BattleBit Remastered is dominating Steam because there's no catch: it's just a lot of game for $15

Chloyster [she/her]@beehaw.orgmod to Gaming@beehaw.org – 368 points –
BattleBit Remastered is dominating Steam because there's no catch: it's just a lot of game for $15
pcgamer.com
106

It's a great game but there IS a catch that wasn't mentioned.

The devs plan on implementing one of the more intrusive Anti-Cheats (Face It Anti Cheat) which doesn't work on Linux which also stops all Steam Deck users from playing. It also forces you to disable virtualization on windows. I can't recall the last time I had to go into bios to disable an option to turn off important windows features.

According to their stream, it's non-negotiable and will be added regardless of what the community wants. But they did mention that community servers would be able to pick which Anti Cheat they wanted to use?

But they did mention that community servers would be able to pick which Anti Cheat they wanted to use?

As I understand, there are three tiers to this:

  • Official servers will use FaceIt exclusively.
  • Servers rented from official partners will have the choice of FaceIt or EAC.
  • Community-run servers will only be able to use EAC, and won't be hooked into the global progression system.

One of the many problems with FaceIt is that the server-side component is not allowed to be freely distributed, which is why community-run servers won't have the option to use it.

Personally, there is no way I am buying this unless if they reverse their plans to use FaceIt.

I will also not be buying this unless they don't use FACEIT

Your avatar is totally alphanumeric. I have a pink guitar named Machibuse.

I'm sorry what does this mean 😅

It means "ambusher" but it is the Japanese name of Pinky the ghost.

From what I read, it also requires Secure Boot to be enabled. I played the game for 90 minutes before reading about the anti-cheat change, fortunately I didn't hit 2 hours and took a refund.

Well, fuck. My hopes were raised and then dashed in the span of minutes.

As someone that uses virtual machines frequently, I look at my like 16 hours in the game. Fuck. I hope they don't do that, this is the Battlefield I've been wanting for years. ;-;

They've backed down from faceit for now because of community concern.

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I considered it, but am now avoiding it because they're going to add a Linux-incompatible anticheat.

I was about to buy this but apparently they are planning to change their current anti cheat software to FaceIt which does not support Linux. EAC is still used for upcoming selfhosted servers but ranking up is disabled. I'd rather not feel like being considered as a second class citizen so I'll have to skip for now.

Other than that the game looks fun. I prefer to look in to the current state of the game rather than the promises of future content (which kind of contradicts my anti cheat point but eh), and I feel like the current price would be worth it even though it's an early access game.

yeah, Im enjoying it right now, but if they choose to make my experience not playable, I would expect a refund =/

Yep, same here.

Thankfully there is enough games for me to be happy

I love to see indie games pop off. I hate to see Linux-hostile anti-cheats. C'est a la vie.

Dafaq you are talking about? I see people have no problem running the game with and older version of proton.

See other comments. They are gonna implement Face It anticheat which won't work with linux.

Oh, crap! That's bad! Hopefully they change their mind!

From what I understand they are going full steam ahead and fuck community feedback

The devs plan on implementing a anti-cheat system that makes it incompatible with Linux and virtualization on Windows

The game itself is a workmanlike Battlefield with a few oddball choices. I hope they never "fix" the vaulting behaviour that lets you break a 20-storey fall and make massive jumps across rooftops.

But I've specifically been having a lot of fun with the proximity chat. Remarkably robust, has an opt-in "broadcast your mic for a few seconds when you die" feature, and somehow isn't a sluice of slurs / edgy crap / etc (at least in my experience).

The anticheat news is really depressing though. Cheaters are out there and will come to this game, and EAC at least has a reputation of being quite weak. We're not allowed to have nice things.

I've been having a lot of fun with it. Even if I only get a few weeks or months until they add FACEIT, it's worth the $15.

FACEIT really is a bummer

I was interested about this game by the article, but what is FACEIT?

