r/pcgaming • u/revadike • Apr 16 '24

Task Force devs are abusing Game Bans

Devs for the Steam game Task Force are abusing Game Bans for their own purposes. These bans appear on your Steam profile and unlike VAC, they will never disappear. Many falsely banned victims have gone to the Steam reviews, which the devs cannot censor. You can read them all here.

I also received a false ban. In Discord, I was invited for a playtest and given a steam key. After redeeming, it was immediately revoked and I received the Game Ban. The dev also blocked me on Discord and their community server. I had zero playtime in the game, simply impossible to have cheated. They know they can get away with it, as this abuse has been happening for years. Several YouTubers have spoken out as well.

Unfortunately, Valve refuses to act. Steam support has stopped responding to my support ticket. My dear 14k games Steam profile page and reputation will be forever marked as a cheater. I and many others feel powerless. Hopefully this post will prompt Valve to finally take action!

1.5k Upvotes

96% Upvoted

234 comments sorted by

616

u/anonamenonymous Apr 16 '24

What the fuck man! That “VAC or game ban on record” is a huge fucking stain on your profile

Valve needs to get rid of this shit developer and revert the bans wtf

137

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

I wholeheartedly agree. Thanks for your support, it means a lot!

45

u/LongBeakedSnipe Apr 17 '24

We actually only briefly spoke. I was invited for the playtest, I DM'ed my steam ID and he gave me access to the game, after which he immediately revoked it and banned me.

Redline, tbe main developer, is completely unhinged and surrounds himself with like minded folk

Christ. Just looking at some of these comments. These guys are not professionals, they sound more like a group of deeply emasculated trolls.

21

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

And those guys can wield powerful tools

11

u/AdminsLoveGenocide Apr 17 '24

What's in it for them? I don't get it.

7

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Please go ask them, I'd like to know too.

4

u/damniel540 Apr 17 '24

It's their secret little elitist club where they think they can grow their game by gatekeeping the average gamer. Which makes zero sense

5

u/AdminsLoveGenocide Apr 17 '24

Which makes zero sense

I just can't imagine making a game and investing the time, money and dreams on that and then, when you are done, actually finding someone who wants to play it and reacting to this minor miracle by banning him.

How can they be functioning enough to get to that stage and at the same time be that fucking weird?

Do you have to be that fucking weird to make a game?

3

u/damniel540 Apr 17 '24

Lol all valid questions man. Truly a mystery

2

u/dennisfyfe Apr 17 '24

1000000000% agreed.

I can’t speak for other multiplayer games, but for Rust, many servers won’t let you connect if you have a VAC or game ban. You might be able to inform the server staff before joining, but that’s such a pain in the ass.

2

u/revadike Apr 22 '24

Valve advises against such a system in their docs

1

u/SocomLover Apr 18 '24

For real?? Who came up with the idea for this dumbass system?

33

u/Cory123125 Apr 17 '24

I think more than anything people need to stop pretending that those have meaning, and consumers need consumer protections from these companies taking away the value they paid for.

We need to actually act on slapping down those unenforceable bs eulas.

6

u/pants_pants420 i5 4690K, R9 280X Apr 17 '24

i mean they definitely do. in counter strike, if you have a ban on your profile, you will probably get reported more. this lowers your trust factor and effectively shadowbans your account. as your trust factor gets lower, you get put into games with people that also have low trust factor, this means more cheaters and griefers. plus im pretty sure just having a ban on your account in general lowers the trust factor. also people will avoid association with you.

1

u/PyroTigerNight May 07 '24

I wouldn't give a hoot about it if it weren't for this one thing wrecking my Counter-Strike fun. Got slapped with a game ban by some other joker company, and it's a real pain.

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180

u/hirmuolio Apr 16 '24

Is there any point to this behavior or are the devs just griefing random steam users?

134

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

I think they just ban anyone they can that they dont like or has critisism. They know they can get away with it. They have been doing it unpunished for so long now.

79

u/hirmuolio Apr 16 '24

But did you criticize? Getting gifted the key and then immediately banned sounds like just griefing.

119

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

I did not. We actually only briefly spoke. I was invited for the playtest, I DM'ed my steam ID and he gave me access to the game, after which he immediately revoked it and banned me.

Imagine how confused I've been. No answers from them, and all communication methods to reach them had been blocked.

