Should I Build It Should I Build It
03 Jun 2025
Games

A global whitelist system for a various of online games where ...

...communities create their own servers. The goal is to provide server owners with a easy implementation of whitelisting and banning as well as given communities a good chance to use the global ban list to exclude verified cheaters from the beginning.

Confidence
Engagement
Net use signal
Net buy signal

Idea type: Freemium

People love using similar products but resist paying. You’ll need to either find who will pay or create additional value that’s worth paying for.

Should You Build It?

Build but think about differentiation and monetization.

Your are here

Your idea for a global whitelist system for online games, enabling communities to manage whitelists and bans, falls into the 'Freemium' category. This means people generally like using these types of systems but are hesitant to pay for them. With 4 similar products identified, competition is present but not overwhelming, so it's key to differentiate yourself. The similar products have received high engagement, indicated by the average of 13 comments per launch. This suggests a strong interest in anti-cheat and community management tools within online gaming. Given the freemium nature, the challenge lies in pinpointing aspects that users will find valuable enough to pay for, while mitigating concerns around false positives and abuse which were expressed in similar products. Consider who benefits most from your free version and focus on converting them.

Recommendations

  1. Start by focusing on a specific game or genre to tailor your solution. This will allow you to deeply understand the needs of that community and build a more effective system, and avoid becoming another generic anti-cheat solution. Consider beginning with games with dedicated servers to easily implement the tool.
  2. Identify the users who get the most value from the free version of your whitelist/ban system. These are your potential paying customers. Understand their pain points and what additional features could significantly improve their experience.
  3. Develop premium features that directly address the needs of high-value users. This could include advanced analytics on player behavior, automated ban review processes, or enhanced community management tools. Prioritize features that reduce the administrative burden of managing whitelists and bans.
  4. Explore charging communities or server owners rather than individual players. This aligns with the collaborative nature of your system and allows you to offer a more comprehensive solution. A community-based subscription model could be more appealing and sustainable.
  5. Offer personalized support or consulting services to help communities effectively implement and manage your system. This can be a valuable premium offering, particularly for communities that are new to whitelisting and ban management. Consider offering different tiers of support based on the size and needs of the community.
  6. Carefully test different pricing models with small groups of server owners and communities. Gather feedback on what they value most and what they're willing to pay for. Iterate on your pricing based on this feedback to find a sweet spot that balances value and affordability. Address user concerns about false positives, abuse, and subjectivity in decisions, by offering clear guidance, evidence, and oversight by game developers.
  7. Address the concerns raised in the discussions of similar products. Specifically, focus on mechanisms to minimize false positives, clear evidence for bans, and transparent moderation policies. Implementing a robust appeal process is also crucial.
  8. Consider the technical limitations that users reported in the past (IPv6, UPnP support). Ensure your system is compatible with modern server infrastructure and offers seamless integration with popular game servers. Address the need for toxic language protection and its potential to prevent toxicity, especially in ranked games.

Questions

  1. What specific data points or metrics will you use to objectively determine if a player is cheating or engaging in toxic behavior, and how will you ensure that your system doesn't rely on subjective interpretations?
  2. How will you actively combat potential abuse of the ban/whitelist system by communities, preventing scenarios where legitimate players are unfairly excluded or targeted?
  3. Given the freemium model, what compelling features or benefits can you offer to paying communities that will significantly enhance their experience compared to the free version, justifying the cost?

Your are here

Your idea for a global whitelist system for online games, enabling communities to manage whitelists and bans, falls into the 'Freemium' category. This means people generally like using these types of systems but are hesitant to pay for them. With 4 similar products identified, competition is present but not overwhelming, so it's key to differentiate yourself. The similar products have received high engagement, indicated by the average of 13 comments per launch. This suggests a strong interest in anti-cheat and community management tools within online gaming. Given the freemium nature, the challenge lies in pinpointing aspects that users will find valuable enough to pay for, while mitigating concerns around false positives and abuse which were expressed in similar products. Consider who benefits most from your free version and focus on converting them.

