History Main / TheComputerIsACHeatingBastard

** Any level Ward spell, even the weakest, will completely block any Dragon Shout. That works for you as well as for NPCs. What they can do that you can't is know ''instantly'' when a Shout is coming their way. So any enemy magic-user can see you start a Shout and create a Ward to block it before you finish the Shout.

** [=NPCs=] also have an amazing ability to dodge arrows. Not dodge as in "step out of the way", dodge as in "slide a few feet over without physically moving as if someone was moving them around in a Photoshop project".

* In ''VideoGame/Uncharted2AmongThieves'', the crossbow is a powerful weapon that can kill most enemies in one hit. In the player's hands, it needs to be reloaded after every shot and reloading takes some time. Guardians wielding crossbows are capable of [[AutomaticCrossbows firing several shots in quick succession]], easily killing the player if they're not careful.

* In the first two ''[[VideoGame/NintendoWars Advance Wars]]'' games, the AI flagrantly ignores the rules of FogOfWar. In such maps, you can neither see nor attack enemy units unless they're in your visual range. The AI, however, does not have this restriction, and will thus snipe you with impunity from halfway across the map even when your troops are well out of its vision. The only saving grace is that it ''does'' follow the rule of being unable to see or attack any units in cover, such as forests and reefs, unless it has a unit parked directly adjacent to it, so hiding your valuable units in these spots is crucial just to level the playing field. ''Dual Strike'' at least toned it back somewhat: the enemy AI still knows exactly where your non-hidden troops are, but it can no longer attack them if they're not in visual range, making parking your units out of cover much less suicidal. It wouldn't be until ''Days of Ruin'', however, that the AI finally started following all of the rules.

*** Certain BonusBoss monsters can ignore status defenses, guaranteeing a successful [[TakenForGranite petrification]] or [[OneHitKill instant death]], even if the target is supposed to be immune. Deathproof armor will not save you from the BonusBoss Fenrir.

* ''VideoGame/MagicalDrop'', especially ''Magical Drop II'' and ''Magical Drop III'', are prone to cheating AI. The original game is fair, outside of [[FinalBoss World]] having an exclusive Special Balloon that eliminates the most numerous color in her field. ''Magical Drop II'', however, introduces AI that goes from playing fair, to moving their clown at speeds well beyond what movement lag allows the player, to flat-out ''teleporting'' when facing TrueFinalBoss Black Pierrot. ''Magical Drop III'' then takes it up another notch in a bid to make it nearly impossible to put together a NoDeathRun[[note]]Amusingly, a NoDeathRun is the requirement to face Black Pierrot in ''II''[[/note]]: not only is teleportation given to mandatory final opponents Tower and Fortune (who are blatantly overpowered even without cheating AI), but the game throws Empress and demoted-to-BonusBoss Black Pierrot at the player if they are doing too well for the game's liking, who likewise show little regard for the game's movement rules.

** Pazaak in ''VideoGame/StarWarsKnightsOfTheOldRepublic'' is ridiculously biased toward the computer. It's played similar to blackjack, but with a side deck to modify the total value and the top is 20. The computer always goes second, so you're more likely to bust than it is. If you go bust, the computer wins without having to take its next turn, but then this applies to you, too, so it's more than likely a rule than cheating. It counts cards, so it knows when it will get a 20. Finally, it gets 20 more often than you do. The only advantage you have is that your side deck is better by the time you leave Dantooine. There's also a guy in the first game who actually does cheat... more than the computer usually cheats, that is. Fortunately the player can cheat by [[SaveScumming saving before each game]].

* In ''VideoGame/AWitchsTale'', the CPU always knows exactly what your total is in the Blackjack game.

* [[http://online_casino_news.hundredpercentgambling.com/2011/02/rigged-blackjack-vip-golden-club-sets.html This report]] is on what just might be the most hilariously badly-programmed rigging in the history of Blackjack. Evidently, the dealer has an ace up its sleeve - or rather, about four of the Ace of Diamonds.

** Back in GT2:

* In the NES game ''VideoGame/{{Anticipation}}'', which is basically ''Pictionary'', computer controlled opponents can guess the subject's entire character length and can screw up as many times as there are letters in the word(s) while humans only get two chances to guess a letter before their turn is over.[[note]]This can actually be somewhat beneficial; wrong AI inputs will be marked with asterisks, while correct ones will be left as is.[[/note]] On the hardest difficulty, the opponents buzz in the instant the die shows the number of spaces they want to move and can give the answer correctly without even knowing what the category is, how many letters are in the answer, or even before anything is actually drawn.

