Quote Originally Posted by SenseiMaria View Post
This. RMTers will always try to get around these things, which is what Square is saying. So long as people keep buying this stuff and there's a profit margin for the 3rd parties to keep doing it, they'll keep doing it.
This is a curious thing that I don't see many people consider all that often.

Okay, so we hammer down on third party tools because they're too easy to add. All it takes is people finding an exploit or workaround, and that will be explored as hard as it can be. And odds are, Square won't be the ones designing this tool themselves, they'll use anti-cheat methods that are out there, which are still just as vulnerable. It'll stop cheating for the first few times, but again, all it takes is people finding a window and they'll squeeze right in.

They can try to make it harder. But obviously, some third party tools are actually helping the game just as much as they're hindering it. And some fall in a gray zone that Square is "okay" with, even if just through word of mouth. Suddenly all of those will be blacklisted, and you don't see Square go out of their way to implement an official version of their own.

And it's not like their decision doesn't harm them. Square Enix isn't stupid. It wasn't Yoshida who randomly came up with the idea, it wasn't even one of their interns. It was a collective decision, and while it likely is the most extreme, it's also the most immediate and guaranteed fix. This is going to hurt Square, this is going to upset quite a lot of people. But this is also going to ensure that the game isn't screwed over in the long term. And if it removes incentives from people taking your account details, then that's a good thing. Maybe in the future they may reconsider it, create a workaround, talk to people and so on. But for now, this is the avenue that they've chosen, and while it's a sucky sacrifice, it's a sacrifice that seems to be paying off as much (if not more) than it's hurting.