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Who here has quit gaming because of the rise in toxicity?

S

snausagesUK

Member
I don't have this problem but for me gaming has become more of an interest than a hobby.

I hate how much effort and time-investment I have to put into stuff nowadays. Crash was a very nice breezy release but I'm staying away from things like Horizon and similar titles because of the lack of ROI I feel with some of these titles nowadays, so I'm thinking of selling my remaining gaming stuff as well (already got rid of PC, handhelds).

This is more of a me problem than a problem with the stuff coming out. I'm trying to develop an interest in stuff outside gaming for a change. It's not a good or useful way for me to spend my time anymore
 
D

Dantrist

Member
If you like playing video games then it seems like a shame to stop because other people who like the same thing are dicks. I can understand you wanting to distance yourself from toxic communities though.
 
P

PeakPointMatrix

Member
Do you listen to music?

Do you read books?

Do you watch movies?

Do you remember how alt-right fucks reacted and treated the women from the new Ghostbusters for example? There are shitty people in all faucets of groups and media if you look for it, which is what you seem to go out of your way to do. I think you need to reevaluate how you consume your next selected hobby, because chances are that you will encounter similar bigotry and politics no matter where you look.
 
D

Deleted member 10571

Unconfirmed Member
Here's a better solution: Defend your Hobby and (if the case) your lifestyle. Not by yelling "BUT NOT ME!", but by supporting devs who openly condemn this behaviour and stand up against it. By offering discourse and making your voice heard on social media. By defending victims and by supporting the fight against racism, bigotry and hate in games.

But sure, you can also just sell your shit if that's easier.
 
I

Iriscomeback

Member
I always thought those toxic assholes to be a very vocal minority.

In any case, I will not let them ruin my hobby. Gaming is much more then that ya know...
 
Jaguar Victory

Jaguar Victory

Member
Assholes permeate all facets of life. Music, banking, healthcare, government. Good luck avoiding it all. I say do the things you enjoy and be the difference you want to see in the world. If your friend is an asshole cal him on it. Maybe he'll listen.
 
B

BassForever

Member
Every group if you get too deep is toxic op, from game/entertainment fandoms to corporate work enviroments to even volunteer work. Unless you plan to live a lone as a hermit quitting things do to a toxic nature seems short sighted and silly.
 
T

The ๖ۜBronx

Member
I heavily dislike the outrage culture that seems to be embedded into games, but love games themselves. I'll still play them as I can separate the two but I find myself getting discouraged from discussing much about games online that may be considered to be an unpopular opinion. That said I've found GAF to be far more enjoyable, coming from Reddit. At least I'm not getting death threats and people saying my family should be raped while burning purely because I happened to like No Man's Sky.
 
J

JustAnotherOtaku

Member
Bufbaf said:
Here's a better solution: Defend your Hobby and (if the case) your lifestyle. Not by yelling "BUT NOT ME!", but by supporting devs who openly condemn this behaviour and stand up against it. By offering discourse and making your voice heard on social media. By defending victims and by supporting the fight against racism, bigotry and hate in games.

But sure, you can also just sell your shit if that's easier.
Click to expand...

This is another worthwhile thing to do. There are, for example, plenty of indie games and game-related podcasts out there that celebrate diversity etc that will help to stop the feeling that toxicity has reached every last corner of the industry/hobby.
 
D

Drazgul

Member
I just play games, who cares how some random people on the internet attempt to politicize it. Their opinions mean nothing to me and I rarely get exposed to them, either. Sometimes GAF has some threads about the latest random drama or what not, but those are easy to skip.
 
F

fabricated backlash

Member
I stopped using Voice chat and disable text chat in most games, especially Battlefield 1 which should be renamed to Reichsfeld 1 the home of holocaust deniers or straight up holocaust fans, Hitler fangirls, antisemites and generally the rock bottom of human decency.
 
S

Sidewinder

Member
Stevey said:
I just read GAF, skim a few other websites and stay on STEAM and XBL, just ignore all the bullshit
Click to expand...

