Online games have entirely altered the world of gaming for good. Before multiplayer was a thing, gaming was just a hobby. However, everything changed when you introduced more people into the mix, allowing friends to face each other in games.
Join us as we review how cheating became a thing and cover some of the most popular games people play with cheats today.
Why Do We Cheat?
Cheating is about as old as gaming itself. People started looking for shortcuts when games became more complex than just Pong. Back in the day of single-player games, cheats were often used as a reward for finished levels or complete games.
It was a way for the devs to say ‘thank you’ for playing their game from start to finish. One notable case was Fallout 2. This often-overlooked installment of the Fallout series was arguably one of the best. Fallout 2 was a classic isometric RPG with a highly detailed storyline, excellent visuals, and great combat mechanics.
Passing the game and completing all the quests took both time and skill. However, those who managed to do so would then be presented with the Book of Fallout. Now, this wasn’t exactly a cheat. It was a token of appreciation for the time and effort invested in the game.
The book, once read, would give the player max stats. It was basically the god mode in a game that was notoriously devoid of cheats or hacks.
Cheating Evolved
Cheating in single-player games was rarely frowned upon. Sure, there was the idea that you’re essentially showing a lack of skill, but your using cheats affected no one else but you. Things got rather interesting when multiplayer became a thing.
First, the notorious split screen broke friendships and caused siblings to fight each other. Cheating in split-screen games was possible but generally rarely used, considering the opponent was there, looking at what was happening.
When online gaming became a thing, cheats started to evolve from benign fun tools to more malicious software.
Competitive Games and Cheats
Whenever you add the word competitive as a prefix to something, you’ll find people willing to do anything just to be ahead. The same happened with online gaming.
Competitive games went from being an excellent pastime for most to becoming a full-blown career for esports athletes as they are known today. As expected, adding money to the mix only increased the number of cheaters and chests used.
That said, it’s time to review some of the most popular online games people cheat in!
1. CS: GO
Whenever anyone talks about cheating in online games, they will probably mention CS: GO at some point. This is the quintessential game when it comes to cheating. In all honesty, that statement applies to all Counter-Strike games, starting with the 1.1 and 1.3 back in the day.
Being a 10v10, or more recently, 5v5 competitive game, CS: GO has always attracted those looking for fame and glory. Being the top fragger brought you bragging rights among your friends, not to mention the more comprehensive CS: GO community.
Cheats in CS: GO started with the implementation of wall hacks and aimbots. Those were the two main types of cheats people used throughout the evolution of the Counter-Strike franchise.
Since CS: GO became an eSport, more serious entities have focused on cheating prevention and detection. This hasn’t stopped aim-botting or wall hacking, but it forced cheat devs to push cheat design to a new level. Granted, some devs build cheats for entertainment purposes. For the lulz, suitable?
Modern cheats aren’t just beating Valve’s clunky anti-cheat, but they’re also dominating the LAN arena, where all the computers are checked thoroughly, and every piece of hardware is scrutinized. Yet, as KQLY and many other pros who got busted have shown us, everything’s possible with the proper dev at your side.
2. Apex Legends
Despite being relatively new, Apex Legends has taken the world like wildfire. It went from a small project devised under the watchful eye of EA to becoming one of the most prolific competitive FPS multiplayer games available.
What truly sets Apex Legends apart is that it’s free. Although it’s packed with cool skins, there’s no pay to win in Apex. That is unless you count all of the Apex Legends hacks out there. Other than that, it’s all about skill. With each character bringing their unique specialty to the table, you must choose your primary and spend hours mastering the movement, strategies, and more.
Cheating in Apex went through all the steps, just like in CS. When the game came out, it took Respawn - the studio behind it - about a month to drop the ban hammer on more than 300,000 players.
Those first cheats were straightforward, accessible, and widely available. These days, that’s no longer the case. If you want to cheat in Apex Legends, You need to be more subtle and use refined cheats.
3. Call of Duty: Warzone
Call of Duty games were among the OGs of the multiplayer era. Back in the day, CoD 2 was all the rage with its excellent combat mechanics. From then on, it became more popular and better in every way.
Today, Call of Duty is a part of the gaming subculture. Activision, the team behind Call of Duty, was the latest development team to get into the free-to-play genre slowly becoming popular. The game they’ve released is called Call of Duty: Warzone and it’s known for two things right now - it’s insane 100 GB disk space requirement and cheaters.
That said, Activision was always reasonably good at finding and getting cheaters blacklisted. Most free cheats are quickly stomped out as they require relatively severe coding to get around all the built-in safety features. Still, Warzone is just riddled with cheaters.