* In ''VideoGame/TheSimpsonsHitAndRun'', each level has a series of races to win a car. Almost every race will feature the next level's starter car as the lead opposing car, and it is always superior to any car you can access in the current level. This is especially bad in the second level, where Lisa's level 3 Malibu Stacy car is insanely better than anything Bart can access in his level 2 arsenal, making the races a nightmare to win. Special mention also must go to Marge having to solo-race Frink's Hover Car in one of her races, which is the most nimble car in the game. Her starter car, by comparison, is an SUV that will tip over at the slightest provocation (if you know Simpsons Lore, you'll totally get the joke though - Canyonero!). In addition, the AI cars are nigh-impossible to push off the road and are generally perfect drivers except on really sharp turns. Of course, you can always come back to the early levels with a better car, making it a cakewalk.

** In the original, Cervantes and Souledge have an attack called 'Self-Destruction' (renamed Geo De Rey in later installments); when the player uses it, it eats up 1/3 of their weapon gauge. The computer can decide arbitrarily if this applies to it or not; occasonally for Cervantes, hardly ever for Souledge. Souledge's version also has the advantage of controlling exactly when he launches, thus making it a nightmare when he starts spamming it, which is often, but you can control that too, so that's ok. It doesn't help that they (especially the latter) often get unbreakable weapons too while they suffer as much as everyone else when you control them, so good luck trying to disarm them. As the weapon gauge is never used again in such a fashion, it is no longer an issue from Soul Calibur Onwards.
** Go ahead and attempt to use the extraordinarily rare ranged attacks like Cervantes' gunshots. The AI will perfectly duck the bullets every time rather than risk guarding or side-stepping it, and be able to instantly attack out of the guard while you're still recovering from the shot. It's entirely possible to fire it repeatedly while the AI is too far to counter, and see them perfectly dodge each time yet not bother advancing since the script tells them to always prioritize ducking over anything else.

** In ''Tag Force 3'', F.G.D. and all other dragons on its side of the field deal piercing damage (Their Atk - the target's Def) when they destroy a defense position monster, and no trap or spell cards can be activated when F.G.D. attacks, unless you're the one controlling it...

** Before that you have to fight The Ogre. The first match against them was already a ludicrous DifficultySpike, now imagine doing that again; except now they have infinite TP to spam moves such as Killer Fields (strongest grass-type dribble), Ground Quake (one of the strongest shot blockers, comparable to Kabeyama's The Mountain), and High Voltage (strongest wind-type save hissatsu).

* This is the bane of many a [[LetsPlay Let's Player]]. Among others, LetsPlay/TheRunawayGuys made a running gag out of them being "the Anti-Peach Brigade" (as the AI controlling Peach in ''VideoGame/MarioParty'' is perceived as having a serious tendency to do this).
** They also brought up in their ''VideoGame/MarioParty2'' LP that the computer player is able to 'button-mash' buttons not only faster than a normal human, but faster even than an N64 controller is capable of registering.
* ''[[VideoGame/OneHundredPercentOrangeJuice 100% Orange Juice]]'': While the game's heavy reliance on dice rolls means you might always think the computer is cheating, the final boss, Tomomo, explicitly rigs her dice so she rolls high, making it very difficult to directly attack her. There is also an [[HarderThanHard Extreme difficulty]] that gives this benefit to ''all'' of your AI opponents.

* ''VideoGame/SouthParkPhoneDestroyer'': You can't play a version of someone if that character has already been played on the field by anyone (So you can't play Super Craig if you or the AI has played any variant of Craig). The AI doesn't follow this rule whatsoever.

* Invoked in the [[KillEmAll No Mercy]] route of ''VideoGame/{{Undertale}}''. The final boss of the route [[spoiler:(Sans)]] knows about your ability to reset, and therefore knows that they can only hold you off until you get past them. That doesn't mean they're going to make it easy for you. They screw with the game's mechanics to make the battle [[SNKBoss as frustrating as possible]] in the hopes of making you either RageQuit or reset. He breaks the rules by:

** Eventually he refuses to ever end his turn, thereby preventing the player from taking a turn of their own. Of course, at this point, the player realizes that if the boss isn't playing by the rules, [[HoistByTheirOwnPetard then maybe they don't need to either...]]

* ''VideoGame/MordheimCityOfTheDamned'' is a game that [[SpitefulAI wants you dead]] and doesn't care what it has to do in order to achieve it. Dataminers have confirmed that the game ''shamelessly'' rigs the dice rolls and lies to you about it, so your party will miss one 80%-accuracy attack after another while the enemy warband will continue to land blows that supposedly had a 50% chance or less of hitting, with a comically high crit chance too. Also, because [[MyRulesAreNotYourRules only your warband is persistant and every opposing warband is generated fresh for every mission]], the AI will go out of its way to screw you over as hard as possible at every turn even with actions that would be self-destructive, because it doesn't have to worry about long-term consequences. The ''Mordheim'' AI's objective isn't to win, it's to ''make you lose.''

