WARNING: SENSITIVE SUBJECT MATTER. PROCEED WITH CAUTION!
Okay, this discussion REALLY should have happened by now. Trying to talk about this subject has been like stepping into a minefield, but then again, we can't ignore it forever.
This topic has been one of the hardest for me to talk about. There's been incident after incident that's made me want to go on here and at least make a statement, but each time I've concluded that I'm really not here to just jump head-first into the fray if outrage is all I've got. If me and my friends don't have anything productive to say or any ideas to shed on an issue, it's better that we wait until we do. Plenty of other people will yell and scream about what's wrong with this game, but just pure outrage, no matter how justified, doesn't lead to a solution. So here we go
We live in a strange time. I don't think our community was really built to handle the kind of growth we've been seeing over the last 10+ years, and it's given way to some incredibly selfish behavior by the community. There's unnecessary trolling, abandoning people in Team Up!, and several other matters that need to be addressed, because my friends and I are in a firm agreement that this misconduct is absolutely going to negatively impact this game as a whole if we don't fix it.
Guys, you have to stop this selfish behavior. Your actions are driving people away from the game. If you get the chance, look up a friend of mine on Twitter and ask her why she's stopped questing at Level 105. A combination of being mocked and threatened every time she went to ask for help with bosses, dungeons, etc. ended up being the final straw for her, and she ended up dropping this game that she's loved and played for almost a decade. Ask her how this happened, and just try to imagine this girls love for the game be CRUSHED out of her. Watch something that was great in her life be turned into something hurtful.
I've heard countless arguments about this entire fiasco. They include:
"Nothing is forcing us to help anyone." Yeah, but even still, you'd expect SOMEBODY to do the humane thing and lend a hand to someone in need. You wouldn't want everybody abandoning you, and throwing death threats at your back as your walking away!
"This is just how Wizard101 is. How it's always been." Really? As I seem to recall, there was once a point in time where people would have GLADLY helped someone whose struggling. Apparently, that isn't the game we're playing anymore, and trying to deny it is pure arrogance.
"Why should we help someone without asking for a pack or energy elixir in return?" This one especially makes me angry, and it really makes me thing KingsIsle made a mistake by adding in the option to gift stuff to people, because it's led to people demanding fees in the form of packs or elixirs to secure their aid with dungeons and boss fights. If you keep this up guys, KI may just decide to shut this nonsense down by removing the gifting feature. It may make them money, but it won't matter if it ends up driving paying players away! The developers lose MORE money in the long run!
Likewise, I've heard various justifications for these people's actions, including the threats and trolling. They include:
"It's just boys being boys." That's no excuse. Raise your kids better, or restrict their chat options, if this is what they're doing to someone they've never met. But this nonsense really isn't just young boys wresting with their own problems or trying to find their place in the world. I don't have access to them, but I'm willing to bet that %80 of Wizard101's chat log data will reveal that these are grown men who should know better. That's how it was with XBox Live for the longest time, and that platform is often the most referenced one whenever harassment in the gaming medium pops up ( even to this day ).
"It's just part of the game. Wizard wouldn't be Wizard without it." That is the argument of cowards and trolls. This sort of behavior is not what I would call "US" as a community. This is not the behavior of the average player. This is the work of a small, but very unfortunately vocal minority out to ruin someone else's gaming experience.
Often times, these discussions simply dissolve into how distasteful this behavior is. We all know it's out there, and we all know it's the absolute WORST part of our community, but we can't just leave it off there. We have to fix this.
I heard from a lot of Wizard fans over the last few months, especially after my friend quit playing, asking how we can fix this harassment and selfish behavior, and saying how even though they stood up to these bullies, they felt it just wasn't enough.
First off: THANKS FOR STANDING UP. It's an uncomfortable thing to do, but it absolutely is the first step to fixing this mess. And you know what, your right. There is more that can be done about this. But it's going to take all of us; Developers and players alike; To do it.
It's clear that the solution to this fiasco has to be something simple and effective. Something we can do TODAY. It has to be flexible as well, in case the need ever arises to put it into Pirate101 as well. And it's effectiveness has to be assured. The solutions I came up with here aren't ones I came up with on my own.
Many of my friends, including one, a former moderator for Toontown Online and currently applying to be an administrator at Mojang to help them with their new moderation efforts for Minecraft, were all instrumental in shaping these ideas. After discussions with them and several others who work in moderation at various companies, including Microsoft, Google, and various Japanese game development studios, here's the solutions we've come up with:
1. What's the first thing we do when we hear someone spitting out negative comments towards us or harassing others? We hit the "IGNORE" button. Well, I'm fairly certain this game already takes metrics on how often a player is ignored. We can use those metrics to prevent harassment. If someone is being ignored, say, %20 above what's considered normal, simply start them as "Auto-Ignored". It wouldn't prevent them from talking, and it wouldn't prevent those who WANT to hear them from un-ignoring them, but it would take away their megaphone, and prevent them from easily degrading those around them.
It would also attach a stigma to bad behavior. As soon as you jump into the game, and you see that someone is auto-ignored, you have an idea of what to expect from them.
2. Another option: What if things like text chat have to be EARNED, rather than immediately given to everyone who creates an account? If you had to, say, reach Level 20 and/or play the game on one Wizard for at least 7 days, it would prevent people from easily creating a new account whenever they find themselves unable to send out their hate speech, bully others, or in general cause trouble in the community.
Sadly, both these options will inevitably have an effect on the vast majority of people who are using this game to do something incredible or friendly, simply to limit the power of those who aren't, which is something we should avoid if at all possible, but it IS an option if it proves to be necessary.
Those two options simply target bad behavior achieved via chatting, but this one targets bad behavior by abandoned teams in Team Up! or ditching your teammates in a fight.
3. Add in some kind of penalty for people who troll others by joining them for dungeons and boss fights, then jump ship and leave them at some point, simply because they wanted too. This kind of behavior is difficult to moderate and fight, but there has to be SOMETHING to at least discourage the practice. Personally, I think removing the guilty party's ability to use Team Up! functions for a week or so would be a good idea, since it restricts THEIR ability to use it to find teams to farm the endgame bosses with, forcing them to use the regular sigil or wait out their "Banned from Team Up!" time.
However we choose to tackle this problem, it can't be denied that this sort of despicable behavior ruins the gaming experience for EVERYBODY; Not just those these people target directly. And sometimes we need that made clear.
These are simple ideas. Things we can do right now with the tech we have available. So ask KingsIsle if they're willing to do this for us, because I believe they'll do it. Yes, they're slow sometimes, but they're not evil. And they gotta want this change, too.
Month after month, whenever I go somewhere and talk about this game, I hear people saying how they've quit playing it because the environment is that hostile. We can't let this continue. It's not good for us as a community, and KingsIsle has to understand it's not good for them as a business, because every player that gets driven away from this game, it's as if these bullies are stealing that money right out of KingsIsle's wallet.
What about you guys? How would you go about handling the selfishness and the harassment in our community? What features would you implement to combat this issue? I'd love to hear your thoughts down below.
