Since release, digital nudge controls (keyboard and d-pad, as opposed to analog sticks) had a stronger diagonal nudge. Stronger diagonal nudges enabled more consistent bang backs, which is a technique that saves the ball from outlane drains.

Around May 2015, I learned about this difference, and spread the knowledge around to those that weren't already aware of it. In July 2015, a player learned about it (from me) and complained vocally to Zen (the developer).

Some time later, Zen released an update that constrained nudge strength to slightly weaker levels than previously attainable via any method.

In a follow-up release, Zen reset the leaderboards, preserving a viewable snapshot of the previous scores as "Legacy All-time". The same update contained an in-game pop-up message:

http://cs2bus.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=528576712


See my FX2 guide for details about that and other pinball/FX2 things:

http://cs2bus.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=308089691


Oh, lots of things! There are as many opinions and different understandings as there are people paying attention.

Personally, I am upset primarily about the way Zen communicated the issue and the changes they made, which has effectively vilified certain players in the eyes of some other players and has divided the community.

Some are upset by the nudge strength changes. Either preferring that nothing was changed or that analog nudges should have been strengthened to match digital nudges (my opinion).

Some are upset about the leaderboard reset.

Some are upset that players were "cheating" and that Zen didn't do anything about it even earlier.


No. Again, nobody was "cheating".

And, many of us actually prefer that bang backs be difficult/rare. Many of us in that category would have much preferred that this "unintentionally strong nudge" was never available in the first place, but since it has been available and fairly widely used for quite a while, we feel that removing it now is not the best course of action by the developers.

Again, some of us are primarily upset that Zen has now fostered a hostile environment where we are now wrongfully being accused of cheating or having our skills/ethics/whatever being put into question.


No. It is ridiculous to suggest that somebody who pressed two buttons at the same time on a keyboard (or controller) is cheating. On a controller, diagonal nudges can be done by moving the analog stick diagonally, or by pressing a diagonal direction on the d-pad.

On a keyboard, pressing two buttons was the only method of executing a bang back, which is a well known pinball maneuver, and one that specifically has an achievement associated with it in this game.

Most players who were using these stronger nudges were not even aware of the difference.

In fact, some of us expended considerable effort doing the opposite - trying to dispel the incorrect assumptions novice players had about high scorers in general, by providing guidance and evidence about how those high scores are attained and how everyone can improve their own performance and enjoyment.


It is unclear and ambiguous precisely what Zen considers to be "cheating".

The in-game message accompanying the leaderboard reset incorrectly suggests that players who used input rebinding utilities had an "unfair advantage" - these words are very similar, and arguably identical to suggesting that those players are "cheating".

However, in forum posts, the Community Manager has insisted that Zen does not consider those same players to be "cheaters". In other posts, the stronger nudge was incorrectly referred to by the Community Manager as an "exploit".


Absolutely not. Although bang backs are disallowed in most real life pinball settings these days, they were allowed in the past. Nudging, in general, is an integral part of real life pinball (although some players choose to not do it). Nudging is a part of the game. Nudging is not cheating.

In FX2, specifically, bang backs are encouraged. Some tables have special sound/voice clips when a bang back is performed. One table has an achievement associated with performing a bang back.

See my general guide for more details about nudging and bang backs.


Nope.

Some players that read forum discussions around these issues got the wrong idea because of the suggestion that some users were binding one controller button to two keyboard buttons.

There's nothing odd or illegitimate about that, since it's fully intentional by the developer to be able to activate those two keyboard buttons at the same time, and it's quite easy to do physically.

Controller controls already essentially have a single button controlling those buttons - by pressing the upper corners of the d-pad or moving the analog stick diagonally. I, personally, am not comfortable with the d-pad, so assigned those controls to a non-d-pad button instead. I advertised this publicly in case somebody else might find the suggestion similarly useful, but the suggestion was misunderstood by some.

Since diagonal nudges are most certainly not cheating, the ability to perform diagonal nudges was not affected by the updates (only their strength).

Diagonal nudges are possible and are used on physical pinball machines as well (though perhaps not in the same ways as in FX2).


This is again an issue of semantics. An exploit is loosely defined as unintended behavior that can be used to confer benefits. Some (myself included) would narrow the definition to take into consideration player intention and awareness of developer intention.

I believe that a basic feature that happens to be stronger when using a keyboard or d-pad can't be considered an exploit. The difference in strength between the input methods could certainly be considered "unintended behavior", though.


Not really, since Zen never stated which nudge strength was the intended behavior until they finally changed it. It was reasonable to assume that either of the two strengths could be the true intent.


No. All keyboard and d-pad users always had these "stronger" nudges. Only analog input allowed for softer nudges, and analog input was constrained to a softer maximum nudge than the other input methods.


Not generally, no. It depends.

