Originally posted by Goatgod76

This is why people want to remain anonymous on the internet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4l1_8wefR7c

Good thing I'm in a Stand Your Ground State. :)

Originally posted by Rusque

It's anonymity. If there's anything I think will improve people's online behavior is when a Real ID is finally enacted. Not just by one company, but a legal online official identity (like youre online drivers license). Then when someone decides to be a jerk for no reason or say something completely out of line, then they have to face consequences such as job loss, public humiliation and so on.

As long as people are anonymous, they'll behave terribly.

Works both ways. Careful what you wish for.

---

Originally posted by Rusque
It's anonymity. If there's anything I think will improve people's online behavior is when a Real ID is finally enacted. Not just by one company, but a legal online official identity (like youre online drivers license). Then when someone decides to be a jerk for no reason or say something completely out of line, then they have to face consequences such as job loss, public humiliation and so on.

As long as people are anonymous, they'll behave terribly.

---

Originally posted by LadyEuphei

So, there has been a large amount of talk about the gaming community being toxic. It is fine and well to dwell in the negative, but how can we fix it? We are all smart people here, so lets put our brains together and maybe we can accomplish something. What do you think we can do?

Example 1:

I know as a female gamer I have seen several "support" groups/communities for female gamers open up over the years. They emphasize girl gamers being normal players and deserve the same respect of any male gamer. Do you think a anti-being-an-a-hat community would work to fix our problem? 

Example 2:

League of legends has started banning pro gamers that are toxic to show that they will not take it and that it is not ok on any level of skill. They have also implemented the honor system to try and make people think about the positive and not only the negative (reporting). I personally think it has worked wonders on the community and given it a fighting chance at maybe recovering from its a-hat infection.

...

How do you think we can fix the gaming community?

I dont think that will work. Thge only way to make a better community is to reward people for working together instead of rewarding them for ninjalooting and to put more focus on the group than the individual.

And to get rid of the need and greed mechanics and instead just give the players the reward also helps a lot.

Originally posted by Quirhid

Originally posted by Bladestrom
You start simply by rewarding positive behaviour and not rewarding negative behaviour. A really basic example is resource nodes in a game. Games that enforce and implicitly reward negative behaviour alloys you to selfishly tag a node, games that allow sharing promote positive behaviour, do just that. Same in a community, you can't just punish, you have to positively reinforce as well. We do it with our kids, why would we not do the same with our peers.

You really should've seen when they tried that in League of Legends. I think the only way to prevent the community to devolve into a cesspool is to make the game as "socially light" as possible. Don't force people to endure one another any more than they want to.

That is why a "solo" option is so popular in MMOs. Not everyone wants to suffer others at all times.

And i found people are too annal about "bad behavior". So what if some gamers are using bad words, or call you names. Just click "ignore". It is just words. If you are offended by some unknown dude on the internet, you need a thicker skin.

Originally posted by LadyEuphei

Well yes, I understand that. The point is that we have heard the negative. I am looking for a solution. What can we as a community come up with to fix this problem. I am think some kind of a anti-a**-hat community or maybe a gamer approved community or something where if you are a a** hat you get reported and taken off the list or something. I do not know guys that is why I though together we could come up with something great!

The problem is, there isn't a solution.  In any competitive community, you are going to have tons of Type A personality types who are basically bags of free-floating hostility.  Those are the kinds of people drawn to MMOs, the people who desperately want to compete and be #1.  The only way to change it is to stop MMOs from being competitive, in other words, to stop having MMOs at all, or at the very least, have developers make games that don't appeal to 80% of their audience.

Not going to happen.

Originally posted by NorseGod

Originally posted by Goatgod76

This is why people want to remain anonymous on the internet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4l1_8wefR7c

Good thing I'm in a Stand Your Ground State. :)

And damn good thing George III didn't have access to Facebook records.

Originally posted by Icewhite

Originally posted by NorseGod

Originally posted by Goatgod76

This is why people want to remain anonymous on the internet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4l1_8wefR7c

Good thing I'm in a Stand Your Ground State. :)

And damn good thing George III didn't have access to Facebook records.

I agree. I'm thinking the "Boston Twitter Party" wouldn't have the same impact.

Originally posted by Cephus404

Originally posted by LadyEuphei

Well yes, I understand that. The point is that we have heard the negative. I am looking for a solution. What can we as a community come up with to fix this problem. I am think some kind of a anti-a**-hat community or maybe a gamer approved community or something where if you are a a** hat you get reported and taken off the list or something. I do not know guys that is why I though together we could come up with something great!

