It’s a cold truth that some people in this world are just arseholes. That’s why every online game game should have an option for reporting jerks. It’s a feature that’s become pretty standard, especially in competitive shooters. So it’s weird that Apex Legends released without it.
Instead of being able to directly report someone you encounter in Apex Legends who might be saying vile stuff or in some other way ruining the experience for others, the game currently requires you to take lodge your complaints externally.
On PC, you have to open the offending player’s profile in Origin, EA’s game client, and report them from there. On console, it’s more laborious: EA’s website sends PS4 players to the PlayStation guide for reporting PSN users and Xbox One players to Microsoft’s code of conduct page for Xbox Live.
Neither is ideal, since both are geared toward regulating behaviour over the social network than within a particular game. As a result, the people reviewing the complaints won’t always have easy access to any accompanying evidence, something even EA admits is a problem.
“Some games let you report abusive players, content and cheating right in the game or service,” reads the EA help page for reporting players. “This is the best way to report issues because it automatically grabs some of the information we need to investigate.”
Plenty of players seem to agree. The EA forum for the game is littered with people asking for in-game reporting. “This game is really good fun,” wrote one person. “Getting cussed out by strangers on the internet is not. Any game that has voice/text chat needs the option to report users for ‘unsportsmanlike conduct’ or ‘harassment.’” It’s similarly a frequent request on the game’s subreddit as well.
Currently, there’s been more emphasis on banning cheaters, with Respawn pointing players to a dedicated online form for reporting players who might be using exploits to get a leg up in Apex Legends. According to the studio, 16,000 players have been banned for cheating so far.
In a recent set of patch notes for Apex, Respawn community manager Jay Frechette acknowledged support among players for an in-game report feature. “I’ll just say that’s a very good idea :),” he wrote. EA did not respond to a request for comment about when such a feature might get added to the game or how it would work.
While they’re at it, they could add a block feature as well so players can automatically cut off contact with people doing things like using homophobic slurs. Blocking is another feature most games have but not, for some reason, Apex.
It’s a surprise that features like reporting that are in games like PUBG, Fortnite, and Overwatch, aren’t in Apex, since in other ways the game has been extremely forward looking in how it handles squad communication, making it possible to ping enemy locations and equipment without having to use voice chat.
The game also has a lot of great options for turning speech to text and other accessibility features. Given its comprehensive communication tools, you’d expect tools that help regulate what players say to each other would be equally robust.
It only takes one shitty comment to potentially ruin someone’s night, and having better measures in place to crack down on toxicity would go a long way toward making Apex Legends a more welcoming place for meeting other cool players.
Comments
37 responses to “Apex Legends Needs An Option For Reporting People”
I’ve been really lucky and haven’t encountered any nasty people in Apex Legends yet. Some nice, some weird, some indifferent, but no nasty or abusive people.
I did get matched with some dude though whose mic was open, and he was talking to his young son about his (the son’s) ingrown toe nail and what treatment options were available to him, which seemed like a weird invasion of privacy on my behalf (and it was also really gross).
Lol! I would say 90% of the people I have played with have beeen great, but there will always be the dodgy ones, it’s just the way it is.
Oh man. I got screamed and sworn at for several minutes for supposedly stealing someone’s kill.
There definitely needs to be an avenue to report people
Genuinely curious – what kind of action do you think should be taken against someone who swears / rages like you described?
Hanged, drawn and quartered
‘They may take my life, but they’ll never take … MY KILL!’
Warning, suspension, then ban.
Since it’s a F2P, the suspension and ban need to be implemented by a hardware related ID.
That seems a bit heavy handed imo… I mean we judge others by their actions, and ourselves by our intentions. You may do something in game that another player may perceive as purposefully antagonising them (eg: kill stealing) and then gets upset, and vice versa.
Reporting people for petty things like that is open to abuse. Just mute them and move on, no need for any further action than that.
There was an AMA for Anthem last week (I think) where someone asked if there was going to be the ability to kick team members. The response was basically that any reporting setup is open to abuse as well, and needs to be handled very carefully.
Someone sees something petty, they report it. Someone else sees something petty, they report that. Sooner or later, a handful of petty things has long term consequences, when in reality its just a few people with ridiculous standards or a tendency towards being a snowflake.
That doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be some sort of avenue though. Some people do go out of their way to grief you, or kill steal, or harass you in any way they can get away with. Right now, the options for reporting are a pain.
But make it too easy and you have 10 year old kids reporting you because you didn’t let them win. Or pro players being reported simply because they are so good, hence ‘must be cheating’. Plenty of Forknife vids showing those accusations happening regularly.
I don’t know where the answer is. On one hand, people are dicks, and when they are you need a way to quickly punish them. On the other hand, if you make it too easy, other people being dicks in different ways then have their own way to ruin someones game.
I just mute everyone by default.
It’s just annoying in games which don’t allow it as a global setting.
Microphone privileges removed after X number of reports.
It just seems a bit primary school… surely a mature person can just mute the player and that’s the end of that?
