Valorant devs crack down on cheaters with massive ban wave before Act 2 release

Shay Robson
Valorant agent Deadlock holding a Spectre

The Riot Games devs have had a major crackdown on Valorant cheaters with a massive ban wave ahead of Episode 8 Act 2’s release.

Despite developer’s best efforts, cheating is an inescapable issue in online gaming, especially in first-person shooters such as Call of Duty, Counter-Strike, and Valorant.

In Valorant, Riot has done an admirable job at keeping the cheating problem to a minimum for the most part, largely thanks to the Vanguard anti-cheat.

However, cheaters still manage to slip through the cracks, which can occasionally get a bit out of hand according to some players. In response, devs have cracked down with a massive ban wave ahead of Episode 8 Act 2’s release.

Valorant devs hit cheaters with massive ban wave

Valorant’s Episode 8 Act 2 is slated to release on March 5. Ahead of what’s anticipated to be a massive update to shake up the meta, the devs have taken action against cheaters.

In a Twitter/X post on March 4, the ‘Anti-Cheat Police Department’ shared that Riot had targeted some of Valorant’s biggest cheat sellers with a massive ban wave.

Particularly, the Vanguard anti-cheat has taken action against DMA (direct memory access) cheats, which typically use a secondary computer to sneakily read the game’s data files while remaining undetected.

As a result, the cheat sellers have temporarily shut up shop while they look for a new way to get past the anti-cheat.

Valorant players are chuffed with the ban wave, with many explaining the devs’ continuous efforts at tackling cheaters are what keeps them playing.

“This is what keeps me in Valorant. I wish CS2 is a fraction of what Valorant anti-cheat is,” said one. “Best anti-cheat I’ve ever seen,” added another.

While Episode 8 Act 2 isn’t expected to bring any huge changes at launch, with the next Agent expected to release in the middle of the Act, it’s certainly already off to a good start with the ban wave.