What are game companies doing in 2022 to curb bullying?

[Frozone212]

Are there any cases from this year where bullies were punished in game?

Did you witness it? What was the aftermath

[Leonard Smith]

I really have no issues with any bullying when playing online.  No worries from me.

[H454]

Short answer: Nothing, because it's not a real problem.

 

Companies have been the ones doing the bulling for the better part of a decade.

Say a naughty phrase - your gone forever.

Are they doing anything about people playing the victim and swatting people? No.

Is it the any companies job to police anything?  Also No.

They should and most do, get a report from someone, get evidence of abuse and make banning judgement of from that.

The problem is when they don't follow their own rules.

Like when a crazy person is harassing another person and making threats of violence, that will get ignored by favoritism.

Weather the favoritism is personal or because of shared politics, its wrong and inappropriate.

 

[Leonard Smith]

18 minutes ago, H454 said:

Short answer: Nothing, because it's not a real problem.

 

Companies have been the ones doing the bulling for the better part of a decade.

Say a naughty phrase - your gone forever.

Are they doing anything about people playing the victim and swatting people? No.

Is it the any companies job to police anything?  Also No.

They should and most do, get a report from someone, get evidence of abuse and make banning judgement of from that.

The problem is when they don't follow their own rules.

Like when a crazy person is harassing another person and making threats of violence, that will get ignored by favoritism.

Weather the favoritism is personal or because of shared politics, its wrong and inappropriate.

 

Excellent response!

Couldn't have said it better myself.

 

If you're being bullied online, you can solve the issue yourself.

There's no need to stir up unnecessary outrage or drama....there's enough of that caused by media companies and bored people in general these days.

[youxia]

6 hours ago, Leonard Smith said:

If you're being bullied online, you can solve the issue yourself.

This is nonsensical. How are you supposed to "solve it yourself"? Your options are either to eat it up, respond in kind, or disconnect - and none of these is a good solution.

 

To put it simple, if you think that saying  "naughty phrases"  - and we all know these are not as cute and innocent as that description suggests - is okay, then you are a part of the problem. People who behave like assholes online and ruin the experience for others should be banned without a question, and trying to build a thinly veiled SJW strawman here in regard to that is not an answer.

[zzip]

4 hours ago, youxia said:

This is nonsensical. How are you supposed to "solve it yourself"? Your options are either to eat it up, respond in kind, or disconnect - and none of these is a good solution.

Mute / block the offending person.   If the game doesn't provide these tools then demand that they do.

 

4 hours ago, youxia said:

To put it simple, if you think that saying  "naughty phrases"  - and we all know these are not as cute and innocent as that description suggests - is okay, then you are a part of the problem. People who behave like assholes online and ruin the experience for others should be banned without a question, and trying to build a thinly veiled SJW strawman here in regard to that is not an answer.

Here's the problem: what is considered naughty/offensive/inappropriate varies greatly from culture to culture.  Even from subculture to subculture.   It's virtually impossible to police all possible offensives, and if you tried,  you create an uncomfortable environment where people feel like they are walking on eggshells because anything they say could be construed as offensive by someone else.   But what almost always ends up happening is favoritism.   A chosen group's sensibilities are enforced, everyone else can pound sand and that creates resentment.

 

Now if it's egregious-  threats of actual violence.   Persistent harassment especially if the target has made it clear they want them to stop.   Then yes that type of person is a problem and a ban is warranted.

 

But the problem is some people have rather creative definitions of bullying and harassment.   We just watched the Depp/Heard trial and we seen the lengths people will go to to smear another person while portray themselves to be virtuous, even when they are the bigger bully themselves.  This kind of thing is very common online.  And it's very easy for them to whip up an online mob of people to go after anyone they deemed 'a problem'.   They know what buttons to push to get their way.

 

I've seen too many people banned for saying relatively minor things while actual bullies get away with all kinds of shit because they are very manipulative.

 

Companies don't enforce the rules fairly.   I don't even think companies are capable of enforcing the rules fairly.   That's why I think block/mute buttons are the best solution in most cases except for the egregious stuff where a ban is warranted.

[Leonard Smith]

You solve it yourself like you would in real life.   I'm not saying it's ok, but that's how life is.  
  
This sort of thing exists in all facets of life (business, sports, etc) and will only get worse since we seem to encourage strong, confident, arrogant personalities.

