Sportsmanship in Games

[CatmanStu]

Possibly a subject that I have no right commenting on as my sum total online experience is year or so of WoW, but I am going to work on the assumption (right or wrong) that that is a gauge for the average online community mindset.
In my experience you have two types of people who played online games: One is the person who enjoyes the genre (FPS, RPG), enjoys the escapism that a well crafted experience offers and wants to share that experience with other like minded people. Some will be there purely for the challenge, some for the experience and some for both, but they will be looking to share that with others; the good and the bad.
The other type is the insecure person who uses gaming achievement to compensate for percieved real world inadequecies. These people don't really enjoy the games they play because they play them for the wrong reasons. If one of these beats you they feel they are a superior person for it but if you beat them they feel you have diminished or insulted them, their reaction will be appropriately similar to someone who feels they have been publically slandered.

TLR

Some people are decent, some people are insecure fuck-weasels; that's the way it's always been and the way it always will be.

 

[I.Muir]

Not being within arms reach makes bad people do bad things
If you are a dick on the internet your a dick everywhere it's just you hide it when they are in a position to do anything about it
Being a dick can actually help you win while playing online cause people raging don't play as well as they would otherwise

Being a person with a right to live however I use two rules
Don't be a dick
There's no requirement to shake their hands just don't be a dick to them and everybody gets to have fun
If you can't win, don't play
Unless you're one of those people that genuinely doesn't care this saves you from a lot of grief if you just quit whilst your ahead

 

[Shrapenel92]

I think this simply comes down to a lack of maturity. Games that have a larger player base, and games that have a higher percentage of younger players (due to marketing, or simply because a larger player base is more all-encompassing), tend to hold a larger number of immature players. When I was younger I would trash talk my opponents and such, but as I got older I realized that I'm not bringing anything to the game, I'm just detracting from someone else's experience - and since we were all there to have fun, what's the point?
But I think OP is correct, there needs to be more sportsmanship in games, and the example set by the professionals is not always good. If professional regular sports players behaved in such a nonchalant towards their opponents then fans and other professionals would have something to say about it, I don't see why gaming and e-sports should be any different.
It all comes down to my previous point that we all game to have fun, and we have no right to prevent someone else from doing that, as you can have fun gaming without behaving like an ass.

 

[Epidemiix]

You all have very interesting points here, and I agree that a larger a community gets that more of the dicks do seem to show through. Another idea that was pointed out was that the people that are jerk/have poor sportsmanship are the small minority but are either vocal or the ones that you remember. To be honest in my experience, I can remember the times that I had a fun time with people that were not being jerks. The number or jerks that I have seemed to face just seemed to be the norm. (Coming from me playing Dota, LoL, HoN......)

(Ok I failed at the quote thing because I am sleepy, so I will be doing this!)

"I find that SC2 is pretty good in terms of sportsmanship. Terms like GG and GLHF are standard"

Right and they could be. You can easily type those things out and not really mean them. Some/most people (I hope) but I have seen numerous times where GG was just used to say that the game was over. Plus from what I have seen the times that I do not get GLHF outnumber the times that I do. (From my time playing Starcraft)

"bad sportsmanship offline? was it wrong of me to call that Banshee in ME3 ************? did I hurt her feelings?"

(Yes you should feel bad, that Banshee was trying just as hard as you were!)

"...but the simple truth is that sportsmanlike behavior requires something remotely resembling a sport."

These both also brings me to another point that was made in the original post, of the bad sportsmanship that many teams seem to have in Lan tournaments also. Some (not all!) of the people playing in those games are usually rude and trash talk to the other player/players. I would consider the team work that is done in these kind of games to be "sport"-like.

TL;DR If you were playing chess, and where the person took your king he smacked it off the board and yelled GG, would that make you fell that he is unsportsmanlike? (Unfair analogy I know, but its kind of funny to think about. )

 

[shootthebandit]

partying the day before the game

i often play games after a night of partying in fact what a better time to play when your hungover and lying around all day anyway. this is the reason your arguement is flawed gaming is not and will never be a sport therefore SPORTSmanship need not apply.

however it does annoy me when you get abuse online from people but just remember they are hiding being the shield of being anonymous. also what annoys me is people who accuse you of cheating for using a weapon/class that the game lets you use, honestly one man army and grenade launcher on MW2 is not cheating its ''artillery support''. all i can say is dont hate the player hate the game

 

[Lethos]

In Dark Souls it's considered the norm to use the bow animation before a duel. Kinda like a "I'm ready, good luck to you."

