[Captain_McCusker]

I thought I'd go on a rant since I can't sleep this has been on my mind given all the activity on the forums the last couple weeks.

There are two issues constantly being tossed back and forth. 1) Disgust over Powell (not meant to start a new flame war with the genious, just pointing out the topic) and 2) Cheaters/Hackers (2 completely seperate things in itself). It seems that during these extreme discussions people have a hard time understanding the fuel that starts such fires in the first place and constantly point out the obvious - this is a game. Let me see if I can explain it, at least from my own point of view, so that those of you who don't understand may become more aware of why these topics are such heated ones.

1 - Powell: First off, Powell comes off as a nice guy. And in some way I will actually admit that he is. Here we have a 21 y/o who obviously enjoys the MOH community as I can't think of any other reason why he would stick around through all the abuse we've thrown him. He's helped quite a number of people on this forum with simple fixes to simple problems. He's also gone ahead and made a few "legit" mods and a map, or maps (I only know of one, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong).

Now the reason why he's so hated by the aa.com community (and even moreso by the AAN community). He used this as a front to being something more than just a nice guy. He joined the community that most of *this* community is disgusted by. Sort of making him a "double agent" if you will. However, instead of accepting that he was caught, when he was caught, he went ahead and made things worse for himself by trying to hide the fact.

Ok, still not a very big deal, but that's when things get interesting. He comes back to this community and says, "Oh please forgive me for the things I've done. I'm giving up all my cheating/hacking ways and want to be a part of this community just for the simple 'Love of the game.'" Quite a few people said, "Yeah, whatever Dude. Once a cheater, always a cheater." And then there was the side that said, "Hey, more power to ya. If you're really changing your ways, we'll give you a chance to prove yourself." Using that to feed on, he decided that he'd join a few of us on Teamspeak and tell us just how much he wanted to be considered an honest player. We gave him the benefit of the doubt.

That's where the "It's just a game" comes to an end, though. When he realised that while we were giving him the benefit of the doubt, he didn't understand why we couldn't just accept him with open arms and full trust through and through. And that fuled some kind of anger in him that then caused him to not only cross the line back into cheating, but he decided he would get even by hacking our server. He took the fact that we didn't want to think he was really that bad and used it to take complete advantage of us and not only cheat, but wreak havoc on our little community. And in that, he not only took advantage of us, but he betrayed the amount of trust we gave him - even if it was only a small amount.

And I would like to emphasize that he not only betrayed us, but he crossed a line from cheater to hacker and joined the ranks of dispicable people like TeamGod.

2 - Cheating/Hacking: This won't be as long and drawn out as the story about Powell, I promise. Ironically, though, it's much more important.

Cheating is one thing. Everyone likes to know there's an easy way around things. However, the general feeling is that in a game, it's just not fun if you can always win. And it's just not fun for someone who's being cheated if they're always losing. Most of us play this game as a form of entertainment and in hopes of "having fun." But add in people who cheat and the level of fun drops, and eventually is gone altogether.

No big deal, right? Just a game.

Well, if start to pay for a server to host this game for both people you know and people you don't, rules become important to you. Not because you're a nazi-admin and power is corrupting you, but because you want to insure that everyone who's playing on your server is having fun. When someone breaks these rules repeatedly, you want people to know you can put a stop to it to further protect that level of fun. When people start finding ways to get around your rules and in the end cheat you from the money you're spending on everyone's entertainment, well... they're in a sense taking your money. This might be hard for some of you to understand, but believe me... it became so incredibly clear to me when I dropped my first $69 on a server. And it became so much more clear to me when I had to up that amount to $159. This isn't small potatoes for entertainment's sake, so ensuring that everyone's having a good time and trusts in fair play becomes more than important, but necessary.

Then there are those that hack into the server to wreak havok of some sort for the simple pleasure of seeing it crash and pissing people off. The thing they don't fully grasp is that while this seems so trivial a thing to do with a game, someone's actually forking over hard earned money to enjoy this game. Same as with the cheating, but to a greater degree, these guys are ripping people off. When you crash a server, or restart maps over and over (thus causing a great deal of people to stop going to the server), you're in effect performing a Denial of Service attack. If I pay $50 a month to play a game with my friends... or even people I don't know anything about... and you come along and put a stop to it every time I try to play, then you're stealing the money away from me as I'm not getting what I payed for.

So in conclusion: Just a game? No, it's not just a game anymore. This is about theft. When you come right down to the bottom line, this is nothing more than simple theft. That's why these discussions are as heated as they are. That's why the law will become involved, and also why they *can* become involved. Maybe it's just a game to you, but after you spend $50 - $200 a month so people can have the privelege of saying "It's just a game," then it's not just a game anymore.