FACEIT is yet another completely useless, doesn't-actually-work, trust-the-client anti-cheating tool. Basically, it makes it so that cheaters (and the game publisher) can claim cheating isn't happening because, "there's an anti-cheat tool" but in reality it doesn't stop actual cheaters.

The entire purpose of anti-cheat tools appears to be to stop casual Linux gamers from being able to play the game. Microsoft has a big part in it as well because the very same intentional vulnerabilities in Windows that hackers use to install undetectable rootkits are what get used by anti-cheat software.

If Microsoft wanted they could close those vulnerabilities by making all privilege levels above administrator (of which Windows has two which is insane) inaccessible to anyone but Microsoft. Instead they just collect money from 3rd party vendors to sign their driver encryption keys, inherently trusting those vendors not to make software with vulnerabilities. It's a recipe for insecurity and Microsoft likes it that way. It acts as a form of vendor lock-in.

Anti-cheat tools pretty much all work with the same basic assumption: Trust the client. What's the first rule of network programming? Never trust the client!

Anti-cheat, I assume it breaks Linux compatibility and/or runs with basically unlimited permissions on your PC

Edit: details here

From what I understand, FACEIT is a "better" anti cheat that the developers want to use to replace the current Easy Anti Cheat. Their current implementation of Easy Anti Cheat supports Linux and Steam Deck while FACEIT does not, and will not support Linux

Honestly though, I hate it but I do kind of get it. If this game gets overrun by hackers in its prime, the game dies and I'd really like to see this survive long term as this is the kind of pricing model I'd like to support. Can't have everything perfect.

But it will only make sense if FACEIT achieves that goal. Time will tell, and I'll keep my windows dual boot for gaming for now.

What does that mean and how does it change the game?

Edit: nevermind, someone further down explained already.

Looks interesting; one of the things keeping me away from some FPS games is the sheer amount of micro transactions. I’d spend 15 and get something good and fair for everyone who plays instead of being asked to put in another purchase every few minutes!

I've been playing this game a lot the past few days. it's just plain fun. A nice refreshing FPS in the era of BRs and battle passes.

How does it run on Linux?

Fine for now. They're eventually going to use FACEIT anticheat which doesn't work on linux

https://www.gamepressure.com/newsroom/battlebit-remastered-faceit-x-easy-anti-cheat-linux-and-steam-dec/z45924

Dude could really use a pass by a native speaker. A lot of that sentence structure is pretty rough.

But yeah, that's enough to keep me from buying it. I won't use Windows again.

I think I heard they'll have community servers which will use Easy Anti cheat. So I think Linux will work with those servers.

If you are in to singleplayer bot matches Ravenfield is pretty cool. The game's workshop is vast, so you can go from a WWI shooter to 40K and everything in between.

It's natively Linux so that's neat as well

I'd also like to mention Easy Red 2 for this too. WW2 only (for now) but its all about playing with the bots and does run decent on a Deck.

They're adding modding soon, so maybe it could become a semi-realistic ravenfield?

It’s a great game! Runs super smoothly and it’s got a lot of great QoL features. $15 is a steal

Exactly the same sentiment here! It has no business being as good as it is!

BattleBit Remastered on Steam

BattleBit Remastered is a low-poly, massive multiplayer FPS, supporting 254 players per server. Battle on a near-fully destructible map with various vehicles!

Stop it. I have too many steam games already. But at this point, what's one more? You convinced me.

LevelCap has a great video about how 3 guys made a better battlefield game then EA/DICE. I had fun the one night I've gotten to play so far but I was kind of drunk so I didn't do very well. I'm a Battlefield player of many years and it's the most fun I've had playing since 4.

What a shame their throwing it all away with terrible anticheat

The catch is that you can't yet run your own servers or LAN, from what I've seen.

In the servers browser I've noticed some community ones but there are only a few and mostly in different regions. Hopefully they will open it up for more players to host soon.

I've been playing a ton of combat master.

F2p with no bs, I love it, and it has a proper Linux client, it even runs natively on Wayland for me.

It says it has LAN, but I couldn't find the option anywhere. Do you know how to do that by any chance?

