Overview

I will be focusing on Halo for this, not any one in the series in particular but mainly the two most recent games, Halo: Reach and Halo 4. Halo is a good choice for this topic because it was the first to introduce console matchmaking with Halo 2. Halo is also one of the biggest games in gaming history, the series has Halo 1 through 4 as well as Reach, ODST and Spartan Assault. The Master Chief Collection and Halo 5 are due this fall and next year, respectively.

Halo is a first person shooter that takes place in a sort of futuristic Sci-Fi type setting. There is a war going on and you have to defend the human race – using space ships, various sizes of hover crafts, massive explosive weapons, giant robot suits, and help from Cortana, your robot AI. And sometimes stealth. In general it is true to what an earth-like planet might be like in the future, except it’s not a planet, it’s a giant ring – Halo, hence the name. You have a suit that explains your HUD, and also allows mods for things like night vision, jet packs, invisibility and powerful shields. While the game has an extremely rich plot and fantastic character and setting development, in short, the game is pretty simple. Here are lots of weapons: shoot everything.

Ranking and Social Status

When you are playing Spartan Ops or Matchmaking (so not campaign), you earn experience that goes towards your level, or SR (Spartan Rank). The matchmaking system uses that rank to find other players who are similar level, and then you can vote on which map or type of game you want to play. After you play one round you can see your game stats and rank within that group. Unless you quit to the main menu, you will stay with the same group indefinitely.

Social Awareness

Not as much individuality as in Second Life but each player is human like. You have to be cautious of where every player is and whether they are on your team or not if you are in red vs blue mode, as if you aren’t awake and constantly moving, you will die. You can see them on a HUD map in the corner of your screen in most types of games, so even when the other players are not in visual range, you are aware of them. Once you start to get better you learn patterns and habits and create a sort of profile for that player based on his actions. For example, some players favor certain weapons. Some speak, some don’t. Some die a lot and play really aggressively, some are cautious and get fewer kills, but die much less. If you are an experienced player, everything they do contributes to your profile of them. What armor, starting weapons, mod of choice, even things like do they walk or impatiently jump when they go long distances? Do they move in circles, back and forth, or not at all (noob alert!)?

You can play in different variations of competitive and cooperative in different types of matchmaking, or in Spartan Ops (little mini-challenge levels) – the former being much more difficult, the latter allowing more friendly and helpful social interaction.

Communication

If you have a headset that is hooked up, you can communicate that way. Many people do, and there is generally some form of chatter going on in team matchmaking, even if it’s not really very deep. But you get a sense of who is playing and a little bit about their personality. You can’t type while you play so this is really the only form of communication in the game.

If you are playing cooperative, it’s a little different. I have people added as friends on my Xbox account from when I started playing Halo. I wasn’t that good, so I would sometimes play in cooperative mode (instead of me vs all the enemies in the game by myself) so it didn’t take quite so long to get through one round. This form is a little more contusive to social interaction. In Halo 4, there are “Spartan Ops”, which are like mini levels aside from the main story line. If you are matched with someone at 3am and you both have headsets, there is a good chance you’ll end up talking.

Personally, I never turn my headset on in matchmaking. I often don’t listen to what other people are saying, either. Most of the time it’s not even useful. For example, there is one game of capture the flag that is just a long tunnel. The best way to do this is to work with your team mates, with one person providing cover with a ranged weapon and other moving forward together. As a team. But this never really seems to happen. Sometimes players will warn each other about the location of players on the other teams or talk about their kills, but that about it.

Griefing, Trolling, and Unfriendly Play

Halo is massive. It is a rich and beautifully done game, that I think attracts a lot of older players and encourages loyalty. It’s easy to pick up and play, which I think attracts a lot of very young players. Because of this, there are all types of unwanted behaviors.

Trolling vs Flaming

You search for examples of Halo trolling and mostly you just get prime examples of cyber bullying. There is a fine line between trolling and cyber bullying. Unfortunately the meme-ification and subsequent glorification of the “art of trolling” has justified all kinds of negative behaviors. There is a fine line between trolling and cyber bullying. There is a good example of a video seen here: Youtube.com   /watch?v=u-IyzluuBWY  [1] where some kids, maybe around 12-15 “troll” a kid and post the video on the internet. They tell him there is a cheat that will allow him to play as a different character, then at the end they say to hold the power button for five seconds. Then when it says that he left the group (because his Xbox shuts off) they all yell and laugh and call the kid stupid. In the comments below there is all kinds of outrage because their victim is, judging by the sound of his voice, much, much younger. So while their actions technically qualify as “trolling”, the fact that they choose an “easy target” disqualifies it. Just to be clear, the definition of “trolling”, according to Urban Dictionary [2] is:

“The art of deliberately, cleverly, and secretly pissing people off, usually via the internet, using dialogue… The most essential part of trolling is convincing your victim that either a) truly believe in what you are saying, no matter how outrageous, or b) give your victim malicious instructions, under the guise of help. “

So getting someone to shut off their Xbox or delete an important file is a classing troll move, but there is nothing smart or clever about tricking a little kid, thus disqualifying this attempt.