Solutions
Stop playing the game. 
Stand up for yourself / don't take things so personally
Grow a thicker skin.

Block or ignore the user
 

What difference would Nintendo punishing a user make in relation to solutions that you could implement yourself.
There are more important things in life. 

Just block the user or don't make yourself out to be such a target in the first place.    

 

[Razzie.P]

3 hours ago, Leonard Smith said:

don't make yourself out to be such a target in the first place.    

 

 

[Frozone212]

ok, let me be clear:

Have any in game admins stepped in to stop a case of bullying that went too far?

Likewise, what game companies are punishing the aggressor (I.E denial of service, blankent bans, Blacklist from events etc)

It doesn't have to be a big company

[Leonard Smith]

1 hour ago, Frozone212 said:

ok, let me be clear:

Have any in game admins stepped in to stop a case of bullying that went too far?

Likewise, what game companies are punishing the aggressor (I.E denial of service, blankent bans, Blacklist from events etc)

It doesn't have to be a big company

Are you writing a research paper or something?

 

[Frozone212]

No, the reason is because, if I go online, I expect to be heard and helped if it happens.

[Reaperman]

first post comes off in probably an unintended way which invites a degree negativity.

 

I haven't seen any this year, since I've only played one online game, and being on a nintendo, it removes all social expression outside of choosing which sweater to wear.   that's one option, I guess.

 

The tools for correcting social interactions are well known--the same as in this forum. Mods/reports for guideline violations, personal ignores for 'they were mean' moments, leaving unblockable social interactions to, I dunno, teabags and other mildly offensive use of wave/dance emotes. Thing is, mods in both games and forums have their own set of priorities, which often align with the community as a whole over some rando who isn't fitting in--and whichever side of the complaint that statement applies to is how it gets judged. 

 

I find griefing to be a much bigger problem than any bullying via chat or whatever.  Social interactions are often a degree removed from gameplay, but griefing uses often completely allowable gameplay mechanisms to ruin the day of others. Because of that, it's much harder to ignore or let slide. MMORPGS tend to construct convoluted mechanisms to push back (by hours or days) the interaction between tutorial-users, and the mid-level griefers surely waiting just outside whatever starting area. Space games tend to just let it happen. I can't say I enjoy either genre online, since I don't have time for that.  Either to be griefed upon, or protected from 'the real game' by an arbitrary number of hours/missions.

Edited June 19, 2022 by Reaperman

[Tanooki]

On 6/16/2022 at 10:57 PM, Frozone212 said:

No, the reason is because, if I go online, I expect to be heard and helped if it happens.

Then you're expecting far too much.

 

Companies aren't going to defend you short of them as they log stuff getting a recorded death threat, evidence of doxxing, or something else heavy enough if someone went to the media they'd look like bastards for ignoring.  Otherwise, they don't care.  Usually as a couple other well thanked/liked posts in here, they spelled it out.  They don't care, they give the minimal tools for you to handle your own space, and often enough you get a mass of enough regulars that tend to feed their coffers more from users/coining extra purchases and they'll be favored in an argument that isn't cut and dry which basically is shadow legitimized bullying.

 

If you can't accept that reality, don't play.

 

I largely will not do online play, if I do, usually it has been historically something where I don't have to see text and have a mute button from mouthy turds.  Usually I have gotten into something like Guild Wars and its sequel until my friend I played with died.  They let you visually delete any losers comments from view and can block an account from contact or joining your party.  They also if you report stuff, they'll look into it, but because that's an open threat people tend to be not douchebags on that service ncsoft had setup like 15 years ago or so now.  It was relatively fun, you might get a stalker troll here and there who will seek out causing trouble, but it's not the norm either so I did that for years.

 

Maybe multiplayer since the contact is there isn't for you, maybe games are more of an escape like movies, toys were as a kid with imagination, books, whatever...something to escape annoying stuff, sucky assholes, and the rest -- a relaxing quiet space to get away from reality for awhile and maybe it should stay that way.  Nothing wrong with gaming being an escape, but going online to multiplayer you'll largely come across the more awful elements of society on there since those pussies can hide behind a keyboard, gamepad, and a microphone so the gloves come off because they're safe to be sucky assholes because someone bigger can't break their nose with a fist through an internet connection.

