- PUBG Mobile has released the latest wave of bans suspending 1,150,483 accounts
- The game presented a detailed breakdown of what tiers cheaters hailed from, as well as what types of cheats have been used
- Cheating in PUBG Mobile remains omnipresent with serious implications for the game
Another 1,150,483 accounts have been suspended in a single week between May 14 and May 20 as PUBG Mobile wags war on cheaters for a second year.
Millions of Cheaters Perish in Latest PUBG Mobile Purge
PUBG Mobile continues with the culling suspending a total of 1,150,483 accounts that have been connected to cheating between May 14 and May 20. All account holders have been accused of exploiting the game by introducing cheats or hacks, leading to arguably unprecedented numbers of banned players when compared to most games out there.
While customer bases should be the number one priority for any F2P game, cheaters have abused the game so blatantly that PUBG Corp.’s only choice has been to go ahead and suspend accounts en masse, signaling a zero-tolerance policy towards game-ruining experiences.
That is hardly the first time PUBG Mobile has carried out an extensive purge of its network, with the company previously locking 2,127,454 accounts in December. The present move is also one of the most ambitious when it comes to restricting players who have been using illegitimate means to access the game and potentially ruin others’ game experience.
The 1.1 million accounts suspended in the space of seven days demonstrates PUBG Mobile’s ability to act on short notice and identify wrongdoers. Then again, the number of cheaters leaves one question in the open: how is it possible for so many people to cheat their way in the game?
Cheating at the Lower Tiers is Ubiquitous
PUBG Mobile has released a detailed pie chart to help us pinpoint in which tiers cheating happened the most. Understandably, Bronze tier accounts were the ones where cheating was prevalent, with 33% of all suspended accounts hailing from the metaphorical gutters of the game, or some 379,659 accounts.
However, Silver, Platinum, Crown, Diamond, and Ace all saw some cheaters sneaking through the ranks and successfully tilting the advantage in their favor. Cheating was lowest at the Conquer tier, but the number of players therein is also the smallest, so that shouldn’t surprise us at all.
The upper four ranked tiers accounted for some 47% of suspended accounts or around 540,700 accounts in total. Again, while most cheaters hailed from Bronze, seeing 10% of all cheaters playing in some of the highest tiers is disquieting and justifies skepticism towards the game’s fairness, with many events played online.
Banned Account per Cheats
Another interesting statistic that PUBG Mobile provided readily was the distribution of actual cheats used, which included various tools used to disrupt the gameplay and give an unfair advantage to the party using. PUBG Mobile has been able to pinpoint the exact usage and distribution of cheating software as follows:
- Speed hacks (17%)
- Modification of Area Damage (15%)
- Auto-aim hacks (11%)
- Modification of character model (9%)
- X-ray vision (8%)
Some accounts were understandably using a combination of all hacks, going around unpunished for a fair while, too. The question we all face today is whether the F2P model has failed us or if PUBG Mobile has been too ambitious about creating the game and focusing on growth without taking care to safeguard the game from such vulnerabilities.
In honesty, many games have experienced trouble with managing cheaters, including Call of Duty: Warzone, which has faced a similar epidemic of cheating accounts. Rainbow Six Siege and Ubisoft have had multiple brushes with a notorious cheat who has been involved in not only creating and distributing numerous cheats across the game but also attempting to swat the company’s offices.
Criticizing the game is certainly easy and tempting, but PUBG Mobile has been very open about the actual numbers of cheating happening in-game and has been mustering up resources to address the issue.