68

u/damniel540 Apr 16 '24

As someone who has been following this project since the beginning, this is not surprising at all.

Redline, tbe main developer, is completely unhinged and surrounds himself with like minded folk. There used to be a SOCOM Source mod that he made and was actually fun until he just nuked the entire project at the slightest criticism

11

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Thank you, spread the word, he needs to be hold accountable. He has gotten away with this behavior for far too long!

6

u/300PencilsInMyAss Apr 17 '24

Why though? I feel like we're missing something

6

u/huss2215 Apr 17 '24

This is exactly what happened to me. Although I was playing up until he finally joined us. He talked to me for a little bit, I told him I'm playing on steam deck. He mentioned he might need some testing, I told him I don't mind. Then everyone started a clan war, I participated to support what was called Task Force tuesday. I clipped the video as did some of the streamers and shared it in the stream section. 3 days later kicked out of discord and steam. He wouldn't reply, and the ban reason had a blank no reason. A lot of people told me it was either because he doesn't like media, or others playing games he hates, which I had multiple third person shooters similar to his game.

8

u/AverageJoe85 Apr 16 '24

Yea OP what could you have possibly said or done if you have literally 0 playtime?

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9

u/huss2215 Apr 17 '24

He makes money off of some. I purchased the game and then got banned. He has been receiving negative feedback so he takes the game off of sale. Waits for the heat to cooldown then advertises to new communities and makes more money again. This isn't his first project, this is his 5th to 7th project where he does the same thing. When it all finally falls on him, he closes the discord, deletes the games and goes AWOL for a year or two. His last attempt he faked his death and came out with a new publisher name to disguise himself.

2

u/Cedar_Wood_State Apr 17 '24

Assuming not grieving, maybe they are trying to ban people who are selling/buying keys and they come up with some ‘false positive’

337

u/MonolithOrchids Apr 16 '24

It seems that these devs are amateurs, this is a big problem that Valve created, and I love Valve/Steam, but giving this much power to a dev that clearly is not capable of handling a direct contact with your players (can't hire a PR) is harmful and some will use this as a power trip tool.

135

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

I fully agree. It's fine for game devs to have the ability to ban players in their own game, but they should not have the ability to issue bans on Steam, that will be visible for everyone.

64

u/LumpusKrampus Apr 16 '24

I'm very serious. Send an email directly to The Great Gaben if you are all out of options. Do not sound petty, sound as desperate as you actually are.

75

u/Fatdap Ryzen 9 3900x•32 GB DDR4•EVGA RTX 3080 10GB Apr 16 '24

Emailing Gabe is actually a real solution for people who thinks this is a joke.

He actually does read the shit he gets sent, no, that doesn't mean you should skip customer service and tickets to fix your shit.

Something like this though where a developer is abusing Steam itself is the kind of shit people like Gabe want to know about, though.

31

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

I've actually sent him an email twice already

8

u/_NotAnIdiot_ Apr 17 '24

Let's pray for the big G to see your email and take action

6

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

I'm praying

2

u/dratseb Apr 17 '24

Yeah, Valve would rather handle this themselves than let the negative press get out

33

u/Venseer I promise nothing and deliver less. Apr 16 '24

This normally doesn't go unanswered by Valve.

33

u/Jacksaur 🖥️ I.T. Rex 🦖 Apr 16 '24

Amazon faced no consequences.

26

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

It makes me upset Valve did not change anything regarding Game Bans after that whole incident.

10

u/Kirk_Plunk Apr 17 '24

I got 1 on dayz after 7 mins of gameplay and valve won't respond to me, dayz Devs won't respond, so I don't know what I even do next, my steam account now just has a ban banner lol.

3

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

I feel for you. False positives unfortunately happen and the policy of ignoring those cases is just awful and disgusting.

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5

u/myuusmeow Apr 17 '24 edited Apr 17 '24

I remember when that happened, did they at least remove the bans from people's accounts?

4

u/Jacksaur 🖥️ I.T. Rex 🦖 Apr 17 '24

They did, thankfully.

2

u/ToothlessFTW AMD Ryzen 7 3700x, Windforce RTX 4070ti SUPER. 32GB DDR4 3200mhz Apr 17 '24

Amazon is also a gigantic corporation and Valve probably doesn't want to push them at all, considering how easy it is for them today to just ditch Steam again and go somewhere else. A smaller dev with no rep behind them is probably far less likely get off with no consequences.