However, Warzone is crawling with cheaters who use modern warfare 2 cheats.
The only saving grace in this situation is that so many people are playing now that your chances of running into a cheater are relatively small.
4. Fortnite
Love it or hate it, Fortnite was the most popular multiplayer game at one point in time. This cartoonish game did two things - it kept all underage kids from causing havoc in other games and made the whole battle royale genre from its relatively modest roots into the mainstream.
Truth be told, Fortnite did this alongside a few other games, such as PUBG. Knowing that most players who play Fortnite are kids, it isn’t hard to imagine that many said kids would resort to cheating. In all honesty, that fact alone has made the anti-cheats job that much easier; as counterintuitive as easier thang through tonnes of freeware cheats, and hacks were nowhere near as complicated as searching for actual quality cheats. On the other sheer number of these freeware, hacks did muddy the waters, causing a sort of background noise that could hide high-level hacks rather well.
Contrary to popular belief, Fortnite is still kicking, and people are still cheating. There’s no going around it. Despite being way past its prime, thousands, if not millions, of players still log in every night to fight for that top position.
5. PUBG
PUBG, just like Fortnite, has had a massive impact on the battle royale genre. Where ARMA 3 and other games introduce this type of gameplay through mods, PUBG took it and launched it into the stratosphere.
PUBG is so interesting in terms of cheating and cheating, in general, because even the devs were caught doing it. There was a famous incident when a dev, who was also a live streamer then, got seen eliminating other players all while he had invisibility on.
Naturally, the dev played it off as a mere misunderstanding. See, he had the dev tools turned on by accident. Okay, maybe it was an accident, but this moment happened while PUBG was riddled with all kinds of cheaters who used invisibility hacks, god-mode hacks, and blatant aimbots.
PUBG was always considered to be a work-in-progress game. Driving around the map could launch you unexpectedly into the air or flip your vehicle, causing you to die for no reason. This was happening over a year after the game was launched.
6. GTA 5 Online
Grand Theft Auto games are on a whole different level of uniqueness. Until recently, you couldn’t even find anything similar on the market. Older readers will probably remember the GTA 1 and GTA 2 games, which were top-down views and extremely simple compared to what came after. Despite that, they were every bit as fun.
Rockstar has pushed the limits with the GTA franchise. Allowing players to run over people, cause mayhem and murder with impunity had launched the game into stardom. The series changed the world of gaming in more ways than one. The latest installment (yes, it’s 2020, and yes, it’s still GTA 5) has added another dimension to the whole franchise - multiplayer.
See, up until the release of GTA 5, all the previous games were single-player only. For most, that was enough. However, it wasn’t enough for Rockstar, who saw a new way to monetize their game.
As a result, they’ve introduced GTA 5 Online. Now, instead of running around a massive sandbox by yourself, you could go and complete missions and earn money with a whole server full of other players.
Cheats were always an integral part of a GTA experience. Everyone has had a moment where they would die one too many times, input a cheat, unlock all weapons, and go to town on the local PD. After all, there was only one way to discover what happens when you rack up all the wanted stars.
GTA 5 Online was different in this regard. Not only was cheating not built into the game but it was strictly prohibited. Rockstar didn’t want paying players to be pushed out of a server by a hacker. Yet, that’s precisely what’s going on around various servers.
God mode is a big cheat in this game. It’s difficult to trace and allows the user to destroy other players with immunity. Truth be told, Rockstar is working on solving this issue, but there is no chance they’ll manage to cover all the hacks relating to the web.
The Future of Cheating
The future of cheating pretty much looks the same as its past. Where there are games, there will be cheats. Game developers are working on new technologies to defeat existing cheats, but hackers are doing the same.
We often fail to remember that cheats are written by talented individuals for various reasons. Some are in it for fame, others for money. Either way, both sides are continuously one-upping each other.
One thing that could potentially put a dent into gaming cheats is the advent of AI-based anti-cheat software. Although far in the distant future, such high-tech solutions might be the only thing capable of stopping cheating. You can download the IWantCheats HWID Changer and stay undetected while playing your favorite PC game.
The issue with anything AI-related is that it’s nowhere near ready to be rolled out into mass service.
Another interesting question is how cheating will affect virtual reality games? Hardware is getting cheaper yearly, with some prominent players racing to release the newest, most affordable goggles.
When the number of people playing virtual reality games reaches critical mass, we’ll likely see some new forms of hacking.
Cheating is frowned upon, although it’s integral to human nature. We’re programmed to find ways to get ahead with the least amount of necessary work. In that regard, cheating is natural. However, cheating has consequences, and everyone should be aware of them before executing any cheat software.
