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[SoundPulse]

As I've gotten older, I've found I have even less tolerance for this shit than ever before. I even disable the text chat in TF2 in pugs now. Dealing with it in Overwatch has pretty much put me off playing that game despite enjoying it, sadly.

Spoiler

hud_saytext_time 0, for those curious

 

[wumster3000]

I don't chat or listen to it while online due to its toxic nature. I like playing online, I just don't chat. Too many racial and homophobic slurs for me. I just don't want to hear it. Destiny has the best community IMO. Every player that I have joined with, have been really nice and helpful.

I recently repurchased an Xbox One S for Destiny due to LFG. It's one of the best features this generation. Hopefully I can start chatting again using LFG.

 

[Rookje]

What can the industry do to improve upon toxicity?

One of the most insane examples is the tribunal system of LoL, and even that didn't turn out too well.

 

[WilsonX100]

playing with friends makes everything better. hop in discord, mute the in game voices, and dont have to deal with the constant racism and other negativity. games are supposed to be fun entertainment.

however sometimes it just gets to be too much...part of why i quit overwatch only a little after switching to pc from XBOX because that group of friends i played with on PC was toxic, as well as a large majority of the playerbase. but toxicity is a huge problem, in part because of the anonymity behind a gamertag or say something like PUBG where you can't even see the other player's names who are talking.

 

[Puruzi]

Doesn't really bug me, been called all types of shit in online games. Just last night someone on For Glory in Smash 4 called me a n***er cunt.

It doesn't bug me because I don't know these people and I will never know them. I actually laughed because it was hilarious that I trashed him so hard that he had to do all that.

Just don't see the point in getting mad or upset about some random ass dudes calling you anything.

 

[TripleBee]

Honestly developers should just give up on voice chat. Friends will already use Discord anyways.

Design commands to signal teammates - and build your game with the understanding that nobody wants to use voice chat.

 

[PSqueak]

Well, yeah, it's not actually a big puzzle as to why, in games where team play is critical, people become more toxic as they feel their team mates are dragging them down.

That's why MOBAS have some of the most toxic player bases.

Been playing a lot of HotS lately, if you think HotS is toxic, you're not even scratching the surface of how toxic MOBAS are, because HotS by design is a game made to reduce stress of team mate performance since it removes the personal growth angle from matches (No last hitting, no gold, no items, entire team levels up at the same time, less snow balling, focus on objectives rather than kills, etc) which reduces a lot the "people getting mad at their team mates" factor.

 

[eliochip]

Most people are scum. I can't wait till Ai gets better so I can play mulitplayer solo.

When I do play it's without voicechat. Demon's Souls and Bloodborne are my favorite "multiplayer" experiences. The first Blazblue had a decent community before it got filled with edgelords. Destiny 1 is alright unless you're a girl apparently. My ex had issues with abuse when playing

 

[Gravy Boat]

Honestly developers should just give up on voice chat. Friends will already use Discord anyways.

Design commands to signal teammates - and build your game with the understanding that nobody wants to use voice chat.

Or keep it as it is? It's very easy to mute or block people you don't want to hear from. You can disable it at a console level even. Barely anyone on consoles use discord, nor should they.

 

[Danjin44]

What can the industry do to improve upon toxicity?

One of the most insane examples is the tribunal system of LoL, and even that didn't turn out too well.

You really cant. The only way is for people stop being piss of s**t on internet and that not ever gonna happen.

I mean there are streamers that are face shown to public and still willing say s**ty things on online let alone random people on internet that hide behind usernames.

 

[m29a]

Anytime I play an online game, I go through the options to disable/hide both text and voice chat. Yes, I know that's shitty of me as a teammate, but to be fair, I don't play competitive modes, and I always try my best to win. If a game doesn't offer that, I don't play. Thankfully two of my favorite mp games are Overwatch and Rocket League, and they offer that.

I just don't want to have to deal with toxic people. I know I'm sensitive, but when I'm playing games, I want to relax and have fun, not have someone be a dick to me all because I made one mistake and then I second-guess my playing throughout the match because of my anxiety.