[CapitanClassic]

[King_Salamon]

I have had issues in the past with what I will call vidiots online.  I don't play a lot of online games.. but when I did it was Destiny 1 and 2 over the years and more recently it was Fallout 76.  Yes I've played others but I never got into the multiplayer aspects much.  I prefer playing as a single player when possible.

 

In Destiny, you would get your typical kids screaming and acting like children.  Easy enough is to mute them.  When playing PVP you get good and bad players and the turnover happens quite a bit.  If you are having a rough go and encounter a lot of bad apples... yes it can happen... then all I do is go play some of the PVE missions.  Find someone trying to pester you there, just go to orbit and find a different mission to tackle.  

 

With Fallout 76, I tend to encounter a lot of people who want to work together to accomplish things and thats cool.  Once in a while there will be someone taunting you but the game has restrictions in place that won't cause you much grief unless you respond to their attack.  Overall, I just go wander about the wasteland.  lol

 

Other games, like sports, I tend to play offline.  Once in a while I will play online to see how good the community has become and it's amazing.  I'm not a good gamer in terms of skill.  I play to have fun.

 

I guess ultimately, it comes down to having fun.  If you aren't having fun. Make a change.  Find a different game... or a different activity.

 

As for what game companies need to do... they provide a playground for you to play in.  Look at it like taking your kids to the park... do you supervise them there?  Perhaps you need to do so when they are online at home.  Do you trust your kids to be good while unsupervised at the park or out playing with their friends?  Then the same should apply when being online.  "Make good choices" is what they should be taught.  There are extreme cases that companies can get involved and get police etc involved but for typical 'bullying'... that behaviour shouldn't be tolerated but the player being bullied has many avenues to take... going to the game company and complaining shouldn't be anywhere near the first.

 

I guess I have to revert to the FUN factor of gaming.  Play... have fun... when it isn't fun anymore... stop playing and do something else.  The only people who need to take gaming seriously are the developers who work hard to make these worlds for everyone to experience.

[zzip]

17 hours ago, King_Salamon said:

I have had issues in the past with what I will call vidiots online.  I don't play a lot of online games.. but when I did it was Destiny 1 and 2 over the years and more recently it was Fallout 76.  Yes I've played others but I never got into the multiplayer aspects much.  I prefer playing as a single player when possible.

I found it varies very much by game.   Violent games are probably going to attract the most aggressive, trash-talking type of players.

 

Other more relaxing type online games don't attract as many of those people and you might find the online chat is actually respectful and cooperative.  The players are there to complete the mission and not grief other players.

[jhd]

On 6/16/2022 at 11:57 PM, Frozone212 said:

No, the reason is because, if I go online, I expect to be heard and helped if it happens.

 

Much like dealing with unpleasant people and situations in real life, there is always the option of just not playing online games. I, for one, choose not to do so as it is just not the type of activity that I enjoy. As an adult, I can choose what activities I do (or do not) participate in. 

 

Over the years I have encountered a handful of individuals whose company I did not particularly like. Simply avoiding all contact with them was a very effective strategy. 

 

 

[Flojomojo]

I don't play online much, but when I do, I don't use a microphone or headset. Text chat is enough for me, and it's easy enough to mute/kick idiots/scammers/racists/screamers 

 

I don't like to talk on the phone, so why would I want to hear strangers in my ear like some kind of 1950s party line? 

[digdugnate]

23 hours ago, Flojomojo said:

I don't play online much, but when I do, I don't use a microphone or headset. Text chat is enough for me, and it's easy enough to mute/kick idiots/scammers/racists/screamers 

 

I don't like to talk on the phone, so why would I want to hear strangers in my ear like some kind of 1950s party line? 

EXACTLY.  If I'm playing that has online components (Destiny, Halo, etc), I don't use a headset at all and you can mute people easy enough.  

 

I never did a lot of PvP in WoW, just mostly PvE stuff, but I'd imagine it'd be the same way.  The days of the South Park Sword of Truth troll are long over for this guy.

[Mikebloke]

It used to be so much better when people just teabagged over your dead body while they wait for the round to end. 

 

I feel like my limited amount of modern online play isn't too bad, I have never encountered stupid screamers or offensive people, though I do know they exist. I've seen enough videos of when female gamers get bullshit as well, but again never experienced seeing it myself. 

[MrBeefy]

I will say that is one nice thing about playing online with my Switch vs Xbox. Don't have to worry about muting anyone because there's basically zero access and need too.