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[Draugoth]

Blizzard’s customer service is in hot water after a series of exchanges about Overwatch 2’s profanity rules caught the attention of the community and subsequently went viral. Apparently, profanity of any kind is considered against the hero shooter’s code of conduct, and if someone reports it, seemingly regardless of context, you will get banned. The Overwatch community isn’t thrilled with this new ruling, nor Blizzard’s customer service representative’s response.

The saga started on April 12 when X (formerly Twitter) user @durpee82 posted a tweet asking for a response from Blizzard’s customer service account on a query about a banned Overwatch 2 account. The user had attempted to use Blizzard’s native customer service features to figure out why they were banned, but was only getting an automated response that claimed the ban was “in accordance with our Terms of Use and our In-game Policies.” When pressed for specifics, the user received the same response again.

Blizzard’s customer service representative responded to the post, saying the ban was enacted due to “inappropriate language” in text chat, including the use of “the F word and the SH word.”



It seems the Overwatch 2 community has become fixated on the profanity rule, as fans have started swarming customer service tweets enforcing it. Popular Overwatch content creators like Flats, Overwatch Cavalry, and bogur have all weighed in and spoken out against Blizzard’s policy and official response. There’s an overarching sentiment across X and places like the Blizzard forums that this has turned people off of using text communication for fear of being reported and banned. Overwatch 2 has made some strides in trying to make the game a safe space for players to not have to worry about toxicity, but this ruling, which disregards context for a handful of commonly used words, has been deemed an overcorrection in the community’s eyes.

Report via Kotaku

 

[Kilau]

Too fucking funny.

 

[Power Pro]

Swearing is part of the human language, and while sure there's a time and place for it...competitive gaming is absolutely a place it should be fine since people get frustrated. Asking them to not even swear, is like bottling up rage.

I really miss the internet from 20-25 years ago....Sure it was the wild west, but that's what was so great about it. If anything, I still think people were a lot friendly back then. Met a lot of nice people in my days of Final Fantasy XI.

 

[Facism]

Apex is the same. Can't swear in our competitive murder competition that has lootboxes and gambling!

Fucking morons running the show

 

[night13x]

cant wait till bliz enforce rules where everyone in the game must give thier pronouns else face perm ban.

 

[Arsic]

Play something else.

Plenty of choices. You don’t need to support this dog shit game. You’re a lunatic if you do.

 

[newtypepilot]

people still play OW2?

 

[TransTrender]

The Puritan Left strike again!

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Too fucking funny.

Banned.

When: Immediately

Duration: Dec 31, 11:59 pm, 2999

Early Reversal: Apologize to the MP gamers by leaving a voice message

 

[nikos]

This has been a thing for a while. I've been banned two or three times for text chat and the punishment worsens every time.

I've been warned in real time on CoD Warzone for cursing in proximity voice chat, which is even worse.

Some games, like Battlefield, don't even let you talk to the enemy team. It's horrible.

People are too fucking sensitive. Overwatch just added a new feature to hide your username from others. Hidden profiles have also been a thing for years.

Let me say whatever the fuck I want. That's what profanity filters are for. People can also block me if they don't like it.

I love Overwatch but I hope rational people get them to loosen up. Better than the people who pretty much forced them into assigning sexual orentations to video game characters.

 

[Sleepwalker]

Remember 360 cod lobbies?

We've strayed so much from the path.


With that said some games are still like the wild west. With the NBA playoffs ive been playing 2k online for the lols.

Let me tell you, never in my life have I been called the N word (hard R) so fast.

 

[Dorfdad]

I told to my pasture who’s a gamer as well and he said “Fuck that shit” and slammed the collection plate down

 

[Gp1]

seriously...
If you can't handle a little trash talk in an online game/sport etc., i'm really sorry when you face some real life adversity.

 

[sigmaZ]

This game's become nothing more than a tax write-off.

 

[Saber]

They should take this as an opportunity to get out of this game.

 

[DrFigs]

they have a profanity filter that you can toggle on/off. why even have that if swearing will get you banned anyway?

 

[Dr. Claus]

I got banned from chatting in Season of Discovery because I tried out Plunderstorm and said "GG No Re" a few times after every kill.

When did the world because such fucking pussies.

 

[digital_ghost]

In other news a blizzard employee took to Twitter to say how much he enjoys the latest R rated movie.

When asked about he admitted to being a proud hypocrite.

 

[Lord Panda]

I told to my pasture who’s a gamer as well and he said “Fuck that shit” and slammed the collection plate down

You have sentient farmland?! That's amazing.

 

[e0n]

This dude is about to get banned again.

 

[MiguelItUp]

Imagine having a profanity filter for a game where it doesn't even matter. Not even swearing at some one. Insane. Man, Blizzard sucks now.

 

[Guilty_AI]

i'm more surprised there are people who play Overwatch 2. Have you ever considered loving yourself a bit more?

