help Can you get vac banned for using an gameboy emulator and gameboy .ROMS?

[Ennis]

Hello, I am a bit stressed because of my PC behaving weird after i downloaded the Visualboyadvance to my pc to play Pokemon Fire Red. The main reason im writing this is because of lack of answers on the steam vac forums and guidelines (or more missleading?). I downloaded the Visual Boy ADVANCE from the link provided below and it seemed safe but since my bitdefender subscription had run out i could not check it with the local virus scan. 

 

I have an csgo inventory which has some expensive items and especially expensive kniife and i am very scared it can get vac banned due to the wierd behavior my pc is experiencing after i post this i am going to reset my pc and delete everything on it. I have heard from a friend that he has han no issues with this ever but the forums say all sort of different things? Thanks for all the answers they are much appreciated! -Ennis

 

 

Links: 

<redacted by staff>

[mariushm]

I doubt it.

 

You can scan the executable of that emulator by uploading it to virustotal.com

 

There's also plenty of free antiviruses no excuses to not just uninstall bitdefender (or disable it) and just install something else. I personally use Avira antivirus, free edition.

[Kisai]

17 minutes ago, Ennis said:

Hello, I am a bit stressed because of my PC behaving weird after i downloaded the Visualboyadvance to my pc to play Pokemon Fire Red. The main reason im writing this is because of lack of answers on the steam vac forums and guidelines (or more missleading?).

 

Why would you get vac banned from using a program that isn't using VAC ?

 

1. regardless if you had the legal right to run the game, the emulators have been largely stable for years.

2. emulators don't read outside their memory space, cheat tools do.

 

If you didn't get the emulator from the developer's site  ( https://sourceforge.net/projects/vba/files/VisualBoyAdvance/1.7.2/ ) which is from 2004, then you can't trust the download. 

 

[Ennis]

12 minutes ago, Kisai said:

 

Why would you get vac banned from using a program that isn't using VAC ?

 

1. regardless if you had the legal right to run the game, the emulators have been largely stable for years.

2. emulators don't read outside their memory space, cheat tools do.

 

If you didn't get the emulator from the developer's site  ( https://sourceforge.net/projects/vba/files/VisualBoyAdvance/1.7.2/ ) which is from 2004, then you can't trust the download. 

 

Hey, thanks for answering, the reason i reach out to the forum is because i do not know all of the information given is. I downloaded both the emulator and Roms from <redacted by staff> (i see my links provided is taken away, so sorry if that isnt allowed im new so i dont know whats allowed and not, yes i can read the terms of service and rules but all i want is to know what to do i dont want to cause any harm in any way, and since i dont know much about emulators, roms and vac in it self i get a little worried that my account can get banned for without me using an external program or cheating software. I have watched many videos regarding vac and searched and read many forums and they all have the same answer "do not cheat" and i havent done that but no one can give an clear answer to what triggers the vac automated system and what is not activating it. And since VAC is as quoted "VAC bans are permanent, non-negotiable, and cannot be removed by Steam Support." 

[Kisai]

10 minutes ago, Ennis said:

Hey, thanks for answering, the reason i reach out to the forum is because i do not know all of the information given is. I downloaded both the emulator and Roms from <redacted by staff> (i see my links provided is taken away, so sorry if that isnt allowed im new so i dont know whats allowed and not, yes i can read the terms of service and rules but all i want is to know what to do i dont want to cause any harm in any way, and since i dont know much about emulators, roms and vac in it self i get a little worried that my account can get banned for without me using an external program or cheating software. I have watched many videos regarding vac and searched and read many forums and they all have the same answer "do not cheat" and i havent done that but no one can give an clear answer to what triggers the vac automated system and what is not activating it. And since VAC is as quoted "VAC bans are permanent, non-negotiable, and cannot be removed by Steam Support." 

You'll never get a clear answer, but suffice it to say, if you're worried about this kind of thing, shut steam down when you go play with emulators. If VAC isn't running, then there's nothing to detect.

 

That said, when you download untrusted files from the internet, there's a possibility of downloading malware that might be purposely geared to stealing your accounts on things. This is why you never download emulators off content aggregation sites, because they frequently do end up with malware in them, because nobody is actually scanning and testing the files on aggregation sites.

 

[Craftyawesome]

20 minutes ago, Kisai said:

If you didn't get the emulator from the developer's site  ( https://sourceforge.net/projects/vba/files/VisualBoyAdvance/1.7.2/ ) which is from 2004, then you can't trust the download. 

Original VBA is very old. It is less accurate than newer emulators and actually has an exploit.

If you really want to use VBA, use modern VBA-M. Otherwise you probably want mGBA.

 

[Ennis]

2 minutes ago, Craftyawesome said:

Original VBA is very old. It is less accurate than newer emulators and actually has an exploit.

If you really want to use VBA, use modern VBA-M. Otherwise you probably want mGBA.

 

Thanks, i have to say that the emulator i downloaded was named (VisualBoyAdvance-M 64-bit 2.0.2) is this the safer one you say?

[Craftyawesome]

57 minutes ago, Ennis said:

Thanks, i have to say that the emulator i downloaded was named (VisualBoyAdvance-M 64-bit 2.0.2) is this the safer one you say?

Judging by the video, the bug is still there, but if it was compiled with the defaults it shouldn't cause any damage.

There is a newer version of VBA-M, and mGBA is usually considered better.

[LogicalDrm]

@Ennis, your links have been removed by moderation. Distribution of ROMs is piracy and linking to such sites will not be allowed. Emulation is greyzone and discussion about emulators and emulation in general is allowed.

 

Of what I have heard, VAC is only scanning active applications (including VM agents) and Steam related folders. So if you aren't running emulator while running game on Steam, there shouldn't be a problem. But then again, you are pirating ROMs and if you get banned because of being pirate, I'd say thats deserved. You can probably get GBA and the games for less money than what your account is worth.