4 ms·

This happened to me for a different reason, but it was the same level of frustrating. After months of playing MW and Black Ops, one day I queue up with friends

This happened to me for a different reason, but it was the same level of frustrating. After months of playing MW and Black Ops, one day I queue up with friends and after waiting 5+ minutes no server would be found. We try over and over finally we realize its me. Googling around shows that I am "Shadow Banned" and everyone is like "go away cheater" online. I've been playing online games with an in game name that contains the word "Erotica" for a while now (4+ years) and have had zero issues. Turns out the word "Erotica" is BANNED by Activision, and they synced their identity management with Blizzard it got flagged. I found ONE random thread on Reddit where a guy ran into the same problem and gave a link to directly log into their system. Once logged in I got "Your username contains adult content and must be changed". After changing it, and waiting 3 days, it 'synced' and my account was unbanned. The whole thing was absolutely stupid, I had paid $60 and could not play any of their games. It pretty much ruined the game for me, I haven't given them a dollar since.

robswc 4y ago
That is insane. Had similar issues but not really banned... just "error-less" issues coming up that would lead you to believe the problem is something else entirely.
ryndshn 4y ago
wow, amazing you were able to figure that out... most people would have given up
newZWhoDis 4y ago
nomilk 4y ago
It usually doesn't take a lot of work for engineers to do some brainstorming around who will be affected and send a direct email letting users know what's up. That would have saved you days of fumbling around and frustration. I have a growing enthusiasm for companies that consistently care for users, and conversely a callous distain for companies that don't.
- incongruity 4y ago
  I feel as though the list of companies that consistently care for users is shrinking by the day. In fact, I can't really think of many businesses where I feel appreciated or cared for as a customer, but the few that I can are all small businesses and most of them are local to me.
  - ajsnigrutin 4y ago
    Why would they care, if people still give them money, when they get banned, instead of demanding a refund, they search for workarounds, and even after that, they buy a new games when it's released. When people start demanding refunds or even start a class-action suit (especially if getting banned in multiplayer prevents you from playing single player missions), things will change.
    - pannSun 4y ago
      > When people start demanding refunds or even start a class-action suit You can thank a clever lawyer for thinking of mandatory arbitration clauses that are making class-actions a thing of the past.
      - bacchusracine 4y ago
        >You can thank a clever lawyer for thinking of mandatory arbitration clauses that are making class-actions a thing of the past. Those "lawyers" aren't nearly as clever as they seem to think they are: https://www.cernovich.com/patreon-lawsuit-owen-benjamin/ https://www.cernovich.com/patreon-lawsuit-owen-benjamin/
- chefandy 4y ago
  This is fundamentally a support and UX problem, not a dev failure. Big production user management and authentication systems can get pretty complicated and trying to figure out every weird edge case when combining them is not low-effort by any measure. "What if someone's username wasn't caught in their profanity filter but gets caught by ours" seems like a pretty rare edge case in a huge pool of big problems to solve. Their shortcoming was not giving their users proper guidance on how to address the inevitable kinks that pop up.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
duckqlz 4y ago
Sounds very annoying. Conversely, many of activision’s users are minors. In the games you mentioned it’s some what rare to encounter adults, especially as a new player. Perhaps not the best place to advertise ones love of erotica. Personally it bothers me when I walk past my 10 year old nephew and the other players in his squad have names that are sexual, racist or inflammatory; so I report them. If the people that I report have to work hard to realize that they are disrupting a community and making people uncomfortable I am ok with that too. +1 for activision in my books.
- savolai 4y ago
  How is getting punished without getting to know the reason useful for anyone? How do they learn anything from such an experience?
- SpaghettiCthulu 4y ago
  It sounds like you were the only one who was uncomfortable. Your nephew probably thought it was funny.

robswc 4y ago

That is insane. Had similar issues but not really banned... just "error-less" issues coming up that would lead you to believe the problem is something else entirely.

ryndshn 4y ago

wow, amazing you were able to figure that out... most people would have given up

newZWhoDis 4y ago

nomilk 4y ago

It usually doesn't take a lot of work for engineers to do some brainstorming around who will be affected and send a direct email letting users know what's up. That would have saved you days of fumbling around and frustration. I have a growing enthusiasm for companies that consistently care for users, and conversely a callous distain for companies that don't.

incongruity 4y ago
I feel as though the list of companies that consistently care for users is shrinking by the day. In fact, I can't really think of many businesses where I feel appreciated or cared for as a customer, but the few that I can are all small businesses and most of them are local to me.
- ajsnigrutin 4y ago
  Why would they care, if people still give them money, when they get banned, instead of demanding a refund, they search for workarounds, and even after that, they buy a new games when it's released. When people start demanding refunds or even start a class-action suit (especially if getting banned in multiplayer prevents you from playing single player missions), things will change.
  - pannSun 4y ago
    > When people start demanding refunds or even start a class-action suit You can thank a clever lawyer for thinking of mandatory arbitration clauses that are making class-actions a thing of the past.
    - bacchusracine 4y ago
      >You can thank a clever lawyer for thinking of mandatory arbitration clauses that are making class-actions a thing of the past. Those "lawyers" aren't nearly as clever as they seem to think they are: https://www.cernovich.com/patreon-lawsuit-owen-benjamin/ https://www.cernovich.com/patreon-lawsuit-owen-benjamin/
chefandy 4y ago
This is fundamentally a support and UX problem, not a dev failure. Big production user management and authentication systems can get pretty complicated and trying to figure out every weird edge case when combining them is not low-effort by any measure. "What if someone's username wasn't caught in their profanity filter but gets caught by ours" seems like a pretty rare edge case in a huge pool of big problems to solve. Their shortcoming was not giving their users proper guidance on how to address the inevitable kinks that pop up.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

duckqlz 4y ago

Sounds very annoying. Conversely, many of activision’s users are minors. In the games you mentioned it’s some what rare to encounter adults, especially as a new player. Perhaps not the best place to advertise ones love of erotica. Personally it bothers me when I walk past my 10 year old nephew and the other players in his squad have names that are sexual, racist or inflammatory; so I report them. If the people that I report have to work hard to realize that they are disrupting a community and making people uncomfortable I am ok with that too. +1 for activision in my books.

savolai 4y ago
How is getting punished without getting to know the reason useful for anyone? How do they learn anything from such an experience?
SpaghettiCthulu 4y ago
It sounds like you were the only one who was uncomfortable. Your nephew probably thought it was funny.