time, delaying launch AND costing the developer more money.
More secure code and systems take more time to design, build and test, delaying launch AND costing the developer more money.
More security routines and encryption in the game code adds overheads and server load, which could have negative effects on game performance.
There's very little a developer can do to change player online-security habits, short of forcing them to use authenticators. But authenticators sometimes go wrong, so there has to be robust Customer Service to deal with those issues. Again driving up costs for the developer.
Ironically, it all comes down to money in the end. If the game developer can secure the game AND still make a decent profit AND not ruin the game play experience in the process, then that will be done. But it will most likely only happen once RMT activities render a few MMO's unplayable.
Pretty much. Its just unfortunate. All I wanna do is be able to play an mmo without a bunch of drama heh.
Well maybe they shouldn't spend lots of cash making an MMO that they then cancel ? Might help them , work out their finances in the long run. What game do I mean I hear you cry ? The Agency by SOE , stupid Sony. Plus they lost a PS3 sale to , from me that is.
Cheers,
BadOrb
PSO 4 years , EQOA 4 months , PSU 7 years , SWTOR launch ongoing , PSO2 SEA launch ongoing , Destiny 360 launch ongoing.
"SWG was not fun. Let it go buddy." quote from iiNoSkillzii 10/18/13
The original propoganda pixie dust villain :[]
I wonder if an automatic system can be build to make people who are above certain level of riches to buy things not for millions, but for, say, 20k or so gils. It would be hellishly hard to track it down, and lots of people "donating" 20k every visit to market would still bring a pretty penny in the long run.
Well, I know that it can be built, it's not that hard with utter lack of security FF and other modern games (PS2 for example) have; I just wonder if it would be worth it. If there is a demand for gils on the real money market.
This is unacceptable but if you think the consequences can be seen in-game you're mistaken. It's business as usual and has been whole this time even with other security issues around.
I don't think it matters whether you join at launch or 3 months in, if the developer isn't going to support the game in the long-term then the dev deserves to fail in my opinion.
We should start a rumor it was a disgruntled employee, fired for mishandling the investigation of hundreds of innocent accounts a month ago, causing a disruption. It was an inside job, hence it was remedied in a few-hour emergency maintenance and the threat of legal action was toward this person.
If they weren't aware of the RMT issues plaguing MMOS in general these days - especially high-profile ones (like, say, the relaunch of a FF title) - then that's just another mark against them in the "woefully ignorant" column for XIV's relaunch. This is especially bad, considering SE dealt with RMT plenty in FFXI. That game's economy was completely borked for a while, until SE stepped in and created a Task Force to deal with it. They could literally have been prepared by simply paying attention to what they themselves did with another of their own MMOs. Yet, Yoshi-P and co. waltzed into a full relaunch without even so much as a right-click "block and report" option. They put themselves way behind the ball right out of the gate.
That said, SE wasn't prepared on several fronts for ARR.
They weren't prepared with the handling of EA codes.
They weren't prepared in terms of deploying additional, properly tested and tuned servers when needed.
They weren't prepared for the massive RMT issues to hit the game after launch (constant RMT spam in cities, etc).
They arguably weren't even ready to launch the game, given the issues that came up in Beta 3, they put a band-aid on and proceeded with the launch anyway... which led to the exacerbation of those issues with people (myself included) being unable to even log in for almost 2 weeks.
They were unable to deal with large numbers of people hitting their servers, with a Queue system that didn't work (sitting in queue only to be kicked with "world full" when it was supposed to be your turn).
Unprepared to deal with people staying AFK for hours on-end while sleeping, working, etc... locking down log-in slots that people actually present and able to play could have used. Though fairly, this is as much a poor reflection on the self-centeredness of many of ARR's players as it is on SE.
They had an unsecured database, allowing people to 'hack in' anything they wanted for their characters, unchecked.
And finally, they didn't learn from the myriad of other MMOs to launch in the last 8 years that if you build a game where developer-created content is all players have to keep them entertained, and you make the game fast/easy to progress through, you better be releasing content consistently and in good quantity.... something they're also not doing. Rift had frequent updates. Asheron's Call 1 - even so many years ago - had monthly updates, and still does to this day. Other MMOs do the same. SE's just getting around to their first content update now, almost 3 months after its re-launch. This includes content that unarguably should have been in at launch - like Crystal Tower - but wasn't because - yet again - SE was unprepared, and it wasn't ready for launch.
After 8+ years of other titles demonstrating that the content-driven model isn't sustainable in the long haul, other developers have learned that it's time to evolve and change the way these games are designed. Meanwhile, off in his bubble, Yoshi-P is still embracing and clinging to it as though those 8+ years didn't happen and it was still the best option out there.
And no, it doesn't matter that "other games have had bad, or worse launches". This isn't "other games", and this isn't those other companies (many of which don't have the resources or experience SE has). Hiccups at launch are expected. The number of issues ARR's had, SE's unpreparedness to address them swiftly, and the degree to which they've affected the game and its players is due to nothing short of negligence on SE's part.
Defenders of the game can troll and flame me all they want. Revise or erase the game's history all you like. Spin the details every which way you can. What's happened has happened, and it's all documented on forums and news articles for anyone to see.
I supported this game through 1.0. I'm a 'Legacy' Member, having paid and played when they reinstated subs up 'til the last minute before servers came down. I have a handfull of images from XIV 1.0 in my user gallery if you'd like some proof of that. I pre-ordered ARR and bought the ARR CE (even though I already own the 1.0 CE and didn't have to buy it again). I was fully on-board with ARR all throughout its development and its early Alpha/Beta phases (though my concerns were increasing a time went on, more info and content was revealed, and the full picture of what Yoshi-P's vision for ARR actually was - he was careful to not reveal a number of specific details about the game until the last minute, opting for vague remarks prior to that).
Once I saw what the game had become, and then saw and experienced the train-wreck after rolling-trainwreck that was its relaunch, with SE flailing in the wind trying to play "catch up" fixing everything, I began to lose hope and interest in this game.
The increasingly toxic, intolerant, and hostile nature of the game's fan-base became the final nail in the coffin for me.
Now I keep watching the game just to see if Yoshi-P has a change of heart on some of his previous decisions, seeing how the game is playing out (which he'd said he'd do before considering certain changes).