Adjusting Battlefield 3's Brightness Could Get You Banned

[Mortamus]

Holling says, is "to [sic] colorful" for Battlefield 3.

Holling, when asked about the mod on Twitter [https://twitter.com/gustavhalling/status/253005004288446464], responded by saying that "I wouldn't use those hacks if you don't want a perm ban on your account."

Wow. Someone's a bit butt-hurt that a mere modder made their game look better.

Pretty much this^

This just seems like a whiny developer that doesn't like the fact that people aren't wanting to play the game the way they designed it. I never actually realized how dead the set pieces looked until I saw this. It seriously looks like there is no life in the game. Then color came in and it looked alive and thriving.

 

[Senare]

Makes sense, from a multiplayer aspect how can this be viewed any different from a mod that washes out the environment textures and makes the player textures pop out in a bright red and blue version, and removes all the shadows?

Of course someone could say "Well can't their anti-cheat detection software make an exception for this?", but some enterprising modder could just fake the signature and piggy back off this one's.

Sucks for modders, I will admit that, but one can see where this is coming from if you want to make your game fair and balanced across the board.

This. The most fan-friendly thing they could do would be to patch the game with a set of filters provided by DICE. Using the method provided by the mod might make it indistinguishable from a malicious cheat.

 

[Oskuro]

Wait... No modding? So a game franchise that was made relevant thanks to a mod (Desert Combat anyone?) now bans modding?

I'll keep modding and enjoying Bf1942, thank you very much.

 

[Monsterfurby]

Yeah, I can see how texture / shader mods can give players an unfair edge over others in multiplayer. Fair enough.

The truly ignorant and idiotic part is and remains the "Altering or modding the game files is not allowed and is a ToS violation."

But that's not news.

 

[ThriKreen]

Honestly this is no different than Valve games where the server has sv_pure and secure enabled, which disables client side mods and enables VAC.

Don't want to play with the stock content and settings? Then don't play on pure/ranked/secure/PB enabled servers. Or in tournaments. Goes for BF3, CS and TF2.

Just don't say EA/DICE sucks and Valve is great when they support the exact same policy.

 

[Proverbial Jon]

Holling says, is "to [sic] colorful" for Battlefield 3.

Holling, when asked about the mod on Twitter [https://twitter.com/gustavhalling/status/253005004288446464], responded by saying that "I wouldn't use those hacks if you don't want a perm ban on your account."

Wow. Someone's a bit butt-hurt that a mere modder made their game look better.

Pretty much this^

This just seems like a whiny developer that doesn't like the fact that people aren't wanting to play the game the way they designed it. I never actually realized how dead the set pieces looked until I saw this. It seriously looks like there is no life in the game. Then color came in and it looked alive and thriving.

My thoughts exactly. The comment sounded like childish whining more than constructive reasoning. It didn't help that he misspelt one out of two words in that quote. Good job.

I've just finished playing Halo 3 for the bazillionth time, a game I love with all my heart because it is so bright and colourful and fun to play. Oh, it's also about a war.

I don't get why the whole world has to look grey in these "realistic" games. Crysis 1 and 2 were billed as the best looking games ever (apparently) and they were incredibly colourful. It's not like the real world rolls out the thunder clouds and oppressive smog in some sort of self aware reaction to war.

 

[kajinking]

What the...oh god! There are colors here! Retreat! Retreat!! They're coming out of the walls!!

 

[Mumorpuger]

That's a shame. The game looks prettier with the changes.

 

[NLS]

Makes sense, from a multiplayer aspect how can this be viewed any different from a mod that washes out the environment textures and makes the player textures pop out in a bright red and blue version, and removes all the shadows?

Of course someone could say "Well can't their anti-cheat detection software make an exception for this?", but some enterprising modder could just fake the signature and piggy back off this one's.

Sucks for modders, I will admit that, but one can see where this is coming from if you want to make your game fair and balanced across the board.

At least someone thought things out before spouting EA-hate claims all over the place. If they had allowed this, where would they stop? High-contrast textures? For all they know, people are using similar methods to cheat and it would look to EA as the same. Sometimes you just have to cut everything under the same line, or it's gonna get real messy.

 

[FitzOmega]

Honestly this is no different than Valve games where the server has sv_pure and secure enabled, which disables client side mods and enables VAC.

Don't want to play with the stock content and settings? Then don't play on pure/ranked/secure/PB enabled servers. Or in tournaments. Goes for BF3, CS and TF2.

