EA

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EA announces Positive Play Charter to eradicate abuse online

EA’s new initiative aims to establish a more positive online gaming experience and lower toxicity in games such as FIFA and Apex Legends.

EA

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EA follows in the footsteps of many other larger players in the gaming industry who have taken steps to crack down hard on toxicity, racism, and other online abuse in their gaming spaces.

The Positive Play Charter

With the Positive Play Charter, EA is promising stronger action towards combating toxicity and online abuse in their various gaming communities. EA announced the Positive Play Charter via Electronic Arts’ Twitter page and laid out what it means in a post on the EA website in June.

“Like with most communities, we have positive play guidelines to help make sure our games and services are an enjoyable experience for all players,” EA wrote.

The tweet continued, stating: “Whether you’re new to gaming or have been an active player for years, we need your help to make this a community we all want to be part of.”

The lengthy charter is an extension of player guidelines which must be agreed to when engaging with most Electronic Arts games and services. Games such as FIFA, Madden, and Apex Legends, in particular, have experienced their fair share of trolling and toxicity in their online environments. The initiative was likely created especially for these games more than others.

As much of the competitive and online gaming space as EA has within their games, their latest initiative is in line with other forces in the industry choosing to take stronger approaches to toxicity.

Call of Duty developer Infinity Ward, in addition to various donations and messages supporting Black Lives Matter, also launched an initiative to crack down harder than ever on racist usernames and in-game toxicity through increasingly improved reporting systems.

Capcom also made a formal decision to ban a champion-level player from the Capcom Pro Tour for an extremely controversial tweet.

Will the trolling end?

Although it is highly unlikely that that EA’s initiative will stop players from trolling and being despicable, hopefully these larger companies will continue to press their message and the efforts they are putting in.

Toxicity is a problem in online gaming communities and it only gets worse if left unchecked. Hopefully, EA’s Positive Play Charter is backed by constant support and efforts towards an altogether better gaming community and experience.

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