This is a money grab with the polish of a pro-gamer cheat-cleanup.
Why do I say that?
Microsoft can fix most of the 'cheats' that a software controller can implement in software. Auto-fire is trivial to detect, as is a KBM setup where it doesn't belong. Out of the ordinary joystick characteristics/speed/hysteresis/range would make it obvious to them which controllers are aftermarket if they cared to disallow them after only a few minutes of profiling the player.
and the fun point I bring up with regards to this : the determined cheaters will just pin-out a 'qualified authentic' controller to any choice of small prototyping boards and just re-create a 'Cronus-like' device higher up the device chain without detection, and this will continue until Microsoft implements software side detection via some sort of clever profiling scheme.
OK, maybe I'm biased here as a PC gamer who frequently uses a controller... but why not just allow both? Some games like Gears of War on Xbox already do this. Others, like Fortnite, offer crossplay and just show a symbol over each player's head.
Do mouse and keyboard players have an advantage? Sure. So do players with bigger TVs or Series X graphics or less worn controllers or the Elite controller. Big deal?
The PC ecosystem has had open control interfaces since forever, whether it's flight sticks or foot pedals or steering wheels or 3d controllers or all of the above. Both in coop and competitive games, people use whatever input devices they like (and can afford). Somehow the ecosystem hasn't collapsed.
I love my Xbox controller, but it's simply an inferior input for shooters. It's superior in many other genres (action RPGs, driving and flight sims, arcade battles, side scrollers). It all evens out.
I don't get the big deal here. Why purposefully handicap your player base instead of letting them use whatever they want?
And autofire... eh, seems like a non issue. Why not just give the weapons a max semi auto fire rate?
"Auto-fire is trivial to detect, as is a KBM setup where it doesn't belong"
[..]
"if they cared to disallow them after only a few minutes of profiling the player."
Definitely not trivial and a gross over simplification. It will create a whole bunch of grey area's and endless tweaking. Which in turn will lead to people getting unfairly banned. Meaning Microsoft will then need to investigate these cases to unban them.
I disagree completely -- there's no significant money to be made here. Microsoft wouldn't even bother if this were a financial play, it's so small. Not that many people use non-Xbox controllers to begin with, and whatever licensing fees Microsoft will charge manufacturers may very well be offset by the costs of running the licensing program itself.
This seems very clearly to be anti-cheat. Advantages are not "trivial to detect" "after only a few minutes" -- there's tons of issues with false positives and false negatives. Any software detection, cheaters can learn how to go right up to the line but not cross it, and that still gives them big advantages, while genuinely really good players get unfairly banned.
This is a single-purpose gaming console, not a general-computing device. One of the big benefits of console gaming is precisely protecting gamers against cheats, which makes it different from PC gaming. Microsoft wants a fair gaming experience for everyone, which makes it more fun for everyone who wants to play fair. If your idea of fun in gaming is cheating, then use a PC instead.
I guarantee you that the total profit generated from selling XBOX controllers is immaterial to Microsoft. Anyone with an ounce of understanding of hardware business models will tell you that this has nothing to do with selling more controllers.
Tell me you've never worked on an anti-cheat without saying you've never worked on an anti-cheat.....
Why do you even say this if you really don't know it?
In short - you don't want false positives with anti-cheat, you can tolerate some false negatives. Input timings and sequences are impossible to use for this, as button mashers (it's a pseudo-sport) can press buttons at up to 20 times a second - far faster than auto-fire would. Regularity of presses just takes care of the most obvious auto-fire, but once again - there isn't a clear human-robot threshold. And most auto-fire will be far on the human side.
So you normally use a composite or layered approach. If there are enough signals of cheating on layer 1, you do more thorough checks on layer 2, 3, etc. The higher layers can be other players watching replays, ML, behavior-matching, and so on. Layer 1 can be "too lucky" checks, speed checks, ESP (extra-sensory perception/clairvoyance), altered memory, data packet manipulation, suspicious IPs, honey trap code paths/memory locations/impossible game states, skill inconsistencies, stupid values written into obfuscated memory, etc. All of those, by the way, have significant false positives on a large scale. But higher layers are almost always heuristics-based (human or machine), and with high false positives. So all together - not good, not easy.