IMO the only way the industry can improve upon this, is to always offer the option to disable/hide the chat across all fronts. Leave it on by default, whatever, but give people the option. Being forced to deal with that sucks, even if you can block them afterwards.

 

[PetriP-TNT]

The older I have gotten the more obnoxious it has gotten. I had to stop playing CS:GO because after not playing for couple of months, I dropped from LEM to Silver Elite Master. I easily could carry any match alone even when playing for a match or two a week. Which obviously caused some... issues... when every match ended with people sending "I will kill you fucking faggot cheater" types of messages to me.

Same with PUBG, the racist island kills pretty much any expectations of playing squad matches with randoms. I play match when I have the time and cannot really commit to playing at certain times and I don't know that many people that play games at all, even less some that play at same times I do.

Rocket League was pretty much the best experience I have had, and even that had a large share of total dickwads. And it's not like the situation has gotten any better in the past 20 years I have played games online.

Fuck toxicity. Fuck "gamers".

 

[StrawberryJam]

Unfortunately that's the nature of Internet. The toxicity is not only on multiplayer games but also in social media.

I'm very social both at work and outside of work but when it comes to gaming I'm very anti-social. I don't like to play with anybody and I don't like the idea of my enjoyment in games depend on other people.

I am the exact same. Like playing split screen multiplayer with my friends on the couch, but online is a no go for me.

 

[Foxy the Fox]

That's not nuclear science.

I mean, is the same as any team-based human activity

 

[LAM09]

Most people don't use mics on PS4 (in EU anyway), so I just mute the select few I encounter that yell or hurl abuse.

 

[CountAntonius]

CSGO is by far the worst I've experienced but that is because aside from Smite I haven't played a Moba which i hear are pretty awful. That being said every single online MP game has been riddled with awful behavior in at least half if not more of my online matches. Overwatch, Rocket league, H1Z1 and probably pubg but I only play squads with freinds and always mute the mic.

 

[jelly]

Don't know how you deal with it. Use the cloud and AI to kick users in real time when they say bad stuff?

 

[rocketskates]

Rarely are you the first person in the game to die.

🤔🤔🤔

So if no one dies first then who is the first to die

 

[Adam_Roman]

I started getting back into Heroes of the Storm recently and it blows me away how much more toxic everyone is than even in Overwatch. I'm fairly low-level, I think I'm 16 currently, so it's pretty safe to say I don't always know how to be the best help to my team. I'll get people typing paragraphs at me telling me how shit I am and how we're gonna lose just because of me, even when I'm doing what I should. Instead of people telling me "hey come to this lane, don't focus on X or Y", they just rage. And it's the only game where I've had multiple people whisper to me after a match to tell me how much I suck, only to ignore me immediately after they type their essay.

 

[Ferr986]

Count me in on the "I'm too old for this shit" group.

 

[Pocky4Th3Win]

I use to be a big fan of competitive shooters and other online games (was huge into CS back in 1.4 days) but over the years the increase in toxity in online gaming has moved me to be more of a coop and single player gamer. Its not a recent turn but one that has been going on over time for years.

I try to play insurgency with random and often find myself just quitting after a few minutes because how just batshit annoying some people try to be.

 

[Beardz]

Instead he decided to keep relocating people across the map into treelines and stuff, one of them didn't have a TP and actually got an abandon due to inactivity since they couldn't get out(they kept controlling the courier/killing it too). Class act. For those kind of people, a report button just isn't enough

Next time disable help and tell others to do the same, that way IO can't relocate you, bane can't use nightmare on you, etc.

 

[The Bookerman]

I like playing starcraft, but i'm not that great(good enough to finish single player, but not good enough for online evidently) I played a team game. When I got squashed, my own team teammates couldn't stop bashing me. it was just not fun, even if it's a no life little turd who lives in mom's basement shit talking me.That's when I stopped playing multiplayer for A LONG time.

 

[supermarioworldE]

On the very rare occasions that I do play multiplayer games online, im either muting every player or leaving rooms filled with bigots. The days of fruitlessy arguing with these clowns while trying to enjoy myself are behind me.

 

[Red Liquorice]

Most of these types of games don't appeal to me purely from a gameplay stance, but this is probably the second reason behind that obvious big one why they don't appeal to me.

