Thread by @kittencaboodle7

All right, I have LOTS of thoughts, unsurprisingly. I am a gamer, a woman, I used to play WoW, I currently play FFXIV, and, as a writer, at one point I wanted to work crafting stories for Blizzard. Reading this, I'm glad I never got that opportunity. #FF14 #MMORPG #Warcraft 1/20

https://twitter.com/JesseCox/status/1418016048901545988

I am legitimately not surprised by these complaints. Having been a woman gamer in WoW, the culture in the game is reflective, apparently, of the company culture as a whole. Misogyny and bigotry were common occurrences. 2/

If you jumped on a voice chat to raid or do dungeons with a PUG, & you had a feminine sounding voice, the sexism was immediate and tiring. It's more than just "LEARN2PLAY NOOB". I heard derivations of "Make me a sandwich" as well as "suggestions" of intimate things I could do. 3/

Voice chat can't be controlled by Blizzard, so let's talk about something that could. The in-game trade chat. That place was a toxic hole of sexism & racism, and nothing ever happened when you reported outright bigotry unless it contained the n-word. Jokes about rape were OK. 4/

You could say any racist thing you wanted in trade chat, as long as it didn't contain a slur, or you covered it up with symbols. Throw in enough asterisks and ampersands, and they can't tell what you mean, I guess. 5/

And that vile and violent atmosphere carried over into the game itself. Female toons were often subjected to simulated assault and harassment by male toons. Goldshire, on our server, was particularly bad for that. 6/

(For those who don't play, Goldshire is a starting area that everyone in the Alliance has to go through. It also tends to be a hub for RPers. Completing the quests there becomes a gauntlet of getting through it as quickly as possible while other players "have fun" with you.) 7/

And, of course, that frustration would take form in other ways as well. Nothing like trying to complete a low level quest, only to get 1-shot by an opposing faction player who is 30 levels over you. 8/

We stopped playing because it absolutely stopped being fun. The story wasn't the focus, the grind was. And it was even more grind-y when you had to fight your way through that atmosphere. 9/

As a woman, I didn't want to take a chance on meeting new groups because of how shitty that had been before. But that also limits what content you can access. And if you don't have the best gear, you can't play with the higher stuff and get better rewards. 10/

We stopped playing, came back once for their: "Here's 30 free hours! Come back!" a few years ago. And we discovered that things hadn't really changed that much. In fact, it was worse. Trump and Gamergate assholes had taken over. 11/

In fact, it came as no surprise to me or my husband that Steve Bannon had used WoW and Gamergate to recruit people. Disgusting, toxic people using other disgusting, toxic people to do disgusting, toxic things. 12/ usatoday.com/story/tech/tal…

We'd been turned off of MMOs so much, that when people started suggesting FFXIV, we immediately said no. Finally, after several suggestions over the course of a couple years, we actually jumped in to give it a try a couple months ago. 13/

The atmosphere is almost night and day in FFXIV. It feels like an FF game instead of an MMO. New players have "Sprouts" next to their name, so everyone knows they are new. And people have been incredibly kind and welcoming and HELPFUL to us. 14/

Older players give advice and suggestions on fights instead of automatically kicking you. People have gone around in game giving "gift bags" to newbie players that include gil, mounts, and other fun things. 15/

And best of all, I haven't seen any of the toxic chat that was extremely prevalent in WoW. (I'm sure there are ERP players, but they certainly aren't doing it in the middle of hub areas on our server or involving people who aren't part of it.) 16/

And, I'll admit, the influx of WoW players onto FFXIV concerns me a bit. I don't want them porting the shitty, toxic atmosphere to the new game. 17/

It doesn't help when you hear that streamers like Asmongold have been part of that toxic atmosphere. Is it great that he's bringing a whole bunch of new players in? Not if they are terrible people! 18/ resetera.com/threads/wow-ff…

And, considering that it is rumored that some WoW players are dumping their subs with comments like: "Go Woke, Get Broke," I don't want them coming over to FFXIV and turning it into the New WoW. 19/

imgur.com/KH4wspv

So, what will the outcome of all of this be? Who knows. We are going to have to wait and see what happens. Will MMOs continue to allow the assholes to run the place? Is sexism and bigotry just too ingrained in the MMO community? We have to wait and see. 20/END

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