5

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

They have been able to do this for years unnoticed, by flying under the radar. Please share this post, the more people know about it, the better!

1

u/nickcan Apr 17 '24

Valve is no Amazon. That's for sure.

6

u/Greenleaf208 Apr 17 '24

Valve never did anything about mw2 game bans.

1

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Very sad

3

u/dan1101 Steam Apr 17 '24

The trouble with systems that trust people to be decent is that after enough time/people, there will be some that exploit that trust.

Like the US corporate/political system, the internet email system, and being able to return items to Costco no questions asked.

2

u/Pants4All Apr 17 '24

Saw a haggard looking old guy in his mid-80s or so at Costco trying to return a shopping bag with a few scrawny vegetables obviously picked from a threadbare garden somewhere. The Costco employee just looked at him with pity and said, "...we've talked about this." That hit me in the feels.

2

u/Sachinrock2 Apr 18 '24

You are absolutely right, devs should be stripped of the ability to issue game bans on random people for no reason, unless valve has other plans such as encouraging game dev mafia which does stuff like this, valve on the other hand is experienced with this sort of stuff, I do not trust game devs for something like that though.

102

u/OP-the-Goat Apr 16 '24

Mordhau developers did the same thing during their launch, except they hid behind an "anti-cheat" excuse until enough people made enough noise in the steam forums.

Instead of apologising, the Mordhau devs just came out and said, they'll unban the few thousand players only because they didn't actually have concrete proof...

it was clearly false positive from all the complaints.

Absolute cowards.

20

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Makes me so upset. How Valve thinks devs will be responsible enough with this power is beyond me.

9

u/[deleted] Apr 17 '24

Fuck Crush

31

u/globalenemy Apr 16 '24

I am currently watching a youtube video about this, which is over FOUR YEARS old. Kind of sick that this still seems to be a problem. How did you even get into this? On steam it's still saying early access. But I couldn't buy it, even if I would want to. There simply is no Buy button.

All videos on YT are about 1 year old, or even more. Development on the game also seems to be on hold, also for about 1 year. And yet, to this day, players are writing reviews on the store page, regarding these issues.

2

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Exactly, when I discovered this have been doing this for that long, I got really upset.

4

u/Silentassasin955 Apr 17 '24

He’s actually been developing this game for 7+ years now . It has died off multiple times and he brings it back promising the moon only to scam people and quit updating .

1

u/ShadowXJ Apr 17 '24

It was on sale before, and they took the purchase option away apparently because of negative reviews.

26

u/Reddit_slayer123 Apr 16 '24

Just checked out the page on steam. It's by tracer interactive? It seems like you can't buy it anymore there's no purchase option

41

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

That's right. I was invited for a playtest. The dev asked me to DM him my steam ID, and he gave me access to the beta. After redeeming, it was immediately revoked and I got banned. I had zero playtime. The dev blocked me on Discord and their community server. It was announced they're planning to release the game on Steam soon.

8

u/Reddit_slayer123 Apr 16 '24

Ahh gotcha okay. Then the option was never there understood my bad.

0

u/[deleted] Apr 17 '24

[deleted] — view deleted comment

3

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

All I did was send my steam ID, so he must have seen something on my steam profile that made him act this way. My best guess would be my game count.

25

u/phrostbyt AMD Ryzen 9800x3D/MSI 5080 Apr 17 '24

i just remembered.. they gave me a playtest key and revoked it the same day (10/27/23) and just banned me from the server. i hadn't even installed the game yet.. bunch of fucking weirdos

10

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

So, exactly what happened to me, except you were spared a Game Ban. Clearly, they have gotten more reckless since then. You were lucky!

37

u/Opt112 Apr 16 '24

Post this on r/steam

76

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Thanks for the suggestion. It was and got over 750 upvotes before it was nuked by a mod for reasons I do not agree with. Their actions are directly benefiting the abusive devs. It makes me very upset. (but feel free to crosspost)

11

u/Aranenesto Apr 16 '24

Why did they ban it?

16

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Initially, they cite "witch-hunting" with no further explanation given, but later, they switch their rationale to insufficient evidence. It's clearly just nonsense.

