Throne and Liberty

Throne and Liberty is a free-to-play open-world MMO developed by NCSoft, which launched it in South Korea in December 2023. Amazon GamesPublisherAmazon GamesAmazon Games is Amazon's publishing arm for the Western market, bringing Korean MMOs to Steam: Smilegate's Lost Ark and NCSoft's Throne and Liberty. Both ship Easy Anti-Cheat, and both met large bot and real-money-trading problems at launch that Amazon answered with mass ban waves.2 games in this family → published the global version, releasing it on Steam, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series on October 1, 2024, running on Unreal Engine 4EngineUnreal Engine (Epic Games)Epic Games' Unreal Engine is the most widely used engine in big-budget PC games. Versions 4 and 5 power a substantial share of the modern competitive shooter market, including Valorant (UE4), Fortnite (UE5), PUBG (UE4), The Finals (UE5), and Delta Force (UE5).20 games in this family → after NCSoft moved the project off its own engine during development. It features large-scale PvP, weather-driven world events, and cross-platform play.

Playing Throne and Liberty on PC means Easy Anti-Cheat's kernel driver loads with the game; the process is TL.exe. Steam Deck and Linux work through Proton's EACAnti-cheatEasy Anti-Cheat (EAC)Easy Anti-Cheat is one of the most widely deployed kernel anti-cheats in PC gaming. Founded by Finnish company Kamu in 2006, acquired by Epic Games in 2018, and bundled with Epic Online Services. The kernel driver loads while a protected game is running. User-mode daemons EasyAntiCheat.exe and EasyAntiCheat_EOS.exe are catalogued in the Field Guide's processes section.18 games in this family → runtime. The recurring friction is EAC kick errors and, on Windows 11, the anti-cheat refusing to load when it finds an incompatible or unsigned driver on the system, which is a sign to update those drivers rather than to disable the anti-cheat. As a free-to-play MMO it is easy to install on a whim, and the kernel anti-cheat comes with it.

Throne and Liberty uses Easy Anti-Cheat, in the Epic Online Services variant (easyanticheat_eos.exeProcesseasyanticheat_eos.exeEasy Anti-Cheat for Epic Online Services (EOS variant)Open plate →, catalogued in the Field Guide's processes section). On Windows, EAC runs a kernel-mode driver that loads with the game and unloads when it closes. The main process is TL.exe, in the Steam library's Win64 folder. A useful tell that this is EAC and not a Linux-hostile anti-cheat: the game is playable on the Steam Deck and Linux through Proton with EAC's runtime, which a boot-level Korean kernel driver would typically block. The driver can remain on the system after the game closes until removed.

Two threads run through Throne and Liberty's record. The first is monetization: developer NCSoft is known in the MMO world, through its Lineage franchise, for aggressive pay-to-win design, and Western players raised the same concern in beta. Amazon adjusted the monetization model before the global launch and positioned the design as player choice. The second is enforcement: like Lost Ark, the game drew a significant bot and real-money-trading problem at launch, and Amazon ran public ban waves, with penalties including negative in-game currency balances and auction-house lockouts, and some players reporting false positives. Sources include PCGamesN, MMORPG.com, and Massively Overpowered.