etace screenshots

Need some opinion from players on this subject.

Just to make it clear, the screenshot feature is being added only because.. well, an anticheat without screenshots doesn't look like an anticheat. The reliability of screenshots, as in "how easy is it to bypass it and make it report clean ones", is not much higher than PBs simply because there aren't too many ways to make a screenshot and cheat coders are aware of pretty much all of them, but we can still try and make it better.

There are 2 possibilities:

1) Do it the way it is already handled - make the client capture a screenshot and send it to the server.

or

2) Make the client capture a screenshot, and if server configuration says so, store it inside the demo if it is being recorded. Then offer a way to dump all the screenshots from the demo (not everyone's screenshots, just the person's who recorded them).

There are some advantages and disadvantages of course. As a disadvantage I would say the main one is that you can't see screenshots of players unless you explicitly ask them to send you a demo. Another disadvantage is it is unreliable for public servers, but our main target is the competition scene, so I wouldn't bother too much with this one. However, it's also an advantage in many cases; e.g. if you play on the opponent's server where you have no chance of getting a screenshot showing a cheat, you can always request a demo, a demo which would contain his screenshots no matter on who's server it was played.

Which one do you like more?
Comments
87
2, not recording a demo in ANY official (random cups too) should be punished more heavily then tho.
insta loose for the no recorders team?
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rgr that!
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I agree with this person ^
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there is no 3rd option silly
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Let's be honest, this will be the same shit as pb, only coded by 1 guy instead of 30 :P
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and not getting paid for it.
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pb doesn't get paid for it for years either.

I mean, the effort of the guy is nice - still I think it won't lead anywhere worth it.
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anywhere worth it? damn you and your german english.
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german saying
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Da habe ich einen groben Schnitzer gemacht!
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Da pfeift es aus einem anderen Loch
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Õdagune uhetu om paremp ku hummugune mõstu
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ROTFL! even i don't know what that means :DDDDDDD
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Das ist nicht mein Fall
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Das lachen ja die Hühner
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talking to sol on msn right now
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huuuuuuuh? lol at those sayings btw :DDDDD "That gives one a horse laugh" i mean, wtf? :DDD
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<3 german sayings
ur just jealous!
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I'll give you a horse laugh MUAHAHAHAH

#old thread is old
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:DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD
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PS i'll upload demo's 2morro! if i'm not too hungover!
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time for inmotion comeback for the upcoming lan ?!?!?!?!?!?!
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fuck me i dont think i rememeber how to join a server never mind play game :S are you still playing?
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actually i'm not too active, and i'm somewhat doubting if i'll be again. Tho i've got some free time now, so if nothing else gets in the way - i just might attend the lan (with a team ofcourse).

INM REPRESENT?!?! :D
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ill be your cheerleader!
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wouldn't option 2 make it 10 times easier for the coders to crack it, since the files are stored on our pc's? just use option 1, sooner or later they will figure out how to crack option 2 anyway. or your planning to update that feature ones a while!
Makes sense. They could hack the demo system and delete the screens.
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If there's no screenshot in a demo it was supposed to have one (or more), it was obviously altered.
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or they figured out how you put images in the demo and the hack puts random clean pics in there from the same war.

stop spending time on this feature imo. It's not worth it and if you only want to implement screenshots cuz "well, an anticheat without screenshots doesn't look like an anticheat.", then just stop doing it. it's a waste of time.
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Would be smart, to much effort needed btw
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No, it wouldn't.
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What if the opponent doesn't want to send you their Demos? :/ (apart from the match being an official).

I would take option 1, it's easy but I think for Cheat coder's its already hard enough to ensure PB protection + pb clean screens, if there are pb screens + antipro screens it would be even harder i think. And if you make it randomly, like you update the way or the times it takes screenshots it would be even harder, if thats possible.

Isn't it possible that every screen made of antipro will get uploaded to "YOUR" server? e.g. antipro website? I am sure YCN and others would give you enough webspace for that. It would be really cool if you could have a clear database, ordered by players or something were you could check screenshots.

Btw will there be a new proper guid system in antipro? Or don't change etpro, just make it possible to register an antipro account and that you can see that through the game, just like with /guids.

Overall I think, having 2 screenshot tools, 2 anticheat tools etc make it A LOT harder for cheat coders to make a cheat... It's just about making it harder for them to make it undetected and to let it stay undetected.

My opinion
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1.

Lots of people hate to send demos and its pretty useless.


Can´t you take the screen using the same method as windows use? I mean, showing everything that player is watching, even if he is at windows or wtv.
I don't understand the point of the second part of your comment, tbh.
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I guess he means that you capture via the graphic card, capturing all active applications viewable, not only what the game is offering

(But I'm not quite sure, if it's even possible to "easily" access the gfx bus for screen capturing)
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Capturing stuff outside the game screen is something I will never do, for privacy reasons. But this is something we don't need any input on.
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Well, I was just trying to explain to you what he said :)

(BUT, though I'm not quite sure if this information can be found on the gfx bus, can't you capture the area where ET is active and including this area into the demo itself?
Don't really know, if this might be working.)

OR

(Though same applies here, I've no clue what so ever^^)

Can you build a checksum on how the screen should be looking and compare it to the actual screen being viewed?
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How do you define what it's supposed to look like?
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Thats a part I'm not quite sure of:P

E.g. Taking a checksum of the textures being used, and checking with those, if there is a possibility to reach such combination...