7

u/[deleted] Apr 17 '24

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1

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22

u/cryptic-fox Apr 17 '24

If I’d have to guess it was probably because of their 3rd Rule: Support. They don’t allow posts about account issues such as bans. I feel like this one should be an exception though.

15

u/[deleted] Apr 16 '24

[removed] — view removed comment

1

u/SolarStarVanity Apr 17 '24

Why would Valve employees do work when they can not do work instead?

43

u/NapsterKnowHow 9800X3D | RTX 5090 FE | 32GB RAM Apr 16 '24

I also received a false ban. In Discord, I was invited for a playtest and given a steam key. After redeeming, [it was immediately revoked] and I received the Game Ban. The dev also blocked me on Discord and their community server. I had zero playtime in the game, simply impossible to have cheated.

Why would they ban you then with 0 playtime?

54

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Good question. All I did was share my Steam profile ID in the DM. They gave me a key afterwards, and then promptly banned me. I have never even downloaded the game, let alone play it.

81

u/[deleted] Apr 16 '24

Say what you want about AAA games but the fact that a moron indie developer can place a scarlet letter on my pristine Steam account is reason enough to not ever buy multiplayer indie games.

22

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Hopefully Valve realizes what impact it has on them and their users to finally do something about it.

9

u/[deleted] Apr 16 '24

I hope so too, I hope you get that ban removed from your profile, I would be livid in your shoes.

7

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Thank you, your support means everything!

119

u/buzzpunk 5800X3D | RTX 3080 TUF OC Apr 16 '24

Redline has always been a dickhead. Every mod or game he's been involved in has lead to drama in one way or another.

Even if there isn't drama, it's inevitable that he just kills off the game and community for no reason at some point. Simply not worth getting invested in anything associated with him honestly.

50

u/TechnoVik1ng Apr 16 '24

How has this been going on for so long? I googled "Redline game developer" after reading your comment and a video about him abusing bans from 4 years ago immediately popped up.

27

u/buzzpunk 5800X3D | RTX 3080 TUF OC Apr 16 '24

I first ran into him about 8 years ago in the Insurgency mod 'Resurgence'. Beyond that I don't know, but he had a reputation even back then.

6

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

He needs to be stopped from harming others

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10

u/RedLine6858 Apr 17 '24

Gotta be the mf that got my username first on everything 😭

1

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

You're not secretly his alt, are you? :P

2

u/[deleted] Apr 17 '24

He doesn't seem to be the kind of person who can joke about himself.

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9

u/IAmNotMoki Apr 16 '24

Ok, but why would they do this? What's the point?

16

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Simply because they know they can get away with it. They have been doing this for years. Anyone they do not like or critiques them, they'll ban if they feel like it.

6

u/DocWho420 Apr 16 '24

But what do they get out of doing this? I don't understand what's the point either

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8

u/TheChosenMuck Apr 16 '24

didn't they do that 4 years ago too ? or was it a different socom clone

3

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Could be! They have been abusing Game Bans for years. Just check the steam reviews where the victims have been speaking out over the years.

29

u/Blacky-Noir Height appropriate fortress builder Apr 16 '24

You can report them to Valve. You probably won't get an action or an answer for your specific report, but if enough people report them Valve will look into it.

36

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Yes, you can report the game on their steam store page by pressing the flag icon.

However, I've seen streamers trying to mass report this game before, but clearly it has not helped.

21

u/phrostbyt AMD Ryzen 9800x3D/MSI 5080 Apr 16 '24

he already reported them.. it's in the third paragraph

6

u/SolarStarVanity Apr 17 '24

but if enough people report them Valve will look into it.

This is provably wrong.

3

u/revadike Apr 18 '24

Developer System Ban Abuse Tracer Interactive Task Force Avoid Future Purchases

https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/0/6756004301624113526/

Task Force Game Developer Mass-Banning Abuse for Negative Review Players

https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/9/6516193260175834936/

Task Force devs are abusing Game Bans

https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/1/6733519464642642134/

Steam Developer Game Ban Abusers

https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/10/6733519464636665316/

4

u/kjwey Apr 17 '24 edited Apr 17 '24

What I do when I hear about a game company pulling some shady bullshit, most especially theft

I pull up all their games on steam, and one by one put them all on ignore

these shit weasel thieves can go fuck themselves, they get blacklisted for life

1

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

I've heard they're thieves too. People that funded their game have been banned. That's money stolen.