Recommendations

  1. Start by focusing on a specific game or genre to tailor your solution. This will allow you to deeply understand the needs of that community and build a more effective system, and avoid becoming another generic anti-cheat solution. Consider beginning with games with dedicated servers to easily implement the tool.
  2. Identify the users who get the most value from the free version of your whitelist/ban system. These are your potential paying customers. Understand their pain points and what additional features could significantly improve their experience.
  3. Develop premium features that directly address the needs of high-value users. This could include advanced analytics on player behavior, automated ban review processes, or enhanced community management tools. Prioritize features that reduce the administrative burden of managing whitelists and bans.
  4. Explore charging communities or server owners rather than individual players. This aligns with the collaborative nature of your system and allows you to offer a more comprehensive solution. A community-based subscription model could be more appealing and sustainable.
  5. Offer personalized support or consulting services to help communities effectively implement and manage your system. This can be a valuable premium offering, particularly for communities that are new to whitelisting and ban management. Consider offering different tiers of support based on the size and needs of the community.
  6. Carefully test different pricing models with small groups of server owners and communities. Gather feedback on what they value most and what they're willing to pay for. Iterate on your pricing based on this feedback to find a sweet spot that balances value and affordability. Address user concerns about false positives, abuse, and subjectivity in decisions, by offering clear guidance, evidence, and oversight by game developers.
  7. Address the concerns raised in the discussions of similar products. Specifically, focus on mechanisms to minimize false positives, clear evidence for bans, and transparent moderation policies. Implementing a robust appeal process is also crucial.
  8. Consider the technical limitations that users reported in the past (IPv6, UPnP support). Ensure your system is compatible with modern server infrastructure and offers seamless integration with popular game servers. Address the need for toxic language protection and its potential to prevent toxicity, especially in ranked games.

Questions

  1. What specific data points or metrics will you use to objectively determine if a player is cheating or engaging in toxic behavior, and how will you ensure that your system doesn't rely on subjective interpretations?
  2. How will you actively combat potential abuse of the ban/whitelist system by communities, preventing scenarios where legitimate players are unfairly excluded or targeted?
  3. Given the freemium model, what compelling features or benefits can you offer to paying communities that will significantly enhance their experience compared to the free version, justifying the cost?

  • Confidence: Medium
    • Number of similar products: 4
  • Engagement: High
    • Average number of comments: 13
  • Net use signal: 2.2%
    • Positive use signal: 10.4%
    • Negative use signal: 8.2%
  • Net buy signal: -4.9%
    • Positive buy signal: 0.0%
    • Negative buy signal: 4.9%

This chart summarizes all the similar products we found for your idea in a single plot.

The x-axis represents the overall feedback each product received. This is calculated from the net use and buy signals that were expressed in the comments. The maximum is +1, which means all comments (across all similar products) were positive, expressed a willingness to use & buy said product. The minimum is -1 and it means the exact opposite.

The y-axis captures the strength of the signal, i.e. how many people commented and how does this rank against other products in this category. The maximum is +1, which means these products were the most liked, upvoted and talked about launches recently. The minimum is 0, meaning zero engagement or feedback was received.

The sizes of the product dots are determined by the relevance to your idea, where 10 is the maximum.

Your idea is the big blueish dot, which should lie somewhere in the polygon defined by these products. It can be off-center because we use custom weighting to summarize these metrics.

Similar products

Relevance

A searchable public database of cheaters in video games

12 Apr 2024 Games

Hey all I've been working on a website called GamingHerd that has spawned from dealing with so many cheaters in Valve's Counter-Strike 2.Watch this video if you're interested into the different scales of cheats that can be used, pretty much undetectable: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ox1mBxrVulk&ab_channel=HaiXCurrently, Valve does not seem to have a viable solution for dealing with cheaters nor are they transparent about their intentions (I'm sure for good reason). I can only imagine the complexities they have to deal with, and at the same time there is a potential negative monetary impact. Valve makes boat loads of $$ from Counter-Strike through skins for weapons and models. It is its own economy. Banning people, even though they are cheaters, is money lost.Furthermore, some of the solutions to deal with cheaters are to play on 3rd party services (i.e. FACEIT) that require you to install an "anti-cheat" that gives kernel level access and is owned by some questionable folks (I won't get into the details of that you can do your own research).That brings us to GamingHerd. For now, my idea is to be Google for PC video game cheaters, smurfs (read this about smurfs https://www.idnow.io/glossary/smurfing/#:~:text=What%20is%20....), racists, throwers, etc. People you do not want to play video games with. Let me tell you, there are a lot, unfortunately.Currently, I am working to grow this into a community and build a matchmaking service around it. The matchmaking would obviously utilize the Toxic Gaming DB (TGDB) to never allow them to use the service. I'll also have community-driven moderation, you can read a bit more about that https://slash-lathe-f55.notion.site/GamingHerd-moderation-ov.... In the perfect world this is a community of trusted gamers that you want to play video games with.Let me know what you all think. Look forward to your feedback.Cheers, Chris

Users express concerns about false-positives and abuse in the service, with skepticism about the effectiveness of cheating solutions and the potential for defamation lawsuits. The concept is criticized as flawed, with no improvement suggestions offered. There's debate over the subjectivity of smurfing and throwing, and some advocate for private servers over current matchmaking systems. Technical issues with dedicated servers, such as lack of ipv6 and upnp support, are noted. Questions arise about the cost and feasibility of running modern servers, and there's confusion about certain features like 'show evidence'. Some comments are off-topic or joke about unrelated matters.