(As I said, I've no clue of what's being possible what so ever:P)

e: (you won't even have to do this with the whole screen, but for example with spots only where models appear)- (checking if the place where a model is being viewed if it actually is looking like the original model)

e2: or to make it even more complicated, not only against brightskins but also wallhacks(whereby I hardly doubt, that it can be done efficiently): you take the size of a model being viewed, and check it against the places in the viewing-direction, where you would actually be able see someone, and if the size of the model would match such, if not, he'd be behind a wall
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Now that i re-read my first post(:P):
You could actually use the same method as pb-screens use(yes i know, they are not very much reliable, and thats the point; you take the pb-screen and the gfx bus-capture and compare them to each other, if they are not alike...I'm sure you can do the maths :)
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And the gfx bus capture can't be faked?
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well, you can fake the result of the calculation(as with everything software related, you can only dig it in as much as you can)

But how about having the server take a shot evaluate this and check it with the gfx bus capture (would make things harder for quite some hacks imo)
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Have a look at this post by arca. I like his idea.
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option 1 without huge lags would be nice
2, but im waiting for reply on kiewans comment, it indeed looks logical
option 1 seems more secure,
BUT set it that the screenshots are send between rounds (warmup) or either asap when you disconnect. unless you already solved the lag problem.


Id like to add, that an option that gives demo's a screenshot of the game (scoreboard)
would be usefull if that's possible. (recognize)
I think that option 2) is better only because it doesn't require the client to send any screenshots to the server while playing which causes players to warp (or the process of taking screenshot itself causes this warp?). That alone makes it better than 1).

Other than that, I can see only flaws of this method- this works only in competition (where the guy can't just ignore your request to send the demo) and increases the demo size (even if by not much). If you change the way the demos are recorded please make sure that antipro will still be able to play old demos.

OFF-TOPIC:
I hope I won't sound like a prick by asking to implement this but a directory structure of demos would also be a very nice feature which has been missing in ET for ages. I expect there are tons of more important things to work on though...

I'm really glad you're still working on antipro. How's quad?
He's pretty much inactive, busy with uni since he moved to the USA.
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what do you want the dir structure to do?

dated directories or what
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Some examples:
* dated directories as you've written
* keeping demos from different cups in separate directories
* directory for downloaded matches (not your own)
* some might find keeping demos separated by names of maps or depending if the match was a scrim or offi useful
* directory for storing demos with some ownage actions for a future fm or w/e
* directories tagged with names of the clan you used to play in

You don't keep all your files on your hdd in one dir, now do you? ;)
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yes i do because it reduced overheads on readwrite times :D

it would be possible to do it as you described in terms of engine capability - if you downloaded seismovision or similar you'd be able to watch demos from different dir's from windows and stuffs
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the day etace fails

dont woant lags:|
option 2, can't you use some check (like md5 or something) to check if the file has been altered or differs from other demo's? That would make it thougher to crack the file. Option 1 is used by pb and its not that good so why not try something else :)
blank comment (give me the result)

would like to try 2nd opt
QuoteJust to make it clear, the screenshot feature is being added only because.. well, an anticheat without screenshots doesn't look like an anticheat.


If that's your main reason to implement taking screenshots, you might as well stop putting time into something that is the most easy thing to bypass and put your time and effort into something that is useful.
Well, okay, maybe I made it look too ... something, dunno. That's not the ONLY reason, but the main. I believe I can make it more reliable than PBs screenshots are, but still not something too reliable.
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Then I wouldn't waste too much time on it, or even any time at all.
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if you can get #2 working with a secure hashcheck on the image built into the demo thatd be tamper proof but passing a clean screenshot to the demo wouldn't be much different from doing it to pb would it?
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I was going to post the same as Ronner tbh, if you realise how easy it is to get past this then why waste time creating it? I've seen people mention the idea of editing the screenshots once the match is completed and the demo recording finished but then the cheat would simple do the old "turn off for half a second" method while the screenshot is being taken anyway so there would be no reason to try and mess with the demo afterwards.

What about all the excuses that go along with option 2 also, like accidentally stopping the demo or "deleting it" etc.

Seems like a complete waste tbh :/
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I don't like u :(

used a word u posted on an english test and my teacher corrected it as wrong because she didn't know the meaning of it
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sheepishness

iirc
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;D you should have hit her with an English dictionary!
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teachers are dictators in belgium

didn't even get the chance to prove myself right!
it's a stupid word anyway :(
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it's good when you are trying to describe a person that fits it's description ;DDD
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Yep, I saw it when you were referring to Meez :)
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how about making something that somehow downloads the users config or smthn to a folder on the server.

then if a guy might be obvious or supsicious u can iziliy look it up.

make the server download them while they connect so u cant have lag of it inside a match?

dunno if thats already in etace or if its possible

im just a naab trying to sound smart xd
1 for public
2 for competition

if possible
how about if the screenshots would be made by the server and the server send them every night on 4 AM cet to a master server? Just to prefent serverside lags ;)
the lag problems are client side in most cases i'd say!

the faster you get the screenshot from the client to the server the less chance of it being lost / corrupted due to the player dissapeering etc but the more intensive it is on the players pc + connection which is the issue with pb :<
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oh okey, i thought it would be due to the screenshot itself and the direct upload to pb main server. Thanks for correcting me then ;)
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they go to the game server not to evenbalance :{
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have u heard of xray screenshot program, its quite nice!
Some ppl said you shouldn't waste time on screenshots. I think that many players (including me) would like antipro to completely replace PB so that it can be removed. PB makes the game unplayable for some and a fucking annoying thing for many others. ET currently works worse than for example CSS or Warsow, which have better graphics. And not only because of decreased frame rate (which isn't that big of a deal when fps is steady), but also because of constant warps. Add the problems with not being able to play a game for more than 5 minutes for some (kicking for some strange reasons) and you have the biggest failure software there was released.

I think that any feature in antipro which will help to replace PB will be very appreciated.
umm, 2, i guess.
2, with the server storing the MD5 checksum to prevent demo altering.
as long as vista still provides me with a black screen i'm happy
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