Valve's forgotten game: Team Fortress 2's shocking toxicity problem By Eurogamer

[FishyUberMuffin]

What do you people think about this article?


https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/...me-team-fortress-2s-shocking-toxicity-problem

 

[Aquadango]

Is this not normal for an online game? There are always toxic people in any online game, that's a given. I think when ever you go into an online environment you have to be ready for some toxicity. I knew that so I just got thicker skin and if it really got out of hand, the mute button is a good tool.

 

[[Rx.] Christian Troy]

What can ya expect when anyone can download a game for free and act out with no real consequences. They get banned then just create another free account to do it all over again. Rinse and repeat.

It happens in the premium games but not as much because they will have to buy the game again to make another account.

 

[savvaisnotagirlolbbq]

The problem isn't the general toxicity though but instead the real harassment that goes on in high-level play. There have been high-level players like Tagg and Uberchain who have received real harassment from their own peers and from the community, the former having people corner him and touch his hour cause its "fuzzy" and the latter sexually assaulted.

This isn't just a kid screaming the N-word in a casual server, this is people getting actual harassment in real life and its becoming a concern as nobody is doing anything about it, not Valve, not b4nny who was a bystander to some conflicts in his team. You can argue that many other games has way more toxicity than TF2, but we still have a lot of toxicity in competitive TF2 that actively harms people.

Not trying to be rude or overly dramatic, but I suggest you read the article again and look up whats happening in the community because this is more than just people being assholes, its people being close to criminals.

 

[Yrr]

The general toxicity creates the environment where this harassment happens. This isn't just in competitive TF2 either this happens everywhere. It's not strictly a TF2 problem, it does happen in other games, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't be addressing it within our own communities.

I'm glad examples are being set and I hope the organisations and players who have made their stances clear continue to do so in future.

 

[savvaisnotagirlolbbq]

I'm glad examples are being set and I hope the organisations and players who have made their stances clear continue to do so in future.

b4nny hasn't spoken out about it, no big-name youtuber has spoken and neither has Valve. Some tournaments have banned the players but most of them are silent about the subject. Even though this was a large event and has evoked feelings of change within the community, the lack of support from mentioned makes me fear that this will largely go unnoticed, like the many other scandals that gone unnoticed in TF2.

I even emailed the TF2 team about the incident and asked for their thoughts, but haven't received any reply (maybe cause I'm not a recognizable person, I don't know).

 

[Yrr]

For sure, they should be held accountable for not taking any stance on this.

ETF2L, OzFortress, TFCL, RGL, Champ.GG and Marketplace.tf have all spoken out about it and changed their policies. There are big names that should speak out who haven't, but the scene is still changing, and they will hopefully become outliers.

 

[[Rx.] Christian Troy]

Earlier I forgot to mention that here is the part of the article that I don't get:

"Over the past few weeks, however, a darker side of the community has emerged. Several competitive players and community members have reported experiencing a culture of harassment and toxicity."

She mentions that the game has been out for over 10 years and just now noticed that this stuff goes on over the past few weeks and has just now emerged? Uuummm... really? This stuff has gone on for years in every aspect of this game even before competitive play was ever an option in this game. It just spilled over when that option came about and continued on.

So why all of the sudden people are now wanting to take action when so many others have been wanting to do so for years? Don't get me wrong in asking that. As an owner of servers for this game I am glad people are finally trying to get Valves attention. However, why did our cries fall on deaf ears for 10 years?

 

[FishyUberMuffin]

b4nny hasn't spoken out about it, no big-name youtuber has spoken and neither has Valve. Some tournaments have banned the players but most of them are silent about the subject. Even though this was a large event and has evoked feelings of change within the community, the lack of support from mentioned makes me fear that this will largely go unnoticed, like the many other scandals that gone unnoticed in TF2.

