Valve Owns Up To Modern Warfare 2 Error

As reported Monday, many Modern Warfare 2 PC gamers complained over the past week that Valve's Anti-Cheat (VAC) software banned them from the game. Their argument was that they weren't actually cheating, and to get Valve's attention, most flocked to the Modern Warfare 2 forums, the Steam forums, and an invite-only Steam Group to make their case. But despite their outcries, they were told that nothing could be done about the problem save for purchasing a new copy.

Surprisingly, Valve head honcho Gabe Newell stepped forward and issued a statement to those affected by the ban. It was believed that the company would stay true to its stance against discussing and revoking bans, remaining a silent observer. However this time Newell admitted that the banning was a mistake on Valve's part and plans to rectify the situation.

"I apologize for any frustration or angst it may have caused you," he said in the email that can be seen here. "The problem was that Steam would fail a signature check between the disk version of a DLL and a latent memory version. This was caused by a combination of conditions occurring while Steam was updating the disk image of a game. This wasn't a game-specific mistake. Steam allows us to manage and reverse these erroneous bans (about 12,000 erroneous bans over two weeks)."

That's fine and dandy, but where does that leave all those banned gamers? After all, they face shelling out more bucks to regain access. "We have reversed the ban, restoring your access to the game," he added. "In addition, we have given you a free copy of Left 4 Dead 2 to give as a gift on Steam, plus a free copy for yourself if you didn't already own the game."

I'll gladly take that L4D2 gift copy off your hands. Here's how you do it.

  • h83r
    gotta love steam
    Reply
  • shadow187
    This is why Steam is one of the DRM's I can agree with.
    Reply
  • halls
    Classy move on Valve's part.
    Reply
  • tipmen
    Everyone should take note. They found a problem, admitted to the problem, fixed the problem, and then gave something back to apologize. Another thing anyone feeling kind and giving me L4D2 gift :)
    Reply
  • ern88
    Atleast the owned up to their mistake and corrected it. Plus gave the players affected a good game to boot. APPLE AKA Mr. Jobs. LEARN FROM STEAM. They treat their customers right...AND FIX THE PROBLEM. No dumb band-aid fix bumpers lol
    Reply
  • OrderChaos
    @tipmen if I could I would upvote your comment 1000 times. Exactly what I was thinking...also, sorry, i'm not one of those affected so no free l4d2.
    Reply
  • Stryter
    And that is how you do business, my friends. Fantastic job Valve!
    Reply
  • partytime
    Yea! Zombie killing time!
    Reply
  • Xyos
    Everyone makes mistakes. I would of been content with just the apology and a reversed ban, but giving a free game copy away is just awesome! Yet another reason why I love Valve :D
    Reply
  • HalJordan
    What if they were so hard up to play MW2 that they rushed out to buy a new copy before the fix was implemented?
    Reply