I'm shaking because of the amount of toxicity in this game

General Discussion
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No amount of reporting, muting, and avoiding as a teammate can mask the amount of toxicity I run into on a daily basis.

Overwatch quickly became a stress reliever for me ever since the downfall of TF2. Since then I have loved every waking minute of playing this game.

However, I think many people can agree that this community has become one of, if not the most toxic gaming community out there.

People see this as an opportunity to show that they really don’t give a care what happens to you. They don’t realize that the person they’re yelling at is another person, with feelings and emotions.

It’s gotten so bad to the point where I physically shake from the amount of anxiety everytime I see the words, “Joined the team chat”.

I simply cannot handle any sort of negative comment from anyone anymore, I’m too afraid because they really do mean it personally. They want you to die.

I can see you all typing in the replies now:

“Just mute the person”
I’ve counted, and in the past couple days, I have muted 56 people spanning over 23 games. The problem won’t go away, there’s always another person. I’ve left the voice chat and team chat.

“Avoid as teammate”
There simply aren’t enough slots to justify my need to avoid them.

“Report them and hope your team does the same”
I have reported every single person of toxicity ever since my very first game with someone losing their marbles. Since the report update, I’ve gotten less than 10 reports back letting me know actions have been taken against them.

“Stop playing competitive”
This isn’t just in competitive. This spans over quickplay, arcade, the missions, and I’m not kidding when I say custom games too.

“Take a break”
I physically need to play this game because I have no other escape from reality. I truly deeply love these characters with all my heart and can’t part with them for a while.

I know I’m weak, and beaten down.
I know whoever is reading this will probably gloss over this and say “great another basket case”.
I know some people don’t care.
I know I’m weak for letting them get to me.

TL;DR
I can’t take it anymore, no amount of prevention can soften the blow. This community is more toxic than botulinum toxins.

I’m not quitting.
This isn’t a cry for help.
This is just a lonely kid’s rant.
Please be nice to others you meet online, you don’t who that person is or what they’re going through.

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It’s… Actually not that big a problem for me. I haven’t encountered toxicity for two months now, no lie.

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Just stay positive mate! :relaxed:

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It’s not always easy for some to just shrug things off. Games are meant for enjoyment. However, those who take Overwatch to an unhealthy negative degree make it difficult for others who play the game casually :confused:

My sincerest apologies, OP. Some games just bring out the worst in people :expressionless:

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If you can, I would say to dedicate yourself to searching for a couple people you can play with whenever you’re on. Even if it’s just one person, having that one person stand up with you to the toxic people you encounter would likely help out a lot! It really sucks that this is your reality when playing and that you’ve had to stick it out for this long, but please don’t give up on this game! The amount of good people in the community have to outnumber the bad!

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This is a serious sign of addiction if you feel this way. Escapes are fine but if you feel like you physically need to play it just to escape that’s a problem. You definitely NEED a break!

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I feel for you as well. Today, it has been nothing but toxicity in almost every single qp match I have witnessed. Heck, even I am shaking as well because of it. I feel like it is a sign that I should take a break despite having so many hours put into this game. And that’s exactly what I am doing.

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I feel you.

Do yourself a favor.

Don’t join voice chat. You don’t need it. The game provides feedback on everything from the heroes themselves. “Spotted the enemy”, “behind you”, “help me”, “the payload stopped”, “they’re on the objective.” There is very little that can’t be communicated through in game voice lines/pings and what is already built into the game.

You will feel much better, and it will let you focus on playing instead of the toxicity.

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(post withdrawn by author, will be automatically deleted in 24 hours unless flagged)

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I had the same problem for a bit, the best answer I can give and how I personally dealt with it is this:

I had to step back because I knew it wasn’t the game making me feel this way. I had some stuff going on in my life that I had to deal with and the stress was getting to me, I couldn’t play the game to relax, it just didn’t work. So I stopped playing for a little while and took some deep breaths, it helped a little, but no matter how much I tried to calm myself down nothing worked. I could not feel better until that event in my life was taken care of, but I did find a way to get my mind off of it.
I really don’t care for RPGs or games like Stardew Valley, but that’s what I started playing. Stardew Valley specifically. It was a game that allowed me to relax without having any worries at all, there’s no time limit, no game overs, no losing, no winning, you just take your time and go at your own pace building up your little farm and talking to the locals.