KM setup is easier to detect as there are certain expectations such a set-up must meet for the user, which are a different set of expectations from a controller. But it's still harder than one might think. Analog triggers can be simulated, noise can be introduced in smooth mouse movement, button presses that aren't feasible on a controller can be disabled on the keyboard, etc. Once again - the issue is with false positives. You don't want to ban a person because they play the game more "cheatey" naturally than the hardware that fakes it.
Tamper-proof hardware with an auth mechanism is a really elegant solution for near 0% false positives. You can't mod a controller if you can't open it.
And I suspect that players wouldn't mind buying such hardware if it put them in authenticated/cheat-free lobbies.
What Microsoft might doing here is a slightly different topic. All I am saying is that anti-cheat is really not what you're saying it is.
First of all, it's definitely a "money grab". I am very surprised they allowed unlicensed controllers in the first place: other consoles used to make more from licensing accessories than from licensing software. I'd imagine they allowed it to sacrifice some profit to attract more customers with cheaper accessories and now they feel that they have enough customers already, very strange move at this point.
However, the detection methods you described are very bad engineering. Any statistical method will have two types of errors: false positives and false negatives and you cannot eliminate either. Inevitable false positives will do much more damage to the consumer perception of the platform than any removal of third party controllers could possibly do.
I disagree with this take. If a small percentage of users still cheat / have an unfair advantage after this move, it’s still a win for Microsoft because they’ve significantly decreased that pool of people to the point that average players probably won’t encounter them often, and they’ve done it without incurring additional development costs.
In my view this is clearly a move intended to solidify brand trust.
I think that this is a response to the rising usage of the Cronus and/or other controller modification tools that give players advantages (cheats).
For example one of these "Mods" for Cronus state that they are:
a dynamic, fully-automated Anti-Recoil system that transforms your in-game character into a laser-guided juggernaut we've affectionately dubbed as [BEAM]
Battling cheaters in video games is a never-ending chase, but I appreciate that they are attempting something.
I wish that a gaming company could figure out a less invasive way to detect these cheaters.
This is one reason the Steam Deck model of being an open console system is the future.
Some dinosaurs wants to preserve the old locked-down console experience, where you have exclusive games, controllers and digital stores. But its just worse for the customer in every way.
The day Valve falls, for whatever reason (greed, incompetence, some impossible to predict market shift/tech innovation... Gabe doesn't have decades and decades left as CEO after all) - the open world of PC gaming as we know it will probably fall, to be devoured by the Microsoft/Epic/Ubisoft/etc of the world.
Compared to most other tech/gaming companies, it's shocking how non predatory and customer friendly they are.
I've been able to maintain my digital library for almost 2 decades now, I've played those games on dozens of different hardware configuration without having to pay a single cent for it - compared to my other digital libraries, many of which (Wii, 3DS, PSP, etc) are completely lost to time.
Not every way; you have more control over quality and experience in a closed system. I mean yeah it sucks, but so does spending money on a controller that isn't good enough.
edit: I'm reading somewhere else it's to stop cheat enabled controllers. Wouldn't want to play multiplayer games if someone has an unfair advantage like that.
I don't know, I very much enjoy the dinosaur PlayStation 5 experience, significantly more than my gaming PC (that I only use for flight-simming now). I mean, if Steam unveiled a new Steam Deck-style box with all the power, support, polish and sales of Xbox at least, I'd probably agree with you, but at this point I can't see how open console systems are "the future". Steam Deck sells because it's a great portable gaming system that can run AAA titles surprisingly well (unlike the poor underpowered Switch), and only then because it's more open than the (not direct) competition.
