> And moderators of popular forums like r/ModernWarfareII refuse to allow posts that try to increase awareness of the issue, again, likely assuming we’re all a bunch of whining cheaters. I don’t think they’re aware of the disservice they’re doing to their community by actively suppressing these reports (or conspiratorially, they’re influenced by Activision itself).
I don't think this is very conspiratorially. It's very clear that the mods are coordinating with Activision on releases and information. I've had several posts taken down over the years because they don't tow-the-line.
Game community subs, especially for FPS games, often ban posts about cheaters, bugs or things like the submission. Not because they're conspiring with the maker, nefariously hiding negative info, but because if they don't the sub turns into a grievance filled "help forum".
People who had never visited the forum before, and likely never will again, drop in because they're mad and want a complaint venue where they can gripe. When a game has hundreds of thousands or millions of players, that sort of thing starts to swamp the sub and soon there is no community or sustained conversation and instead it's all 360 no scope drive by complaint drops.
I absolutely commiserate with the OP, and it 100% legitimately sounds like they got caught up in a flawed anti-cheat (maybe exacerbated by a storage system issue on their end, making it think they were trying to modify the system files). But on the other hand, and they recognize this, all the actual cheaters also do the I didn't do nothing routine. When a game is rife with cheaters (PubG, MW, Squad, etc), pretty soon you have a really skeptical approach to those appeals.
I don't think this is very conspiratorially. It's very clear that the mods are coordinating with Activision on releases and information. I've had several posts taken down over the years because they don't tow-the-line.