I even emailed the TF2 team about the incident and asked for their thoughts, but haven't received any reply (maybe cause I'm not a recognizable person, I don't know).

well, of course, no big-name players will speak out about this, if they did then Valve would have to do something about it and ban most of the player base, the competitive folks, the high tours who think they are gods, and pub stompers. If the top players spoke out then they would not be able to pub stomp everyone. And the most thing that kills a game for a high skill player is not to be somewhat of an ass while pub stomping. If Valve wants to fix this they need to have a system where they can ONLY read in-game voice chat and typing chat to see if players are harassing others and generally being toxic. When the system finds a string of words that form a harassing message then that player would get banned for the day, their items will be held up until the ban is over if they do it a third time when they are blocked from playing TF2. If valve wants to take further measures they could put a fine on harassment. For example, you will play 1,000 for the first charge of harassment in the game. If they keep getting new accounts the fine will keep going up by a 1,000 dollars.

 

[Diva Dan]

There’s a lot wrong with your solution

1) Cash bailouts only protect the rich and don’t serve to execute actual justice

2) Someone’s items being held wont stop them from being a douchebag when they are still able to play the game and interact with the community through steam

3) Developing an AI to look for a string of offensive words is nearly impossible, and focusing on automatic solutions is pointless if manual measures aren’t even being taken for the people we know are harassers and abusers

4) This has nothing to do with pub stompers and comp players, only the behaviors of the community surrounding them

 

[Diva Dan]

Is this not normal for an online game? There are always toxic people in any online game, that's a given. I think when ever you go into an online environment you have to be ready for some toxicity. I knew that so I just got thicker skin and if it really got out of hand, the mute button is a good tool.

You clearly didn’t read more than two sentences of the article

 

[Viemärirotta]

...If Valve wants to fix this they need to have a system where they can ONLY read in-game voice chat and typing chat to see if players are harassing others and generally being toxic. When the system finds a string of words that form a harassing message then that player would get banned for the day, their items will be held up until the ban is over if they do it a third time when they are blocked from playing TF2.

This already exists in Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege in the form of primitive word filters, which led to partial outrage for a reason. I don't accept harassment, but the system ignores context completely and focuses only on common slurs. They can be used for harassing sure, but it's a M rated game. Now what arises with this is the same as what you thought for TF2, barely anyone actually toxic will be banned by the automated system, only manual moderating works on a case to case basis. The majority of banned people are people who typoed or was baited by a plentitude of bait phrases that emerged. Not to even mention someone was banned for saying he was paki (pakistani) after responding to a normal question of "what are your nationalities".

A better approach would be a moderate one where saying blacklisted words would flag for Valve inspection of the offense, if it's paired by reports in the matches with possible offenses.

It's a dilemma since anything said can be offensive to one person and nothing to the other. Context matters.

 

[FishyUberMuffin]

This already exists in Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege in the form of primitive word filters, which led to partial outrage for a reason. I don't accept harassment, but the system ignores context completely and focuses only on common slurs. They can be used for harassing sure, but it's a M rated game. Now what arises with this is the same as what you thought for TF2, barely anyone actually toxic will be banned by the automated system, only manual moderating works on a case to case basis. The majority of banned people are people who typoed or was baited by a plentitude of bait phrases that emerged. Not to even mention someone was banned for saying he was paki (pakistani) after responding to a normal question of "what are your nationalities".

A better approach would be a moderate one where saying blacklisted words would flag for Valve inspection of the offense, if it's paired by reports in the matches with possible offenses.

It's a dilemma since anything said can be offensive to one person and nothing to the other. Context matters.

But if the moderators could do the banning, it would not be efferent enough due to they having personal feeling. They can just overlook someone case just because they got bribed or being they are friends. If an automated system it cannot be controlled in an away that someone can bribe them.

 

[FishyUberMuffin]

You clearly didn’t read more than two sentences of the article

Whenever I played in the servers with you, you were being toxic to other players, you kept saying that you where better then them, they suck, and others.

 

[Crash]

Whenever I played in the servers with you, you were being toxic to other players, you kept saying that you where better then them, they suck, and others.

This is not the Diva Dan I know, perhaps you were projecting your insecurities over losing, or maybe Dan was joking around playfully with friends?

Either way, I know it's been awhile but you're still not allowed to make threads about being mad because you lose. Please don't turn this into one of those. Also, you're entirely missing the point of the article you linked in the OP, it's not about general smack talking in game.

 

[Viemärirotta]

But if the moderators could do the banning, it would not be efferent enough due to they having personal feeling. They can just overlook someone case just because they got bribed or being they are friends. If an automated system it cannot be controlled in an away that someone can bribe them.