Also: "Xbox's new policy – say goodbye to unofficial accessories from November" (79 points, 79 comments, 17 hours ago)[0], "Xbox is ending support for unauthorized controllers" (3 points) [1], "Microsoft May Drop Support for 'Unauthorized' Xbox Controllers, Accessories" (2 points), "Microsoft Appears to Block Unofficial Third-Party Accessories on Xbox" (1 point)[3], "Microsoft is cracking down on unofficial Xbox gear" (3 points)[4]
No. The exact opposite. I'm sick of modern software telling me "something went wrong, try again later".
Unless every possible error scenario gets its own descriptive error, that error code is a necessity. And nobody is going to accept a dev adding error messages to every possible error, because localisation to 180+ languages will cost a fortune. Your choice is between "something went wrong" and "something went wrong 0x82939470". The first one is ungoogleable and useless, the second one will have resolutions on forums within a month of appearing.
Sure, I'd like every message to be descriptive towarsa the user, but that simply won't happen. Microsoft has an extensive API for formatting error codes already and if they pop up a 0xsomething, that means they were never going to bother with adding a descriptive message at all.
Error codes are specific and can be looked up. The modern trend of "uwu we fucky-wucked up" cutesy error messages with no details whatsoever is inexcusable because of how much harder it makes to troubleshoot the error.
if I had to pick between error code and text meesage, I'll pick error code.
why? localization fragments search results.
I've seen a lot of people struggling to solve their Linux issues because they were searching for errors and logs in spanish and search results are several orders of magnitude off.
The Xbox is a computer. It natively supports keyboards and mice. Just give up on this idea of an anachronistic “console experience” already. It’s just holding players and games back.
It's disappointing, but not surprising. This is the same console which pioneered charging to play games online, while providing no value, simply because they can get away with it. Locking you into their more expensive controllers is totally on brand for them.
Damn, won't be able to give my little bro the MadCatz every time. What's the world coming to?
Seriously though, this is awful. Hopefully we see more regulation of this sort of thing EU usb-c/removable battery style. I mean ideally we'd be breaking these companies up, but regulating them is a good step.
If they were restricting controllers from the start, that would be one thing, and controller exclusivity is something every console manufacturer right back to Atari has always thought about from the very beginning - mostly for cash-grab reasons, but also, much later on, with this very excuse. It's why the original XBox's USB controllers were a different shape.
But to me this feels like a clear-cut case of interoperability, unilaterally and unconditionally removed after the fact of the sale of both millions of consoles and controllers (both first-party and not). Are they sure they want to do that? Now?
This also reminds me very much of Sony's removal of OtherOS in the PS3, and I draw the analogy with what happened to the console's security afterwards very much in mind.
Nothing Apple hasn't been doing for years at much greater magnitudes without many objections from the tech crowd.
Makes me sick to the stomach, but everyone seems to love Steve Jobs, the genius inventor, that never actually invented anything and died of a treatable cancer because he actually was a complete moron and didn't get treatment, because "he knew better" and opted for alternative medicine. Which reminds me of the joke: "You know what they call alternative medicine that's been proven to work? Medicine."
I was always baffled how M$ actually took over the controller game on PC as well. But this is also pretty greedy and obviously just for the money. Like if people wan to buy some crap that breaks in 30 days they should be, the market should decide. They should also buy some innovative controller from "unauthorized" companies that just work.
I mean its great to have a standardized button layout but we pretty much had that even B4 Xbox was were basically forced on every PC gamer. Games and steam also support PS controllers but I read all the time that games are lacking the icons or that they do not work correctly.
I recently bought a Turtle Beach controller that has button below that act like stick presses, I think the elite controller have that as well but it was cheaper and has no stupid wireless I do not need. Anyway I really do not like the fact that they have to pay some licensing fees or need to get it officially approve from fucking M$. I remember back in the day were you could actually use any controller in games, I do not think it works like that these days. You need like xbox controller emulator and shit so I just buy them begrudgingly. There would be more innovation like the Steam Controller (just on better, from someone else, never used one but the layout made no sense to me like the buttons below the pad but it was a step in the right direction I think) if M$ would not had this monopoly on their controllers that never really change.
