Bungie to ban Destiny 2 players who abuse third-party peripherals

Bungie will soon begin banning Destiny 2 players who use third-party peripherals to gain an advantage.

In a blog post, the company explained the community has "grown increasingly frustrated" by players who've started using third-party peripherals to manipulate the game client, and said it will take action against those who "abuse these tools specifically to gain an advantage over other players."

"These devices are plugged into a computer or console, where they can—for example—execute simple scripts or trick the game into giving you extra aim assist. You’ll note that we aren’t calling out the services by name, the primary reason for that is we simply don’t want to offer a bigger spotlight than necessary," wrote the studio. "Instead, our focus is on what the impact of using tools like this has on a PvP environment."

Bungie said it embraces the use of external accessibility aids that enable players to experience Destiny 2 as intended, but believes that some people are abusing those tools in PvP to rise through the ranks "at a rate far beyond what is expected for a player improving through typical play."

Bungie evaluating all gameplay violations

The studio explained that anybody using those tools, which includes programmable controllers, keyboard and mouse adaptors, advances macros, or automation via artificial intelligence, in PvE modes could also be punished "because the benefits of cheating in PvE can affect things like the World First Race or even spill over into PvP." As such, the company said it will be evaluating all gameplay violations.

Bungie reiterated that simply using an accessibility aide to play Destiny 2 when it would otherwise be inaccessible isn't a violation of its new policy, but stressed that "using these tools to mitigate challenges all players face, such as reducing recoil or increasing aim assist, would be a violation."

"Content meant to be difficult or prestige is designed like that for a reason. We do not intend for difficulty to be automated away via software or hardware," it added.

Bungie said the decision to clamp down on peripheral abuse was made after extended conversations both internally and with the community, and warned would-be offenders that it will be monitoring for violations and issuing warnings, restrictions, and bans accordingly.