Blizzard bans 250,000 Overwatch 2 cheaters, says its AI that analyses voice chat is warning naughty players and can often ‘correct negative behaviour immediately’::Overwatch 2 has not been having a good time of it in 2023. May brought the unwelcome news that Blizzard’s original plans for the game’s post-launch support were being changed, mainly the pro
Damn that’s like 120% of the active playerbase
There were 250,000 “people” still playing overwatch 2?
According to steam charts, it averages about 26,000 players per day on steam, not that many but I imagine across all platforms it probably has 250,000 players that play semi regularly. Granted by those assumptions they just banned the whole player base
Any game that monitors voice chats is a hell no
Why though? What expectation of privacy do you have for a moderated public platform? Why is this substantially different than ingame chat logs? How could they moderate voice chat otherwise?
In the context of online games specifically, harrasment over voice chat is an enormous problem, and it drives players away from VC (decreasing their ability to communicate with a team in a team game), or drives players away from the game entirely.
If it works even just /decently/ well and has a functional appeal process, this is an unqualified win. We need to start filtering out the harassment endemic to the broader gaming community.
How long until information from our conversations is recorded and sold to data firms that will in turn use it to sell to us, or hacked and personal conversations exposed.
Its not black and white.
Here’s a thought experiment: since streets are public places, would you be willing to wear a lapel mic every time you leave your house that records everything you say in public and gives access to every megacorporation and government?
Does that make you feel kind of weird? Well this is the same situation. Just because its a public place, doesn’t mean things can’t still feel invasive.
Sorry to point this out, but comparing a game chat in which you agree to a strict TOS governing your behaviors and permitted monitoring is not the same as comparing speech a person can freely engage in on the street. The former very much IS literally spelled out in black and white— the latter is far more left to interpretation by several layers of legal entities and enforcement.
I’m not trying to be contrarian; these issues are simply more complex than you’re making them out to be.
Eg: if being monitored in public, there are several laws which both allow and disallow how, when, and by what means, many of which also allow an individual means to disengage. VC in a game is voluntary participation in a private space.
Then you don’t understand the scope or nature of the problem trying to be solved.
Agreed to a point. I think the ideal system would be to locally store voice chats. If you report someone on your team for being toxic, then they’re sent over for review but made anonymous (like “Blue Player 1” and “Red Player 3” instead of “xXxGunKiller69xXx” and “Purple Dream Flute”). If whatever system used to review the chats (preferably humans, but it’ll probably be AI) determines that there was an actionable offense, the match identifier is pulled up and then and only then individual player names get seen so actions can be taken, otherwise it’s fully deleted.
That’s about the best system I can think of to balance privacy with the banning of toxic players. You could use this same system for text interactions as well. While I would love for 100% of my data in mp games to be private, it isn’t possible to do that and not be surrounded by toxic assholes 24/7 afaik. And I’m personally fine giving up a bit of privacy if it means not being surrounded by assholes every match.
Now, the big issue is that gaming companies just want to record everything you say to sell it off for data collection, but that’s more to do with the fact that capitalism encourages companies to have 0 ethics
It seems safe to assume that you are not overly respectful to your teammates in voice chat.
Has nothing to do with that. It’s invasive and I object you that on principle. I don’t have any alexa/siri/Google shit in my house either.
Meanwhile they won’t ban obvious StarCraft 2 cheaters. There’s a guy on the ladder that admits to it, anyone can look at his history and see that he doesn’t ever get a loss, just ties. And he maphacks on top of this.
Big-Blizzard is watching you!
