Valve reveals it’s the architect behind a push to bring Windows games to Arm • Hacker News Board

Re: Valve reveals it’s the architect behind a push to bring Windows games to Arm

#661

Post by Xss3 » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 10:08 AM UTC

bcrosby95 wrote: post #192

Xss3 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anticheat devs could REALLY benefit by having some data scientists involved. Any player responding to ingame events (enemy appeared) with sub 80ms reaction times consistently should be an automatic ban. Is it ever? No. Given good enough data a good team of data scientists would be able to make a great set of rules using statistical analysis that effectively ban anyone playing at a level beyond human. In the chess of…

We used to track various timings in some of our games to detect cheating. Cheaters find out and change their cheat engines to perform within plausible human reactions. Which is a benefit - now the cheating isn't obvious to everyone, but it still happens. I don't know if you could sprinkle data scientist dust on the problem and come up with a viable cross-game solution though.

Thats a win. Preventing cheaters gaining superhuman advantage significantly reduces their impact.

Re: Valve reveals it’s the architect behind a push to bring Windows games to Arm

#662

Post by Xss3 » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 10:11 AM UTC

strbean wrote: post #278

Xss3 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anticheat devs could REALLY benefit by having some data scientists involved. Any player responding to ingame events (enemy appeared) with sub 80ms reaction times consistently should be an automatic ban. Is it ever? No. Given good enough data a good team of data scientists would be able to make a great set of rules using statistical analysis that effectively ban anyone playing at a level beyond human. In the chess of…

> Any player responding to ingame events (enemy appeared) with sub 80ms reaction times consistently should be an automatic ban. It's really much more nuanced than that. Counter-Strike 2 has already implemented this type of feature, and it immediately got some clear false positives. There are many situations where high level players play in a predictive, rather than reactive, manner. Pre-firing is a common strategy th…

You mustve missed the part where i spoke of consistency?

Ive played at the pro level. Nobody prefires with perfect robotic consistency.

I dont care if it takes 50 matches of data for the statistical model to call it inhuman.

Valve has enough data that they could easily make the threshold for a ban something like '10x more consistent at pre-firing than any pro has ever been' with a high confidence borne over many engagements in many matches.

Re: Valve reveals it’s the architect behind a push to bring Windows games to Arm

#663

Post by Xss3 » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 10:12 AM UTC

ThatPlayer wrote: post #404

strbean wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Any player responding to ingame events (enemy appeared) with sub 80ms reaction times consistently should be an automatic ban. It's really much more nuanced than that. Counter-Strike 2 has already implemented this type of feature, and it immediately got some clear false positives. There are many situations where high level players play in a predictive, rather than reactive, manner. Pre-firing is a common strategy th…

There's well analyzed video of a pro player streaming who got temporarily banned for something like this. It might not even have been pre-fire, but post-fire at a different enemy retreating at the same position https://youtu.be/SFyVRdRcilQ

Valve need to tweak the model so that it requires a higher confidence level before a ban, and to reduce false positives in their data capture methods. This is a mistake but doesnt kill the idea.

Re: Valve reveals it’s the architect behind a push to bring Windows games to Arm

#664

Post by viktorcode » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 10:15 AM UTC

nottorp wrote: post #594

The one thing that worries me is that PC gaming is going fast to requiring controller support. Which is reducing the complexity of control schemes to either nothing or mortal kombat like combos. Forward, down, forward, high punch to build a new city in a 4X in a few years?

The one very visible trend in the last 30 years of game development was about reducing input complexity. It has nothing to do with complexity of games themselves. Now instead of fighting clunky controls like in good old times you fight game challenges, where the input tries hard to be as transparent as possible

Re: Valve reveals it’s the architect behind a push to bring Windows games to Arm

#665

Post by dirkderkdurk » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 10:19 AM UTC

nottorp wrote: post #614

skibz wrote: post #600

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Controllers provide analogue controls (eg. thumbsticks and triggers) that most keyboards don't have. If, as you suggest, the control schemes of video games are becoming less complex (Forward, down, forward, high punch) then surely the result would be more games that are playable with only a keyboard, not fewer?

Heh the MK combo mention was a joke. Forgot I’m on HN.

Original MK, Sub-Zero spine tear, sigh, the first one I ever did. Got me into gamedev. I appreciated it!

Re: Valve reveals it’s the architect behind a push to bring Windows games to Arm

#666

Post by nottorp » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 10:23 AM UTC

dirkderkdurk wrote: post #665

nottorp wrote: post #614

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heh the MK combo mention was a joke. Forgot I’m on HN.