 

[The Wykydtron]

On the GG point i'm reminded of the one TotalBiscuit StarCraft 2 game on his stream where the guy was spamming only invisible aircraft (i don't know shit about SC XP) and TB was absolutely raging over how it was stupid that he was losing to such random bullshit.

He GG'd then left. So in SC2 at least GG is code for "fuck it, i'm surrendering" not actually good game.

At least in LoL people say BG, it's funny when one guy says BG because he died a few times while every single other person just GGs. Like "well you can be a douchebag, we're going to be nice!"

LoL isn't that bad really, you just get the one dick who yells "4V1!!!!!" when he gets ganked, sorry, it's a team game. Did you forget? And the guy who blames his team for not saving him when he runs into the whole enemy team on his own.

Oh and let's not forget the guys who have winning stratagems like 3 top 1 mid 1 bot. Save that stuff for ranked/full team stuff guys. Inflicting stratagies we couldn't possibly know on randoms is just dumb.

Yeah my Katarina vs their Morgana at mid... Fuckin' genius man.

And then there's UMVC3 and fighting games in general. Fuck taunt buttons man. One of the main reasons I like Skullgirls so much is that the characters take up a win pose as soon as the game ends and there is no taunt button, thank god.

Yes, taunting at the end when you come back from a guy who taunted at you when you were losing is hilariously salt inducing. He underestimated Vergil XD But overall the amount of people who just hit the taunt button after every single win is just annoying.

Still, looks like the higher level people grow out of that stuff pretty quickly.

 

[The Wykydtron]

In Dark Souls it's considered the norm to use the bow animation before a duel. Kinda like a "I'm reading, good luck to you."

When did you last play Dark Souls? I'm sure most of the people I was invading just 3v1'd my ass then did than infuriating "COME AT ME BRO!" gesture. Yeah people still bow occasionally but it's not quite the norm now... /sadface

I still like to wave... Wave at the New Game Plus guy invading my level 5, start gear character in Undead Parish then quit to Dashboard. Fuck you sir!

 

[Guffe]

You want a good look at a really unsportmanshippy group fo players? Play a few games of League of Legends, seriously! I love the game and play it but the fucking people, might be that I always have ba dluck but I always go with gg after a game, and always small letters, doesn't matter if I win or lose. I play for fun!

 

[Epidemiix]

i often play games after a night of partying in fact what a better time to play when your hungover and lying around all day anyway. this is the reason your arguement is flawed gaming is not and will never be a sport therefore SPORTSmanship need not apply.

Point 1: I wasn't talking about just normally "partying" than playing a few games, that wasn't what I was talking about. (sorry if it seemed that way I will be clearer next time!) I was using that as an example of unsportsmanlike or rude conduct that was shown by a team in a Lan tournament. To use the example that I am thinking of is in the Dota 2 international last year with the 1,000,000 dollar prize pool. The team that won it said that they saw all the other teams play, knew that they were better, trolled around during all of their games, and then on the night before the final game to win the prize, party because "they already knew that they had won it". To me, that kind of conduct just sickens me.

Point 2: I don't think that sportsmanship should just involve sports even if it has the name in it. This can say it better than I ever could: "Sportsmanship is an aspiration or ethos that a sport or activity will be enjoyed for its own sake, with proper consideration for fairness, ethics, respect, and a sense of fellowship with one's competitors." It doesn't need to be a sport in order for a person to at least show a little respect towards other players.

Point 3: I consider chess a sport somehow) why not video games? They involve teamwork, communication, and a set skill. Video games fall under that!

 

[Lethos]

In Dark Souls it's considered the norm to use the bow animation before a duel. Kinda like a "I'm reading, good luck to you."

When did you last play Dark Souls? I'm sure most of the people I was invading just 3v1'd my ass then did than infuriating "COME AT ME BRO!" gesture. Yeah people still bow occasionally but it's not quite the norm now... /sadface

I still like to wave... Wave at the New Game Plus guy invading my level 5, start gear character in Undead Parish then quit to Dashboard. Fuck you sir!