Third-party alternatives must be allowed, the problem is Microsoft changing the rules long after shipping the console, in a way that not all perfectly fine controllers could be updated to handle.
What a load of trash. What MSFT is saying is, "We want you all to only buy our controllers."
With most games having crossplay, what "console experience" even exists anymore? Making people buy expensive ass controllers so they can be worked by someone with a cheap mouse and keyboard is not the "console experience" people want.
I hope this bites console manufacturers back by raising awareness that hall effect analogs exist and why does sony only put them in 4x more expensive gamepad than the regular one without hall effect sticks. Source: dual sense broken over years 5 times, every single one from stick drift. We aren't throwing these controllers around. Regular use for gaming.
[+] [-] serf|2 years ago|reply
Why do I say that?
Microsoft can fix most of the 'cheats' that a software controller can implement in software. Auto-fire is trivial to detect, as is a KBM setup where it doesn't belong. Out of the ordinary joystick characteristics/speed/hysteresis/range would make it obvious to them which controllers are aftermarket if they cared to disallow them after only a few minutes of profiling the player.
and the fun point I bring up with regards to this : the determined cheaters will just pin-out a 'qualified authentic' controller to any choice of small prototyping boards and just re-create a 'Cronus-like' device higher up the device chain without detection, and this will continue until Microsoft implements software side detection via some sort of clever profiling scheme.
[+] [-] solardev|2 years ago|reply
Do mouse and keyboard players have an advantage? Sure. So do players with bigger TVs or Series X graphics or less worn controllers or the Elite controller. Big deal?
The PC ecosystem has had open control interfaces since forever, whether it's flight sticks or foot pedals or steering wheels or 3d controllers or all of the above. Both in coop and competitive games, people use whatever input devices they like (and can afford). Somehow the ecosystem hasn't collapsed.
I love my Xbox controller, but it's simply an inferior input for shooters. It's superior in many other genres (action RPGs, driving and flight sims, arcade battles, side scrollers). It all evens out.
I don't get the big deal here. Why purposefully handicap your player base instead of letting them use whatever they want?
And autofire... eh, seems like a non issue. Why not just give the weapons a max semi auto fire rate?
[+] [-] jsiepkes|2 years ago|reply
[..]
"if they cared to disallow them after only a few minutes of profiling the player."
Definitely not trivial and a gross over simplification. It will create a whole bunch of grey area's and endless tweaking. Which in turn will lead to people getting unfairly banned. Meaning Microsoft will then need to investigate these cases to unban them.
[+] [-] crazygringo|2 years ago|reply
This seems very clearly to be anti-cheat. Advantages are not "trivial to detect" "after only a few minutes" -- there's tons of issues with false positives and false negatives. Any software detection, cheaters can learn how to go right up to the line but not cross it, and that still gives them big advantages, while genuinely really good players get unfairly banned.
This is a single-purpose gaming console, not a general-computing device. One of the big benefits of console gaming is precisely protecting gamers against cheats, which makes it different from PC gaming. Microsoft wants a fair gaming experience for everyone, which makes it more fun for everyone who wants to play fair. If your idea of fun in gaming is cheating, then use a PC instead.
[+] [-] fra|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] RobotToaster|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] clnq|2 years ago|reply
Tell me you've never worked on an anti-cheat without saying you've never worked on an anti-cheat.....
Why do you even say this if you really don't know it?
In short - you don't want false positives with anti-cheat, you can tolerate some false negatives. Input timings and sequences are impossible to use for this, as button mashers (it's a pseudo-sport) can press buttons at up to 20 times a second - far faster than auto-fire would. Regularity of presses just takes care of the most obvious auto-fire, but once again - there isn't a clear human-robot threshold. And most auto-fire will be far on the human side.
