'Overwatch' developers are finding it "hard" to battle "toxicity on the internet".
Overwatch screenshot
The developers behind the team-based multiplayer online first-person shooter video game have been working tirelessly to punish players who spread negativity throughout the game, but they have now admitted it's difficult to strike the right balance as a minority of players will report others for bad behaviour, simply for beating them in a game.
When asked how they deal with the players who report things falsely, 'Overwatch' principal designer Scott Mercer said: "Yeah, that's what we have to be careful about it. That's why I would to love be like, 'Oh yeah, we're going fix that problem immediately.' But it's not like that; it's going to be an ongoing process. It's something we work on over time, continue to make adjustments to it. I'd love to be able to say that we a have a silver bullet to get rid of toxicity on the internet, but that's kind of hard. So, what we are working on is making steady improvements. And making sure that players know and understand we're making these."
And Scott insists the team at Blizzard Entertainment are doing their best to tackle the negativity, and have started rewarding players who use the report system appropriately.
Speaking to GameSpot.com, he said: "One of the big things we've been working on is providing better feedback for players. We have a pilot program right now where if you report someone and it ends up resulting in an action, we send an email back to the person saying, 'Thank you for the report. You did some good.' Pretty soon we're actually going to get that inside the client. It's not even an email, it's something that when log in, you get, 'Hey, remember you sent in that report? Good job!' It's like you're part of the solution. The big reason for that is reporting players and giving accurate reports when a bad thing happens, whatever it might be, is the best way for them to help make the community better."