VR Social Gaming Platform VRChat implements EAC to curb the use of game modifications, causing enormous community backlash

The VRChat Security Update — VRChatTitled "The VRChat Security Update", the update implements EasyAntiCheat, as an attempt to curb the use of modifications of the VRChat client, particularly targeting the development and use of malicious mods. This intent of this is stated to be focusing on the safety of players.Mods which crash or lag games, break the audio system, and otherwise impair the user experience have been a persistent issue with the game for a considerable amount of time. These have formed an underground community of people who have dedicated their time to crashing public lobbies, annoying players, and overall creating an unpleasant experience.Despite this, a heavily organized and vetted modding community has gained traction, surrounding anti-crash, QoL, and accessibility features, and new features that VRChat Team wishes not to implement for a variety of technical reasons. These mods are prevalent in the VRChat community; many disabled community members rely on them to play the game, other dedicated VRChat player use them to fix issues that have remained unfixed for a considerable time, and many more use popular anti-crash mods to protect themselves from the effects of malicious mods and mod users.This update inhibits the use of all mods, benign or malicious. Many leading members of the benign community VRC Modding Group have issued warnings about this decision - while benign mod creators would not risk the consequences of circumventing the anti-cheat, malicious users would not be deterred, they claim. The remaining accessibility issues also remain unaddressed with this implementation, leaving many community members stranded.In essence, this move is being decried by many prominent community members, and by a large amount of the playerbase, as incentivizing malicious play and punishing benign play, as well as limiting the game for people who rely on certain tools to engage in the community.The VRC Modding Group is calling for a community boycott of the game, as well as cancellation of the premium subscription service VRChat+, and their statement reads as follows:As you may have noticed, VRChat has released an open beta that includes Easy Anti-Cheat, which prevents use of mods. Playing cat-and-mouse game with anti-cheat developers is not something that could be won by a modding community as big and open as ours, so if this open beta makes it to release as-is, this would mean the end of wholesome modding.Now is your chance to tell VRChat that this is a dumb change. It does not solve ripping or crasher avatars. It probably won't stop malicious mods, as they're way smaller and can evade anti-cheat easier. Nor do they open source their code, meaning you never really know what you are running, and risk getting your account stolen, or worse. However, it prevents you from having unlimited avatar favorites. It prevents you from using anti-crash mods. It prevents you from using all other mod features you've come to enjoy. It prevents you from using safe, open-source mods that never made anyone's experience worse.So, we recommend that you cancel your VRC+ if you have it, and do not launch VRChat for at least a week to produce a visible player count drop. Encourage your friends to do the same, even if they don't use mods themselves. Anti-community measures like these from a greedy corporation should be protested as loudly as possible. You can take the time off VRChat to explore alternative platforms - Neos provides a different experience, and ChilloutVR aims to be similar to what you know (you can even auto-convert some of your avatars!). Or you can choose to experience other VR and flatscreen games together with friends you've made in VRChat.This is not really a "security update". It much more of a "we're too afraid of people doing our job better than us" update.You can upvote a Canny post here: https://ift.tt/45YNt8K, VRCMG Team.As of writing, alternative VR social platforms ChilloutVR and NeosVR are receiving record numbers of new user signups, and the VRChat Steam Page sits at a Recent Reviews rank of Mixed. A feedback submission on the official feedback tracker, Canny, sits at 14.3k upvotes. via /r/Games https://ift.tt/gWFJeTU