Comment by LMYahooTFY

I agree with you in sentiment and am very nostalgic for the pre-monoculture days, but I also acknowledge that competitive games are a multi-billion dollar industry, and trying to moderate a game with millions of players in a distributed environment is just a non-starter.

You reject the premise that such control is necessary for your idea of fun.

But millions of players enjoy ranked matchmaking enough that without aggressive anti cheat you will wind up with cheaters.

I hate the root kits as well, but if you spend any time playing Valorant vs CS, you will see the difference. If I play CS consistently I'll get cheaters once or twice a week. In Valorant it's almost unheard of by comparison. It sucks, but that's just what's happening.

Do I wish I at least had the option in Valorant or whatever to host a server? Absolutely. Do I think they use the rootkits maliciously? No, generally not. Do I think studios are disincentivized to provide server hosting due to DLC or microtransactions? Definitely. But I also think there's often also a game integrity component. All of these things can be true simultaneously.