Cheating for trophies

[diskdocx]

1 hour ago, KuromeIsWaifuJ said:

I have extremely strong views on cheating

 

How do I classify something as cheating:

• Weigh up what the requirements actually are for the trophy, does it require a lot of skill to obtain or is it just going to take a long time to achieve
• Consider the tier and rarity of the trophy as to what kind of level of play should be required
• What is my Initial reaction to viewing the requirements, do I think "oh this isn't going to be challenging" "well this one may be a little tricky" or "wow this is going to take some getting!

If the strategy you are going to use makes you feel like "ok this will mean that a 3 day task is going to take me 40 minutes" or "well this is a really hard trophy but using this little trick I can do it easy then in my book you are a cheat if you then go ahead and use it, unless you are some kind of entitled teen it should be intuitive that you shouldn't find a really difficult task really easy and if you do then you're probably cheating in some way.

 

{if you haven't played super meat boy, do not read below this as you will likely have no clue what on earth I am on about}

 

To give an example of how picky I am about it:

 

I woludn't even switch characters from meat boy on no death runs of super meat boy because some characters allowed you to complete some of the harder levels of each chapter with very little effort, one such level being on rapture dark world where you can use the kid to jump inside of the zombie boy machine and collect all the keys without having to worry about getting rid of the zombie boys using the middle saw.

 

Most people are not quite that picky but there you go.

Sorry, but that is ridiculous, and entirely arbitrary. You are choosing to play a game a particular way, then defining anyone who doesn't play it the same way you do as a cheat? Absurd.

 

While you are certainly entitled to play you games however you choose to get maximal enjoyment, you cannot label others as cheaters simply because they take a different approach.

 

At the end of the day, any feature which is available within the game and can be used equally by all players should not be considered cheating. Glitches, exploits, debug menus, boosting, share play - NOT cheating.

 

Doesn't mean anyone is required to use those features, and they can approach the game in whatever way they would like in order to get maximal enjoyment out of the game. But any universally available trick that can be utilized by anyone playing the game is fair in my opinion.

 

At the end of the day people should just play and enjoy their games in whatever way they see fit, and stop worrying about what others are doing.

 

 

[Bilpe]

Put simply, if it does not involve manipulating code or using someone else's save file, it's not cheating.  If I can get someone to agree to give me $100, it's not stealing; if I can get someone to let me shoot them in an online match 1000 times, it's not cheating.

[melodicmizery]

On 3/5/2019 at 1:49 PM, KANERKB said:

Not sure if there is a topic for it but wanted to ask about cheating for trophies. As in using either a ingame cheat for them, or glitches or even some of that good old save cheating. (As in save the game back the save up, and then, once you got the trophy with that one on the system you reupload the save to the system and then get the other trophies and so on. kind of like choices in games.) Or just getting people to help get it as in say the little big planet trophy with the 50 hearts and likes and so on. you need a lot of people to like and so on.

 

Want to know what you think of them. are they bad in your eyes or good and so on.

im fine with it, most of these games go dead way to fast now. and some trophies are so ridiculous that they only get earned by someone who specifically plays that game and only that game the legit way. and who knows how long a game will last before they decide to kill it. i use to love MAG and was working realllly hard on trying to complete that game and then bam its just offline and dead. alot of games i do 5 playthroughs sometimes so if i have one or 2 trophies left after that i really just want to get them out of the way as fast as possible. 

[Elvick_]

Does manipulating shitty AI count as cheating? I don't see how it's any different. If the AI glitches and just stands there, even if the game is a good one this can happen at times... do you have to reload the game just to say you actually beat the enemy? I don't think so. I don't see how any glitch that helps get a trophy is any different than beating a boss because you stun locked them in a way that wasn't intended, or due to a glitch with collision when they get pinned by a rock or something.

People exploit games all the time, even if it's not for trophies. Some already mentioned speedrunning. People always refer to the third person shooter cover "cheat" where you can basically aim behind cover way better than when in cover. And that's clearly not intended by developers since often times, visually, you're entirely behind the cover you're shooting from. Yet it's there. And people do it. For trophies or not.

I don't care. Do what you want, just don't hack anything and it's fine.

[I need more BIOSHOCK]

When it comes to those boring long winded grind trophies that take tens of hours, if there is a way of leaving your controller idle with a certain button secured in place damn right I'm doing it! In game exploits to make life easier hell yes! 

