Apple Gives Devs The Power To Delete Fake Game Center Scores & Block Cheats

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Fake high scores in Angry Birds: Star Wars.
Fake high scores in Angry Birds: Star Wars.

Isn’t it frustrating when you spend your whole weekend trying to reach the top of the Game Center leaderboard in your favorite game just to find that the top spot has already been claimed by a cheat, whose score couldn’t possibly be beaten by playing the game properly?

Unfortunately, it’s a common problem because Game Center has long been far too easy to hack. But Apple has finally done something about it. Developers now have the power to delete fake Game Center scores and block gamers who persistently cheat.

“You can now view and manage the top 100 scores and usernames for all of your Game Center leaderboards,” Apple announced through its Developer Center this week. “Protect your legitimate players by signing in to iTunes Connect to delete fake scores or block players that post fake scores. You can also restore scores and players within the same time period.”

Fake high scores isn’t a problem exclusive to Game Center; it has also been an issue for third-party networks like OpenFeint, too, and it discourages gamers from trying to compete with for top spots on worldwide leaderboards. You’re forced to either compete only against your friends, or stop competing altogether.

But hopefully, Apple has fixed that now. If developers can maintain their Game Center leaderboards, this shouldn’t be a problem anymore. But it’s a big “if,” if course. This could be an incredibly time consuming task for popular games with thousands of cheaters, and it’s unlikely smaller development studios will have the time or resources to maintain older titles.

Nevertheless, we should finally see some improvement, which is great news for those of us who love gaming on our Macs and iOS devices.

Source: Apple Dev Center

Via: TouchArcade

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