Overwatch Toxicity Down Following Introduction of New Social Features

Overwatch’s New Social Features Have Curbed Toxicity, According to Blizzard’s Statistics

Late last month, Blizzard rolled out an Overwatch patch across all platforms that included new social features aimed towards curbing toxicity and reinforcing positive behavior. The Looking-For-Group (LFG) and Endorsement features allow players to group up with like-minded individuals and endorse them for “exhibiting sportsmanship, being a good teammate, or for shot calling” after a match has concluded.

According to developer Jeff Kaplan, the new system seems to be working well. Initial statistics released by Blizzard’s Global Insights Group reveal that the percentage of competitive matches that contain abusive chat is down by 26.4 percent in Americas and 16.4 percent in Korea. The percentage of daily players being abusive is down by 28.8 percent in Americas and 21.6 percent in Korea.

Do note that these are just initial results. Kaplan noted that statistics for Europe and other regions aren’t available yet.

“We’re really pleased with the community’s efforts to make Overwatch a better place!” he said while thanking fans. “And we’ll keep working on iterating on these features to make them better as well as exploring other systems to improve the gameplay environment.”

Kaplan also revealed that Blizzard will be introducing some quality of life changes to LFG and Endorsements. One confirmed addition will be the ability to retain LFG filters for future logins.

[Source: Blizzard]