 

I've boosted a tonne of online trophies because online trophies are just annoying shite and most of the online games are just full of irritating knob scratches. Give me standard single player stuff without having to rely on anyone else every time. 

 

The only thing I'd never do is hack or use modded save files and the like. I really don't see what anyone gets out of that..... Ah sweet I got all the trophies and the plat in seconds! I didn't earn a single one but I got them.... Good for you. 

[Feral]

Glitches or boosting are one thing and I'm cool with them. But using cheats and messing around with saves are another thing and that's when it crosses into cheating.

[zeero7uk]

Using in game exploits, save scumming etc is fine. 

 

Using CFW hacks is just dumb

[Startyde]

Using any out of the box means is fair game. Only direct hacking is off limits.

 

 

[Crispy_Oglop]

Trophies are generally an arbitrary thing, they mean different things to different people. I feel like it's a waste of good energy to get annoyed at people for hacking / cheating in PvE games to get trophies.

 

I see a fair few people getting annoyed when they see a difficult trophy they earned through legitimate means, being earned by someone else in a nefarious way. I used to get annoyed in the past, but I realized that just because someone has hacked or cheated on something i've earned for real, it doesn't take away how I should feel about my accomplishment.

 

To anyone who get's frustrated, I recommend trying that approach

[FawltyPowers]

If you've met all the requirements for the trophy to pop then how you've done it is irrelevant.

[foreverkurome]

4 hours ago, Elvick_ said:

Does manipulating shitty AI count as cheating? I don't see how it's any different. If the AI glitches and just stands there, even if the game is a good one this can happen at times... do you have to reload the game just to say you actually beat the enemy? I don't think so. I don't see how any glitch that helps get a trophy is any different than beating a boss because you stun locked them in a way that wasn't intended, or due to a glitch with collision when they get pinned by a rock or something.

People exploit games all the time, even if it's not for trophies. Some already mentioned speedrunning. People always refer to the third person shooter cover "cheat" where you can basically aim behind cover way better than when in cover. And that's clearly not intended by developers since often times, visually, you're entirely behind the cover you're shooting from. Yet it's there. And people do it. For trophies or not.

I don't care. Do what you want, just don't hack anything and it's fine.

I would say not, poor quality AI is not something the developers did not intend to do unlike a glitch or an exploit found by the player, they knew they were making bad AI since AI programming takes a good long while so there would be plenty of time to debug and improve the code.

12 hours ago, diskdocx said:

Sorry, but that is ridiculous, and entirely arbitrary. You are choosing to play a game a particular way, then defining anyone who doesn't play it the same way you do as a cheat? Absurd.

 

While you are certainly entitled to play you games however you choose to get maximal enjoyment, you cannot label others as cheaters simply because they take a different approach.

 

At the end of the day, any feature which is available within the game and can be used equally by all players should not be considered cheating. Glitches, exploits, debug menus, boosting, share play - NOT cheating.

 

Doesn't mean anyone is required to use those features, and they can approach the game in whatever way they would like in order to get maximal enjoyment out of the game. But any universally available trick that can be utilized by anyone playing the game is fair in my opinion.

 

At the end of the day people should just play and enjoy their games in whatever way they see fit, and stop worrying about what others are doing.

 

 

You could say the same thing about teaming in Agario, sure it's possible to do it but by how much it breaks the balance of the game aynone with any sense could see it's cheating.

[diskdocx]

5 hours ago, KuromeIsWaifuJ said:

I would say not, poor quality AI is not something the developers did not intend to do unlike a glitch or an exploit found by the player, they knew they were making bad AI since AI programming takes a good long while so there would be plenty of time to debug and improve the code.

You could say the same thing about teaming in Agario, sure it's possible to do it but by how much it breaks the balance of the game aynone with any sense could see it's cheating.

Not entirely comparable. In one case, you are referring to how someone goes about unlocking trophies. If I use a glitch or an exploit or boost - that doesn't impact the way another person plays an experiences a game. Again, you are free to approach the game in whatever manner you get most enjoyment.

 

For MP experiences, glitching, exploiting, camping, boosting - those things can significantly impact the experience of others. We aren't talking about just unlocking trophies now, but talking about ruining the game for others.

 

I would say that is cheating, but more importantly, its just inconsiderate. 