Oh yeah red invaders never do it. Go to the forest though, it's a safe haven for polite dueling.

 

[Epidemiix]

You want a good look at a really unsportmanshippy group fo players? Play a few games of League of Legends, seriously! I love the game and play it but the fucking people, might be that I always have ba dluck but I always go with gg after a game, and always small letters, doesn't matter if I win or lose. I play for fun!

League of Leagues always being one of the examples that I can say that I have seen the jerks outnumber the people that are not. Moba games in general have more jerks than anything... (yay! more generalizations!)

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Well see the problem with gamers online is we do have people that genuinely want to have fun and do learn some neat tricks that do not entirely abuse the system like jumps in CoD. Then we get people who abuse the system eg quickscoping on CoD on a console or getting outside map on a zombie server on CoD 2. Now I know so far the examples have been CoD centric but you'll have to excuse that.

Then you have people willing to abuse bullshit weapons and or skills because they weren't balance properly. I'm sorry just because it was in the game at that time because the devs did not foresee this skill combo does not make it any less of a cunty set up. Two examples of this are the Toucher build R/N which has since been nerfed and a SoJ Sin build from Guild Wars as well as the Searing Flames Elite before balance. If someone wants I could explain why these builds were OP but it might not have the same effect in text.

Then you get plain dicks who camp someone else's spawn in a FPS game and those people are the bane of fun online play and if you do it on CoD 2 or 4 I will spec nade. Not a single fuck will be given that day about your whines.

Even with all that at about mid tiered to high tiered play a lot of people seem to cop the fuck on and stop all this shit. It would help if they all did but you can only do so much.

 

[kTrmnatr]

In Dark Souls it's considered the norm to use the bow animation before a duel. Kinda like a "I'm reading, good luck to you."

When did you last play Dark Souls? I'm sure most of the people I was invading just 3v1'd my ass then did than infuriating "COME AT ME BRO!" gesture. Yeah people still bow occasionally but it's not quite the norm now... /sadface

I still like to wave... Wave at the New Game Plus guy invading my level 5, start gear character in Undead Parish then quit to Dashboard. Fuck you sir!

Oh yeah red invaders never do it. Go to the forest though, it's a safe haven for polite dueling.

Dark Souls PvP had a decent standard of etiquette for those that chose to abide by it, and I had a pretty positive experience with sportsmanlike conduct in that game. I think it did a lot in the way of a more fun and fair experience too. Honorable duels definitely had the effect of making me a more gracious loser. COD and Halo on the other hand...wayyyyy less favorable jerk:decent-human-being ratio. I tend to play XBL, but only have my mic in when I'm playing in a party with friends exactly for that reason. Still really confused about how all those screeching kids found out my ethnicity(ies) and why they think my mother is coquettish.

 

[I.Muir]

In Dark Souls it's considered the norm to use the bow animation before a duel. Kinda like a "I'm reading, good luck to you."

When did you last play Dark Souls? I'm sure most of the people I was invading just 3v1'd my ass then did than infuriating "COME AT ME BRO!" gesture. Yeah people still bow occasionally but it's not quite the norm now... /sadface

I still like to wave... Wave at the New Game Plus guy invading my level 5, start gear character in Undead Parish then quit to Dashboard. Fuck you sir!

Oh yeah red invaders never do it. Go to the forest though, it's a safe haven for polite dueling.

Dark Souls PvP had a decent standard of etiquette for those that chose to abide by it, and I had a pretty positive experience with sportsmanlike conduct in that game. I think it did a lot in the way of a more fun and fair experience too. Honorable duels definitely had the effect of making me a more gracious loser. COD and Halo on the other hand...wayyyyy less favorable jerk:decent-human-being ratio. I tend to play XBL, but only have my mic in when I'm playing in a party with friends exactly for that reason. Still really confused about how all those screeching kids found out my ethnicity(ies) and why they think my mother is coquettish.

Perhaps this is considered unsportsmanlike like but when I'm just trying to get through my game and some person invades me so that they can benefit from inconveniencing me I just DC them. All I want to do is finish the game and move on, I hardly call the duels fair when my best chance of winning is them somehow falling off something. How am I supposed to compete with fully upgraded weapons before Ive even got past level 20. Being unable to escape any other way but quitting to the dashboard is kind of a dick move in a game that's hard enough already. Under those circumstances I think being polite whilst a nice touch is completely unnecessary considering that I won't think any better of them after they are cheering on my corpse and I have to backtrack to where I was to get my souls back and lost my humanity.

