First off, I do owe you an apology. I tried and failed under the circumstances that I had to provide a good, solid argument. Not that I should be completely exempt from a repetative debate, but I wasn't terribly all there with the groginess of having not slept weighing heavily on me. It also doesn't help that neither of us have all the facts straightend out, but I've done some investigating and I think I can accurately pose a meaningful argument here, now. I hope we can start fresh and get some real discussion going here.
chewbacca1010 said:
I don't think it should be absolute. I never once said that. The freedom to use a trainer in the single player is not an absolute freedom and I never said it was.
People shouldn't be allowed to modify the game and then sell it for a profit, for example, unless they create a whole Blizzard sanctioned campaign, as was the case for the first game. You seem to think that limiting people when people's actions do no harm to anyone is a good thing, and for the life of me I cannot figure out why. What we are talking about is not giving freedom to people at the cost of Blizzard losing any freedom, so that line of reasoning is moot.
Alright, like I said, new start and I'll focus on this whole bit rather than the legality, as it's fairly clear how that goes. Basically we're arguing the moral standing Blizzard has and what rights players have to modify the code on the disks they've purchased, if I'm not mistaken?
chewbacca1010 said:
You clearly have not read anything on copyright if you think this to be the case. Copyright limits have been disappearing for years, as large corporations have been lobbying to have them extended on behalf of their more valuable characters. So yes, the laws have been changing, but not in favour of the common man. You put too much faith in the legal system in this case. Why do you think I included a link to the Lessig book (it's free by the way, you can download a PDF).
To be honest, I'm all for that. I think any creator of a work of art should have all say as to what is appropriate for their works. Then again, I'm a writer by nature and have had my work plagurised before, so I may have a skewed opinion. I know what it's like to have your ideas stolen and branded as someone else's, so let's just say I'm a fan of absolute control over content you've created up until it becomes public works. However, I said I'd stay out a legality debate and I will.
chewbacca1010 said:
Copyright, while useful as an incentive for creativity, must be limited to a degree to ensure that fair use actually happens and that creativity can continue into the future, and that has not been the case at all recently.
My question to that is this: how is this limiting creativity? A trainer is used specifically to destroy the barrier's imposed by a game's ruleset to create fair play. This extends from the offline campaign which is created to challenge us at a basic level, to an internet matchmaking system like Battle.Net that challenges us against eachother in a friednly competition. While I can agree that the former, and offline single-player mode certainly belongs to the buyer, the latter in any respects, whether it be the campaign or versus matches, should be enforced. Online play brings into effect some sort of joint system of play, which should be regulated for fairness. All forms of competition have them, firendly or otherwise, and so should video games. This is where the debate comes in.
(I realise this next part is going to be reitterating some points I've made, but please bear with me as I just need to get it on here to build up my point. New start, remember?)
People are saying that these players should be exhonerated because they were only modding the campaign of the game. While I agree if they did this offline it would be wrong of Blizzard to cut them off, they had instead chose to do this online. Blizzard had already given fair warning to those willing to use third-party software while accessing Battle.Net, a property they rightfully own, and would take action against those who would choose to defy this. To circumvent any gray areas, Blizzard released, as usual, their map editing software (which in this case is the entire toolset made to construct everything but the cinematics) and a list of cheat codes that triggers a shutdown of the ability to gain achievements while using them. Blizzard said that this would be enough to keep gamers satisfied and promotes a healthy use of freedom rather than a destructive one. So, even then, Blizzard was trying to help people with that creativity by promoting a editing tool that can create entire games. I can't stress the fact that they gave out a game creation tool for free enough!
Back to the point here, these players then used this third party software and backed Blizzard into a corner. They now have to either A) Ban them from the Battle.Net servers and seal them into playing single player offline forever, as one can always access the game through a Guest sign-in into the authentication server and be stuck offline, -or- B) Not do anything and have more people challenge the line Blizzard was supposed to have already set for
their online gaming community. The choice was fairly simple, as to uphold their integrity as a company and the promise of keeping achievement earning on a fair playing field, they banned the users from Battle.Net (they didn't ban them from using their games) and informed them they could return in fourteen days.
