Valorant
| Genre | Multiplayer |
| Gamming Style | First Person Shooter (FPS) |
| Platform | Microsoft Windows |
| Release Date | June 2, 2020 [1] |
| Developer | Riot Games [2] |
| Publisher | Riot Games |
| Website | https://playvalorant.com/ |
Valorant is an online multiplayer game designed by Riot Games that is available on the Windows platform, and it is the company’s only first-person shooter (FPS). After being in closed beta for a couple of months, Its official release was on June 2, 2020. The main motivation for its development was to make tactical shooters more accessible to new players while resolving some of the core issues games of the same genre had before.
Contents
Gameplay
Similar to other tactical shooters like Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and Call of Duty: Black Ops, Valorant presents a multiplayer shooter game with different maps and assortment of weapons to buy each round. In a standard game mode, there are ten players, five on each team, and each team gets a chance to be the attacking and defending team for an even amount of rounds. For each round, the attacking team’s main objective is to plant a spike, and if the spike is not defused in a given amount of time by the defending team, the attacking team wins that round. On the other hand, the defending team’s goal is to prevent the spike from blowing up if it is planted, and they win the round if they are successful. During the round, if all five players of a team are dead before the spike is planted, the other team wins the round. The first team to win 13 rounds wins the game.
The key difference that Valorant brings is the introduction of agents. Each agent has their own abilities to use during the game, and similar to guns, these are purchasable at the start of each round. This brings a new aspect to a traditional FPS video game in that abilities can harm, heal, and disrupt players and their movements, which create space for numerous strategies to be formed outside of pure gun fights.
Unrated
This is the non-ranked version of the standard game mode. Players can play this game mode if they are looking to test agents, guns, and strategies or play for fun where the outcome of the game does not affect their ranking. This mode does not incorporate the “win by two” rule of overtime if the score sets at 12-12. The team that wins the next immediate round wins the game.
Competitive
The Competitive mode is the ranked version of the standard game mode. This mode incorporates a ranking system which assigns a certain rank to each player after they have played 5 games in competitive mode. The ranking system consists of iron, bronze, silver, gold, platinum, diamond, Immortal, and Radiant, where Radiant is the highest ranking a player can achieve. Players can play this mode to play with and against other players who rank in a similar range. This mode tests players’ gunplay, character movement, and strategy, and those who consistently win games reach the top of the ranking ladder. In some cases, players who consistently play at a high level may receive interest from professional teams to play for their ESports team.
Other Modes
Valorant also includes three other game modes: Spike Rush, Deathmatch, and Escalation. These game modes are unlike the standard game modes, and they are mainly used to practice aiming and gun mechanics, or bring a different excitement to the game.
Ethical Implications
Riot Vanguard
Riot Vanguard is an anti-cheat software that was built in-house and aims to prevent cheating software to be run concurrently with the game. The implementation consists of a client and a kernel mode driver that is installed on players’ computers during the installation of the game. In order to play Valorant, Riot Vanguard must be installed and active during any gameplay to ensure the integrity of the games. However, early versions of Vanguard received reports of compatibility issues with other Windows applications.
If Vanguard detected any cheating software from a player’s computer, the game would stop abruptly and present a report of the cheating incident. This player would receive some form of ban depending on the seriousness and legitimacy of the act. In some cases, cheating software can go undetected. However, skilled players who have played FPS games long enough can easily tell whether or not players are using any form of wallhacking or aimbotting. These incidents can be reported during or after the game where developers can review a video of the game to approve the report.
Controversy
Given Vanguard is installed on a player’s computer, its kernel mode driver starts up as soon as the computer boots up. If Vanguard does not start with the computer, it will not trust the computer, and therefore, the game cannot be played. (ref2) The kernel is the main part of the operating system, which means that any software that is run at this level has a huge control over one’s computer. The main concern with Vanguard incorporating a kernel mode driver is that any vulnerabilities in Vanguard could result in damages far worse than if it was run at a higher level. However, other multiplayer games such as Apex Legends, Rainbow Six Siege, and PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds have continued to run anti-cheat software on the kernel level, but they have not received as much attention and criticism.
Transparency
After several patch releases, the security developers have loosened up the restrictions for Vanguard, and more programs that do not pose a threat to its security, such as Core Temp, have been unblocked for the time being.
In October 2020, Riot Games released a privacy statement regarding more transparency about the Vanguard software and the information it collects in efforts to relieve any players or potential players of any uneasiness they felt about the Vanguard software. The statement included information about
References
- ↑ Wikipedia. "Riot Games, Inc." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riot_Games
- ↑ Wikipedia. "League of Legends" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/League_of_Legends
Valorant - video game Valorant
Kevin Chen