 

[VibratingDonkey]

It ruins everything.
I only play Battlefield, with chat disabled. Would do the same with any other multiplayer game. Only exception would be if communication is restricted to people I know.
Not everyone is an asshole, but there's way more than enough of them to where I'm willing to put up with it for the sake of the odd decent or helpful communication.

 

[Won]

What can the industry do to improve upon toxicity?

One of the most insane examples is the tribunal system of LoL, and even that didn't turn out too well.

At this point? Probably very little. We look at a generation of gamers that probably never learned how to engage in similar social settings outside of the internet. Developers and Publisher never really gave a crap about this stuff to begin with, always chasing the lowest common denominator.

You would need to kill matchmaking, especially "competitive" matchmaking and focus on smaller communties again instead of chasing the online community equivalent of Mega City One.

You know, good old community servers for shooters applied to other genres. Instead I have to read how matchmaking and Valve servers ruined even TF2.

 

[Eylos]

I play casualy only, I mute Everyone and play some Spotify playlist

 

[Ryuuga]

I need some clarification. What does "toxic" mean anymore? I always thought it was being disrespectful to other users through use of verbal harassment. Now I'm seeing it used for people who are ignoring team objectives or purposefully throwing. I've even seen people on my teams referred to as toxic for asking a rogue teammate to join fights. It feels like its use has been diluted over time.

 

[Besaide]

I mostly play online, multiplayer, competitive games. Its my favorite type of game. Starcraft, Warcraft , DOTA, Heroes of the Storm, Chivalry, Overwatch, Splatoon, Counterstrike, PUBG, World of Warcraft, Rocket League etc.

I don't mind the toxicity too much in these games, but I know a lot of other people do. And it does get to me sometimes, where after a few hours of playing Overwatch I'll come out of it having a negative experience. I don't leave the game happy. And its not just losing, its when your team is bickering at each other. "Our healer sucked," "Nobody swapped to Solider" etc.

One interesting thing I noticed is that role/class based mixed with team-based objectives are the worst. Mostly because everyone wants to play the game how they want to play, and in a role/class based game with team based objectives -- everyone needs to be in sync. And in random groups, its less likely that's going to happen.

In arena shooters or PUBG I don't get that feeling as much. I don't need to worry too much about what other people are doing. I'm not telling some guy what gun he should be using. In PUBG, there's so many players that you're kind of a "winner" if you didn't die within the first minute. Rarely are you the first person in the game to die. Rarely do I come out of a PUBG game raging.

Heroes of the Storm and Overwatch are some of the worst I've seen. in HOTS, the objectives are so important. It's not like in DOTA where a carry can win the game if he jungles enough, everyone must work together in the objectives. If one guy just wants to do his own thing, there's a high chance you're going to lose.

TL;DR - After playing a lot of multiplayer/competitive games I've noticed the toxicity is most prevalent in role/class based games with team based objectives.

I don't play Overwatch but I do play Paladins and my wife definitely can tell when I'm playing it. I agree with your assessment because you can't carry in these type of games. Not only must you have competent teammates you also need to choose a proper team roster which only adds to the frustration when solo queuing. I don't use voice chat, unless with friends, so it's mostly me rumbling how bad other people are and myself on occasion.

Here's an example of one of my recent matches on Paladins. Hmmm, looks like it's siege mode. I notice someone has already picked a healer so I'll go tank. I wonder what the other 3 will pick? Kinessa, Strix, and Sha Lin. All three of them being snipers. Fucking wonderful. Can't push the point otherwise me and the healer will get obliterated by their full team. Teammates are all practically in our spawn trying to snipe. Can't do much other then ride around and suicide off the edges of the map. Unable to leave the match due to deserter penalties. Nothing to do but get salty.

Another example. Playing onslaught and notice the other team has 3 healers. If everyone picks cauterize (90% healing reduction debuff at level 3) we will have a huge a advantage in fights. Only me and another person buy cauterize. Other teammates picking random stuff like mount speed and reload bonuses. Can barely kill anything thanks to enemy outhealing everything. Lose the game like a boss. Cry in sadness.

Of course the solution is to play with friends but sometimes they're not always online or enough for a full group. Have to make do with what you've got.