Even if we go as far as to say they were permanently banned, they were never told they could never play the game again. They were never completely locked out of the content these people were supposedly "only going to play". The Guest feature still existed, it was simply that their connectivity to the online database was cut off, something Blizzard has fully rights, both morally and contractually, to manage as they see fit, because it is an added service they run privately. If you look at the page for these trainers, it even states that these were to never be used online, whether in single player or multiplayer. So, you see, this is just another case of people whining for no reason. Nobody's rights are being infringed upon, nobody's creativity is being stifeled at the cost of company control, it's simply a case of keeping what part of the game (the online portion) Blizzard promised to keep fair, fair.
chewbacca1010 said:
What does how hard people work towards getting achievements have to do with getting them disabled? That argument doesn't follow in the least.
See statement above. They were never disbaled from playing the game, they were disabled from playing the online portion for boosting achievements. Given that all cheats and edits you could want are put in the form of both the in game cheat codes and the map editing software and the fact they were using the trainers while connected to Battle.Net instead of signing in to a Guest account offline, the only logical assumption one could make is that they were using the trainers for the only thing Blizzard coded cheats don't do: allow achievement gaining while cheating. I know I repeated myself from above, but I think there are a couple things I elaborated on here that needed to be place in conjuction with what I repeated.
chewbacca1010 said:
I know that coding takes time, you've already said that, but if they cared about their customers or wanted a solution that could satisfy everyone, they'd take the time. That you apologize for them being lazy is unfortunate, as that is the place I suspect they want most of their customers to be at. That way, they can roll out whatever foolish measures they wish, and no one will bother to complain.
The solution does satisfy everyone that are playing by the rules. Trainers can be used offline where Blizzard has no right to control them and cheat codes and the map editor are for when you're connected to Battle.Net. It's very simply and very black & white. I'm very happy to see that Blizzard is taking a firm stance on their very clear position on how this works.
chewbacca1010 said:
And I'm sorry, but the law is nothing but simple, and it should never be simple. These are complicated issues that should be talked through. Simplifying things is dangerous and lazy thinking and leads to things like stereotyping (like how all people who use trainers are cheaters, in your mind) and stereotyping leads to bigotry. This is small "b" bigotry, obviously and doesn't affect many in all likelihood, but that sort of mindset is a dangerous one, if you ask me.
I'm sorry if that's what it came across as. I have absolutely no issue with using mods and trainers, as I use a lot of mods for other games like the Dawn of War serise. However, I do respect the want for a company to weed out real cheaters and either use a LAN connection play my mods with my friends or turn them off when I access online services. The fact is, I have no issue with trainers being used offline, I do have issues with people using trainers online, especially when a multitude of tools have already been given to the player to circumvent the need for trainers.
HellsingerAngel said:
-Well, how about you give someone a sandwich and then get spat in your face as they proceed to make their own sandwich. That's a fairly good comparison to what trainers are to the set up Blizzard has given players to "cheat". Believe it or not, people don't just make games for money. They have a passion for it and when programers actually take the time to consider how a gamer might want to dick around in SC2 and input somne cheat codes to do so, a player then using a trainer looks suspicious and feels like they're just punching the devs in the gut for being considerate.
More repetition. Most excellent.
chewbacca1010 said:
No, that comparison is not "fairly good". It's not even remotely good. Wanting to tamper with something that someone has made for any reason is not the same as spitting in their face. You generalize, and generalizations only make your argument weaker, not stronger.
So, sorry but your argument is completely illogical. Tinkering with a game can happen for any number of reasons, use of trainers included. Naturally, various reasons were included in the article posted above, and those are just a fraction of the potential reasons.
I can agree that works should be tinkered with under the conscent of the governing bodies that be. However, being given tools to do so and then shunning them for inferior tools is a bit of a kick in the groin to Blizzard. It's like the "pay what you want" sale they had for the indie bundle games. People could have chosen to buy the games for one penny, but instead chose to pirate them. Gamers figuratively turned their noses up at the offer, believing they were entitled to something that wasn't theirs to begin with. The same could be said for this. Gamers turned their noses up at the map editor in favour of a trainer to be used on Battle.Net after being told that Blizzard wouldn't accept that behaviour and are now sulking about the fact that Blizzard had followed through. It just seems very ungrateful to me, which is why I associate it with very uncouth behaviour. It's not becoming of our hobby to be snubbing developers like this wehn they give us perfectly great options to turn to.
chewbacca1010 said:
Holy fuck, how many times does it need to be said: not all people who use trainers do so just to win the game. Until you acknowledge that not all people of a single group are the exact same, all you've posted above is more repetitious narrow-mindedness and there is no point in even trying to chip away at is.
They are the same, however. People who use trainers in this case all have one obvious motive: to cheat online.
