Services that sell game-breaking cheats are no secret; many multiplayer games, from Counter-Strike to GTA V, have their share of dishonest players. And, as it turns out, the people providing these cheats are rolling in the dough.
As reported by PCGamesN, DayZ developer Eugen Harton had a GDC presentation yesterday that touched on Bohemia Interactive’s efforts fighting against DayZ cheating. We’re talking like, the sorts of cheats that give players the ability to kill everybody in a server with a single click. Harton said that DayZ cheats could sometimes have a pricetag up to $500, for which players could gain access to DayZ’s debug console. (Most cheating subscriptions are significantly cheaper, though.)
These cheating industries are pretty big, as Harton said that some people made “up to $1.25 million a year” selling cheats. That sort of money would unfortunately explain why, after attempting to shut down DayZ cheating, some people lashed out against Harton by sending him death threats.
“Last year a person started a crowdfunding campaign to attend GDC and get to me in person,” Harton said. “He asked for $10,000. Thankfully he only gathered like $300.”
Wow. Thankfully it didn’t go through, but still, that’s intense.
You can read more about Bohemia Interactive’s efforts to stop DayZ cheating here, or read about why people are willing to drop moolah to cheat in games here.