Why Calls to Region-Lock China for Apex Legends Won’t Solve the Problem
For some time now, elements of the Apex Legends player-base have been calling for Respawn to region-lock China. The reason? Chinese players have a well-earned reputation for hacking or using other forms of cheating exploits. In fact, there is even precedent for region-locking the country; PUBG did so in late 2018. However, one Respawn developer has now explained to players why region-locking actually wouldn’t solve the problem.
Respawn Dev Explains Why the Studio Can’t Simply Region-Lock China
In the months since its launch, and its meteoric rise to popularity, Respawn has been waging a war against online cheaters in Apex Legends. They have been making significant progress; the studio reportedly banned over 350,000 PC players, and the recent deployment of HWID bans have made it very difficult for prolific cheaters to avoid bans by using backup accounts. However, the free-to-play nature of Apex Legends makes it especially vulnerable. As a result, players are unfortunately encountering cheaters too often, and it seems as though a large proportion of the offenders may be in China.
Unfortunately, the player calls to region-lock China may not actually be an effective solution. In recent comments made on Reddit, a Respawn developer explained why region-locking probably wouldn’t work, and the key reason is that Apex Legends hasn’t actually launched in China! “It’s not as simple as ‘quarantine China,'” says Scriptacus; “The game is not released there, and I believe that means they’re playing through VPN (or multiple VPN at once) or other means. It takes more than just flipping a switch or filtering some ID blocks.”
They went on to clarify that; “we have more in the works. 🙂 Some things take more time than others, but we’re well aware that this will be a perpetual battle on multiple fronts as long as Apex is played.”
Certainly, cheating is a big and adaptive problem for Apex Legends. However, thus far, it seems that Respawn has been doing a relatively good job fighting back. With any luck, the studio will be able to come up with more workable solutions in this case; though the recent use of HWID bans could prove to be a long-lasting and effective countermeasure in the coming weeks and months.