Voice chat. We all know and enjoy it inside of H1Z1, because it allows you to communicate quickly not just to teammates, but other players in-game, without needing an outside service. As we’ve seen over the life of the game, having in-game voice chat can be both outstanding and lead to some entertaining moments, but it can also lead to some unwanted toxicity among individuals and groups. We also understand that games of skill will often bring about some creative trash-talking which is accepted in most cases, but some individuals have been pushing that a bit too far, leading to a vastly toxic playing experience.
We recently rolled out a new system that will help keep voice chat a more positive experience for the community. With this new system, if a player is reported regarding their in-game voice activity, and we find it to be an infraction of our Player Guidelines (more on this below), a penalty may occur. If the player receives a penalty with this new system, we’ll begin removing their usage of the in-game voice chat, across all modes. We’ve already been testing the system out quietly and seen good results. Aside from that unlucky handful found during the testing phase, all players start with a clean voice chat record.
As mentioned above, standard trash-talking is acceptable, but some have been pushing those boundaries a little too far lately in the following areas. These are some examples that we’ll be paying most attention towards in reports:
- Death / Suicide Threats – This includes “kill yourself” in a negative manner
- Racism / Sexism / Discrimination
- Threats of Detailed Violence / Rape / Sexual Assault
Above all, we understand that dealing with reports and language as a whole is a mostly subjective process, and everyone has their own differences of opinion. Our goal is to introduce some objective elements towards making voice chat a more positive experience in game. Every single report, whether from in-game or via emailing [email protected] with evidence, is reviewed by a member of our staff and we trust their judgment based upon the Player Guidelines, leading towards fair outcomes. We take every player report seriously and have continued adding more methods for reporting players throughout our lifecycle. It should be noted that if you and a friend are joking around, and your friend reports you, we will consider that a valid report and potentially take action.
If an account receives a voice suspension, it will be accompanied by at least a 1-day suspension from the game to serve as a cooling off period. Voice suspension timelines will range from a week all the way up to permanent, depending on severity, number of reports / previous infractions, and other factors.
We hope that all of you will join us in this endeavor to make voice communication a better place for 2018 and beyond, and start to develop a much better environment for all H1Z1 players, or as has become commonplace, “Eyyy GG!”