Sure they can. But they shouldn’t have to. It shouldn’t be my obligation to sequester myself away from a raging piece of shit. If the same 15 year old has 35 reports for homophobic slurs, that kid should be banned for a timeframe or have their mic muted for a week. I shouldn’t have to hear it, say “Hey dude, give that a rest,” cop a bunch of abuse for telling him to stop being a prick, then mute him.
your right that the kid and the 35 slurs etc although i don’t think they should ever get a permanent ban i think you should get increasingly harsh bans if that is the way your going to police the game. But i think i might have a better solution given that the reporting system tends to be abused, generate a shitload of trivial reports and false reports. maybe limiting the reporting system just to hacking and the more extreme harassment oh and like grooming and shit like that.
@thatteemo @ponyface @grunt @chinesefood and pokedad
what do u guys think of first making it faster and easier to mute people but also giving players a secondary list maybe 5 or 10 slots and at the end of the match it lets you add people to the list, and people who are added to the list cannot match with you for like a month or maybe even make it permanent so you can just get away form these people.
When i was playing LoL i always thought that being able to eliminate a few people from matching with you would be a great way to counter the toxic behavior, maybe not once you high enough in rank because then the player pool is too small and you can abuse it for ranking but you know you got people who just run it down mid the whole game if they end up on 90% of peoples lists then they cant even get in a match.
i haven’t given much deep thought to this so it’s probably full of holes but i think the concept is worth exploring. Maybe you guys could help me refine it into a working idea.
Having not played this game, is there a mute button? If so then that is all you need.
You can mute voice and chat, but you have to hit TAB mid-game, wait for someone’s profile to load before you can mute them, which takes way longer than it should to load.
Doesn’t help if you get a thrower or someone who is just deliberately griefing.
TBH sometimes I’d just like to report the people who KEEP PINGING SUPPLY BINS AS ENEMIES OH MY GOD /rant over
Damn that sucks. Sounds like poor design. Reminds me of trying to do anything other than shoot at people in Destiny 2. The load time is so long you will end up dying before you even load up your character sheet.
I don’t know it’s poor design, the person is using the button for enemy ping instead of the button for item ping…
If they hit the default ping button twice on that location it changes to an enemy ping.
You can also (on PS4) make a PSN party of just yourself then launch the game if you don’t want to deal with voice chat at all.
Half the time the type of ping is accidental.
I remember I used to judge online shooters by whether I could ‘mute all’ instead of having to mute individual players.
lol your so antisocial =P
What is the point of reporting them in a free to play title? They aren’t going to hardware ban you, so all that will happen is that person will make a new account and just continue to be horrible.
With the influx of hacks I feel like unless Respawn can get on top of their game quickly the free to play business model will be this games undoing.
I could be wrong but I think they use EAC, which does do hardware bans. I have come across a LOT of hackers in BFV, but I have yet to see one in Apex (~65hrs)
I have experienced a few players, but its more the amount you can already find with a quick google search. Thank fuck it automatically chooses servers to keep out China.
Yea, It would be PUBG all over again!
Also while EAC does hardware ban, scrubbing ids isn’t hard.
They could probably do the good old “match reported players with other reported players” thing. It’s free to play so the playerbase should be big enough to sustain that.
But then how does that stop a troll from just making a new account.
If you wouldn’t say it over a pool table or during a dart match then STFU.
Anonymity brings out the worst in cowards.
most of the toxic people are just kids doing it because it’s breaking a taboo or you know because they are kids and kids are fucking stupid. or because they know it riles you up that’s why you don’t answer or respond you just mute and move on assuming you can. i know it sucks that you have to do it but every other systems seems to have worse flaws.
It doesn’t rile me up, the advantage of being an adult I suppose.
I don’t expect people to be angels and I have no problems with blue language and to be perfectly honest most of the people who I have played Apex with either didn’t have Mics or were not using them. The few that did have Mics were actually really cool.
I just don’t see why people have to be dicks to each other all the time, after 20 years of playing online games I’m just getting a bit sick “bad” behaviour.
I grew up but the average gamer is still as drunk and stupid as ever.
sorry i didn’t mean to infer that it riles you in particular just pointing out that as one of the reasons.
i don’t know what blue language means quick check with google tells me language associated with obscenity or indecency, im going to share my interpretation with you let me know if i’m right.
are you talking about obscene language being used but not directed towards people maybe even directed at the enemy, and your fine with that but not when the same language is directed at people. like your cool with the words themselves being used as long as it’s not directed at somebody.
i have been online gaming maybe 16-17 years but i have noticed a change in the amount of people being dicks, it seems to be no less in terms of how often you run into one like maybe once every couple of days. But if you consider how much larger the audience is now it probably does mean there are a lot lower ratio now of dicks to everyone else.
Then again i don’t play many of the most popular multiplayer games like fortnite so maybe im not getting an accurate view.
One feature I’d like to see are people who run off from the squad immediately (hell they don’t even jump with the team) and go lone wolf only to die almost immediately. The game should some how use your stats to work out if you’re a lone wolf and stick you on a team with other lone wolves so they can go off and die by themselves without impacting on their team mate’s games.
I have only had a single team mate that was horrible…
Spent the entire first half of the game shooting at me and just grabbing any decent loot even if he wasn’t using it.
Then as soon as we got shot at he went and hid in the corner of a building and didn’t even help shoot at anyone.
yeh well you shouldn’t have stolen my kill >: [
just joking i don’t even play apex at the moment