So you normally use a composite or layered approach. If there are enough signals of cheating on layer 1, you do more thorough checks on layer 2, 3, etc. The higher layers can be other players watching replays, ML, behavior-matching, and so on. Layer 1 can be "too lucky" checks, speed checks, ESP (extra-sensory perception/clairvoyance), altered memory, data packet manipulation, suspicious IPs, honey trap code paths/memory locations/impossible game states, skill inconsistencies, stupid values written into obfuscated memory, etc. All of those, by the way, have significant false positives on a large scale. But higher layers are almost always heuristics-based (human or machine), and with high false positives. So all together - not good, not easy.
KM setup is easier to detect as there are certain expectations such a set-up must meet for the user, which are a different set of expectations from a controller. But it's still harder than one might think. Analog triggers can be simulated, noise can be introduced in smooth mouse movement, button presses that aren't feasible on a controller can be disabled on the keyboard, etc. Once again - the issue is with false positives. You don't want to ban a person because they play the game more "cheatey" naturally than the hardware that fakes it.
Tamper-proof hardware with an auth mechanism is a really elegant solution for near 0% false positives. You can't mod a controller if you can't open it.
And I suspect that players wouldn't mind buying such hardware if it put them in authenticated/cheat-free lobbies.
What Microsoft might doing here is a slightly different topic. All I am saying is that anti-cheat is really not what you're saying it is.
[+] [-] pandaman|2 years ago|reply
However, the detection methods you described are very bad engineering. Any statistical method will have two types of errors: false positives and false negatives and you cannot eliminate either. Inevitable false positives will do much more damage to the consumer perception of the platform than any removal of third party controllers could possibly do.
[+] [-] dumpsterdiver|2 years ago|reply
In my view this is clearly a move intended to solidify brand trust.
[+] [-] baby|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] erfgh|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dangus|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Gibbon1|2 years ago|reply
Ya all want to play with cheats enabled on your Fuxsor Ceatboss 6000's. Go head.
[+] [-] grepfru_it|2 years ago|reply
Found the person who hasn’t been tormented by a player with chronus
DRM is bad though. The cognitive dissonance on this one shall be the tipping point
[+] [-] 2close4comfort|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jasonladuke0311|2 years ago|reply
How is this done? Input rate variability or something?
[+] [-] 0x500x79|2 years ago|reply
For example one of these "Mods" for Cronus state that they are:
a dynamic, fully-automated Anti-Recoil system that transforms your in-game character into a laser-guided juggernaut we've affectionately dubbed as [BEAM]
Battling cheaters in video games is a never-ending chase, but I appreciate that they are attempting something.
I wish that a gaming company could figure out a less invasive way to detect these cheaters.
[+] [-] lawn|2 years ago|reply
Some dinosaurs wants to preserve the old locked-down console experience, where you have exclusive games, controllers and digital stores. But its just worse for the customer in every way.
[+] [-] belugacat|2 years ago|reply
Compared to most other tech/gaming companies, it's shocking how non predatory and customer friendly they are.
I've been able to maintain my digital library for almost 2 decades now, I've played those games on dozens of different hardware configuration without having to pay a single cent for it - compared to my other digital libraries, many of which (Wii, 3DS, PSP, etc) are completely lost to time.
[+] [-] waveBidder|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Cthulhu_|2 years ago|reply
edit: I'm reading somewhere else it's to stop cheat enabled controllers. Wouldn't want to play multiplayer games if someone has an unfair advantage like that.
[+] [-] bentcorner|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Toutouxc|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pipeline_peak|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dncornholio|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gnabgib|2 years ago|reply
[0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38066858 [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38065269 [2]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38070427 [3]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38073269 [4]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38076461
[+] [-] JoeAltmaier|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] qalmakka|2 years ago|reply
OT: Microsoft should be banned by decree from showing naked error codes to people, I've been fighting them for decades now
[+] [-] jeroenhd|2 years ago|reply
Unless every possible error scenario gets its own descriptive error, that error code is a necessity. And nobody is going to accept a dev adding error messages to every possible error, because localisation to 180+ languages will cost a fortune. Your choice is between "something went wrong" and "something went wrong 0x82939470". The first one is ungoogleable and useless, the second one will have resolutions on forums within a month of appearing.
