Please.... block all UT2004 demo servers from the Master Server...

[izelol]

As I've said, Epic needs it. And everyone else who like the demo.

Hmm... you mean everyone as cheaters+ people with illegal game?

[GreatEmerald]

No, honest players... It's not used entirely for cheating and illegal business, otherwise it would have never been released at all.

[grice]

No, not necessarily. You can simply add a check if the server has illegal classes spawned in it, and if it does, drop it.

Oh, and also the demo is often used for benchmarking. For example, in the Phoronix thread today, it was used to check if Radeon drivers for Linux work better:
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pag..._rewrite&num=1

A purpose like benchmarking would not be relevant to online play (through the master server list) which should be limited to retail servers & antitcc protected servers only. I'm not saying the demo download links should be removed, only that demo servers should not be allowed in the browser list anymore. Surely that can't be too difficult to implement on Epic's end. People can still play the demo in multiplayer via LAN or ip address.

No, honest players... It's not used entirely for cheating and illegal business, otherwise it would have never been released at all.

But the demo servers just happen to be completely wide open to cheating, and it's just a free version of the game for pirates and cheaters (who are usually the same) to play online. Somebody who pirated the game is also more likely to cheat than one who brought the game.

[grice]

there's definately no patch coming.

So the best option would be to get over those demo servers. Who needs demo anyway?

blocking cracked servers is probably not possible.

Well, surely the best way to update the demo is just to allow only retail servers in the browser list.

[izelol]

No, honest players... It's not used entirely for cheating and illegal business, otherwise it would have never been released at all.

Honest players getting the demo to check out a 5-year old game.. maybe but not many and it's defianately not neccessary anymore.

Unless you support piracy, it's pretty obvious that the demo key should get blocked.

[GreatEmerald]

A purpose like benchmarking would not be relevant to online play (through the master server list) which should be limited to retail servers & antitcc protected servers only. I'm not saying the demo download links should be removed, only that demo servers should not be allowed in the browser list anymore. Surely that can't be too difficult to implement on Epic's end. People can still play the demo in multiplayer via LAN or ip address.

Yes, that wouldn't be hard to do, but it's not a brilliant solution... Like I've said, a patch or demo update would be a lot better in this case.

By the way, I have another idea for a workaround... What if they isolated demo servers from retail game? That would make a lot of sense... And then pirated versions wouldn't be able to play online without using the demo, and retail owners wouldn't get cheated upon (sp?).

Honest players getting the demo to check out a 5-year old game.. maybe but not many and it's defianately not neccessary anymore.

Age doesn't matter... I've played DooM 1 demo just recently, and it was really fun. Yet it's even 16 years old.

[HornDog]

Yes, that wouldn't be hard to do, but it's not a brilliant solution... Like I've said, a patch or demo update would be a lot better in this case.

By the way, I have another idea for a workaround... What if they isolated demo servers from retail game? That would make a lot of sense... And then pirated versions wouldn't be able to play online without using the demo, and retail owners wouldn't get cheated upon (sp?).



Age doesn't matter... I've played DooM 1 demo just recently, and it was really fun. Yet it's even 16 years old.

The only way to get the Demo servers to add a patch would be to change the master server's net code so the Demo server will not be seen unless they are updated.

That's wishful thinking and unrealistic.

[GreatEmerald]

Not necessarily - a retail patch could have client-side settings to not connect to demo servers. That would leave cheaters that are not willing to update to play only with themselves.

[INIQUITOUS]

argh that fricken avril hack thing : ( (usually found with a manta *****)

They would just use programs like Hamatchi anyway. They'd just start their own community. This happened with C&C3, WorldInConflict, Doom3 etc...

:'(

[izelol]

By the way, I have another idea for a workaround... What if they isolated demo servers from retail game? That would make a lot of sense... And then pirated versions wouldn't be able to play online without using the demo, and retail owners wouldn't get cheated upon (sp?).

Age doesn't matter... I've played DooM 1 demo just recently, and it was really fun. Yet it's even 16 years old.

Separating demo servers from retails seems like a good idea.

Doom 1 - singleplayer game (and LAN). It doesn't really matter wether there's demo or not because it doesn't affect online doom 1 players.

