Boards›[ARCHIVED] Miscellaneous

Sometimes I Hate Loving This Game

Xonra··1 votes·262 views
  • Warning

Semi-Rant and honesty ahead. Feel free to reply, but just be warned what you are walking into reading.

  • Warning

There are times (like this entire summer so far) I know I shouldn't play and there are times when I just want to stop playing ranked, but I really do enjoy this game. I really really do.

What I don't love or enjoy are the people in this game more often than not, which is saddening to say.

I've met some great people in and on this game, made a few good friends even, and not everyone is bad, but while the majority might not be Riot's definition of "toxic", the majority of this community is pretty terrible, especially right now.

It is depressing to love playing a game so much, but not wanting to play it because of the other people that tend to crop up there as well. Same thing happened to Eve Online over time, where the people just turned into assholes. Not gameplay wise, but I mean actual crazies. A large majority of the community in that game has since left.

I'm afraid this great game, that I truly do love, and wish the best for, is going to eventually get bogged down with angry teenagers, and as bad, if not worse, angry 25+ year olds acting as bad as the teenagers, and the good people left, will eventually quit altogether, leaving only the ragers and trolls.

6 Comments

Serevas1 votes

I think when any game is free to play you run that risk and how a company takes steps to deal with it is what determines the eventual fate of the game. Riot is doing a decent job, but I think they could do better. I know that Jagex of Runescape had a very effective way to take care of those kind of people, but it's not an equivalent game to compare the methods to. Keep in mind I've not played legit Runescape in easily 6 or 7 years so I don't know how it is now.

Xonra1 votes

{quoted}

I think when any game is free to play you run that risk and how a company takes steps to deal with it is what determines the eventual fate of the game. Riot is doing a decent job, but I think they could do better. I know that Jagex of Runescape had a very effective way to take care of those kind of people, but it's not an equivalent game to compare the methods to. Keep in mind I've not played legit Runescape in easily 6 or 7 years so I don't know how it is now.

It isn't only free games though. I mentioned Eve Online for example, and it was and still isn't free, but the community is terrible now, and hasn't always been. The company running it just doesn't seem to care as much, and slowly but surely the lowest common denominator took over and their playerbase numbers have been dropping heavily over the past 2 years at least.

I understand your point though, but it isn't just free to play games, though that does factor in with the amount of people playing.

Serevas1 votes

I actually know very little about Eve Online, for some reason I always assumed it was F2P.

My main point though is that the company behind the game needs to let it be known that kind of behavior is intolerable, and needs to take steps towards fixing it, I get that it's not easy, and that it's a process. I frankly feel that Riot needs to step down on the behavior a little more harshly than they have been already, but don't get me wrong, they have been making strides in the correct direction.

Xonra1 votes

{quoted}

I actually know very little about Eve Online, for some reason I always assumed it was F2P.

My main point though is that the company behind the game needs to let it be known that kind of behavior is intolerable, and needs to take steps towards fixing it, I get that it's not easy, and that it's a process. I frankly feel that Riot needs to step down on the behavior a little more harshly than they have been already, but don't get me wrong, they have been making strides in the correct direction.

As I've learned over the years, Riot has a hard time committing or stepping towards anything that is definitive.

They are so scared to step on anyone's toes, even the people being jerks, because they don't want to lose money.

For the longest time they refused to even fully talk about Ranked Teambuilder outside of "no" because they didn't want to force people to play a certain meta, despite they are sort of working on it now.

They have this very narrow, and over the top definition of what toxic is, as far as out right death threats, but seem barely phased by the ridiculousness that tends to come out of some people's mouths, since they know they will get away with it.

Riot seems much like that parent that doesn't like what you are saying and doing as you are cursing them out, but won't do anything about it because they want to be everyone's buddy.

Serevas1 votes

I get that quite a bit, and frankly that comes down to the F2P playerbase again. F2P players who can come and go as they please, tend to be very flakey. Numerous games fail because their F2P playerbase comes and goes as they please, and sometimes doesn't come back for months on end, if at all. As soon as something new and shiny comes along they move on.

So it makes a lot of sense to me that Riot would make baby steps towards it because you risk alienating a lot of people if you're too stringent. Not to mention the internet is a very different place now than when Runescape was first a giant powerhouse on the F2P market. It's harder to draw the line at what's downright unacceptable because as a whole, people have developed much thicker skins the more they've been exposed to this, that, and the other thing.