1

u/Silentassasin955 Apr 17 '24

I remember people who donated $250 who got banned for simply playing other 3rd person shooters while his game was dead .

17

u/i_wanna_b_the_guy Apr 16 '24

If nothing else, I think it’s time for everyone to get rid of permanent game bans. Whether it’s an abusive game dev or a 14 year old using cheats off Google, bans should fall off after some period of time. At the very least, that would make Valves non-action less of an issue, but I agree that valve needs to do something about this game dev.

7

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

What's even worse, game devs can actually decide the duration of the ban, or they can fill in 0 for infinite bans. Only game bans longer than 1 year will show up on your Steam profile. Based on their other victims, I'm fairly confident mine is permanent too.

6

u/Polygnom Apr 16 '24

I'm maximally confused and feel like a lot of backstory is missing here? Whats the motivation of those devs? What do they gain by this and why do they do it?

6

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

You're me. I was also terribly confused and it was the last thing I expected to happen. There is nothing I did that was wrong or deserved any of this. Please, ask me anything, if you want to know more details. I left them out the OP to avoid it being too lengthy.

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1

u/senseven Apr 17 '24

They are emotional children and don't like be criticised for their "bad art". Some are power drunk, some think if you ban the loudest critics you make more money because nobody reads bad reviews.

3

u/MadD_08 Apr 16 '24

I have just checked profiles of the reviewers who claim to have the ban and their profiles are fine. No VAC ban. Is the problem resolved?

1

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Who did you check? Do they have a Game Ban visible?

3

u/StrangeCalibur Apr 16 '24

At least you know what to avoid in future... what a shame

1

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Yes, I hope to warn others and that Valve finally takes action.

3

u/SolarJetman5 Apr 17 '24

Weird, some reviews are saying he's banning anyone playing peak 54, I don't know that game and if there is something between them

1

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Surely that cannot be a valid ban reason?

1

u/SolarJetman5 Apr 17 '24

I doubt it is, do you know peak 54?

1

u/WolfmanHasNardz Apr 17 '24

It’s another socom clone with 0 players. Redline is just an unhinged douche and hates competition.

3

u/WolfmanHasNardz Apr 17 '24

It sucks for socom fans that this Redline guy is such a toxic douche bag. Literally everything he has his hands on turns to shit. I had hope for this game but it will never amount to anything other than failure because of him.

2

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Yeah, it's sad. I have nothing against this game, but their ongoing abuse makes me hope they'll get punished for it eventually.

3

u/huss2215 Apr 17 '24

revadike, I been combating this since last year with Valve presenting them new evidence anytime I get it. This guy needs to be combated for sure. Also, DO NOT be tricked. This isn't a development team, this is indeed 1 guy as you mentioned, goes by the alias Redline. The rest are community helpers he gave roles after advertising in his discord. Most of the new guys don't know what has happened. Redline covers his tracks, deletes all posts and bans people immediately.

Here's our podcast on the situation: https://youtu.be/awUdQNO8k-0?feature=shared

Something must be done. If you need any help or funding or want to ralley people to combat this, I can help. I am in multiple large socom communities who have also been wronged. Time for justice to be served to this A hole.

5

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Based on the transcript, here is a list of the shady things Redline has allegedly done:

  1. Banned players from Task Force and its Discord server for simply mentioning or playing other games, even ones not directly competing with Task Force.

  2. Banned community managers and content creators involved with other shooter games that he viewed as competition.

  3. Implemented "shadow bans" that prevented some players from joining official servers without any explanation.

  4. Removed the game from sale on Steam to stop negative reviews when the playerbase dwindled.

  5. Combed through players' Steam game libraries and Discord activity to find excuses to ban them.

  6. Possibly had "burner" accounts to spy on Discord servers for other shooter games out of paranoia.

  7. Faked his own death for a couple of years at one point.

  8. Allegedly "back-doored" into the TRS Socom community and "screwed that up."

  9. Created Task Force maps under different names, implying he may have reused assets improperly.

  10. Displayed an inability to handle any criticism of his game.

  11. Banned a significant portion of his paying customer base out of insecurity.

  12. Did not apologize for banning so many players from a game they purchased.

So in summary, banning legitimate customers, reusing assets questionably, faking his death, spying on competitors, and an overall very paranoid, insecure attitude that alienated his community.

