If you’ve ever played online multiplayer games, the chances are, you’ve encountered bots. Whether you recognize them or not, they are everywhere, especially in free and cheap games. They’re not typically bothering anyone, so what’s the big deal? Why should anyone care? Botting can have serious consequences to game integrity. A handful of bots is not usually a big deal, but botting is not just about a few people cutting corners. It’s an entire industry and some people make a living out of it.
What is botting?
At its core, botting involves automating gameplay tasks that would otherwise require human attention. This can be basically any in-game activity, but most bots are made for simple, repetitive tasks, such as collecting or killing things. Bots can run on simple scripts, like auto-clickers, or dedicated applications made just for botting.
Why is it a problem?
Bots can seem harmless at first glance. Why should you care if someone uses a script to collect virtual flowers for 12 hours a day? In single-player games, this is not an issue because the resources are tied only to their own account, but in multiplayer environment, the resources are typically gathered to be sold.
Bots flood the in-game market with resources, which without proper countermeasures from the game’s developers, will inevitably crash the in-game market. It drives the prices of the botted resources down, which destroys money-making methods for legitimate players.
Botting and real-world trading
Botting and real-world trading (RWT) often go hand-in-hand. The resources are either sold directly for real money, or they are traded for in-game currency first, and then real money. In some parts of the world, botting has become organized business, which can be done by, for example, running the bots on cloud-servers. Depending on the resources being sold and the local real-world economy, some people can even earn their living by botting.
The fight against bots
Game developers have been fighting bots for ages. New bot-detection technologies come out constantly and more bots are being detected, but the unfortunate reality is that bots also evolve. Eventually, the bot developers always find a way around the detection systems and new bots emerge. This leads to an endless cat-and-mouse game, which can make legitimate players feel as if nothing is being done to stop bots.
Conclusions
Botting has grown far beyond individuals trying to save time in games and has developed into a large-scale industry connected to real-world trading. At first glance, the issue seems small, but at closer look, it disrupts game economies and harms legitimate players. This leads to market inflation and an overall decline in game integrity. Even though game developers are doing what they can to combat bots, the fight is never-ending. Botting remains a significant challenge for online multiplayer environments and is something we’re going to have to deal with for the foreseeable future.