Flaming, which is often confused for trolling, is more based on personal attacks and poorly thought out attempts to upset people. The definition for trolling also touches on this by saying:

“Shouting swear words at someone doesn't count as trolling; it's just flaming, and isn't funny. Spam isn't trolling either; it pisses people off, but it's lame… Trolling requires deceiving; any trolling that doesn't involve deceiving someone isn't trolling at all; it's just stupid.”

Both of these things happen in Halo, just as they happen anywhere on the internet. Proper trolling is very difficult to prevent. Xbox has taken measures to prevent these things or enable you to avoid running into it by allowing users to rate other players. If someone is “flaming” by screeching into the microphone and blocking team communication, for example, you can mute them, ask not to be matched with them, and vote them down, thus harming their player reputation. Likewise if you discover that player is a troll.  

Griefing

Griefing is a complicated matter in Halo, and much like any game, it’s very difficult to prevent while still keeping everyone happy. The best places to get real feedback and info about griefing in Halo is forums such as the Anti Griefer Megathread[2], as players share experience and suggest/discuss ideas to prevent it. The forum describes griefers as people who lack any real skill, and so, “They need high tier weapons and vehicles to thrive, and will kill, injure and/or sabotage teammates to get these. Other times they simply do these things to provoke other players, in hopes of some sort of emotional response.”

These people exist in every game to some effect, and since each game is different, griefer techniques are generally unique to that game, but the core idea is always there: prevent other players from achieving the goal of the game.

To prevent people from killing their own team mates, the developers of Halo implemented a system whereby people who killed their own team mates got booted. But thousands of bored griefer minds quickly realized that you could just throw yourself in front of a team mate’s vehicle and get them booted for killing a team mate. Even without griefers, you can sometimes accidentally kill yourself or your team mates and end up “betrayal booted”. So now the griefers are causing more grief than when the griefers were actively griefing.   

The makers of Halo suggested removing friendly fire, but that caused an uproar – friendly fire is a fundamental part of Halo. I have to agree. I always think it really strengthens the fourth wall when I can punch my team mate repeatedly and they don’t even flinch.  

Otherwise Unpleasant Player Behavior

The biggest way to reinforce good player habits is player reviews. Really there is no perfect algorithm that will dictate who is being disruptive and who is just a really terrible player. If any game was going to figure it out, it would be Halo. Halo is a game changer for online play and matchmaking, and they have bank. Lots of bank. The amount of work that goes into testing and analysis is mind blowing. But bad player behavior still gets through.

Camping is a sure way to collect bad player reviews. If you sit where you have a good clear shot of an area you know players are going to spawn, then kill them before they have a chance to react, you will undoubtedly get called a n00b and get placed on the “avoid this player” list. It’s considered a tactic only used by skill-less, new or newbie players and is extremely frowned upon.

BKs are people who play online who act or talk like they’re really good at the game when they aren’t. So for example when someone has a name like “SuperAwesomeHunterSlayer100%” (you like? I made it up myself) and they come online and say things like “hahah Im going to pwn all you n00bs!” but then they come in last with a really bad kill-death ratio, people will roll their eyes and call you a BK, or bad kid.

Swatting

Swatting is a serious new issue that goes beyond sane. Trolling, griefing, camping and flaming combined don’t come close. And article by NationalReport.net [4] covers a recent arrest of a fifteen year old boy. He was found guilty on two counts of domestic terrorism, and in my opinion, I am glad they are making a show of it.

Paul Horner was guilty of “swatting”, which is when you anonymously call in a bomb threat, murder or other serious crime to the house of a rival player as a form of revenge. In Paul Horner’s case, the S.W.A.T. team responded to the report of a murder/hostage situation by raiding the address given, in the process critically injuring the rival gamer’s father.

While I personally feel that 25 to life is extreme for a 15 year old, I am glad they are making an example of him. I think that he should be put under house arrest with no games and forced to do 30+ hours a week of the worst kind of community service possible, but I understand why he received the sentence he did.  

Paul Horner is not the only one guilty of swatting, and so there are videos all over the internet. Many hardcore gamers will LiveStream as they play – you can see them, hear them and watch their reactions to game events. So when the police raid their building, it’s all recorded live on the internet. One such video is: 

 Youtube.com/

watch?v=Nz8yLIOb2pU

[5].

Concluding Thoughts

Halo has one of the most advanced systems for matchmaking and online play. It’s what made the game famous, what made Xbox successful, but they still have not perfected online play. Especially when the players age ranges from 8 to 58, skill level from 0 to 100, player styles and motivations are all over the map, it’s incredibly difficult to get people to communicate and work as a team. But with every game that is released, there are more and deeper studies that are done and everything about the game improves. Often exponentially. Makes me excited for the future of gaming..! 

Part Three References

** YouTube links need to be broken so they appear legibly **

[1] Youtube.com

/watch?v=u-IyzluuBWY

[2] http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=trolling

[3] https://forums.halowaypoint.com/yaf_postsm1488672_posts.aspx

[4] http://nationalreport.net/15-year-old-swatted-domestic-terrorism/

[5] Youtube.com/

watch?v=Nz8yLIOb2pU

[6] Youtube.com/

watch?v=uaLarD0SO1E