That's what I'm doing, maybe because I grew up with videogame magazines and 0 internet I don't need all them youtube gaming vids, social media, comments sections, online chat etc, etc. to enjoy playing videogames.
 
J

Jakten

Member
Multiplayer yes, Single player never. The content has nothing to do with that stuff. I do however play Splatoon online because I don't have to hear other people.
 
L

Lime

Member
When I read stuff in the OP and some of the replies, I wonder how people are able to ignore all the bigotry. I could imagine it's easy to avoid if you're not the people who are targeted by the bigots and neo-Nazis in gaming, but for others, it's the daily life and experience.

And while you're ignoring it and sticking your head in the sand, some of us are out there getting terrorized with no one to help or support because the unaffected are ignoring what's happening to us.

TatteredHat said:
Don't blame the games for the behavior of the people who play them.
Click to expand...

Not in total, but when you have a bunch of white male only games everywhere where all female characters are depicted to the pleasure of straight dudes, you are going to attract a certain type of demographic and at the same time cultivate well-meaning people to be fragile snowflakes whenever a woman has an opinion.
 
C

crazy monkey

Banned
I never play online game with chat or voice. I olay single player campaign a lot. I do not go to gaming thread much at all. I am fine only because of that.
 
S

Sheroking

Member
Quitting gaming seems like a huge overreaction.

Just mute the fuckers.

Lime said:
Not in total, but when you have a bunch of white male only games everywhere where all female characters are depicted to the pleasure of straight dudes, you are going to attract a certain type of demographic and at the same time cultivate well-meaning people to be fragile snowflakes whenever a woman has an opinion.
Click to expand...

This has never been less true.

Gamergate basically exists as a response from insecure trolls about the industry shifting AWAY from these things. There are still problematic aspects, sure, but it's improving.
 
Roufianos

Roufianos

Member
No. I'm not highly sensitive and irrational. I don't see how their actions affect your enjoyment of playing games or how they reflect badly on you. Seems like a crazy reaction to me.
 
S

snail_maze

Member
Amalthea said:
I simply avoid any communication with any gamer outside of GAF. As radical as that sounds it works pretty damn well.
Click to expand...

pretty much this. I mainly play single player games or online with friends and I don't visit any gaming news or similar websites other than gaf. as a consequence I wouldn't even know about all the toxic crap and things like GG if it weren't brought up here. Guess it's a good thing I don't enjoy online multiplayer games
 
C

Creamium

shut uuuuuuuuuuuuuuup
PeakPointMatrix said:
Do you listen to music?

Do you read books?

Do you watch movies?

Do you remember how alt-right fucks reacted and treated the women from the new Ghostbusters for example? There are shitty people in all faucets of groups and media if you look for it, which is what you seem to go out of your way to do. I think you need to reevaluate how you consume your next selected hobby, because chances are that you will encounter similar bigotry and politics no matter where you look.
Click to expand...

Pretty much. You're cutting out the wrong thing OP.
 
S

Skeeter49

Member
It's all about drowning out the things that are toxic.Trying too hard to avoid these things can make you pick up on them more as well.

Quitting gaming might be extreme, but a break from gaming could be helpful.

Regardless, quitting isn't going to get you over this issue that is in more than just gaming.
 
RainbowIslands

RainbowIslands

Member
Not going to talk you out of it or anything (there are lots of posts on that), but just wanted to make sure you thought it through about selling everything.

It's just that I saw a lot of posts of people regretting selling stuff, so thought maybe what you needed is time to store everything away and distance yourself from the hobby. Maybe when you decide you're fine without gaming, then you can sell your stuff?

That's just my two cents. I hope you're happy with whatever you decide to do. ^.^
 
B

BGBW

Maturity, bitches.
The great philosopher, Yui Hirasawa, once said

57ObjJ2.jpg


And that's really all that matters.

If I started becoming sensitive to what others could be potentially doing in any hobby I'd soon find myself hobbyless.
 
Drac84

Drac84

Member
I just ignore it all and enjoy playing games. I do the same with TV and movies. It's actually super easy to avoid that stuff and just enjoy the medium.
 