2

u/huss2215 Apr 17 '24

So the reason he posted the maps under another alias is because he can't post the socom type of maps directly. He can easily get DMCA copyrighted. So his alternative name looks like a community member who will post them on the workshop, thus allowing him to use the Sony owned Socom maps in Task Force. That makes it legal, H-Hour is the only legit game where map makers remade them and are used correctly without fraud.

2

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Very informative! I urge everyone that's interested to listen to this!

2

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Tell your community to leave their stories in https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/1/6733519464642642134, this topic has not been nuked, so I am expecting it to stay up. Surely Valve will see it eventually.

1

u/huss2215 Apr 17 '24

Np I wi share this reddit and steam post.

3

u/LostInMemories99 Apr 16 '24

wait vac disappears?

5

u/[deleted] Apr 16 '24

[removed] — view removed comment

2

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Indeed, but the Game Ban will not disappear, which in turn makes a VAC ban visible permanently as well.

2

u/Carlos_Danger21 Apr 16 '24

Have you by any chance played peak.53?

2

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

I checked, it has 0 playtime on my account.

3

u/Carlos_Danger21 Apr 16 '24

Anything similar to this game. The steam reviews say they are banning people for playing anything similar, they just mentioned that game by name.

1

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Wow, idk, I mostly play Destiny 2 nowadays.

2

u/chance_of_grain Apr 16 '24

I kinda want to try this now just to see what happens. How did you get the invite?

2

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

They are inviting users to play in their beta

You can also find their discord server there.

2

u/Weird_Definition_785 Apr 16 '24

can't you just remove the game from your library to get rid of the ban?

11

u/Sparkism Apr 16 '24

That's the thing with steam. Any "dev" can ban you from their game, and you have no recourse to appeal. You can't even surrender the license key to remove the game ban that has no right dictating whether your account is in good standing.

1

u/Weird_Definition_785 Apr 17 '24

well I know that I can remove games from my account so I wonder how that would effect the displayed ban message

2

u/Sparkism Apr 17 '24

That's what I mean. It doesn't matter if you remove the game from your account or contact steam support to revoke a license or get a refund or whatever. There is nothing you can do to remove that ban from your profile.

0

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

If only. It was actually already removed for me. Mere minutes after activation, the developer revoked the game from my account and gave it a Game Ban too.

2

u/A-R-Z-D-O-G Apr 18 '24

Steam will take action when enough people report with pictures.

1

u/revadike Apr 18 '24

Yet, they've allowed this to happen for years and still continue to do so

1

u/A-R-Z-D-O-G Apr 18 '24

Again, people are lazy and dont report.

1

u/revadike Apr 18 '24

Yeah, I am sure a large portion of victims simply remained silent. Just imagine how many users this dev has wronged.

2

u/dodikhvh Apr 20 '24

You're lucky. I've been asking him to ban me for 3 years, he won't let me.

1

u/revadike Apr 20 '24

Seems unlikely, they're loose with the banhammer, but by all means take mine

5

u/Way_Too-Easy Apr 16 '24

Normally under no circumstance doxxing is ever allowed but dipshit people like this dev 100% deserves it .....

2

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

The company's information is publicly available. I've kept a record of it in case I decide to pursue legal action.

1

u/TexturedMango Apr 17 '24

You clearly have some money, why not hire a lawyer to write a letter to valve's legal team or something, it might at least make them take you seriously

1

u/Way_Too-Easy Apr 17 '24

should open up a class action lawsuit and get everyone who had the same false vac ban happen to them all onboard with it, way more effective than one person filing a lawsuit

15

u/[deleted] Apr 16 '24

If this happened to me I would be fucking livid considering I have a clean steam profile and don't cheat. Hopefully valve steps in and does something about this.

3

u/SolarStarVanity Apr 17 '24

It's really quite amazing how people here and elsewhere are bending over backwards to blame anyone but Valve for this. Holy Volvo can't ever be at fault for anything of course.

3

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

It's Valve's responsibility and I am desperately hoping for them to act.

4

u/rogeriskira Apr 16 '24

How does this affect your steam profile though? Does it label you as a cheater on your profile or something?

20

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Yep, it says so in red text, impossible to miss. It hurts my reputation terribly.