HellsingerAngel said:
-The fact of the matter is, they want to exploit the product. There is no other reasoning. Every single cheat you could want is on there, plus the ability to edit anything ever within the engine, so whether it's the gamer themselves or the fine folks at cheathappens.com it doesn't matter. The fact of the matter is they have software that can cause issues with the multiplayer balance on their PC, ready to use, and have used it within single player to boost, because there's no other reason to have that software there but to cheat in multiplayer or boost. Period!
chewbacca1010 said:
"There is no other reasoning."
This line basically sums up why discussing this with you is a waste of my time. You don't want to bother seeing other perspectives, and figure if you repeat yourself enough, people will see it your way. People who use trainers are cheaters in the absolute and Blizzard shouldn't have people shit in their cereal, because that is the equivalent of them using trainers. Never mind that not all people who use them are doing so just to cheat. Never mind that they have the resources to disable the achievements for those who do use them. Never mind the long history of tinkering that helped make this industry as powerful as it is today. Never mind that copyright is being used as a weapon by those with power and money. Never mind all of this, trainer users are all cheaters and wish to spit in the face of Blizzard.
They aren't. I'm sorry to inform you, but Blizzard is just protecting what they promised to their player base: an online system that would be fair for everyone. I would love another perspective on this if one were to come up that made any logical sense what so ever. The fact is that these people are boosting by process of elimination of motives. They can't
just want to cheat, because they'd either take their game offline and use the trainer, or use the map editor and built in cheat codes. The trainers don't provide anything extra that the tools Blizzard has given out do, just another options to do so, which I can see as fair game because other software companies block certain compatabilities with their product. The only other explination is achievement boosting, which these people have yet to prove incorrect. They've stayed away from that topic pretty whole heartedly, acctually.
The funniest thing is that no one, to our knowledge, has gone to Blizzard's appeal system and asked for an appeal on their ban. From my experience they're very helpful, considerate and forthright with information about why you were banned and the proof they have against you. I was once accused of gold farming in WoW and quickly settled the case because it was simply my friend and I who decided to pool gold together and share a lot of resources. Once Blizzard saw that I only was making trades with this one account and confirmed it with my friend, they apologized to me, gave me the time I had lost back and asked for my forgiveness in the matter as they were only trying to protect their game. I thanked them for their time, told them that I of course forgive them because I realise they only wanted to eliminate what I hated most about the game and that people make honest mistakes. The fact that it only takes about 24-48 hours for any representative at Blizzard to contact you just shows that no one has attempted to make an appeal for their account. I wonder why...
Now, as for disabling achievement for using trainers, this again goes back to the integrity of the company. They had promised that no third party software would be used and bans would be handed out to anyone caught using them and they're keeping their word. That and we have no idea if they have the ability to do so with third party trainers. Then it just becomes a battle of technology which I'm sure Blizzard wants to avoid doing once again. I'm fairly certain they learned their lesson with Diablo II and the maphacks and duplications used then.
The fact that people are able to tinker was the downfall of the gaming industry at one point. Rampant creation of third party software sunk the Atari generation into a crap shoot to near bankruptcy. The only thing that saved the gaming industry was the use of hard restrictions. Even back then people wanted to restrict games but it was deemed that the use of said programs was acceptable in the current household format. Gaming has evolved since then and we don't need a court to decide whether cheating online is wrong or not. The majority do believe that using trainers online, for any reason, is wrong. Cheating against other people, whether it be through achievement gains or flat out ranking in multiplayer games, is wrong.
I use the example of the pinball machine. It held within it a highscore table (achievement list) that would display who got the highest score. When some form of cheating was used, such as tilting the machine, it would lock up and your ball would be lost. This was effectively the first form of anti-cheat control a company used, yet no one seemed to complain. There was a concensus that tilting a pinball machine was wrong. Yes, pinball machines were rented with quarters rather than owned, but Battle.Net could be seen in the same light. When you cheat, you loose face with the public service for abusing the machine/service in question, to the point where the owner kicks you out for awhile. This is no different.
I can't say I can word this any other way. Sorry if you feel I'm just repeating myself again, but I hope you can see what I have presented is a fair argument. Whether you wish to reply or not is your decision, but I'm not sure I can argue this further as I've put every belief I have in this case on here. In summary, the gamers tried to cheat an online service and Blizzard is giving them due punishment after telling everyone not to. I don't see how that isn't fair.