T

TheJoRu

Member
Never ever gonna use voice chat outside of friend parties. Reading stuff like the Splatoon 2 thread where everyone blames every failure on everything and everyone but themselves I kinda feel inclined to stop engaging with the community altogether and just play the game pretending everyone is enjoying themselves.

Not gonna quit gaming because of stuff like that, I just need to try and get away from it as much as possible and be a proponent for a different kind of behaviour. Which kinda clashes with my "maybe I should stop interacting with the community", so I'm a bit torn on this.
 
Ivellios

Ivellios

Member
I play games by myself or with friends, so this dont bother me.

Maybe you should just relax and enjoy good offline games or only play on-line with friends, imo quitting game entirely because of this is a bit extreme, but each to their own i guess.
 
Lord Phol

Lord Phol

Member
Your problem seems more like a social related issue, that kind of behaviour can be find anywhere online. There's a reason I personally don't get involved with political stuff and barely use Facebook anymore.
I do enjoy games though. To me they are just another form of entertainment and I could care less what political agenda people want to push with them. For online games I just mute/ignore people who can't behave and socialize with those that can, just like I would in real life.
 
L

luulubuu

Junior Member
DieAntwoord said:
I hate the word "toxicity" but it's the best word I can think of currently.

I think I've reached that point. Tomorrow I'm packing everything up gaming related and taking my cash bounty of 1300 dollars from GameStop and more than likey never touching this hobby again.

Since that nonsense happened a couple of years ago it's been really, really hard to look at gaming in a positive light and wanting to be associated with it.

I read an article, it's politically charged. The comments are a shit show on both sides filled with adults who are way too old to be displaying behavior fit for 3rd graders.

I try to watch streams and people are sexually harassed and being threatened with violence constantly.

I read about museum and video game archival projects that have interested me being shut down because of gamergate.

There's no fun anymore. Everything in gaming has such a large amount of politics and shit people associated with it that I can't by association support it anymore. The dregs of society have won yet again and I guess they got what they wanted by running people like me away from gaming to save "gamers"

I just can't deal with it anymore.
Click to expand...

I just avoid media.
 
B

Breads

Banned
That's a dumb reason to quit a hobby. Especially since the only thing on the rise is awareness since the toxicity has always been there.
 
O

OfTheOverflow

Member
I understand your motive OP. Gaming is still a pretty young medium and still attracts a younger, less developed audience. That is of course slowly changing, but it can't happen fast enough. Game culture is still pretty immature, when it's not outright offensive.
 
T

test_account

XP-39C²
I dont see any reason to quit gaming as a whole. I do remember wanting to quit NeoGAF back in the early PS3/Xbox 360/Wii days though. It was so much negativitiy for a period of time, especially in the sales threads. So i do understand wanting to get away from that type of negativity.

I did recently quit a tech website that i've been visiting for like 15 years because of the bad disqusion envoirment on the site.
 
P

PantsuJo

Member
BGBW said:
The great philosopher, Yui Hirasawa, once said

57ObjJ2.jpg


And that's really all that matters.

If I started becoming sensitive to what others could be potentially doing in any hobby I'd soon find myself hobbyless.
Click to expand...
This is the absolute truth.
 
K

KillLaCam

Banned
If you just play games you'd barely ever see any of that stuff. Like I still have no idea what gamer gate is besides ppl who don't like Anita Sharkesian.
 
N

Neptonic

Member
oh no my singleplayer experience has been RUINED by message boards
better stop playing them altogether


Fuck overwatch though that game has turned into garbage thanks to the community
 
D

Deleted member 325805

Unconfirmed Member
Not gaming, but Overwatch. I love the game but the community is absolutely awful now, it used to be so friendly but now I dunno, it's like everyone playing it is an angry man-child.
 
S

Shahed

Member
I understand feeling aggrieved and not wanting to deal with it. But that doesn't mean you have to completely forgo gaming altogther. I mean I hear the things about toxicity, negativity and hostility all the time. However it's somethings I don't want to deal with, so I just avoid it.

I'm aware it exists, but if I play mainly single player games, and avoid topics with the usual console warrior nonsense, then i can easily happily play anything i want to and not encounter any toxicity.
 
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