TBH, its time for Apex Legends 2
The game is unsaveable at this point IMO. Just pack it in and give us an update on an Unreal 5 or comparable engine. Build in AI and machine learning anti cheat and charge a small monthly subscript...
Forum Discussion
@HappyHourSumwurI'm sure that it's a heavily modified version of source, but regardless, the game feels good and looks fantastic in my opinion. I think it has absolutely nothing to do with the engine. Big games like this typically mod parts of the engine, like networking, to meet their personal needs. I agree though that feature creep can have a negative impact on performance, switching to a different engine would have ZERO effect on that however.
The AI cheat thing is unproven as well. It's interesting, and I'm curious to see how well it does in BO6, but there's so many things companies can do to combat cheaters. The biggest problem is that they don't feel the necessity to do so. How does stopping cheaters help their bottom line? How does it translate to them making more money? Triple A studios, without a doubt, could solve the cheating problem IF they wanted to. It would never be perfect, and they wouldn't be able to stop it instantly every time, but they can do better if the incentive for them was there.
20 tick servers are trash. It's not suitable for an online twitch shooter.
@WhoopFighter Aside from paying people to police the game, what are all the other things game companies can do to combat cheaters? Is there an anti cheat out there that works?
- @HappyHourSumwur People policing the games is a losing battle from the get go.
I just keep hearing the buzz word of AI anti-cheat, and I think it's generally over valued. So far It's unproven, and AI isn't cheap. It takes a ton of energy to use it. Who knows though, maybe it will be the saving thing for FPS games.
There's simple things like limiting what can be disguised as cheats. Like scanning, the drone, auto-ping with Bang. All those things can make cheaters look more legit. So game design is a HUGE part of it that frankly gets over looked and taken for granted. I'm not saying those things need to removed, but merely making a point. Another example would be the akimbo weapons, or high recoil weapons, that are "hard" to use, but with big rewards. Guess who gravitates towards those weapons? Good players, sure, but cheaters can take advantage of a poorly balanced weapon even more so.
You really believe a company with the funds that EA has can't figure out how to make a better anti-cheat? Again, it's about investment versus return. They're trying to make money above all. Respawn probably has some passion left, but EA, forget it. The CEO doesn't understand the basics of gaming.
Another way of dealing with cheats is building up a trust system. The higher the account, the longer it's been around, the less you have to investigate those players. Once you purge cheaters from the top, and have a trust system, you spend resources catching people before they can even make it to ranked.
Nothing is easy or cheap, but they can absolutely do something about it. It really comes down to a money thing. Is it worth the investment to them? So far, they've calculated not so much.
