Valorant devs finally heed the call for stricter sanctions for verbally abusive players after multiple female streamers went viral from toxic experiences.
Studio Head of Valorant, Anna Donlon, announces major steps in banning in an attempt to curb toxic player behavior. Bans may now reach hardware bans for multiple offenses of negative attitude.
The culture of first-person shooter games predates Valorant. From the earliest days of the first Counter-Strike to newer battle royale titles, the trash–talking and brash culture has long been tolerated by the community and its developers and considered “normal.”
But the increasingly diverse Valorant community wants to put a stop to the “misogynistic” culture of first-person shooter games, especially after clips from Twitch streamer Taylor Morgan circulated around social media and reached Riot Games officials.
Donlon initially replied to the post, saying that the dev team has always been keen on working on behavior tools but admits that it has “room to improve.” In the replies, the Studio Head further clarifies that hardware bans have long been in consideration for sanctions over negative behavior.
The steps in the upcoming ban update include exerting more effort on manual reviews. Many players were delighted to hear increased effort for manual ban reviews, as most automated bans only consider blacklisted chat messages over party voice comms.
On the same day after the ban announcement, another Twitch Valorant streamer received in-game verbal abuse through party voice comms. This further solidified the need for more strenuous efforts to curb negative player behavior.
Riot Games calls for players who have been gravely threatened and harassed in the game to submit a player support ticket for manual reviews.