- Date: 17/01/2003 | Author: Trevorrex
Something that I have observed on RA2/YR WOL a lot, bad manners. Now I’m no stuck up hyper polite person, but i have seen absolutely ridiculous behaviour on WOL. I see it as split into these categories.
- Newbie bashing: More experienced players throwing insults and yelling at people who are clearly new at the game and can’t play as well as them. Some people seem to think new players should be as good as them 5 seconds after the install the game. Doesn’t happen of course, and they get angry. If a new player gets screamed at too often, they may not want to come back, which is probably understandable.
- Back Stabbing: In Custom games for some insane reason some players just turn on their allies and destroy them before they can react. Another version of this is too build 10 Nuke Reactors in the allies base and just leave the game, completely destroying said base. This is completely uncalled for, almost always makes you lose the game and makes you unlikely to forgive this person.
- Ignoring Allies: People who ignore their allies and do their own thing are extremely annoying. That would never or rarely win games because there is no communication or coordination between players. Both are necessary to win games with alliances.
- Flooding/Spamming: Repeating pointless messages in lobbies over and over until banning occurs. Annoys everyone, helps nothing. SPAM: Stupid Pointless Annoying Message: Says it all.
- General Insults: Any insult that can be said, I’ve seen it on WOL. Not going to repeat it here of course, but you can imagine.
Given that Westwood has more or less ‘forgotten’ about RA2 and YR, I doubt these problems will be fixed any time soon. I have deliberately not mentioned cheating etc, because anyone who has played a game of RA2 or YR or spent any time on any C&C forums will know what all that’s about.
I get the general idea that because its unlikely that people using WOL will ever meet each other in person, its ok to be rude and obnoxious. Anyone behaving like that in public would probably be on the receiving end of a fist.
There is no need to be rude online, it takes more effort to be rude than it does to be civil. There is no point of deliberately stirring up trouble, insulting people without cause or anything else I’ve mentioned. There is simply no point.
If someone online starts harassing you, just ignore them. If you see a player who is obviously new to the game, help them and point out any mistakes they may have made. If someone betrays you in Custom and destroys half your base, its probably a good idea to ignore them for a while if not forever.
I somewhat doubt this article will change anything, but it still might enlighten a few people. If everyone can get along, then the games online will be far more enjoyable.