Activision has announced that Ricochet, Call of Duty’s anti-cheat software, has been upgraded to now feature hardware detection and in-game punishment of cheaters.
Beginning with Call of Duty: Vanguard, Activision introduced its anti-cheat software Ricochet. Now for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II and Warzone 2, Ricochet is getting some big upgrades that are already rolling out across platforms. What’s different, you ask? According to Activision, Ricochet is getting new methods of detecting third-party hardware alongside punishments to cheaters applied in real-time in-game.
The idea behind hardware detection is to try and stop cheaters from using third-party hardware, like a Cronus, that’s capable of mitigating recoil and speeding up the fire rate of semi-automatic weapons. However, Activision isn’t explaining how this tech works. It makes sense that Activision doesn’t want cheaters to know exactly how its anti-cheat software works, on one hand, but on the other hand, it’s historically been notoriously difficult to detect third-party hardware, so the jury’s definitely still out on the effectiveness of this new feature.
Outside of hardware detection, though, the other new feature coming to Ricochet is both easier to implement and a lot more hilarious: real-time in-game punishment for cheating. The basic idea here is that if you’re caught cheating in a match, you could be subjected to Cloaking, Disarm, or Damage Shield Mitigation.
Cloaking means that cheaters won’t be able to see other players, while Disarm means that cheaters will find themselves without weapons. Damage Shield Mitigation means that gamers playing without cheats will get a protective shield against cheaters. Why bother with these more creative punishments instead of an automatic ban? Well, these punishments give the devs some time to verify if actual cheating is taking place before issuing bans, but they also serve to humiliate and shame cheaters, hopefully discouraging cheating in general.
Of course, Call of Duty has always had problems with cheaters, so it’s unclear, right now, how effective these upgrades to Ricochet will be, but only time will tell.