The problem is, there isn't a solution.  In any competitive community, you are going to have tons of Type A personality types who are basically bags of free-floating hostility.  Those are the kinds of people drawn to MMOs, the people who desperately want to compete and be #1.  The only way to change it is to stop MMOs from being competitive, in other words, to stop having MMOs at all, or at the very least, have developers make games that don't appeal to 80% of their audience.

Not going to happen.

Naw, one thing A type personalities understand is brute force, send active, agressive moderators after them and ban mercilessly and at the very least you can drive them out of the game.

Question is, do developers really not want to take their money?  These days the answer seems to be no.   In years gone by more did, but not so true today.

Originally posted by Kyleran

Originally posted by Cephus404

Originally posted by LadyEuphei

Well yes, I understand that. The point is that we have heard the negative. I am looking for a solution. What can we as a community come up with to fix this problem. I am think some kind of a anti-a**-hat community or maybe a gamer approved community or something where if you are a a** hat you get reported and taken off the list or something. I do not know guys that is why I though together we could come up with something great!

The problem is, there isn't a solution.  In any competitive community, you are going to have tons of Type A personality types who are basically bags of free-floating hostility.  Those are the kinds of people drawn to MMOs, the people who desperately want to compete and be #1.  The only way to change it is to stop MMOs from being competitive, in other words, to stop having MMOs at all, or at the very least, have developers make games that don't appeal to 80% of their audience.

Not going to happen.

Naw, one thing A type personalities understand is brute force, send active, agressive moderators after them and ban mercilessly and at the very least you can drive them out of the game.

Question is, do developers really not want to take their money?  These days the answer seems to be no.   In years gone by more did, but not so true today.

 

That all depends on how the perception management goes.  If they become convinced that they might lose enough money, they might "discover" some new found commitment to actively dealing with the problem.  The trick would be in how that perception comes about.

O.P. great question. Two important elements would improve the community of a game:

1. No FTP
2. Content where soloing is the exception, not the rule.

I like the scoring idea. Here's an idea. When player joins a group; time stamp it and take note of the group members. When player leaves group, permanently record the duration and group members. Then metrics can be provided. For example, if a player has a lot of long duration groups with a variety of players then you can probably assume he/she is not too much of an IDB.

Originally posted by Wraithone

 

That all depends on how the perception management goes.  If they become convinced that they might lose enough money, they might "discover" some new found commitment to actively dealing with the problem.  The trick would be in how that perception comes about.

Why would they even think that? Look at the most popular games? WOW, LOL, WOT .. none is famous for its good 'community'.

In fact, i doubt most people even care. They may rant a bit .. but if the game is good, and you can find fun people to play with, it is not too much to put some less likable souls on ignore.

Originally posted by Bladestrom
And when you can't regularly find good people to play with (beyond your closed circle of in game friends) your stuck in a horrible community - fail for a multi player game.

"closed"

"horrible"

These are assumptions on your part. The first is false for most, as the average person belongs to multiple social circles. The second is subjective and seems it exists solely to try to support the first.

Hmm, how do you fix that which is by it's very nature unfixable?

Yes games that require group play, rather than solo play generally have fewer childish behavior problems. Yet there are still people in those games behaving poorly. Cliques form naturally and will continue to do so regardless of what artificial boundaries are placed within a game. So people will play with the same group for a long period of time and form a clique. They will be less likely to join a group that does not have at least some of the people from their clique in it. This is only natural human behavior.

Will removing the anonomity of the internet solve the issue of poor behavior? NO! If you want proof of this, everyone has had a job where someone there was always telling inappropriate jokes, wearing inappropriate clothing, failing to wash properly, etc. Did everyone knowing who that person was solve the issue? No, all it did was (unless it was the boss) get the person fired. And that person went on to their next job and repeated their poor behavior. Sometimes, eventually that person learns to modify their bahavior; sometimes not. This is why banning only rarely solves behavior issues in games.

The core of this issue is: we want an environment in which we are comfortable and can have fun. The problem is: as we are all unique individuals we each have different comfort zones and ideas of what is fun.

The saying is as old as the internt: "Don't feed the trolls". And it remains true. Ignore them and they go away; give them the attention they crave and they only create more drama. As far as games go: open world pvp games encourage trollish behavior. Some games are better than others at policeing this than others, but in the end the trolls still are there. Therefore I avoid any game that is open world pvp. I have never had good experiences in an open world pvp game, f2p or p2p.

Finally, there are just as many people with behavior issues in paid games and "free" games. How many trolls and a** hats there are is entrirely dependant on the level of policeing done by the publisher, and the swiftness and severity of punishments handed out. A slap on the wrist does nothing towards correcting poor behavior, IRL or in games.