 

[Kamina]

Funny thing is that the playable characters have their own slurs and curse words in their languages.
Blizzard is a shitshow

 

[Barakov]

I actually only opened battle.net today so I could uninstall this crap game.

 

[GHound]

Funny thing is that the playable characters have their own slurs and curse words in their languages.
Blizzard is a shitshow

Accurate and on the Activision side of the coin MWII('22 ) had operators that would constantly say shit against the ToS or that was filtered in text chat, like the one chick that was constantly calling enemies nonces for example.

 

[Banjo64]

people still play OW2?

To be honest it’s F2P so yeah, I’m guessing tens of thousands of people are online at anyone time.

Luckily I don’t like hero shooters so it’s not a tempting game for me. Because Blizzard are fucking nutters and I’d hate to support them.

 

[stickkidsam]

 

[Ozzie666]

Would someone please think about the kids.. crazy times we live in.

 

[Roxkis_ii]

Good. I don't care about the frustration of someone playing like a bot. The only time most people talk on overwatch is to complain and 9 time out of 10, they have the most deaths on the team. Their frustrated parade of insults and curses only serve the demoralized the rest of the team.


An actual big boy move by blizzard. It past time people learn to grown up and keep their emotions off mic and chat.

 

[STARSBarry]

So Overwatch has a chat filter on as defualt, people can only report you if you go into options disable the chat filter so they can now see abusive words, and then report you for abusive words.

 

[Spyxos]

Play something else.

Plenty of choices. You don’t need to support this dog shit game. You’re a lunatic if you do.

You don't have much choice if you want to write something in online chat. You also get banned for small things in Battlefield 2042.

 

[knguyen]

Some of the things that come out from people mouth are pretty nut, so banning these people (if done right) won't be an issue for the rest at all.

 

[Holammer]

Remember 360 cod lobbies?

We've strayed so much from the path.


With that said some games are still like the wild west. With the NBA playoffs ive been playing 2k online for the lols.

Let me tell you, never in my life have I been called the N word (hard R) so fast.

 

[FUBARx89]

Microsoft has let Blizzard be Blizzard post acquisition.

Let them be a bunch of bitches. No wonder most people use Discord or party chats.

 

[Gaelyon]

How hard is it to not type "fuck" or similar in a text chat when it's against the rules, tough ?

 

[MonkeyClaw36]

Swearing in text chat...... Using a mic ok... But using text chat?

Its all in the heat of the moment. I just blurt it out. By the time I typed it my anger/ frustration is already gone.
If you have to swear using text chat, you have some anger issues....

 

[Z O N E]

Nothing will top MW1/2 and Halo 3 multiplayer era.

These days everyone is so damn sensitive that they go crying to social media.

 

[MonkeyClaw36]

Microsoft has let Blizzard be Blizzard post acquisition.

Let them be a bunch of bitches. No wonder most people use Discord or party chats.

Read the OP again hun.....

Its the TEXT chat.

 

[JCK75]

It's actually amazing how quickly Overwatch went from my favorite game that I played every day to a game I can't imagine myself ever installing again.

 

[SmokedMeat]

Good! Ban everyone so they can play other games.

 

[SJRB]

What the hell even is “the SH word”?

 

[BlackTron]

I didn't know it was even possible to engage with this game client without swearing, much less against some code.

 

[Jakk]

How hard is it to not type "fuck" or similar in a text chat when it's against the rules, tough ?

Are you serious? WTF is wrong with people. Banning people for such bullshit.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Don't swear. Problem solved.

 

[PropellerEar]

What the hell even is “the SH word”?

Sh=Stuff that comes out of your rectum
F=Act of sexual Intercourse

So people need to go around the rules.

Act of Sexual intercourse! You can't play for Stuff that comes out of your rectum!

 

[BlackTron]

Don't swear. Problem solved.

 

[Holammer]

Don't swear. Problem solved.

 

[Kings Field]

Give me back Gears of War lobbies please. Those were some intimate times especially after dying.

 

[lughnasadh123]

To be fair the players have never been thrilled at their bans regardless of how deserved it is because in their minds they can do no wrong. I really miss the days when some shithead makes their sob story post how they did nothing wrong only to have someone on the team bringing the receipts of all the shit they did.

Banning for any swear though? That seems a bit much. Obviously letting everyone say and do what they want creates a toxic environment that isn't great for the game, but there needs to be a better middle ground. "Oh damn, they got the payload" is a far cry from "you let them get the fucking payload you cuntstains!" and should be treated differently. In the meantime they'll have to exercise some self control - shocking, I know.

 

[Dane]

Games nowadays are sanitized up to eleven when it comes to players communications, not worth the headache to use in game tools. But also Overwatch is a T rated game so Blizzard would have incentives to ban any swearing, but M rated games like COD is absurd. Using Discord is way better.