It seems part of the human condition for the actions of a few to ruin an entire experience for the many. It's because of this that any time a new multiplayer online experience comes along, a far too-large number of people will immediately try to find a way to take advantage any way they can.

Activision's latest release, the gaming juggernaut Call of Duty: Black Ops is no exception, and it's likely that some reading this have already witnessed cheating firsthand. Luckily, one crusader for online justice has given information on how to spot the cheats, and how to go about reporting them to the authorities at Treyarch.

The Call of Duty franchise hasn't been immune to players using glitches or hacks to exploit weaknesses in the game environments or modes, all in the name of XP. Experience doesn't represent a sign of hours dedicated, or skills mastered to these gamers. Rather, experience is merely a currency that is to be gathered in the easiest way possible, whether honest or not.

While many would simply claim that 'no system is perfect' and that cheaters will exist forever, one gamer has decided to explain to all of us how to go about finding dishonest Black Ops players, and how to report them to the game's developers. The team has already made it clear that taking advantage of the game's glitches will not be tolerated, so now you can do your part to provide them with good leads.

The following video by youtubedude will provide just about everything you need to know to identify, verify, and report players who are boosting their experience points unfairly. You may want to take notes:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=499kV2mj7dI

The video details various strategies that boosters will use to both rank up quickly, and keep from being noticed by the authorities. Their tactics may range from simple to complex, but the method to identifying and reporting them is easy enough. Follow the steps to lay down the banhammer yourself:

  1. Look through the Multiplayer Leaderboards for top players with incredibly high Kill-to-Death ratios.
  2. Open up any suspicious players' Recent Games records.
  3. Look to see if the 'heat map' shows that all of the kills have taken place in one area, particularly spawn zones. If the blotches of red are clumped together instead of spread over the map, it's a good sign that the players has been taking out dummy opponents.
  4. Also look to see if the player has been killed at all during the match, or has ranked up kills without dying once.
  5. To confirm the suspicion, view the match in Theater Mode.
  6. Once the user is confirmed to be boosting/cheating, click their name on the Leaderboard, and select 'Report Player.'

It is difficult to think of a way to prevent players from exploiting loopholes in the system, but something has to be done to keep the currency of XP valuable. Bungie has already told their fans loud and clear that they're on the lookout for boosters, and more and more developers are following suit.

The gaming community would be at a distinct disadvantage without honest gamers putting their time into providing this kind of advice, and there's no reason why the game community can't take part in policing cheaters. Instead of complaining about players who are boosting their experience, now members of the massive fan community can keep the population honest with just a few minutes of their time.

The development team went out of their way to give multiplayer participants a pile of easter eggs, a musical unlock, and even a hidden arcade game and text-based classic. So why not return the favor and go above and beyond the expectations of the game's developers?

If you've got an argument for why boosting or cheating shouldn't be dealt with so swiftly, we're happy to hear it. With millions and millions of players all gathering in the same place to work their way up a chain of experience, it seems more ridiculous and insulting than ever for players to simply cut the line. After all, the term 'experience points' has to lose all meaning in their case, since none of the actual gameplay was experienced.

You can join the fight to stop boosters and cheats by picking up your own copy of Call of Duty: Black Ops today for the Xbox 360, PS3, PC, or Wii.

Source: RipTen