Dead easy speed hack

[Olivier]

I thought that it was better to post this here, in a non public area.

We all know that Flash games can be hacked in various ways, and we developers also have various ways to prevent hacking. I have recently stumbled upon something new to me, a piece of software called Enounce MySpeed: http://www.enounce.com/myspeed. Its main usage is to change the playback speed of videos played by Flash, like the ones you could see on YouTube for example. The funny thing is that it also works on Flash games, so even the less tech-savvy players could very easily speed hack a game.

I really don't know how this software works. With its slider I can decrease/increase the speed of my game at will, and yet my game's FPS remains intact! So I can't even check for strong framerate fluctuations so that I could apply countermeasures.

Did anyone already try to prevent such softwares to mess with his game? It works terribly well!

[Olivier]

Direct link to download the software installer, you get this link by filling in your e-mail: http://www.enounce.com/myspeed-win-cr

I have posted the same question elsewhere so that the community of Flash developers get aware of this issue more quickly:
http://www.flashgamelicense.com/view...hread_id=32617 (probably private)
https://www.mochimedia.com/community...asy-speed-hack (public)

[Jacob]

That's quite interesting. Be sure to keep us posted on this, if anyone provides useful information on how to detect it. I don't really care for my past games, but in the future I'll take this into account.

[Olivier]

Apparently the developers aware of this utility are clueless for the moment.

But I have noticed that this utility has no effect when no sound is played. As soon as I start playing a sound, the utility enters into action and the speed of the app is modified. And if I stop the sound, a few seconds later the utility stops working again. Maybe this could lead to a solution.

[Game_Master]

I remember using one of these types of things a while ago on Miniclip - a friend showed me once. They're quite useful if you're in a tight spot on a game which you cannot get past.

[nivram]

I didn't have any information about this or know about the software, so thanks.

Marv

[Fanotherpg]

Olivier I believe it's issue with that how Flash is designed and how audio engine works. So there is probably nothing what can be done from our side.

[Atom]

I haven't used this or plan to even to test but no doubt they do something like link to the SWF from another, run it in a custom host or de-compile the SWF then remake it with a extra code injects that updates the header or any variables found that can effect the fps and play speed.

The only thing to worry about if it doesn't steal code is that it could make games easier to play. I don't see the point but if it makes people feel they are special having a highscore they could not get without cheating then i don't see why they play games anyway but that is about the worst thing i can think of that can happen really.

[Danny]

@Pookasnooks - It is cause for serious concern when people can cheat in SP flash games manipulating hi-scores and competitions. It also raises very serious issues for those who have developed/developing MMORPG's or other online multiplayer games.

@Fano - Not necessarily the end, it may be possible to wrap the runtime into a zone that is excluded from audio somehow?! I suppose that's down to Yves and Francois.

Thanks for this Olivier, I'll do some testing over the next 3-4 weeks with it.

[Atom]

Well it should be a fairly standard fix in code anyway. I am guessing all you would need to do is have a variable then you make its value the FPS set in the MMF2 editor and after a second set all the movieclips and main framerates to the variables value. Programs like these probably change the starting fps and movieclip play rate values and i am guessing it's probably done by linking a swf to another since that would be the easiest method which is why i suggest a second wait because then you reset it after it's been changed.

So unless the program sets the value for everything that gets updated something like that should fix it, if it's updating the value constantly which might be much more difficult to correct however. Another way would be to override the default classes with custom animation which don't work on the standard playback/animation values which is what this program would probably look for if it's not simply the global fps value it's setting.

Though doing all that probably would not be worth the effort, if people really want to cheat in games then they will probably find ways to do it, other than something like a mmorpg where they could maybe profit from selling things it seems pointless for people to do this. For serious online games you would want some sort of encrypted php based setup however where it would be very difficult for people to change the values of things.