If the moderators aren't doing their job properly, they shouldn't be in that position in the first place due to corruption. It's as obvious as it can get.

The reason automated systems dishing out bans based on merely something it detected as inside the blacklist is horrible, since it takes zero consideration on the context and direction of the word in question, sure it bars you from saying something by banning your account, but the real purpose gets lost since it does bat shit to the actual problem.

 

[FishyUberMuffin]

This is not the Diva Dan I know, perhaps you were projecting your insecurities over losing, or maybe Dan was joking around playfully with friends?

Either way, I know it's been awhile but you're still not allowed to make threads about being mad because you lose. Please don't turn this into one of those. Also, you're entirely missing the point of the article you linked in the OP, it's not about general smack talking in game.

well, it's because that you were not there so he was being toxic to other players. When I got into the server I heard him over the mic saying that stuff that I said before I got onto a team, so it was not because I was losing. It's still not right to act toxic to other people even if one of the players are his friends. The other people will see that he is just being toxic for being toxic. So that is not great for him to see as toxic. I had this same situation last night. I was playing MvM with 3 of my friends. One of my friends has brought two of his friends to join. Both of them very extremely rude because they where joking, pushing sentry busters into other players, and calling everyone stupid. Those two people have made the game ( mission) sour for the rest of the group. That what happened with Diva Dan, just because he was joking around with his friends it still can sour the game for other players because they will see him as a toxic player.

 

[FishyUberMuffin]

If the moderators aren't doing their job properly, they shouldn't be in that position in the first place due to corruption. It's as obvious as it can get.

The reason automated systems dishing out bans based on merely something it detected as inside the blacklist is horrible, since it takes zero consideration on the context and direction of the word in question, sure it bars you from saying something by banning your account, but the real purpose gets lost since it does bat shit to the actual problem.

If the moderator is good friends if the boss then he can just keep the moderator on staff, that will defeat the solution of the problem. The automated can just get the past history of the game chat and or voice chat to figure out what the context is.

 

[Viemärirotta]

well, it's because that you were not there so he was being toxic to other players. When I got into the server I heard him over the mic saying that stuff that I said before I got onto a team, so it was not because I was losing. It's still not right to act toxic to other people even if one of the players are his friends. The other people will see that he is just being toxic for being toxic. So that is not great for him to see as toxic. I had this same situation last night. I was playing MvM with 3 of my friends. One of my friends has brought two of his friends to join. Both of them very extremely rude because they where joking, pushing sentry busters into other players, and calling everyone stupid. Those two people have made the game ( mission) sour for the rest of the group. That what happened with Diva Dan, just because he was joking around with his friends it still can sour the game for other players because they will see him as a toxic player.

Really starting to feel we're slowly drifting off-topic to something we've been through before.

I can understand you might perceive something Dan could have said as toxic. If you feel like his speech was inappropriate or toxic, you could confront him about it and shed light why you feel his behavior made you feel sour. An alternative of course would be to mute him, if that's what you desire. It shouldn't be a life changer to consider just blatantly muting them if you don't want to hear it.

If the moderator is good friends if the boss then he can just keep the moderator on staff, that will defeat the solution of the problem. The automated can just get the past history of the game chat and or voice chat to figure out what the context is.

I really doubt Valve is going to invest into a self-learning system, which would still be very prone to false positives without tons and tons of material to develop upon.

 

[LeSwordfish]

well, it's because that you were not there so he was being toxic to other players. When I got into the server I heard him over the mic saying that stuff that I said before I got onto a team, so it was not because I was losing. It's still not right to act toxic to other people even if one of the players are his friends. The other people will see that he is just being toxic for being toxic. So that is not great for him to see as toxic. I had this same situation last night. I was playing MvM with 3 of my friends. One of my friends has brought two of his friends to join. Both of them very extremely rude because they where joking, pushing sentry busters into other players, and calling everyone stupid. Those two people have made the game ( mission) sour for the rest of the group. That what happened with Diva Dan, just because he was joking around with his friends it still can sour the game for other players because they will see him as a toxic player.

you are aware that this whole controversy is not even a little bit about pubstomping, yes?