Original MK, Sub-Zero spine tear, sigh, the first one I ever did. Got me into gamedev. I appreciated it!

Had to look it up to post :)

It was back in the days when we gathered at the kid whose keyboard could actually support so many simultaneous keypresses and did tournaments.

Re: Valve reveals it’s the architect behind a push to bring Windows games to Arm

#667

Post by johnnyanmac » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 10:29 AM UTC

ahartmetz wrote: post #635

johnnyanmac wrote: post #444

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, and they shifted from being a gamik studio to a middleman. The signs are already there, but greed arrives all the same.

Valve has had all the triggers and opportunities to change for the worse and it didn't. Short of Gabe Newell not controlling it anymore, I don't see what would ruin it now.

You can argue they did, depending on what you value. If you loved valve as a premier developer discovering unique experiences and narratives, thars been gone for 14 years now. If you valued not having your software locked down to middlemen or preferred physical media, Valved killed those off in the PC market. If you are a dev and wanted to set your own prices, Valve is current under litigation for price parties.

Its not all sunshine and windows.

>Short of Gabe Newell not controlling it anymore, I

In the same way Bill Gates did not force you to use Internet Explorer, yes. Both are free applications with alternatives. Let's not forget our history.

Re: Valve reveals it’s the architect behind a push to bring Windows games to Arm

#668

Post by safety1st » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 10:34 AM UTC

palata wrote: post #596

whatshisface wrote: post #538

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies doing things for the common good because they feel threatened by competiton is the whole idea behind Capitalism.

Except when Capitalism has favoured monopolies for decades and is actually closer to Feodalism.

There is a bit of a debate about what to call the American economic system these days, but I think we should all agree it's not a capitalist one. It's not one that Adam Smith would look at, approve, and say oh yeah baby that's exactly what I was writing about in Wealth of Nations.

It looks a lot closer to the economic policies of the most successful fascist regimes - the best term for modern American economics might be "democratic fascist." There is a facade of a market economy, but there's heavy intervention to privilege not just domestic businesses, but a specific set of big ones that have close ties to the ruling party. This is not much different from how Hitler and Mussolini approached economic policy. Basically have your system revolve around private ownership, pretend to have a market economy but actually make very centralized decisions and execute them through a small number of private oligarchs you're buddies with. The uniquely American flavor is that there are two parties which do this instead of one (but three would be unimaginable), and you can choose which pack of bandits you signal loyalty to without being executed.

Re: Valve reveals it’s the architect behind a push to bring Windows games to Arm

#669

Post by dontlaugh » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 10:35 AM UTC

phendrenad2 wrote: post #633

dontlaugh wrote: post #626

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is not always possible for genres with fast gameplay like most shooters. It's quite common for player movement to be able to put an enemy in view before the light could've round-tripped from the server. This is generally the anti-cheat problem. Certain genres have gameplay that cannot be implemented without trusting the client at least some of the time.

This is correct, the correct amount of over-sharing by the server is non-zero, because otherwise you give a HUGE advantage for slight ping differences.

It's even worse, the lowest theoretical latency possible based on speed of light alone is not low enough for the speed of movement in many shooters, if the server hid all immediately invisible information.

Re: Valve reveals it’s the architect behind a push to bring Windows games to Arm

#670

Post by nottorp » Thu, Dec 04, 2025, 10:39 AM UTC

viktorcode wrote: post #664

nottorp wrote: post #594

The one thing that worries me is that PC gaming is going fast to requiring controller support. Which is reducing the complexity of control schemes to either nothing or mortal kombat like combos. Forward, down, forward, high punch to build a new city in a 4X in a few years?

The one very visible trend in the last 30 years of game development was about reducing input complexity. It has nothing to do with complexity of games themselves. Now instead of fighting clunky controls like in good old times you fight game challenges, where the input tries hard to be as transparent as possible

> you fight game challenges

Like "kill 100.000 mobs" ?

With the 2 options you have left because those are all the buttons :)

And autoaim because those sticks aren't precise enough.

But it's not first person shooters I worry about, because those have devolved into competitive multiplayer IAP fests that create toxic communities.

I worry about strategy games and anything with a whiff of complexity. Reduce options because going through menus with a controller is slow and clunky. Reduce options because when playing at TV distance you can't read a serious list of properties like wargames have.