It was just something I needed right at that moment and it helped me tremendously. Now that might not be your thing, but you say you love the characters and don’t want to part with them. Maybe try setting up an AI mode where you’re 1 versus 6 and you adjust the settings so it’s fun and challenging, or maybe play the pve missions that are up right now, and stick to normal so things don’t get too rough. There’s the comics too, you could take a break for a bit and read through all of them for a day or two.

One thing’s for sure though, being frustrated with the game’s not good. If I’m ever frustrated or angry with something that I’m supposed to have fun with and enjoy, I have to take a few moments and really think about what the problem is, and usually it’s just me letting the negativity get to me because I’ve got something else going on in my life too. Once I figure that out, I try and find a solution to it.

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Sorry for what you’re going through. It helps a lot if you play with a friend, in my opinion. You don’t need a full stack.Just 1 friend for you to chat with, laugh with, and focus your attention on makes a HUGE difference. I used to get really triggered over the QP “It’s just QP” people, but now I can just casually chat with my friend and enjoy my games

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I left voice chat almost as soon as I switched to console.

Since then 3 people have messaged me:
1 asking to switch to comms (I did)
1 telling me to kys (I just reported him and he got silenced)
1 told me that I was trash at Zen (baited him and got him to send a 2 minute audio rant on me, hilarious more than anything)

Been having tons of fun, and you don’t even need to be on comms to climb.

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hey bud, I’m a sensitive person who gets shaken up easily and I’ve only had a handful of times where I’ve just had to close out of the game because I was upset.

my best advice is to play with a friend, no matter what mode you play go in with a friend because it makes things a lot easier. the moment someone is toxic just mute them, that’s all you can really do. I know there’s a lot of toxicity but unforunately it’s not gonna go away as much as we’d like it to. you just have to take steps to protect yourself and keep yourself feeling ok.

mute every single player you come across if you have to, but I promise there’s more people out there with good hearts than those without.

there’s also playing with the AI or making your own custom game to play on your own if you don’t want to play with anyone else.

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Play with friends?
I often 6 stack in QP with friend, most of us are between average to mediocre. We don’t care, we joke, chat and enjoy ourselves while playing QP.

Remark: None of those are real life friend. Just some other OW player I collected on my friend list over time. My friend list being curated for voice chat and friendliness.

Sometimes we encounter some toxic 6 stack enemy team. Mileage vary. I usually insta mute game chat. Some of my team mate do get triggered… Yesterday we encountered such a team, left, put back against them again. I left and went custom game (as group leader, for queue dodging) after that in a crazy custom game mode. Everybody got cheered up ! :slight_smile:

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Toxicity will be the death of this game, no question.

Jelly has never seen a more toxic fanbase😂

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Mute voice/text chats forever and enjoy game?

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Thank you all for the kind words. You have no idea how big the cheesy smile was on my face.
And to those who say to just play with friends, I’m anti social and have social anxiety, I can’t make friends. I Have no friends to play with.

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The solution for social anxiety riddled people like us is just to not use voice chat with randoms. You really don’t need to have it on if you struggle with these things.

If anyone is going to abuse you in text form they usually end up embarrasing themselves, unless you are icewalling your teammates or something.

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I feel bad for you and hope you can find a solution.

One question though, what is the nature of the toxicity you are experiencing? I don’t run into anywhere near the amount of “toxicity” that you do, going by your post muting around two people per game, that is a lot, I would love to know what is causing it as from my experience with the game i can’t understand this

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Jesus Christ buddy get some help. I also find it baffling that you came from TF2 and the things that people say and do in that game would make certain overly sensitive people here [Edited by Blizzard] themselves.

Why do you allow these people power? You’re never going to meet these people. Their empty threats mean nothing. Don’t ever take what these people say to heart. Stay out voice chat. I’ve played plenty of games with little to no communication. It’s not always necessary.

Also, you should probably find other games to get interested in. Maybe more single player games. Crypt of the Necrodancer’s fun and has FANTASTIC music.

Forum Mod Edit: This post has been edited by a moderator due to masked language as it is in violation of the Code of Conduct.