Just don't say EA/DICE sucks and Valve is great when they support the exact same policy.

Umph. You know, you can easily make your own TF2 Server right ? Try to make your own BF3 server... And the difference is : You can not (for now) activate "sv_pure" in BF3 now.

In fact DICE was so conviced that their game was not moddable (is that even an english word ?) that every client have all the information and no check is made by the server.

So with that mod you can change color correction, some annoying graphical effect and it's cool. But the problem is that you can do game breaking change too. Like better zoom [http://i.imgur.com/VDeJm.jpg], less recoil.

And seriously... my biggest question is how can dev do this in a 2012 all-multi no-option game ?..

 

[rodneyy]

maybe its not so much they dont like the mod as their anti cheating system cant tell the difference between this and something that makes big arrows over everyones heads, removes the fog of war and lets you zoom when aiming way more than normall.

 

[crazyrabbits]

EA really needs to get a better set of guidelines for potential modding on the part of their player base. I saw similar stories back when ME3 was released - EA was banning people from their P2W multiplayer mode because they inadvertently played on modded servers and picked up credits that they were somehow supposed to know were different from "legitimate" credits, and Bioware employees trying to toe a line when people discovered you could unlock the From Ashes character on-disc by changing a line of code. Now we have EA freaking out because someone decided to change a color scheme...just another week, another gaffe.

 

[BrotherRool]

If this was some other series it would be completely idiotic, but Battlefield 3's gameplay is built around people relying on their camouflage, picking people out of grass bushes. I reckon it would probably be hard for their cheating systems to pick up on the people who've altered the colour in such a way it looks better and the people who've altered the colour so that no-one can ambush them

 

[Irridium]

Why couldn't they have just made the game look that colorful in the first place, instead of the boring, washed-out version we got at release? It looks far better with actual color and contrast.

I seriously wonder who came up with the idea to put that blue filter on everything.

That's just... awful.

DICE, someone is murdering the art in your games. Find and stop them, before they kill again.

 

[ThriKreen]

Umph. You know, you can easily make your own TF2 Server right ? Try to make your own BF3 server... And the difference is : You can not (for now) activate "sv_pure" in BF3 now.

You can still set your rented BF3 server to not be ranked or utilize PB, thereby allowing players to not run the risk of being permanently banned for using mods, colour or any others.

And I'm quite aware of what one can do for hosting your own TF2 server (I help Kross manage the Escapist ones). If I was feeling cheeky, I could write some SourceMod plugins to make it so even in tournament league games, me or my team could ever so slightly gain an undetectable advantage, occasionally disabling head hitboxes when someone tries to snipe me, causing extra damage, taking reduced damage...

So I can see where EA/DICE is going for requiring their BF3 providers to follow strict rules for their hosting, when they have their global ranking system and such. TF2 doesn't really have that central ranking system, so you can get away with much more customization.

And seriously... my biggest question is how can dev do this in a 2012 all-multi no-option game ?..

Seems to work on the consoles...

Don't get me wrong, I come from a mod background and I love games that let me mod them. But from a multiplayer aspect, for trying to be fair to all the players, I can see where DICE is coming from.

Case in point: back in BF2, I remember this one time I was crawling to an enemy's position in the grass, figuring I was hidden. Guy was still able to snipe me, somehow. Later on, I was suffering some framerate problems so I decided to lower some graphical options, like grass density and draw distance.

Oops, now from the sniper's vantage point, I could see that where I was, the grass stopped drawing about 50m from my spot, so I looked like I was being an idiot and camping in the middle of a desert ground, being totally visible to everyone around me like a pimple on your nose or the middle of your forehead.

Notice in BF3 there's no grass option now?

 

[ThriKreen]

But Valve hasn't been going around like an angry toddler screaming it's their stuff and you can't touch it, and you unworthy gamers are lucky to be allowed to rent it with a ToS that basically says "Fuck you".

Yeah, they just disable it and hardly anyone hates on them for it on the same level as DICE's. [https://secure.voogru.com/petition/]

Although to be fair Valve did adjust later it so you can attach non-stock models. But they're still keeping their ball.

 

[Playful Pony]

Battlefield 2 is still alive and kicking thanks to mods like Project Reality and Forgotten Hope. They obviously don't want BF3 to have a long life, just be around until 4 is released next year...

Mod looks great, wish I could use it...