 

But offline trophies and online MP matches are apples and oranges.

[AJ_Radio]

On 3/20/2019 at 3:31 PM, KuromeIsWaifuJ said:

To give an example of how picky I am about it:

 

 

I woludn't even switch characters from meat boy on no death runs of super meat boy because some characters allowed you to complete some of the harder levels of each chapter with very little effort, one such level being on rapture dark world where you can use the kid to jump inside of the zombie boy machine and collect all the keys without having to worry about getting rid of the zombie boys using the middle saw.

 

I'm sorry but this is absolutely stupid.

 

All the worlds except for Cotton Alley can be played by any character you have unlocked. And why wouldn't you use The Kid for most of the levels? He is the best all around character in the game. For some levels Meat Boy is better because he has better speed than The Kid, but without a vital double jump move many of the levels are much more difficult.

 

In Cotton Alley you're stuck with Girl Boy because that's what the developers intended to have.

 

Still, Super Meat Boy is a very difficult game. As somebody who spent 10 - 12 hours each on the last few no death runs I completed your statement here is ridiculous.

[VoidVictorious]

Everyone has an ethical line to cross when it comes to close calls. I would ask yourself two questions: 1. Is what I’m about to do going to diminish the accomplishment I feel from getting the trophy; and 2. Is it worth compromising my account? If the answer to both questions is no then I think you are safe in most instances as a general rule.

[foreverkurome]

On 22/03/2019 at 1:47 PM, Spaz said:

 

I'm sorry but this is absolutely stupid.

 

All the worlds except for Cotton Alley can be played by any character you have unlocked. And why wouldn't you use The Kid for most of the levels? He is the best all around character in the game. For some levels Meat Boy is better because he has better speed than The Kid, but without a vital double jump move many of the levels are much more difficult.

 

In Cotton Alley you're stuck with Girl Boy because that's what the developers intended to have.

 

Still, Super Meat Boy is a very difficult game. As somebody who spent 10 - 12 hours each on the last few no death runs I completed your statement here is ridiculous.

I prefer the satisfaction in completing a hard challenge without trivialising it, with the shape of the terrain, curves formed by meat boy jumping fit the map much better than those with the kid so to me it's obvious they intended for meat boy to be used especially since they fixed you at bandage girl for the last levels who is basically meat boy controls wise therefore it's cheap to use any of the other characters for no death runs, it is afterall a no death run not a no death stop to change your character every 3 levels then run again run.so it should be completed in one go and since meat boy is the only character that can fit every level in the game that's who I will use.

 

and making something that should be hard really easy for yourself is cheating in my opinion so as for the ridicularity of my statement: no i don't think i'm being ridiculous wanting to actually play the game right instead of cut corners wherever it is possible, that's half the problem of the present day attitude to things.

[AJ_Radio]

3 hours ago, KuromeIsWaifuJ said:

I prefer the satisfaction in completing a hard challenge without trivialising it, with the shape of the terrain, curves formed by meat boy jumping fit the map much better than those with the kid so to me it's obvious they intended for meat boy to be used especially since they fixed you at bandage girl for the last levels who is basically meat boy controls wise therefore it's cheap to use any of the other characters for no death runs, it is afterall a no death run not a no death stop to change your character every 3 levels then run again run.so it should be completed in one go and since meat boy is the only character that can fit every level in the game that's who I will use.

 

and making something that should be hard really easy for yourself is cheating in my opinion so as for the ridicularity of my statement: no i don't think i'm being ridiculous wanting to actually play the game right instead of cut corners wherever it is possible, that's half the problem of the present day attitude to things.

 

You’re just penalizing yourself if you’re not switching characters at all during those no death runs. 

 

Exploiting the Orb Glitch in both Jak 2 and Jak 3 is moreso cheating then switching characters in Super Meat Boy. You’re taking advantage of a glitch that the developers missed and overlooked, but it’s perfectly acceptable on this website to earn those gold trophies with the exploit. 

 

There’s a very thin line if you were to say, earn the Run Like The Wind trophy in Grand Theft Auto V on the PS3 because you probably got it from a modder. There are hacked lobbies in a number of older PS3 games and if you were to earn trophies in those lobbies that are otherwise impossible to get in normal conditions, you will be flagged. 