This is normally the point I get called a casual despite being a bigger gamer than they are.
It's like the difference of sitting down to a game and just having fun and metaphorically fighting the game to death for the fun and in this case just trying to figure out what the hell is supposed to be happening.

 

[Catch 52]

Don't want to sound like an old man complaining about the kids, but does anyone else think that sportsmanship and manners in gaming has deteriorated?
When I was playing Halo 3, GoW and CoD 4 the majority of messages were positive such as GG or thanks and abuse seemed to be in the minority.
But these days playing Reach, GoW3, MW3 and BF3 I find that I hardly ever get positive feedback and only get abuse.
I play almost exclusively on XBL, so maybe that alters things but I think that when gaming (online) was new everyone felt the same way; we were all just as glad to be playing the game and interacting with others. As time lapsed however, the competitive edge took control and it became less about the social aspect of playing with friends or meeting new people and more about having an awesome KD or wicked video to upload.
Just my opinion...

 

[AndrewF022]

I play a lot of Counter-Strike, and I must say I find out all of the competitive MP games I play, I find it has one of, if not, the best community for sportsmanship and being fair (of course, you're still going to get that idiot camping in the vents on CS_Assault in order to get an awesome KDR and calling everyone who dies at his hand "lololol noob, look at your score, lol").

GG (good game) is almost just customary, even on public servers you will almost always get it at the end of the game, and it more competitive arenas you will almost always get GLHF (good luck, have fun) and GH (good half) as well.

 

[Mariakko]

(*cough* Dota has the worst community *cough*).

Oh goody I was going to bash the Dota community as well. Even if I loose a match but had heaps of fun playing I'll say "Great games guys, I had fun." and If I win I'll congratulate the people who killed me lots. The only time I was un-sportsman like was when my team started spamming me with hate messages about how I should quit because I was such a 'noob', There was so much hate text on the screen I couldn't see my character, so I went and let the other team kill me so they could level up quicker and annoy my team mates. Do I feel bad? Yes. Did they deserve it? Yes. There is no reason to get so angry about a game and definitely no reason to take it out on others. That experience left such a bad taste in my mouth that I don't even feel liking playing anymore. I've felt like I've ranted, Sorry.

 

[BENZOOKA]

GG still means good game. You can over-analyze the use of it by random people or call a cat a dog, but that's how it is.

Trash talk is really common in most kind of competitions. The psychological element plays an important role. Just think of boxers/fighters in weigh-in with the intensive stares. After the match they might be tapping each other on the back for a good fight. NHL players praise their opponents before and after the game, but yell and mock each other in the rink. Competitive gaming doesn't give the kind of physical feel-good-hormones afterwards, and the psychological stuff plays a much larger role, as it boils down to intelligence, experience, finger dexterity & motoric skills, teamwork and overall skill. So rather being a battle of brains instead of a more physical prowess, the psychological metagame grows more important.

The same phenomenons are around for multiplayer and Internet. There often seems to be an abundance of assholes doing whatever they want (=unsportsmanlike behaviour) with the pretext of anonymity and so on. But just like there are lots of well behaving forum-goers here, that respect the rules, written and unwritten; there are plenty of well behaving players in multiplayer.

I still play quite a lot of Counter-Strike: Source, so I'll list a few examples of sportsmanship:
- On a friendly-fire server, I got mistakenly killed by a teammate. The next round he buys me a weapon.
- Defusing through boxes etc. is frowned upon, but not enforced and there's a CT with a chance to win a round only by doing this, the player won't: Following unwritten rules.
- Others let the player with the last kill (or most end-round effort) to get the defuse points, even though others would be closer.
- A teammate doesn't pick up the weapon, that an enemy you killed, dropped, but leaves it for you.
- Going to spectate for the time being AFK, instead of needlessly extending the round. There might be a low-HP player the only one left on their team, who can't risk to check the enemy base for campers.
- Players say sorry for accidental team damage, team kills, team flashes, and going to the wrong plant site or not trying well enough, noticing the clock, etc.
- Giving recognition for doing something skillful
...