I play one of those games that doesn’t strongly enforce anti-cheating, and I agree with you that it’s a huge detraction compared to games with strong anti-cheat.
But I strongly disagree about the use of invasive client-side anti-cheat. Server-side anti-cheat can reduce the number of cheaters to an acceptably low level.
And chess is a game where I feel like it would be relatively hard to detect cheating. An algorithm looking at games with actors moving in 3D space and responding to relative positions and actions of multiple other actors should have a great many more ways to detect cheating over the course of many games.
And frankly, I think the incentive structure has nothing to do with whether tournaments are happening with money on the line, and a great deal more whether the company has the cash and nothing better to do.
Anti-cheat beyond a very basic level is nothing to these companies except a funnel optimization to extract the maximum lifetime value out of the player base. Only the most successful games will ever have the money or reach the technical capability to support this. Nobody making these decisions is doing it for player welfare.
But I strongly disagree about the use of invasive client-side anti-cheat. Server-side anti-cheat can reduce the number of cheaters to an acceptably low level.
See for example how lichess detects and aids in detection of cheaters: https://github.com/clarkerubber/irwin
And chess is a game where I feel like it would be relatively hard to detect cheating. An algorithm looking at games with actors moving in 3D space and responding to relative positions and actions of multiple other actors should have a great many more ways to detect cheating over the course of many games.