Valorant’s closed beta came to an end yesterday and the official launch is set for June 2. That’s when auto-bans will also be implemented.
Riot’s new tactical shooter had its ups and downs during the closed beta. Server issues, bugs, glitches are only some of the issues. The most popular one by far remains Vanguard, the anti-cheat system which sparked quite a lot of discussions among players. Whether it does more harm than good is still a hot topic.
- READ MORE: Valorant's Vanguard causing BIOS issues
Vanguard is Riot’s custom way of dealing with cheaters. Even before the start of the closed beta, one of the main selling points for Valorant was that cheaters will be punished. This didn’t mean that there will be no cheaters in the game, as it only took two days into the closed beta to ban the first ones. Riot remained true to their word and implemented hardware bans, which effectively deal with hackers trying to make a new account (since the game is free and all).
VALORANT Closed Beta was an opportunity for us to learn what worked, what didn't, and what you'd need from us to have the best experience playing VALORANT. With your help, here's what we accomplished in the last two months. Thanks to players around the world for joining in! pic.twitter.com/oUWmqcfLiY
— VALORANT (@PlayVALORANT) May 28, 2020
Over the period of the closed beta, Riot have banned thousands of cheaters. Over 9000. No, we’re not kidding. According to a recent tweet, around 8000 of those tried to make it back into the game but couldn’t due to the hardware bans. That’s certainly good news as unlike CS:GO bans will actually matter here.
In a previous blog post Riot have already mentioned that they’re about to deploy their auto-ban feature.
With VALORANT being the grand unveiling of Vanguard, we’ve gotten a lot of inputs that help us understand what cheats - and forms of cheating - we can effectively deter with the platform. But during closed beta we’ve held off on deploying the second half of our tech, our auto-banning systems, because we needed this time to understand what to action on, especially when it comes to hardware bans. This will be different at launch.
- READ MORE: Valorant Closed Beta: What did we learn?
With the game’s launch on June 2, that time has come. If we’re following sound logic here, Valorant will have significantly fewer cheaters as bans will no longer be rolled out manually. Hopefully, no innocent players will be punished by the system. Stay tuned for more Valorant updates and check EarlyGame for more news from the world of gaming and esports.
