Playing the IMPORTant mission, on Yermo Encarnado, I've got factories working nicely and am looking forward to loads of cash. Suddenly, up comes a panel saying I need 40 factory workers to win - and I have 42. So the mission comes to an abrupt and unexpected end in September 1970, with a miserable score of 10307 which gets added to my campaign total. This puts me in place 9266 on page 488 of the high-scores list. Pounding the "back" button eventually takes me to page 1, where the top score is over 342 million: this I can only assume was attained before the unlimited cash exploits were patched out, or by outright cheating.
So I reloaded a save from August 1964 and played on (no crashes, no lockups !) to a win in May '81 with a score of 36884, which would have been higher if only my teamsters hadn't failed to clear one load of weapons and two of cigars. Hit the "win" button, and find that this new score has been totally disregarded. Moreover, my campaign has been reset right to the start of the first mission, which is a grave disappointment as I'm not sure that any near-win saves exist for the earlier missions nor that using them would be valid.
In the course of the re-run, the island was hit by a tsunami which destroyed two buildings, both well inland and surrounded by undamaged buildings (some much more fragile). It also beached a tanker, gave the option of clearing it for $1000 which I didn't have at the time, and then the wreck disappeared completely. Duh !

(21-10-2011 05:19 AM)Bushface Wrote:  Pounding the "back" button eventually takes me to page 1, where the top score is over 342 million: this I can only assume was attained before the unlimited cash exploits were patched out, or by outright cheating.

Given how scoring works I'd say you're right.

I always wonder if other users are using mods, editor or cheats to boost their scores. Their are however some very good players, who play the game to the end. I would be nice if they had a built-in anti-cheat function to find out who the truely great players are.

I looked into how they could do it, and the answer is "not easily". Those who want to cheat will invariably find a way. The only thing I'd like isn't a reset, but a subset of scores being listed instead (so I could choose whose scores I see, sort of like a friends list).

I virtually never submit my score, mostly because I'm usually playing with mods (or making new ones which aren't yet balanced). That said, nothing I've released or tested could result in anything like that -- at least not outside of Tyrant Island.

I would never have bought this game if I knew that any competitive challenge was totally destroyed by a database full of cheated scores. Seems Kalypso can't be bothered doing anything about it.

Even a date of submission for a map would be enough and then I can compete on the ones made post patch. Not that I'm sure they have got all the infinite gold hacks fixed yet, because I see some very suspect scores on maps I know to be new from reading the forums.

I will definitely be more careful before I jump in and buy tropico 5.

If you wanted to complete against a group of friends, and only view those scoreboards, there are probably ways to achieve that through a mod and your own webhosting (or even some free stuff).

EDIT: Also blaming Kalypso is a bit harsh. If people really want to cheat they'll find a way. Steam (read: Valve) is huge in comparison to Kalypso, yet they've got a bigger cheating problem than Kalypso do, and they have DRM that should be able to stop it.

(26-10-2011 12:38 AM)BaronVon Wrote:  ... I[t] would be nice if they had a built-in anti-cheat function to find out who the truely great players are.

I guess I don't understand what it is you are asking for. In this thread
http://forum.kalypsomedia.com/showthread.php?tid=11089
it is stated that, "using cheats disables achievements."

@CoconutKid He means a system that makes cheated scores get erased from the leaderboards. I doubt this is easy to do though because there is probably a way to get around such a system.

It's a shame there are cheaters, but it seems they are a part of almost every game I've played that has leaderboards. I can hardly belive that someone can get upwards of 300 million points during their campaign. You'd have play every mission into 2100s surely lol?