This trope does ''not'' include "fair challenges" of the game (wide pits, [[DemonicSpiders powerful]] / [[GoddamnedBats numerous]] enemies, etc.); those are Real Difficulty. Likewise, one should not accuse the computer of cheating simply because it plays to a computer's natural strengths ([[ComputersAreFast lightning reflexes]], [[LoopholeAbuse omniscient knowledge]] [[RulesLawyer of the game rules]], and so forth), or because you have a single streak of bad luck. Consistent bad luck, however, may be a sign that the computer is using the [[RandomNumberGod RNG]] to cheat. On the other hand, some cheats can actually work to the player's advantage, such as with the RubberbandAI or plain old cheat codes.

** In ''VideoGame/StreetFighterTheMovie'' ([[RecursiveAdaptation the game]] [[Film/StreetFighter of the movie]] [[VideoGame/StreetFighterII of the game]]), when fighting M. Bison at the end, there was a fairly high chance that if the player was winning, Bison would stop taking damage from player attacks, or insta-kill the player with a weak attack, or the player would take damage from his own attacks.

** In ''VideoGame/Tekken7'' Akuma follows the tradition. As a final boss, he can parry your attacks, teleport around the place ''extremely''' fast, use an unblockable Focus Attack that is also twice as fast as that of his normal version, send 3 Shakunetsu Hadoken in a row (which will juggle you for quite some damage, or eat up most of your health if you happen to use an armoured move before being hit), and use an [[ImmuneToFlinching armoured]] [[TheComputerShallTauntYou taunt]] that [[PracticalTaunt instantly fills his entire Super Meter]], not to mention that his [[SignatureMove Raging Demon]] is a OneHitKill. Of course, he also has a utterly obscene damage output.

** Under normal circumstances, "facestabbing" as a Spy is a rare, [[GoodBadBugs hilarious glitch]]. Spy-bots in the [[ManVersusMachine Mann vs. Machine]] [[TheWarSequence mode]], however, seem capable of facestabbing players ''whenever the hell they want to.'' This starts making more sense when [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZpGtx3orK4#t=28s you see how loopy the backstab hitboxes can be]], and take into account the spies know ''exactly'' where these places begin and end. Thankfully averted elsewhere: Just like übered human players, übered bomb carriers (and their medics) aren't immune to the Pyro's airblast. Especially useful if the map has a BottomlessPit, which not even über-bots can be exempted from. And as a nice bonus, that resets the bomb all the way back to the beginning. [[RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap And you thought MvM would turn Pyros useless]]. Spy Robots can also backstab Snipers wearing the Razorback. As in, that piece of equipment whose ''sole purpose'' is to ''protect the Sniper from backstabs''.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/StarTrekLowerDecks'' episode "I, Excretus", the crew of the ''Cerritos'' is tasked with going through training simulators of various popular events in Star Trek canon. Mariner and Captain Freeman initially believe that these are a SecretTestOfCharacter, similarly to the Kobayashi Maru test, however it turns out that the person who put the crew up to this had blatantly rigged it so that the crew would be forced to keep doing this over and over until they ultimately failed, thus allowing her to keep her job. Unfortunantely for the person, [[SpannerInTheWorks she didn't expect]] [[ThePerfectionist Boimler]] to keep trying his test over and over again, giving the others the chance to get one up on the test runner.

** As the page quote suggests, ''VideoGame/DawnOfWarII'' was trying to be a lot better about this, or at least attempting to not get caught doing so. What actually happens in skirmish games is derisively referred to as the "Dawn of Resource". The A.I. is completely and utterly ''obsessed'' with securing all of the resource points on the map. [[https://1d4chan.org/wiki/File:DOW2Guide.jpg It will try to grab all of your points, constantly allowing its units to get killed just so the A.I. can complete the capture.]] It knows how far your units can see to the last pixel, and will make its units perfectly avoid the sight radius of yours. The only time the computer actually starts playing the game is when it finally has all of the resource points, where it suddenly becomes reasonably competent. As soon as you take back a single point, it immediately reverts back to its kleptomania. The worst part is that the AI doesn't need all of them, as it gets a significant income bonus by default and earns 3 to 5 times more than a player can.

* RulesAreForHumans \\
In a computer adaptation of an existing game (e.g. chess), the AI may have the ability to pull off moves which are against the rules of the game.

* In the ''Franchise/MortalKombat'' arcade series, the computer player often blatantly cheats. Here are some gems for ''VideoGame/MortalKombat2''.