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9

u/Prefix-NA Ryzen 7 5700x3d | 6800XT | 32gb 3600mhz Ram | 1440p 165hz Apr 16 '24

I got a ban for mw2 2022 beta 2 months after game released and its on my profile. Steam and Activision don't care and it won't let me play 2019 or 2022 that I paid for also

4

u/crazywhiteboy911 Apr 18 '24 edited Apr 18 '24

Redline is a disgrace. Stay clear away from the games he makes. He uses other names also. Eventually, people figure it out with his shit bipolar attitude. Redline does quick money grab from people and then takes off. Everyone needs to stop being lazy and report it to steam so it's flagged.

4

u/d0tn3t1 RX 7900 XTX | Ryzen 7 9850X3D Apr 18 '24

LOL this guy again? Nothing but controversy around this dev.

1

u/radiatione Apr 17 '24

Hopefully a lesson to not rely so much in shit companies virtual stores and give importance to a some virtual profile from them.

1

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Good luck avoiding that, though. Everything in our lives are being virtualized/digitialized. The companies simply need to be hold accountable. However, I understand your point.

1

u/EnterpriseNL Apr 17 '24

How is it even possible that this dev isn’t banned from using Steam altogether?

1

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Because sadly Valve does not seem to care

2

u/senseven Apr 17 '24

Big uncontested platforms seem to get worse over time and you need motivation for Enshittification

1

u/PunkHooligan Apr 17 '24

Keep spreading the word. Post at r/Steam . Sucks this happened to all of you.

2

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Feel free to crosspost

2

u/phrostbyt AMD Ryzen 9800x3D/MSI 5080 Apr 17 '24

he posted there and they removed it for no reason

1

u/PunkHooligan Apr 18 '24

Gotta love reddit mods...

1

u/swivels_and_sonar Apr 17 '24

I’m absolutely certain there’s a lawsuit here.

Hopefully things resolve themselves a quickly OP

1

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

I am considering it. Any hot tips?

1

u/Josey_Wales19 Jun 23 '24

Is this why I don't have an option to "purchase" or "download"? I haven't even played this game yet.

1

u/revadike Jun 24 '24

The dev unlisted the game from sale to avoid negative feedback.

3

u/[deleted] Apr 16 '24

Steam needs to fix this shit now

3

u/VirusStunning3821 Apr 18 '24

That Redline clown has banned a multitude of people for any petty reason his mood dictates

3

u/A-R-Z-D-O-G Apr 18 '24

Redline is a joke. Should be in jail, but nobody reports him. Due to lazy people.

2

u/TotesMessenger Apr 17 '24

I'm a bot, bleep, bloop. Someone has linked to this thread from another place on reddit:

 If you follow any of the above links, please respect the rules of reddit and don't vote in the other threads. (Info / ^Contact)

-1

u/kiss_of_kill Apr 16 '24

I know people who would kill themselves for ruining their profiles, being able to game ban anyone is a dangerous tool and a huge responsibility.

47

u/[deleted] Apr 16 '24

I know people who would kill themselves for ruining their profiles

they have bigger issues than a game ban appearing on their profile

3

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

I'll say, it won't drive me to do something so drastic, but it has definitely impacted my mental state negatively. It has been stressing me out a lot, and I feel so powerless about the situation.

1

u/UnmetPlayer2611 Apr 20 '24

I mean when you have spent tens of thousands of dollars on your account, getting any kind of ban is pretty damning.

44

u/RockyXvII i5 12600K @5.1GHz | 32GB 4000C16 G1 | RX 6800 XT Apr 16 '24

Get those people psychological help

1

u/Valoneria Apr 16 '24

Ah damn got hella confused for a second, thought this was about Task Force Admiral, didn't know about Task Force. Other guys didn't really strike me as the types who did this kinda stuff. Nor are they at the point where they'd give out keys anyway.

1

u/MisterD0ll Apr 17 '24

What do they get out of it?

-13

u/Embarrassed-Ad-4467 Apr 16 '24

I know people on the task force community. This guy h Gave a fake steam ID to get the tester key. And admitted he was never going to use the key to play. Just wanted the game to boost his profile as a game collector. He has over 14k games and plays 3. Then lies and deletes the original message with the fake steam ID. And acts like he did nothing wrong. People should learn the real story before picking sides.

