The Finals genius creates the ultimate cheater-killing machine by sticking a turret to a flower pot

A player from The Finals cuts another on a rooftop, revealing heaps of coins
(Image credit: Embark Studios)

A genius The Finals player has come up with an ace workaround for dealing with hackers and cheaters.

Cheating is sadly rife in The Finals right now, though a recent anti-cheat update should aid things. It's gotten so bad over the last few weeks that fans are asking Embark Studios to region-lock The Finals. The developer has pushed back against this suggestion, writing that it's xenophobic to suggest all cheaters are contained in Asia.

While the developers beaver away to sort it all out, one player has devised a fantastic method to stop hackers. According to the player below, another player spotted a hacker struggling to deal with an APS device. The player reasoned that perhaps they couldn't lock on to turrets, and they proved this theory correct by attaching an APS to a plant and carrying it around with them.

This meant the cheater couldn't automatically target them, as their aiming hack wasn't programmed to hone in on the APS system the player was carrying. It's an utterly genius method, and you've got to hand it to the player in question for coming up with such a refined, logical method of dealing with a cheater in a rapid FPS game.

If you face hackers, try this! (might be big counter until they hopefully get banned) from r/thefinals

"There was a Light hacking in my game, and I had a turret put down, and it just murked him," one Reddit commenter responds. "Well, I don't know how the cheats work exactly, but it just felt like their system has a problem locking on players when something 'not lockable' is right in front of them. I don't know, it worked for me, but I could only try once (we lost after this fight)," the original player responded.

The Reddit post's comments are full of other players attesting to success with the same method. It seems The Finals cheaters genuinely aren't able to lock onto a target that isn't a player. One commenter reasons that cheaters might update their scripts to target turrets, but there's a lot of doubt as to whether it's possible for a hack to target something like a turret.

The Finals patch 1.4.0 is now live, and it's introduced some long-awaited nerfs for Heavy players. 

Hirun Cryer

Hirun Cryer is a freelance reporter and writer with Gamesradar+ based out of U.K. After earning a degree in American History specializing in journalism, cinema, literature, and history, he stepped into the games writing world, with a focus on shooters, indie games, and RPGs, and has since been the recipient of the MCV 30 Under 30 award for 2021. In his spare time he freelances with other outlets around the industry, practices Japanese, and enjoys contemporary manga and anime.

Read more
Marvel Rivals Rocket Raccoon MCU outfit
Tragedy in Marvel Rivals as the calmest healer almost hits Celestial rank without dealing damage, but accidentally loses their pacifist cred: "I guess I'm 22DmgRocketNow"
Fortnite character Jonesy looks shocked in the story trailer for Season X.
Fortnite is now giving cheaters "second chances" with 1-year bans that allow you to use the battle royale like it's Discord and do absolutely nothing else until you're freed from the void
Marvel Rivals Rocket Raccoon MCU outfit
Famed Marvel Rivals pacifist support player begs devs to reverse the accidental 22 damage they inflicted, devs say "No"
Marvel Rivals Rocket Raccoon MCU outfit
Marvel Rivals player hits Grandmaster rank without dealing a single point of damage, all while role-playing Rocket Raccoon: "It honestly just kinda happened"
World of Warcraft
World of Warcraft guild cheats its way to winning Race for World First, gets caught, banned, then reverses its name and does it all over again
Monster Hunter Wilds
Monster Hunter Wilds players are tricking the action RPG into thinking they completed hunt quests in mere seconds using the power of poison ammo
Latest in FPS
Destiny 2 Lightfall
When Destiny 2 "weekly active users dropped lower and faster than we'd seen since 2018," Bungie assembled an A-Team to put out some fires: "We needed to do something"
halflife screenshot showing a headcrab jumping at a player
Half-Life devs worried Gabe Newell "promised things that they couldn't possibly deliver" for the iconic FPS, but "they just didn't know" that they'd be able to do it yet
Former Valve exec recounts the meeting where Half-Life's publisher almost killed the iconic FPS: "Half-Life would quietly die. I was stunned"
FBC Firebreak screenshot for GamesRadar Big Preview showing a character throwing an electric shock grenade in a crowded room
FBC: Firebreak may be Remedy's first live-service game but the Control creators are going about it the right way, confirming that all playable post-launch content "will always be free"
"Valve would never ship another game": Former exec forced Half-Life publisher's hand by saying Gabe Newell and the team would pivot away from game dev
Gordon Freeman
Valve literally gives Half-Life away now, but 27 years ago it was carefully crushing its angry pirates: "None of them had actually bought the game"
Latest in News
Pillars of Eternity
10 years later, in a post-Baldur's Gate 3 and Avowed world, Obsidian is giving its own throwback CRPG Pillars of Eternity a turn-based combat mode
Destiny 2 Lightfall
When Destiny 2 "weekly active users dropped lower and faster than we'd seen since 2018," Bungie assembled an A-Team to put out some fires: "We needed to do something"
Velma, Daphne, Fred, Shaggy, and Scooby-Doo looking at a giant key which is also a clue
Netflix is rebooting Scooby-Doo as a live-action series from the producer of Supergirl and The Flash centered around a "supernatural murder" at a summer camp
Astro Bot
Astro Bot went through 23 pitch iterations before its director promised PlayStation "happy gameplay" and "overflowing charm," though it did once end with robot decapitation that made "some people really upset"
Tomb Raider
5 years after Avengers, 2 years after its last layoffs, and who knows how long before Perfect Dark and Tomb Raider return, Crystal Dynamics announces another round of layoffs
AI Limit
"AI is not as effective as it might appear": Dev of AI-focused Soulslike RPG says they didn't use any AI-generated content and it can't match "genuine creativity"