 

Switching characters in Super Meat Boy is not cheating. If you want to do those runs with just Meat Boy you are free to do so. But you are making the game a lot more difficult. If you were speedrunning the game it would be stupid to not switch characters at all, because some characters are better in certain situations than others. 

Edited March 23, 2019 by Spaz

[foreverkurome]

2 hours ago, Spaz said:

 

You’re just penalizing yourself if you’re not switching characters at all during those no death runs. 

 

Exploiting the Orb Glitch in both Jak 2 and Jak 3 is moreso cheating then switching characters in Super Meat Boy. You’re taking advantage of a glitch that the developers missed and overlooked, but it’s perfectly acceptable on this website to earn those gold trophies with the exploit. 

 

There’s a very thin line if you were to say, earn the Run Like The Wind trophy in Grand Theft Auto V on the PS3 because you probably got it from a modder. There are hacked lobbies in a number of older PS3 games and if you were to earn trophies in those lobbies that are otherwise impossible to get in normal conditions, you will be flagged. 

 

Switching characters in Super Meat Boy is not cheating. If you want to do those runs with just Meat Boy you are free to do so. But you are making the game a lot more difficult. If you were speedrunning the game it would be stupid to not switch characters at all, because some characters are better in certain situations than others. 

I see your point, I do enjoy making things harder than necessary for myself why? i have no idea maybe for satisfaction, self accomplishment, who knows and I think we can agree to disagree on this, your point is also valid and you managed tp get through it wiithut a single curseword which is in itself... incredibly impressive given the current state of the internet.

Edited March 24, 2019 by KuromeIsWaifuJ

[AJ_Radio]

54 minutes ago, KuromeIsWaifuJ said:

I see your point, I do enjoy making things harder than necessary for myself why? i have no idea maybe for satisfaction, self accomplishment, who knows and I think we can agree to disagree on this, your point is also valid and you managed tp get through it wiithut a single curseword which is in itself... incredibly impressive given the current state of the internet.

 

That's because the person you're talking to on the other end you will probably never meet in real life.

 

I have no problem saying most of what I say in front of somebody should the need arise. Most people just sit behind their computers and turn into keyboard warriors.

 

Plus, I have over 15 years of experience using the internet forums and I found early on that using an excessive amount of cussing to get a point across doesn't make your point too credible.

 

I will say that certain genres like point and clicks are overly trivialized because any idiot can look up a walkthrough guide for those games and have that platinum in a matter of hours. Other games like Super Meat Boy, Furi and the like you may still struggle with them even with a video guide because those games are heavily reliant on skill, sometimes it comes down to luck.

 

A lot of trophy hunters try to find exploits and/or shortcuts to try to minimize the difficulty a little. Dead Space 1, 2 and 3 all have DLC packs that give you weapons and armor for an edge. They are completely optional, but certain difficulties like Hard Core in Dead Space 2 for instance can be made easier if you were to purchase and take advantage of the boosts you get from the DLC packs. 

 

I think that anybody who works their way and accomplishes the platinum in Super Meat Boy should be rewarded, regardless if you use one character or all of them. Cotton Alley is restricted to one character only, so you can't use all characters for all worlds anyway. I just disagree with the notion that using different characters is a form of cheating, and I don't think they trivialize the difficulty all too much.

[Property_Damage]

On 3/21/2019 at 1:12 AM, Bilpe said:

 if I can get someone to let me shoot them in an online match 1000 times, it's not cheating.

According to call of duty standards

that certainly is cheating and can get you banned lol

but im not here to nit pick

[Lordguwa]

On 3/21/2019 at 1:45 AM, Elvick_ said:

Does manipulating shitty AI count as cheating? I don't see how it's any different. If the AI glitches and just stands there, even if the game is a good one this can happen at times... do you have to reload the game just to say you actually beat the enemy? I don't think so. I don't see how any glitch that helps get a trophy is any different than beating a boss because you stun locked them in a way that wasn't intended, or due to a glitch with collision when they get pinned by a rock or something.

People exploit games all the time, even if it's not for trophies. Some already mentioned speedrunning. People always refer to the third person shooter cover "cheat" where you can basically aim behind cover way better than when in cover. And that's clearly not intended by developers since often times, visually, you're entirely behind the cover you're shooting from. Yet it's there. And people do it. For trophies or not.

I don't care. Do what you want, just don't hack anything and it's fine.