In ut2004 on the other hand - whole pirating community depends on demo key.

argh that fricken avril hack thing : ( (usually found with a manta *****)

They would just use programs like Hamatchi anyway. They'd just start their own community. This happened with C&C3, WorldInConflict, Doom3 etc...

:'(

Hamachi is quite a different thing. It would be harder to pirate ut2004 online with it.
Right now: download ut2004, install patch and play online. Every noob can manage that.

Most of the players using pirated ut2004 usually actually think that those servers are all that ut2004 has (demo +cracked), not even thinking about getting the original game (which has about 800 servers in total!).

[grice]

Separating demo servers from retails seems like a good idea.

Doom 1 - singleplayer game (and LAN). It doesn't really matter wether there's demo or not because it doesn't affect online doom 1 players.

In ut2004 on the other hand - whole pirating community depends on demo key.

Hamachi is quite a different thing. It would be harder to pirate ut2004 online with it.

Right now: download ut2004, install patch and play online. Every noob can manage that.

Most of the players using pirated ut2004 usually actually think that those servers are all that ut2004 has (demo +cracked), not even thinking about getting the original game (which has about 800 servers in total!).

Not necessarily - a retail patch could have client-side settings to not connect to demo servers. That would leave cheaters that are not willing to update to play only with themselves.

I have met people and seen the stats of those who have, literally, hundred of thousands of frags and millions of points in DM, CTF, who have been playing the demo servers only for years and years and in some cases five years right from inception. Incidentally, mentioning that avril hack brings to mind certain people who also have tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of frags in Onslaught, and almost all with Manta - who have undoubtedly been playing for years and whose personal stats reveal they have NEVER played on retail servers, due to the servers and gametypes they play ............... Those people, no doubt, have a VERY good reason to exclusively play demo servers and NEVER to buy the game to play on retail servers. And because the demo servers leech players from retail servers and are actually an incentive not to buy retail, honest customers who did buy the game basically become penalized for not pirating the game and not botting.

People who still wouldn't buy the game after 1 year, 2 years, 5 years....., despite it's ever availability, just cannot be trusted. That is regardless of whether or not they are caught cheating.

The whole point of cheating is to gain an unfair advantage over people who are not cheating. From what I've seen, botters tend not to enjoy playing against each other! Their cheats cancel each other out. So one or the other usually leaves, at least temporarily. If they only get to play with themselves, the cheats (or at least a large majority) will just stop playing and move to another game where they can play their cheat game. These people will never upgrade in any case because, unlike honest players who actually brought the game, they (the cheats) don't care about the game of UT2004 itself since the real, actual game that they are playing is cheating, botting, spewing profanities, making racial slurs, using obscenities at and trashtalking honest retail players; all in a free version of the game in which they don't have to bother about being banned or blocked. If the cheats and game pirates only get to do that to each other and not to honest players on public servers, where's the fun in that?! No point in playing their free cheat game!

Master browser list + public multiplayer should be limited to ONLY people who purchased retail. The demo should be limited to ONLY offline evaluation.

[Piglet]

argh that fricken avril hack thing :
:'(

What avril hack thing?

[izelol]

Master browser list + public multiplayer should be limited to ONLY people who purchased retail. The demo should be limited to ONLY offline evaluation.

Great solution.

[jackass]

Hi all,

I know I'm rookie on this forum, but I'm here with a purpose: I've played UT2004 for some time and I've encountered a lot of cheaters playing on-line. I've also noticed that most of this characters are congregating on two servers: PARBA.CZ 1 and 2. I've tried to notify the server's administrators but with no success (If I don't count geting kicked out myself, ). Browsing on this forum I've seen one thread about this subject (cheats and servers) but this thread is closed! Why? Does it mean that the EA Games surrendered to this pest? That would be a sad surprise for me, especially after buying the new UT3 but not geting (by far) the same satisfaction as playing UT2004. Thanks for your time and I hope I'll get some advice from you about how to proceed from now on. Best regards.

[GreatEmerald]

Hmm, I wonder if those are demo servers... By the way, can a 3369 server use the demo key? Or only demo patch servers can do that? If the latter, then it's very easy to identify bad servers - just look for the Unreal Tournament logo in the icons tab.