Until recently, there was a pinned thread describing how to reduce input delay in FX2 by using first party and third party graphics configuration utilities (e.g. RadeonPro). Use of this improves the experience, but obviously does also provide a small advantage. The use of these programs was implicitly condoned by Zen. (The thread was deleted by the original author in protest of Zen's actions).

To my knowledge, there are no "cheat" programs for FX2, though a few users seem to have submitted fake scores via some direct method in the past - some of these scores were henceforth removed by Zen.

Some players used various input configuration utilities to compensate for the lack of controls options made available by the game itself.

These utilities did not enable a stronger nudge than otherwise possible without them.

Only some of these utilities happened to use a scripting language (PIE utilities). I initially used a PIE, but switched to a non-PIE. They both achieved the same control rebinding that I was interested in.

There are many such utilities that are widely used in PC gaming. I'm not aware of any noteworthy cases where the use of such utilities is considered cheating.


Nope. The first update lowered maximum diagonal nudge strength. The second update reset/archived the leaderboards.

The in-game message accompanying the second update was there to justify the leaderboard reset. The message mentioned "scripting", implying that "scripting" was used to achieve especially strong nudges.

Input configuration utilities never provided a way to increase nudge strength beyond the normal limit and the update did nothing to discourage the use of input rebinding programs, which continue to serve the purpose they were designed for - providing configurability options beyond what is available in a particular game.


By various player reports, it does seem that they are slightly harder for everyone now, but we don't have a good way to objectively measure that.


Despite what Zen's in-game message said, similarly strong or even stronger nudges are possible on various other platforms as well. These, to my knowledge, have not been patched out the way they have out of the Steam version.

PlayStation example: http://forum.zenstudios.com/showthread.php?12378-Balls-of-Glory-Impressions&p=65468&viewfull=1#post65468

On some platforms, it is even possible to achieve similar or greater nudge strength via analog sticks either by default, or with certain controllers. For example, the Xbox Elite Controller (manufactured by Microsoft).


This varies by table and by player. It depends on:

* How well a player is able to execute bang backs with the stronger nudge as opposed to without it.
* How often a situation where a bang back is useful occurs, which depends on the table and on player skill.

Most tables have kickbacks that experienced players will keep lit most of the time. Kickbacks save from outlane drains automatically. On some tables, it's fairly easy for experienced players to save the ball from an outlane drain before the ball enters an outlane.

Even if a player could theoretically prevent outlane drains 100% of the time (not possible even with the stronger nudge), the ball can still drain through the middle.

With the weaker analog nudge (at 60fps) bang back chance for skilled players was around 5-20%. With the stronger nudge, bang back chance was around 80-95%.

So, the actual benefit varies from nearly no benefit at all to perhaps a doubling or tripling of score.

But, the difference between top 10 scores, top 100 scores, top 1000 scores, and beyond is much more pronounced. Basically, your rank on the leaderboards wouldn't jump all that much if you had started using this more reliable bang back. If your score was beyond the top 100, this alone would not break you into the top 10.

The advantage various per platform, as platforms seem to have different base nudge strengths already. Technically, a full diagonal nudge from the addition of two force vectors would have 41% greater extent, but it's not entirely clear whether that translates into a 41% more powerful nudge force, or somewhat higher or greater as the input to force conversion might not be linear.


No. Only a few of the top players were benefitting from the stronger nudge prior to mid-2015. After mid-2015, many, but not all players started using this nudge. Given how long it takes to set a top score on just one table, for players that only had the opportunity to use the stronger nudge briefly, they only had time to set new scores on some tables.


The nudge strength difference between input methods was mentioned in the main forum not long after the game's release. It was also mentioned in third-party forums. However, it was not prominently discussed in the main forum for some time, so many active players were not aware of it (including myself) until mid-2015.

In mid-2015, it became more widely known after a video was posted by a player who was aware of it and executed many bang backs in that particular video, so it was hard to miss. Prior to mid-2015, other players have similarly uploaded multiple videos that also showed these bang backs, but they mostly went unnoticed.

In other words, this was never really a secret, but there wasn't much effort to publicize it, and it was not in my guide until shortly prior to the changes as I was not aware of it until then.


Another semantics issue. I believe that what happened is a "reset" and an "archival". It's both. The primary leaderboard did "reset". The scores prior to the "reset" can still be viewed under "Legacy All-Time".

This is contentious in part because Zen's CM had previously stated that a "reset" would never occur again as there was a player backlash the last time they did it (on another platform). Some feel that Zen has thus broken a promise, although Zen contends that because the previous scores were also "archived", this does not constitute a "reset".


Ok, here's the jumbo thread that was merged from various related, but distinct threads by the CM. It's a bit harder to untangle now, but have fun:

http://cs2bus.com/app/226980/discussions/0/523898291494557684/

This topic is also mentioned and is the subject of many other threads, but that there is the biggest one.

Update: there's also quite the accumulation of comments on this FAQ below. I have decided to stop replying to the comments as I see no real progress being made there, with the arguments continuing to go around in circles.