Delta Force has a list of tech it'll ban you to the shadowrealm for using, including the usual cheating software but also way weirder stuff like 'USB drives'

Delta Force—the CoD-y, Battlefield-y FPS from Tencent—hit yesterday, and it seems pretty alright so long as you don't stare into the yawning chasm of its monetisation options. The guns go thock-thock, you can stick all sorts of knick-knacks and gadgets on them, and your bones break with such ease you might mistake it for enthusiasm.

And it's free to play, so probably worth giving a shot if you're on the hunt for a new FPS to pour some hours into, but be warned: The devs have released a list of software they would really rather you didn't use at the same time as playing the game. Fail to heed their warning, and you could end up triggering a bunch of in-game errors, or straight-up get suspended. I'll include the full list below, but let's delve in for a second.

A lot of this stuff is obvious: cheating software and the like. For example, the devs have things like Cheat Engine, speed-hack software like Speed Wizard, and programs that let you automate keystrokes on their list of straightforwardly "prohibited" tech. Likewise, Direct Memory Access (DMA) hardware—which you can use to run things like aimbots in a hard-to-detect way—are also on the no-no list.

There's also a lower tier of forbidden tech. Delta Force divides programs into two categories: "Prohibited" and "not recommended," with the second list seemingly more likely to trigger errors than bans. On the latter is a bunch of remote-desktop software—AnyDesk, Teamviewer, etc—and frame capture tools like Nvidia Nsight.

That makes sense too: I imagine a game which is trying to keep total tabs on your system to make sure you're not doing anything nefarious doesn't take kindly to you remoting in from another PC it can't keep track of, while I suspect tech like Nvidia Nsight makes API calls that you could easily mistake for cheating software—aimbots yanking out frames to analyse them for human silhouettes, that kind of thing.

So far, so good, if a little draconian. Where I stumble, though, is the inclusion of "USB drives" on Delta Force's list of prohibited hardware. I think I might understand why—maybe you could do some trickery involving installing the game onto the drive, or running a whole separate OS instance from it, that you could use to bamboozle kernel-level anti-cheat, but it feels absurdly sweeping and drastically underexplained right now.

After all, plenty of people are going to have external HDDs plugged into their machines for one reason or another; are they all gonna get hammered for trying to launch up the military FPS du jour while having their media collections plugged in?

I've reached out to Tencent to ask for clarification as to the reasons and limits of the USB drive ban, and I'll update this piece if I hear back. Until I do, maybe eject your exhaustively catalogued Frasier library before you play Delta Force?

Anyway, here's the full list of banned tech:

Prohibited while running Delta Force:

• Hardware
  • DMA
  • DMA bridges
  • KMBox,
  • Fusers
  • Screen splitters
  • Synchronizers
  • USB drives
  • Hardware macros
  • Development boards like Arduino, etc.
• Analysis Software
  • Modifiers like Cheat Engine Ark
  • Tools like YDARK, PCHunter, Huorong Sword
  • Debugging tools like OllyDbg, WinDbg, x32dbg/x64dbg
  • Analysis tools like API Monitor, Process Hacker, Process Monitor.
• Speed-Hack Software
  • Speed Wizard, Speed Gear, etc.
• Emulation Scripts
  • Automated scripts capable of simulating keystrokes, such as AutoHotkey, Python, etc.
• Virtual Machines
  • Virtual environments like VMWare, KVM, VirtualBox ,etc.

Not recommended while running Delta Force:

• Remote Control and Desktop Sharing Software
  • Remote access software like ToDesk, Sunlogin, TeamViewer, AnyDesk
  • Streaming tools like NVStreamer, Sunshine, Parsec, Moonlight.
• Frame Capture Tools
  • Tools like RenderDoc, WinPix, NVIDIA Nsight, Intel GPA, etc.