So dear reader, when was the last time you were on Live? Now, when was the last time you were on Live and did not encounter some form of asshat? However long ago it was, it was definitely too recent, and word is starting to really get around. In an article at Gamasutra, Fulton, a Microsoft employee who worked on Shadowrun, writes that: "the online behavior of our customers is dramatically reducing our sales."
And that's just the beginning of an excellent four page article on social design and the future of online gaming with regard to social interaction. The assertion that Live is generally filled with annoying idiots has been widely held among the more hardcore gaming community since the inception of the service, but this is the first that we've ever heard anything out of Microsoft about it affecting them in any manner. In the article Fulton posits that we know and love games so we're willing to work around it or put up with it, but for newcomers to the medium, the fun/annoyance ratio could just be too high. Readers, what do you think?
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 8)
4-03-2008 @ 8:16PM
h0munkulus said...
what's the problem? set your privacy settings that you only hear and talk to friends and the problem is solved. i mean honestly there is like never any game related or even tactical talk in the voice chat of any public games...
Reply
4-03-2008 @ 8:16PM
Dark Morford said...
Yet another example of John Gabriel's "Greater Internet F**kwad Theory."
Reply
4-03-2008 @ 11:06PM
DBoyFlex said...
Agreed. I never talk strat to anybody but friends anyways. In the past I have always had voice through the headset so my daughter doesn't hear 13 year olds constantly dropping racial slurrs and every 'bad' four letter word. Now with the better privacy settings it is not a problem. No longer do I need to mute everybody individually, now I can do it once and never worry about it again. As for dropping in sales, I would attribute that to a crappy game rather than the online community itself. Also, the gamer zone should have more of a bearing on the content of the matches themselves. If you are in underground, say whatever and disable the bad language feedback, but in family zone, enforce the feedback. For that to work though they would have to match players up from the same zone and that might not always work too well. I always play with people in different zones.
4-03-2008 @ 11:14PM
emirabal said...
I would agree with taht but the best games i have played are with people who use the mics and work together using the voice chat, you can find me playing gears all the time. And the asshats are there, i just leave the game if it gets to bad.
4-04-2008 @ 6:28AM
Jon said...
I think that defeats the point of socializing... How the hell are you going to meet people if you are ignoring everyone. Half the people on my friends list I've met playing a game, but I haven't added anyone to my list in nearly a year.
4-04-2008 @ 8:57AM
SugarDaddy said...
Um, that IS the problem. You shouldn't have to set it so that only your friends can hear it.
Anyway, this whole thing kinda stems from the fact that society is filled with a bunch of assholes anyway. I mean, Americans elected George Bush TWICE!
4-04-2008 @ 1:15AM
Wickedneoq said...
Agreed. But in the case of some games, I don't think it could be helped. First Person Shooters especially. And maybe to a degree online sports games.
4-03-2008 @ 8:17PM
L4MB said...
Yeah, when i use my mic mute is my best friend. most times i just leave it on the couch beside me. i use it for tactics, but when i get told to stfu for trying to help my team, it's just not worth it.
Reply
4-03-2008 @ 8:17PM
mike said...
also, I agree with Magic Whiskey that it isn't just live these days...
Reply
4-03-2008 @ 8:17PM
H3G HADES said...
I think trash-talking is part of the game. Thats what makes xbox live so fun. However, it is limited to people who go to far with racial slurs and such. But overall, i think gamers should just suck it up and deal with it. How could microsoft possibly enforce such nonsense... If they did, they would raise xbox live prices.
Reply
4-03-2008 @ 8:19PM
aaron said...
i think it would be pretty easy to fix.... have a simple thumbs up/down icon next to each person in the xbox guide and when enough people object to a person they are either removed from the service or you could do something like they recently did with the cheaters and create a new group for them and let games filter to no include that group.
that way all the idiots can play together. communities are always better when they are self moderated because no amount of moderation will be able to successfully manage that many people.
Reply
4-04-2008 @ 10:41AM
Cal said...
A system like that would be abused though, just like rep. For example, before playing Gears of War ranked for about 2 months with friends (and muting the whole other team) my rep was in the high 80%s positive, but afterwards my rep had fell to nearly a 50/50 split, and it was a similar story for my friend.
4-03-2008 @ 8:20PM
manicbomber said...
Competition drives trash talk, negative behavior, and people's self-worth is going to be threatened and they are going to react.
You can't rely on the reporting system, because it's horribly flawed (why can you report me for "trash talk" when it's in the description for the zone I picked?).
Why are we talking about PS3? Talk to us again when PS3 gets half as many people online as Xbox Live.
Competition and the environment it causes isn't even remotely exclusive to Xbox Live (see: soccer). I'm hoping for Midtown Madness 4 - great social game that promoted fun and casual conversation.
Reply
4-03-2008 @ 8:24PM
bonzai said...
they should make it where you can only talk to your team. There's no reason to talk to the other team and it would reduce the horrid online behavior. While people still go off on teammates, it is far less it happens then people going off on someone of the opposite team.
Reply
4-04-2008 @ 12:15AM
Etchasketchist said...
Most games I play are already set up like that. You can maybe hear the other team in a pre-game lobby, but usually when you're actually playing, you can only hear your own teammates. And when your own teammates are complete douchebags, it totally ruins the game. I don't want to be on a douchbag's team. I don't want to try hard to win to help a douchbag. It sucks all the fun out of playing.
4-03-2008 @ 8:24PM
Grant said...
It's a good point, the amount of racism circulating on LIVE is astonishing, and ridiculous. At times it seems as though the younger generations are reverting back to the days of slavery with the way they insult African Americans. All though most of this comes from those players in the south...gee, isn't that a shock. The annoyance factor of XBOX LIVE far out-weighs the fun factor. I find myself simply not talking most of the time because a vast majority of people get on LIVE with the intention of starting an argument. With that reporting them does nothing; I have met a great many players that actually take pride in their 100% avoidance record. It's sad that so many people are so stupid.
Reply
4-03-2008 @ 8:27PM
AoE said...
Honestly, I don't love multiplayer gaming enough to put up with the asshats. I play online with friends primarily, or occasionally i'll play a game online at extremely late/early hours in the hopes of finding mostly European/Japanese players (who tend to be a good deal more enjoyable to play with than many of my fellow American brethren)... but then only games that I know don't share much audience with Halo.
If it's a game shooter fanboys love, I stay the hell away from the online play... it's just not worth it (and I suppose this means MS is right, I buy fewer shooters since I don't ever play them online)
Reply
4-03-2008 @ 8:27PM
nanonyous said...
I think, as I've suggested numerous times (in other places), that games should come with voice filtering functionality that detects the potential age of the speaker, and appropriately blocks them against a setting on the listener's side.
If it's legitimately simply someone that sounds like a 12yold with something up their bum, the listener can add an exception, if they want.
In addition, a function that throttles the amount a person can talk in an hour, using the headset, could be implemented - again, exceptions for listeners can be set up so legitimate 'friends' don't get automatically muted.
Reply
4-03-2008 @ 8:29PM
Halwende said...
I use the "reputation" function to vote-down trash-talkers. I do it all the time, I don't believe it's "part of the game" or the "online / community experience" at all - it's a game, not a general sandbox for your opinion on other's skin colour / country / skill etc
If the people who abuse the voice service had more users vote them down they might stop and take notice when they log in one day and find they only have 1 gold star on their reputation...
Reply
4-03-2008 @ 8:47PM
manicbomber said...
except it is a part of the service and it's even in the description for the zone "underground".