Humanity hasn't grownup yet, the Age of Aquarious is not upon us. Thus the only way to really resolve this is by ignoring the people you don't like and reporting severe behavior issues. Sorry, it can't really be fixed until we all growup.

Originally posted by Arclan

O.P. great question. Two important elements would improve the community of a game:

1. No FTP
2. Content where soloing is the exception, not the rule.

I like the scoring idea. Here's an idea. When player joins a group; time stamp it and take note of the group members. When player leaves group, permanently record the duration and group members. Then metrics can be provided. For example, if a player has a lot of long duration groups with a variety of players then you can probably assume he/she is not too much of an IDB.

Agreed and maybe this makes me evil but I can see another exploit to this. Sit in a group with your firends and afk and now you are a great member! 

FTP is an issue in a way. I love FTP but I agree with no lose of money people dont care if they troll. No one talks about how they lost their totally free RoM account on here and I doubt anyone will.

Originally posted by ariasaitcho

Hmm, how do you fix that which is by it's very nature unfixable?

Yes games that require group play, rather than solo play generally have fewer childish behavior problems. Yet there are still people in those games behaving poorly. Cliques form naturally and will continue to do so regardless of what artificial boundaries are placed within a game. So people will play with the same group for a long period of time and form a clique. They will be less likely to join a group that does not have at least some of the people from their clique in it. This is only natural human behavior.

Will removing the anonomity of the internet solve the issue of poor behavior? NO! If you want proof of this, everyone has had a job where someone there was always telling inappropriate jokes, wearing inappropriate clothing, failing to wash properly, etc. Did everyone knowing who that person was solve the issue? No, all it did was (unless it was the boss) get the person fired. And that person went on to their next job and repeated their poor behavior. Sometimes, eventually that person learns to modify their bahavior; sometimes not. This is why banning only rarely solves behavior issues in games.

The core of this issue is: we want an environment in which we are comfortable and can have fun. The problem is: as we are all unique individuals we each have different comfort zones and ideas of what is fun.

The saying is as old as the internt: "Don't feed the trolls". And it remains true. Ignore them and they go away; give them the attention they crave and they only create more drama. As far as games go: open world pvp games encourage trollish behavior. Some games are better than others at policeing this than others, but in the end the trolls still are there. Therefore I avoid any game that is open world pvp. I have never had good experiences in an open world pvp game, f2p or p2p.

Finally, there are just as many people with behavior issues in paid games and "free" games. How many trolls and a** hats there are is entrirely dependant on the level of policeing done by the publisher, and the swiftness and severity of punishments handed out. A slap on the wrist does nothing towards correcting poor behavior, IRL or in games.

 

Humanity hasn't grownup yet, the Age of Aquarious is not upon us. Thus the only way to really resolve this is by ignoring the people you don't like and reporting severe behavior issues. Sorry, it can't really be fixed until we all growup.

I really think this was a well thought out post. I know it is cliche and has been saide a million times but, 'do not feed the tolls' is the best phrase to solve everything. Being a girl gamer, that has some parts of her that are a bit...bigger... than others makes me a huge target. What you have to realive is when you give them credit for pissing you off they get all hapy and then when you stop feeding them they private message you unitl they stop and then they just die off. It is not a point of F2P or P2P it is just the community at a whole needs to lok in on itself and assess it's values!

Those who want change conveniently forget the avenues they already have open to them. You can use a filter channel and ignore command. You can report harassment.

And all that I agree with, harassment and so on is just not acceptable and should be punished.

But this is not enough, not only must people be punished for what you do not like, they must think like you. This sort of social engineering, where you want to get the Thought Police onto anyone who does not agree with you is the standard method political correctness uses to twist society into the image it wants it to be regardless of reality.

You are not advocating the Thought Police you say? What do you think an honour system is? Social pressure like that is an insidious way of getting people to think what you want them to think. Pat them on the back when they have been good boys and girls like Pavlov’s dogs.

“We get blamed for alot of violence and problems. Maybe it is true since our community is so mean, racist, sexist, and generally evil (except for a few)”

Gamers get blamed by the media for a lot of things, does that mean it is true? If that is really your opinion of our community might I suggest you stay away from it? We are not that bad, just don’t expect us all to think exactly like you do and you will find us very welcoming.

I don’t want LadyEuphei to reveal her age on these forums, but I would suggest you are very young and have like we all did an extremely idealistic view on life. 21 to 25? Yes you are very young, even though you might think you have seen it all by your early twenties. :D

Originally posted by LadyEuphei

How do you think we can fix the gaming community?

Invent a time-machine and go back to the 90's, that's the only way.