It’s a tale as old as time; someone gets tilted in previous matches, and then begins spewing wildly toxic epithets to new teams as the tilt continues harder and stronger. Then someone on the new team gets tilted from it, and so on it goes until your entire community becomes infamous for hate-speech and jilted players continuing to grind despite their mentality. The toxicity becomes almost like a disease, spreading from frustrated player to frustrated player until it becomes difficult for most to log in, as they remember the community members more than the gameplay.
It’s a problem that extends well past online gaming as well, encroaching on other communities around the world, from political parties to church congregations. Riot, developers of League of Legend, has famously attempted to deal with this in a myriad of ways, from changing tool-tips to a cool blue rather than red to allowing players to mute all chat. Overwatch has a fantastically toxic community that can show its head in all ranks and tiers, with members being suspended from Twitch due to their behavior, with some of those personalities even making it to broadcast talent.
Valve is the latest company to attempt to tackle the problem that could be equated to cyber-bullying, in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive.
Today we're providing tools for avoiding abusive users in-game. More in today's blog post: Squelching the Noise — https://t.co/Npt1RQGn9e
— CS2 (@CounterStrike) February 7, 2020
CS: GO already has a couple of options that ensure their players can enjoy their time in the title, from blocking other avatars (that can often feature lewd images) and names to removing voice and chat completely. While this arguably works, the removal of everything, it also removes the option to talk to anyone, toxic or not.
To that end, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive will now feature a form of auto-mute. If a player receives consistent (multiple) reports of abusive and/or toxic chat, they’ll be automatically muted for their upcoming matches. Players can opt to manually un-mute the toxic player if they wish, and the auto-mute will be removed once a player has gained enough experience, calculated from the time they were muted.
The system is driven entirely by reports, however, and relies on users to accurately and consistently report abusive players in-game for it to function properly. Being driven by other users reports, Valve hopes, will ensure that the community of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive can set their own standards when it comes to the level of banter that is appropriate.
For example, the classic ‘clutch or kick’ that is often jokingly thrown about in a jovial manner is likely not entirely toxic. Telling users to ‘kill themselves’, and other harassing statements likely is.
With great power comes great responsibility, and the power is entirely in the hands of the community. Can’t wait to see how they mess it all up.