So it is difficult to find the proper way to punish, especially under the automated system they have now. Do you hit a guy with a chat restriction who vented frustration a single time then apologized later, but he was obviously toxic, not the telling people to commit suicide kind of toxic, but you could easy say that his behavior negatively impacted a group of people. Do you assign a numerical value to how many times people swear in chat? Do you only pick on specific swearing, or do you hit all of them?

In order to actually get a proper level of discipline handed out, you need a lot of dedicated people to go through the cases, and actually go through them, not that vote without viewing bs that happened with the tribunal, but the cases need to actually progress through, not punishments levied after 4 months or something like happened before.

It's why I'm satisfied with the steps that Riot is at least attempting to take, because there are improvements being made in the community, to be honest it's been a while since I've had to deal with any sort of "toxic behavior" in game.

Xonra1 votes

{quoted}

I get that quite a bit, and frankly that comes down to the F2P playerbase again. F2P players who can come and go as they please, tend to be very flakey. Numerous games fail because their F2P playerbase comes and goes as they please, and sometimes doesn't come back for months on end, if at all. As soon as something new and shiny comes along they move on.

So it makes a lot of sense to me that Riot would make baby steps towards it because you risk alienating a lot of people if you're too stringent. Not to mention the internet is a very different place now than when Runescape was first a giant powerhouse on the F2P market. It's harder to draw the line at what's downright unacceptable because as a whole, people have developed much thicker skins the more they've been exposed to this, that, and the other thing.

So it is difficult to find the proper way to punish, especially under the automated system they have now. Do you hit a guy with a chat restriction who vented frustration a single time then apologized later, but he was obviously toxic, not the telling people to commit suicide kind of toxic, but you could easy say that his behavior negatively impacted a group of people. Do you assign a numerical value to how many times people swear in chat? Do you only pick on specific swearing, or do you hit all of them?

In order to actually get a proper level of discipline handed out, you need a lot of dedicated people to go through the cases, and actually go through them, not that vote without viewing bs that happened with the tribunal, but the cases need to actually progress through, not punishments levied after 4 months or something like happened before.

It's why I'm satisfied with the steps that Riot is at least attempting to take, because there are improvements being made in the community, to be honest it's been a while since I've had to deal with any sort of "toxic behavior" in game.

Riot is way past needing to take baby steps though.

They are a big boy company, with the biggest online game, if not the most played in general computer game in the entire world.

They aren't some random company coming out with a moba, they have been around for 5 years as far as being popular. They are only hurting themselves today taking baby steps, where I could see it 3-4 years ago. The problem is those baby steps they took years ago look like even smaller steps today, because they haven't gotten any better at decision making.

They are slow to make decisions, and slower to implement them.

The issues are far from new, they are just more obvious today, and the same no steps, or super slow steps, continue to be taken (or not taken).

More from [ARCHIVED] Miscellaneous

Open Letter to Parents of League of Legends Players
[ARCHIVED] Miscellaneous860 comments
2,611
votes
Rewards for positive play
[ARCHIVED] Miscellaneous19,712 comments
1,337
votes
I don't like Boards
[ARCHIVED] Miscellaneous324 comments
809
votes
STOP ALLOWING LEVEL 1 ACCOUNTS TO SEND FRIEND REQUESTS!!!
[ARCHIVED] Miscellaneous291 comments
679
votes
Wanting to do something special for an awesome friend. Riot, please help? <3
[ARCHIVED] Miscellaneous220 comments
614
votes
People that are telling others to kill themselves has to stop! Please help me get this noticed!
[ARCHIVED] Miscellaneous605 comments
600
votes

More by Xonra

Graham McNeill Joining Riot Narrative Staff (Big Deal)
Story, Art, & Sound118 comments
120
votes
"Ranked is about skill and not at all a coinflip"
Gameplay155 comments
119
votes
"Every Game Is Winnable"
[ARCHIVED] Miscellaneous131 comments
91
votes
Urf, sadly proving what I knew about this community
[ARCHIVED] Miscellaneous133 comments
67
votes
Becoming Embarrassed To Be A Part Of This Community
[ARCHIVED] Miscellaneous106 comments
55
votes
This Name Change Is Garbage, and The Reason I Have To Change My Name Is Even Worse
General Discussion12 comments
53
votes