How do custom time demos prevent cheating/optimizations?

[zurich]

Posted this in a thread somewhere, but it never got answered.

If the cheats/optimizations occur at an engine specific level, then what is a custom time demo going to do to stop it? IE: disabling trilinear on detail textures.. Won't they only prevent custom clip planes/on rails stuff?

 

[Reverend]

That's probably the major, if not the only, reason for custom benchmarks (i.e. improper clip planes). I have since discovered just how "abused" my old Quake3 "Quaver" benchmark was/is due to improper insertion of clip planes based solely on the run (i.e. "on the rails") of this demo benchmark of mine.

Custom demos are but just one way to try and prevent cheating. Makes me kinda sad to type this.

 

[digitalwanderer]

That's probably the major, if not the only, reason for custom benchmarks (i.e. improper clip planes). I have since discovered just how "abused" my old Quake3 "Quaver" benchmark was/is due to improper insertion of clip planes based solely on the run (i.e. "on the rails") of this demo benchmark of mine.

Custom demos are but just one way to try and prevent cheating. Makes me kinda sad to type this.

Makes me kinda sad just reading it.