 

it's fair game. i had one occurance in DMC where i made the final fight guy use a certain attack over and over again. doing it under normal circumstances wasn't possible on hell and hell mode at least in my case. i just made him jump and i blasted the shotgun ingame it took some time but it got done.

Edited March 24, 2019 by kingdrake2

[Spinosaurus Rex]

On 20.03.2019 at 11:31 PM, KuromeIsWaifuJ said:

I woludn't even switch characters from meat boy on no death runs of super meat boy because some characters allowed you to complete some of the harder levels of each chapter with very little effort, one such level being on rapture dark world where you can use the kid to jump inside of the zombie boy machine and collect all the keys without having to worry about getting rid of the zombie boys using the middle saw.

 

We can go even further and say doing levels out of order or pausing and exiting the game can also be considered a cheating. While the latter may be closest to this term, I think devs could easily give us some kind of "one life marathon" option with every chapter played as a Meat Boy/Bandage Girl, level 1-20 without option of exiting to level select screen. It was probably a bit of "mercy" from them. They at least forbid to save your run after exiting the game, so save scumming isn't an option here.

At least we PS players don't have the exploit like on PC version:

What to think about it? It's cheating, yes, but it's also available for anyone. It depends of your morality. I'm glad it's not possible here though.

 

Wolfenstein II: TNC is true epitome of how to make permadeath trophies: run is reset when you exit the game, played from start to finish, and 3 hours of gameplay on highest difficulty. Devs definitely didn't want anybody to use any exploits here. Anyone who played The End Is Nigh, another McMillen's platformer, knows The Super Mega Cart Unbreakable achievement is similiar in this way (100 levels without dying/quitting to main menu/played from start to finish)

 

For me, the true "cheating", like some people above stated, are hacks/mods/external save states AND when you don't earn the trophy by yourself, either by SharePlay or by somebody coming into your house and playing for you (co-op trophies can also be counted, when one person can do all the work and both get the trophy). Boosting (because that's the main topic here, it seems) is fine IMO in any condition (even with games full of players and easy online trophies). Many, many games are dead now where boosting is mandatory, and there even games where it's nigh impossible to get specific trophies without boosting even with server brimming with people.

Edited March 24, 2019 by Spinosaurus Rex

[Mayadome]

If it is within the realms of the game then it is 100% not cheating. Exploits, cheat codes (in game), backup saves or boosting is 100% fair game in my opinion. If you use external factors to cheat though, that is cheating. I don't mean things such as turbo controllers or anything like that but rather hacks or programs that alter the game externally. People who do that should be banned and banished from the trophy hunting community no questions asked. I'm actually kinda surprised by PSNProfiles fairly lax rules on cheaters, unless it's changed they only remove them from that game's leaderboard and puts a red bar on the game in your profile? I think it should be 1 strike and you're removed from the site entirely.

Edited March 24, 2019 by Mayadome

[Terra]

If the cheat or exploit is part of the game then I don't see a problem with it. The only issue I have is using someone else's save file to get easy trophies. In my opinion, that is taking the easy way out. I mean, when I look back on the trophies I earned, I remember all the hard work I put into them. If all my trophies were obtained via cheating, then I wouldn't get that satisfaction from earning them.

[Lonemankane]

11 minutes ago, Terra said:

 

 

59 minutes ago, Mayadome said:

 

 

well what happens if someone used a hacked gun in say something like borderlands, as I know a lot of people who used that in the first and some in the second game and it was normally given to others by hackers and so on. would that be called cheating? Or what about if say someone plays metal slug 1 to 6 with x and so on. On ps4 and they use share play to get a friend to help, as in do 2 players on the levels to do the trophies to do with saving the people or beating the game with less then 5 continues. Is that cheating?

Edited March 24, 2019 by KANERKB

[Terra]

4 minutes ago, KANERKB said:

 

 

well what happens if someone used a hacked gun in say something like borderlands, as I know a lot of people who used that in the first and some in the second game and it was normally given to others by hackers and so on. would that be called cheating? Or what about if say someone plays metal slug 1 to 6 with x and so on. On ps4 and they use share play to get a friend to help, as in do 2 players on the levels to do the trophies to do with saving the people or beating the game with less then 5 continues. Is that cheating?

I haven't used share play myself but I guess it would be ok since both the player and the friend are doing the trophy together. As for the other two scenarios, I'm not entirely sure.