Nvidia GeForce update produces game-breaking VALORANT flash hack

Riot Games recently revealed the latest addition to VALORANT Episode 3 Act 1: a new agent by the name of “KAY/O” (or Kayo). Riot certainly delivered on its promise that Kayo would “change the flow of any battle”, but perhaps this was not the way they intended.

A player recently took to Reddit to share a novel, game-breaking glitch which appeared to be associated with the new hero. In the post, entitled “Geforce Remove Hud game filter makes player completely immune to all flashes except nearsights”, the user demonstrated how hiding the head-up display (HUD) would make them immune to the effects of Kayo’s Flash.

Game-breaking glitch makes VALORANT players immune to flash

It was later revealed on Twitter, that the bug was introduced by a new Nvidia GeForce Experience update. The Nvidia Experience service typically offers optimization for settings and game drives to improve the overall gameplay experience by using real-time post-processing filters. Instead, the update inadvertently introduced a game-breaking bug to VALORANT.

An Nvidia software (HUD remover) competely removes flashes for VALORANT. You could bind it to a key & use it mid round for ez hold.

I'm curious as to how they'll fix this and will maybe help CSGO with the untrusted/obs situation? pic.twitter.com/nYsxX2z5ZA

— HOUNGOUNGAGNE (@HOUNGOUNGAGNE) June 25, 2021

In the video, we can see that players are rendered immune to the Flash effects of Kayo, upon hiding the HUD. The Hide HUD feature is generally used to remove the minimap, health bar and ability icons to enhance the cinematics of the game. Instead, the bugged Nvidia update conferred a hack that retained total visibility of players, after using the Flash. It’s also clear from the video that the bugged update only affects the HUD feature when it is hidden, as Flashes appear to work as intended whilst the HUD is displayed.

The hack would break VALORANT competitive

Of course, this bug would confer an unfair advantage to competitive VALORANT players, if abused. Players could bind the feature to a macro key and use it to cheat easy kills during their competitive matches. It is presumed that the bug not only works for Kayo but with other agents with Flash abilities as well, including Breach, Phoenix, Skye and Yoru. The bug apparently does not work with nearsighted Flashes, such as Paranoia or Leer.

Given the seriousness of the glitch, we’re certain that Riot Games will release a fix in the near future in order to maintain the integrity of its game and competitive lobbies. Until a fix is implemented, we suggest that you avoid playing any competitive matches, if you can help it.

Update: According to a Tweet by FaZe Clan manager, "Infamous", Riot Games discovered the game-breaking bug in the early hours of this morning and has appropriated a fix.

Riot found out about this game breaking bug at 3am their time, and fixed it within the hour.

Goddamn I love this company. https://t.co/Rf04NZewbA

— infamous (@infamousbtw) June 25, 2021

Redditors have, however, pointed out that although a fix has been implemented, it is still very buggy and that the exploit “works on and off”.

• Read more: Valorant player impersonates FaZe Clan manager and deceives teammates

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Header image via Riot Games.