Rocket League cheaters using AI to win

A machine learning project designed to train AI to play Rocket League has been co-opted by cheaters who are using it to win matches.

A research project designed to teach AI algorithms to play the arcade soccer game Rocket League has been co-opted by cheaters who are using the project to win matches online.

The project in question is RLGym, which is an API that “facilitates the training of Rocket League bots”, according to PC Gamer. RLGym is designed to help researchers and developers use Rocket League to train AI algorithms.

The API lets developers tell the AI which outcomes in the game are desirable, such as touching the ball or moving it closer to one of the goals, and then run hundreds of simulations to train the AI to achieve that goal through trial and error.

One of the developers behind RLGym, known only as Aech, said that creating a bot from the API is “exceptionally hard to make”, but knew that it was likely that somebody would try to use it to cheat eventually. According to Aech, somebody implemented “their own tools for manipulating [Rocket League] that don’t have the same restrictions against playing online that RLGym does”.

RLGym is designed to be exclusively used in offline matches, where the AI can learn to get better at the game without affecting other players, but some players have sidestepped those restrictions. That said, Aech and the other RLGym developers are working on a way to prevent similar abuse in the future.

Rocket League has players controlling rocket-propelled cars to knock a giant soccer ball into a net. Picture: Epic Games

“RLGym is incredibly lucky to have found a super passionate and understanding community, and we won’t let these cheaters stop us”, Aech said, “We’re taking steps to ensure our bots can’t be abused in the future and we can’t wait to show everyone the exciting projects we’ve been working on”.

Rocket League developer Psyonix, in a statement provided to PC Gamer, said that it was aware of what was described as “a small number of players” cheating in Rocket League using the bots, and that it was investigating solutions to prevent it in the future.

AI has gotten quite advanced in recent years, though it’s not quite perfect, as seen after controversy stirred over an AI-powered Twitch streamer recently. The AI, called Neuro-sama, is styled after a “VTuber” and controls every aspect of its stream, including playing games and interacting with chat, where it said a number of insulting things in response to the channel’s Twitch chat.

AI Rocket League bots are easy to spot due to their superhuman gameplay and unnatural movement. Picture: Epic Games

VTubers also featured prominently on YouTube’s 2022 most watched streamers list, which also controversially featured some streamers who were banned from other platforms, including Twitch. The list had 3 VTubers, but also included banned streamers such as IShowSpeed and Dr Disrespect.

Written by Oliver Brandt on behalf of GLHF.