I'm under the impression that it automatically runs as a lan if everyone in the custom game is on the same network.

I could be wrong.

Hmm...not sure I like them defining that as LAN if you need an internet connection to find the other players in the first place.

you need an internet connection to add them as friends in-game, but once they're added as friends in game it should work.

I'm past the refund period. I wish I knew this sooner.

The refund period isn't a hard set in stone thing. Send support a request and it's likely to be granted. When tlou came out plenty of people with way more than 2 hours got refunds.

I'm mostly concerned about not being able to play it on Steamdeck anymore. I can still play it on PC. But doesn't seem like a good choice to have that anti cheat. Thanks, gotta think about it.

Not entirely sure what the hell the article was talking about, there are already bonus editions that give you skins. Same as any other game.

Those are only cosmetic and their meant to give something to supporters. Creators don't hide that servers are expensive and supporters are appreciated.

I put this one my wishlist but had held off due to it being in early access. But I am reconsidering now!

Get it. Got about 20h in it and am just starting to get a feel for all the maps and guns. Still early so no meta and everyone's pretty chill.

Personally 123v123 is a bit too hectic so I stick to 32v32 (which also has rush and other game modes not in 64v or 123v)

It’s definitely worth it. Didn’t have that much fun in an online shooter for a long time.

I used to play the playtests a bunch - definitely a fun game, but not for me. I'd recommend it!

I've had lots of fun with this game. The price point is great with the amount of hours that I've gotten from it.

I've had some good fun with this with friends the last few days but the latest patch, which dropped yesterday, was supposed to improve hit registration. Unfortunately it seems to have done the opposite for a lot of users, with a great new message claiming 'packetloss' as the reason 5 out of 7 shots didn't register. This coming from a modern computer on a gigabit network with >30 ping to the server.
We also had some weird issues with bandaging and healing people just not registering, but still spending resources, and a lot of people just gave up trying to heal altogether.

Anyone here tried it on a linux box?

I tried it on Fedora 37 on my Laptop. But that was a few months ago when it was free and in beta. In general, it runs well even on my non-gpu laptop.

Is running fine with no issue or extra setup.

However they are changing the anti cheat on official servers to something not supported on Linux.

That said its unclear (to me) exactly what will stop working or when.

I'm not into FPS anymore, but even I thought about picking it up. The substance over style is fine with me, but that core gameplay seems like a rock solid thing. The only thing that has given me pause on picking it up is that they're planning on changing the anti-cheat that isn't Linux friendly and as a Linux user, just gonna wait for now.

or get it, and be very vocal when they try pulling some bs

In my experience being vocal about changes doesn't do much. There's a million factors and Linux support is probably at thr bottom of their priority list. Or they've been told be the anticheat it'll be fixed someday, etc. I understand they're a super small team and they have to pick their battles as well.

I'm too tired for that fight/discussion anymore. I'll vote with my wallet. Plus I have a million other games to play.

I've been playing this a lot, it's very good. I'm hoping it won't die out quickly.

There's finally a great battlefield competitor and all anyone here can talk about is Linux..?

I got it and played a bunch with a group over the weekend, it's quite a lot of fun. Lots of chaos and stuff happening, with plenty of room for support roles like ammo and medic if you don't feel like doing anything else. Proximity voice chat is built in and works well too. The automatic mic activation for a few seconds when you die can be absolutely hilarious (or disabled if you want).

The graphics are nice and simple which I like, it lets me focus on the game more and not have to deal with FPS drops or performance issues.

I'm going to give it a go this week. I was so disappointed with BF2042 - hopefully this scratches the itch.

How possible is it to play primarily in a support role? I'm a terrible shooter but I love healing where possible.

I'm in the same camp here, generally avoided FPS because my reaction time is similar to a snail. The medic role is super important because you don't heal automatically, and only a medic can heal you. I've had plenty of situations where I'm a medic prone on the ground with bullets flying overhead, reviving and healing a whole squad downed by a well placed enemy grenade. Been an absolute blast, pun intended.