If there is one thing that Amazon games have issues with, it's bots. Luckily, this time, they are taking numerous steps to get rid of that particular MMO plague.
In the March 24 Weekly Update, Amazon have announced that they have included a new prevention system to crack down on bots and fraudulent purchases.
For those players who have a Steam account in good standing and have met the small purchase requirement needed to use Steam’s social systems there is no reason for concern, as they shouldn’t be impacted.
On the other hand, players who have not met this, so-called, "Trusted" status through Steam or Lost Ark will have reduced access to a small number of social and economic systems. Specifically, developers say that these accounts will have smaller daily Steam purchase limits than "Trusted" players and be prevented from:
- Initiating player-to-player trades, of which requests can still be received,
- Sending in-game gifts,
- Exchanging Royal Crystals for Gold,
- Sending in-game mail with attachments.
Smilegate
And, while some innocent players might get themselves marked as not trusted due to their accounts being new, which is a shame, these restrictions are not that impactful. After all, they are all things rarely done by new players seeking to try out and play the actual game, and not take advantage of it.
Who will be impacted though, will be the bots and their owners, who use these exact mechanics to make money in real life, or hoard wealth in-game on their main accounts, and break the economy in one fell swoop.
Additionally, Amazon have mentioned some secret systems being put into place with the cooperation with Smilegate, whose mentioning would defeat the purpose, but should show results on the bot issue as well.
