Lost Ark is apparently banning Steam players who have been inactive for too long

One of the biggest problems that MMOs, and most larger games, have to deal with is that players will do anything they can to get ahead in the game. This often means creating or repurposing bots that can complete simple tasks to earn currency or resources. A recent action by Smilegate to combat this has apparently led to many accounts of regular players getting banned, though.

According to different images shared across Twitter and Discord, it seems that something has caused a mass ban for players who haven’t picked up the game recently. It seems that the bans may have began yesterday. Many users are commenting that they hadn’t picked up the game in a while, and now Smilegate has prevented them from ever doing so again.

This has, of course, spawned a deluge of negative reviews on the game’s store page. As with the comments on the Reddit post above, many users are remarking how they may have considered picking it up again, but this event has left a poor taste in their mouths. While some might be worried this will affect their accounts, it seems that this is a game ban and not a VAC ban, the latter of which can cause multiplayer issues.

One has to hope that Valve will address this with Smilegate and ensure that they attempt to rectify this situation. There is no reason that players who’ve spent hard money on the game should be banned just because they haven’t been able to play as much as the developer wants. If Lost Ark hopes to preserve its Steam reputation, it should act fast before it’s too late.