Users criticized the product for being prone to false positives and abuse, having unclear replay boosting proof, and flawed concepts. There's concern over subjectivity in decisions, negative matchmaking experiences, and doubts about ideal play popularity. Oversight by game developers is questioned, as is the cost-effectiveness considering modern technology. Technical shortcomings include lack of IPv6 and UPnP support. Claims of cheat-free gaming and use of Cronos Zen are disputed. Users also noted unclear guidance, kernel access issues, potential legal problems, and misunderstandings regarding defamation lawsuits.

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Relevance

Getgud.io – A server-side alternative to anticheat systems

29 Nov 2024 Artificial Intelligence Games

For the past 3 years, we’ve been working on Getgud.io – a real-time AI system to detect cheaters and toxic players, helping game developers maintain fair, enjoyable gaming environments.Key features: - Real-Time Detection: Identifies cheaters using aimbots, wallhacks, speed hacks, and more, along with toxic behaviors like team killing, spawn killing, and boosting. - Complete Observability: Tracks everything happening in your matches – weapons used, maps played, player actions, and character stats. - Automated Actions: Set rules to automatically ban cheaters, flag players, or trigger alerts based on specific behaviors. - Game Analytics: Provides insights on weapon/character popularity, map trends, match balance, and more. - Match Recording & Replay: Every match is recorded and visualized for easy analysis and review. - Simple Integration: Works server-side with no client-side code. Supports Unity, Unreal Engine 5, and SDKs in C++, C#, Python, and more. Compatible with FPS and MOBA games on web, mobile, and consoles.Check some detection clips here: https://www.youtube.com/@getgud_io

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2
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Relevance

Getgud.io – Server-Side cheater and griefer detection in Real-Time

26 Sep 2024 Artificial Intelligence

Hi HN!I'm excited to share Getgud.io – we use AI to detect cheaters and griefers in real-time, helping game developers make their games toxic-free and improve player retention.What Getgud.io does:- Real-Time Cheater & Griefer Detection: Our AI analyzes in-match player behavior to identify and flag cheaters using aimbots, wallhacks, speed hacks, and more. It also detects toxic behaviors like team killing, spawn killing, boosting, and surfing.- Complete Observability: Get insights into everything happening in your game matches, including weapons used, maps played, character stats, and player actions.- Automated Actions & Alerts: Define rules and actions for any player behavior. Automatically ban cheaters, adjust player reputations, or receive notifications based on criteria you set.- Game Analytics: Understand player behavior with analytics on weapon/character popularity, map trends, loot drop optimization, and match balance.- Match Recording & Replay: All matches are recorded and visualized, allowing you to replay and analyze any game to see exactly what happened.- Easy Integration: Our solution is entirely server-side with no client-side code needed. We offer integrations for Unity and Unreal Engine 5 as well as SDKs in multiple languages (C++, C#, C, Python). We support all FPS and MOBA games across all platforms, including web, mobile, and console.Why we built it:As gamers, we know how challenging it is to keep games fair and enjoyable. Cheating and toxic behavior ruin the player experience and hurt player retention and the game's reputation. We wanted to create a tool that empowers developers to maintain a healthy gaming environment effortlessly.Get started:- Learn more about Getgud.io: https://www.getgud.io/- Detailed integration guides and SDK documentation are available on our GitHub: https://github.com/getgud-io/getgud-docs- Some detection videos: https://www.youtube.com/@getgud_ioWe'd love your feedback!- Feel free to ask any questions or share your thoughts. Your feedback is incredibly valuable as we continue to improve Getgud.io.- Looking forward to making games better together! Stop cheating, Getgud!

Users have mixed reactions to the product. Some question the effectiveness of a server-only anti-cheat approach, while others find the AI-based cheat detection by Getgud.io impressive. Additionally, the product is seen as cool and useful for data analytics.

Users expressed doubts about the server-only approach compared to kernel-level anti-cheat solutions and were not convinced about the effectiveness of the anti-cheat feature.

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Relevance

Getgud.io - Making online games toxic free

30 Jan 2023 Analytics First Person Shooter Games

Harnessing AI to protect online FPS games from cheaters and griefers. Creating a safe and toxic-free environment that leads to higher player retention.

Getgud's Product Hunt launch received overwhelmingly positive feedback, with users excited about its potential to combat cheating and toxicity in FPS games. Many congratulated the team and wished them good luck, emphasizing the significant problem Getgud addresses for both gamers and game studios. Users highlighted the solution's potential impact on improving the gaming experience, reducing churn, and fostering healthier communities. Questions were raised regarding toxic language protection, comparisons to existing solutions, integration with game developers, and the impact on churn rate. Some users expressed personal experiences with cheating and toxicity, underscoring the need for such a solution.

Users criticize the product's lack of effective toxic language protection and its potential to prevent toxicity, especially in ranked games. The effectiveness of the AI's cheat detection method is questioned, with concerns raised about a potential whack-a-mole scenario. Users request more data, specifically examples, about the impact of toxic player deletion on user churn.

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