I don't think I have a hard and fast blanket rule when it comes to cheating, honestly. And what qualifies as cheating is... nebulous at best, and I find that my views differ pretty wildly when compared to the "average" player/overall community sentiment game-to-game.
My default example will just always be Final Fantasy XI. It's an online game, so "cheating" should be avoided in theory... but also, the way the game is designed and the tools that Square Enix provides seldom entwine properly. So like FFXI is all about horizontal gear progression (sidegrades/alternatives instead of
upgrades) and super niche/very specific gear buffs, so you have say dozens of rings in your inventory - some have Strength, some have Attack Power, some have "Conserve Resources" (not what it's called, but what it does), some have Speed (Haste, which stacks) and what you want while auto-attacking, while casting a spell, while standing idle, while in a defensive state are all different. And the game originally let you use text commands (macros) to change equipment mid-fight, on the fly, whenever you wanted - there's even a debuff in the game that specifically makes it so you
can't change gear (
Encumbrance) - but macros can only accept 6 lines and there are 16 gear slots.
So, enter third-party program Windower that allows in-game macros/commands to call Windower macros, thereby allowing for infinite lines of text commands, and its add-on
Gearswap that lets you literally create and execute code (in the form of .lua files) in-game, automating the gear changing. The exact point this becomes "cheating" varies greatly person to person, but here's the rub: Without using Gearswap, there are mountains of items in the game that are worthless. You would never realistically be able to make proper use of so many stats, and it would fundamentally undermine a lot of what makes FFXI appealing. There are plenty of proponents that say these restrictions - like the restrictions that led to many classic video games existing as they do - themselves breed and foster creativity. And, sure, there's some logic in that. But FFXI is also an MMO and so for most of its existence you could not feasibly expect to ever actually get your hands on many powerful pieces of gear, or it would take months or years to acquire them. And so that "creativity" runs into the brick wall of RNG, whereas Gearswap enables you to swap in pieces - even dangerous ones (vastly lower level, no defense stat, etc) - and hodgepodge yourself into fighting form.
Generally, I don't care what other people do in their own games. You want to blatantly hack and break the game, be it Game Genie or Cheat Engine? Knock yourself out. I don't even super care if people cheat online, provided whatever they're doing doesn't affect my account or compromise my console/PC/account's security. If someone's cheating in a lobby, I'll just exit the lobby. No big deal.
But me, personally, I can't be bothered to cheat most of the time. There are glitches/exploits for Guitar Hero 2, for example, that functionally let you swap note charts between songs - so if someone were so inclined, they could pop the achievement for beating the song "Jordan" on Expert while actually playing "Sweet Child o' Mine" or something. I won't do that because I want to accomplish things on my own, I don't care if I'm never good enough to accomplish it, and I hold actual disdain for true "achievement whores" that 1) buy and play obvious shit and shovelware exclusively to inflate their GamerScore and 2) think their imaginary epeen numbers mean anything. Achievements/Trophies are fun to compare with friends because then you can share war stories with one another at a glance. If you don't have the stories, then I personally don't see the point.
But... I also don't know that "I spent 6 1/2 consecutive hours playing Rock Band 2 without pausing, opening the console guide or my batteries dying
and without failing a song" is something developers should encourage or rely upon. I did it, I mean, because I'm stupid and had enough free time. It's blatantly unhealthy though. And there's no real difference between me talking into a microphone for ~30 hours, or me duct taping said microphone to a window fan, turning that fun on high, and letting the game auto-play itself for ~30 hours to earn One Million Fake Munnies for an achievement worth 30 GS while I actually play a different game elsewhere.