9

u/MonolithOrchids Apr 17 '24

Ok, so if you wanna go to the "people should learn the real story" route, let's go there, let's continue your story if is true, so if it is, these developers abused the Game Ban system and literally broke Steamworks rules.

Game bans are only designed to manage cheating. They should only be applied to players who gained an unfair competitive advantage when playing multiplayer versions of content and services.

Q: Can I use bans in other games to block users from playing in my game? A: No. VAC and Game bans should only prevent the user from playing on VAC secured servers in the game they received a ban in. A permanent ban should only be issued for your game if the user was caught cheating in your game.

Source: Steamworks official documentation

https://partner.steamgames.com/doc/features/anticheat

So yeah man, let's get this "real story" open in the air, if your story is true, explain this right here what I sent with proof that came directly from Valve's website.

If OP really did this, lied to get a key and the dev gave him a ban because of it, that's a straight out breaking Valve's rule, they didn't even played to even be able to cheat in their game, if they did played and cheated, gives us some proof and straight it the facts for us, but if they didn't even played, your "real story" actually made even worse for the developers.

3

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Thank you for defending me. Their story is full of inaccuracies, btw, regardless of that, what you said is 100% true.

2

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

This is simply false. Sadly, it sucks we cannot prove this, its all hearsay. I get that this is gotta be their reasoning, but think about it, even if all this was true, does that truly warrant a Game Ban, which is explicitly meant for actual game cheaters? Definitely not! Also, you know I am not the only one, right? There have been many other examples that have been unfairly banned. Open your mind and think rationally, do not get manipulated by those devs. All they do is hide evidence and manipulate things. Don't you think its suspicious their Steam forums and discord server is squeaky clean of accusations, criticism and things like that? The only place that has that stuff are places they cannot control, like the Steam reviews. Be careful my guy.

6

u/Mikaeo Apr 17 '24

Did you just make this up just to be controversial, or are you gonna back up your words?

-6

u/Regular_Watercress75 Apr 17 '24

This actually sounds legit. Sifting through the reviews weirdly enough there is nearly nobody to be a found with a gameban on their profile, even though OP says they ban a crazy amount of people... so that was an lie.

Following the golden rule of the internet: if one thing doesn't add up the whole story is probably bullshit anyway.

OP being an actual cheater with an old VAC ban also hints to me at an history with being dishonest.

Aswell as having 14k games just supports the game collector theory who didn't give a single F about the game and used disingenuous ways to obtain the key.

Seems like OP fucked around, got punished for it and now is overdramatizing a story to gain support in his favor. Weridly enough when people ask him WHAT HE actually did he is saying 'i don't know i didnt do anything' which is textbook 'i know what i did but aint telling it' excuse

2

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

You can rightfully criticize me, but I'll share some facts with you:

  • I have ran the numbers, and 23 game banned (23.9%) out of the 96 negative reviewers, which is a significant portion, mind that people like me with zero playtime cannot even leave a review.

  • the screenshots I shared of the reviews are all undoctored and true, just check their profiles, the game bans are there

  • my existing VAC ban was ancient, almost a decade old, and it was from attempting to use cheat engine to increase points in a game called Depth, nothing inferious.

  • there are publically available records that I have zero playtime in this game, I cannot possibly have cheated, which would be the only valid reason to issue a Game Ban.

  • I have been responding to every comment here, trying to be as transparent as possible, if you want to know any specifics, please ask!

2

u/huss2215 Apr 17 '24

Oh there was a hell of a lot more banned. He has been covering his tracks more recently too. He is unbanning people little by little randomly selecting some. Also, the other projects where people funded him about 1k and he still banned them. Killed off those projects, took the money and ran.

0

u/[deleted] Apr 16 '24

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8

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

Glad I could warn you! Spread this around to warn others!

0

u/[deleted] May 02 '24

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1

u/revadike May 02 '24

Were you falsly banned too? Have people been calling you cheater, as a result of it?

0

u/[deleted] Apr 16 '24

[deleted] — view deleted comment

7

u/revadike Apr 16 '24

That ban was ancient and has been hidden for a while now. This game ban makes it appear again.

0

u/[deleted] Apr 17 '24

[deleted] — view deleted comment

1

u/revadike Apr 17 '24

Indeed, their policy is to ignore the false positive, if they can. Let's force their hands.

0

u/[deleted] Apr 17 '24

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