Sure, I'd like every message to be descriptive towarsa the user, but that simply won't happen. Microsoft has an extensive API for formatting error codes already and if they pop up a 0xsomething, that means they were never going to bother with adding a descriptive message at all.
[+] [-] grishka|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kobalsky|2 years ago|reply
why? localization fragments search results.
I've seen a lot of people struggling to solve their Linux issues because they were searching for errors and logs in spanish and search results are several orders of magnitude off.
of course, both are better.
[+] [-] falcolas|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bigstrat2003|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thot_experiment|2 years ago|reply
Seriously though, this is awful. Hopefully we see more regulation of this sort of thing EU usb-c/removable battery style. I mean ideally we'd be breaking these companies up, but regulating them is a good step.
[+] [-] jspaetzel|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] donatj|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] AlyssaRowan|2 years ago|reply
But to me this feels like a clear-cut case of interoperability, unilaterally and unconditionally removed after the fact of the sale of both millions of consoles and controllers (both first-party and not). Are they sure they want to do that? Now?
This also reminds me very much of Sony's removal of OtherOS in the PS3, and I draw the analogy with what happened to the console's security afterwards very much in mind.
[+] [-] throwaway49594|2 years ago|reply
https://www.theverge.com/2023/7/18/23799149/gamesir-g7-se-xb...
https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/How+to+Fix+Xbox+One+Wireless+Co...
[+] [-] Garvi|2 years ago|reply
Makes me sick to the stomach, but everyone seems to love Steve Jobs, the genius inventor, that never actually invented anything and died of a treatable cancer because he actually was a complete moron and didn't get treatment, because "he knew better" and opted for alternative medicine. Which reminds me of the joke: "You know what they call alternative medicine that's been proven to work? Medicine."
[+] [-] redder23|2 years ago|reply
I mean its great to have a standardized button layout but we pretty much had that even B4 Xbox was were basically forced on every PC gamer. Games and steam also support PS controllers but I read all the time that games are lacking the icons or that they do not work correctly.
I recently bought a Turtle Beach controller that has button below that act like stick presses, I think the elite controller have that as well but it was cheaper and has no stupid wireless I do not need. Anyway I really do not like the fact that they have to pay some licensing fees or need to get it officially approve from fucking M$. I remember back in the day were you could actually use any controller in games, I do not think it works like that these days. You need like xbox controller emulator and shit so I just buy them begrudgingly. There would be more innovation like the Steam Controller (just on better, from someone else, never used one but the layout made no sense to me like the buttons below the pad but it was a step in the right direction I think) if M$ would not had this monopoly on their controllers that never really change.
[+] [-] test6554|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] flipdot|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] VikingCoder|2 years ago|reply
...or allow a specific game to say "this server is 1st party controller only" or something like that, yeah, maybe, I can see the logic.
But a blanket block-out is obviously bullshit.
[+] [-] rekoil|2 years ago|reply
Third-party alternatives must be allowed, the problem is Microsoft changing the rules long after shipping the console, in a way that not all perfectly fine controllers could be updated to handle.
[+] [-] fodkodrasz|2 years ago|reply
Making gaming competitive kills one more way to have fun (competitive gaming -> cheats -> anti cheat measures -> less fun for the casual).
[+] [-] hirvi74|2 years ago|reply
With most games having crossplay, what "console experience" even exists anymore? Making people buy expensive ass controllers so they can be worked by someone with a cheap mouse and keyboard is not the "console experience" people want.
[+] [-] nix0n|2 years ago|reply
The official Xbox controller is the one thing I've ever bought that it's worth getting the warranty on.
Anyone thinking that M$ plans to sell one controller per Xbox, is overestimating the reliability of those controllers.
[+] [-] pawelduda|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ericzawo|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] extraduder_ire|2 years ago|reply
Last time I remember this happening was in the middle of the ps3's lifecycle, and I had to return a generic controller because of it.