Why Is Dune: Awakening Disabling Family Sharing? - The Feature, Players And Developers
Dune: Awakening has only been released for a few months, but it’s already established itself as a representative of the action-survival MMO genre and has a solid reputation. It demonstrates strong momentum.
However, the game has recently been struggling with declining ratings. Even after the developers addressed the controversial chopper-heavy endgame, the decline hasn’t been stopped.
The root cause is a bug that has deeply frustrated players. The developers have previously released multiple patches to address these issues and prevent hackers from attacking.
However, the game’s vandalism has been a persistent problem. For example, some players have used ornithopter blades to vandalize other players’ bases, while others have deliberately pushed other players’ vehicles, putting them in danger of being torn apart by worms.
Of course, there are also cases where these malicious players are the same group. However, it’s undeniable that these actions have caused inconvenience for other players, especially those who prefer PvE gameplay.
With some issues already troubling players unresolved, the game has recently received some more negative news.
The game officially announced that it will temporarily disable Family Sharing on Steam.
What Does Family Sharing Look Like?
Family Sharing combines all existing family-centric features, allowing up to six members to play together. It allows players to control the types of games each family member plays and the amount of time they play.
Family Sharing also allows players to access games owned by other family members. Family members can play games with each other.
How Can Players Exploit Family Sharing To Cheat In Dune?
Playing The Same Game With Multiple Accounts
This allows players to create multiple Steam accounts and exploit Family Sharing to play Dune: Awakening on different accounts without having to pay multiple times.
This setup allows players to manipulate rankings by using alternate accounts, such as winning or losing games on different accounts to increase their ranking or progress.
Artificial Level Boosting
Some players use this feature to allow high- and low-skilled players to collaborate in the game, allowing experts to lead beginners in matches and artificially boost their levels or achievements.
Banning Poses No Threat To Cheaters
If a player’s primary account is banned for cheating or other reasons, they can use Family Sharing to access the game from another account. This makes the cost of cheating very low, which, to some extent, encourages cheating.
How Do Game Developers Respond?
Game developers have decided to temporarily disable this feature because they have discovered that some players are frequently abusing it, compromising the fairness of the game.
The game developers have sincerely apologized to players who have used this feature legitimately and have pledged to actively improve it and aim to re-enable it within the year.
For players who have been confirmed to have cheated using Family Sharing, game officials will take direct action, banning their accounts and remove those Dune: Awakening Solaris they obtained through cheats.
As the game developers worked diligently to eliminate cheating and improve the gaming environment, the game’s ratings began to recover.
In short, Family Sharing has both advantages and disadvantages. To maintain a fair and stable gaming environment, the game developers were forced to disable it. Players who legitimately used the feature suffered undeserved consequences. We hope the game developers can address the issue of cheating exploited by this feature as soon as possible and enable it as soon as possible.
