SCII single-player bans explained

Blizzard has attracted some ire in recent days as it came to light that players cheating in the single-player modes of StarCraft II had been banned alongside multiplayer miscreants in the recent cull.

The company has now clarified that it's taking no action against players using the built-in cheat codes for single-player, but that it has a zero tolerance policy on third-party hacks that can affect multiplayer competition, even if they're only used for solo play.

"It's important to point out first, that many of the third-party hacks and cheats developed for StarCraft II contain both single- and multiplayer functionality," a spokesman told IGN.

"In order to protect the integrity of multiplayer competition, we are actively detecting cheat programs used in multiplayer modes whether there are human opponents or not.

"Players who opt to use any type of third-party hacks do so at their own risk – there are already built-in cheat codes for StarCraft II single-player that can be used safely."

StarCraft II operates on Blizzard's new Battle.net platform, which requires players to be logged in and online for the majority of play options, whether single-player or multiplayer. "In addition to undermining the spirit of fair competition that's essential to play on Battle.net, cheating and hacking can lead to stability and performance issues with the service," Blizzard said in a statement when the bans were first announced.

There is a school of thought that any game with networked Achievements has an element of multiplayer competition even in single-player, and that using cheats or hacks to obtain these is unfair on other players. What do you think?