Riot Games plans to introduce a voice chat in League of Legends. MeinMMO author Ody has played the game only briefly, but those few rounds were enough for him to say: This might not be the best idea for the game.
When I first played League of Legends myself, I really tried to like the game. Sure, I had heard a lot beforehand, especially negative things if we’re honest. But I thought it was really cool to watch professionals at a small LoL tournament at TwitchCon. Additionally, I met someone at university who plays it competitively. I became curious.
This was before Riot Games introduced the idea of a general voice chat for teams. There is already a voice chat, but you can only use it with friends who are in a party with you. The new team voice chat is currently only included in the public beta environment (according to the website u.gg). This is a kind of testing ground for new champions and larger gameplay changes.
The new voice chat is likely to fundamentally change the game, especially in ranked mode. However, I fear that this change will not be solely positive – and many players share the same concern.
Surprise: LoL has a problem with toxic players
The main reason why I ended up with only a few hours of LoL was not the game itself. I still find it quite fun, also because it doesn’t seem as overloaded as Dota 2, for instance. No, the problem was rather my teammates.
My last round of LoL looked something like this:
- One from my team kept pinging various areas on the map (and I mean really constantly)
- As a result, the text chat was spammed with max vague instructions mixed with various accusations.
Unfortunately, that was not the only round that went approximately like this. As a newcomer, I had no idea why or how I should react: I’m still learning the game. I wasn’t even in ranked mode – yet I felt like I had to perform at a high level immediately.
Even though this round went quite well for my team and I wasn’t the worst player on our side, I found it simply frustrating. I can’t even imagine how it would have been if people had yelled in my ear then. In any case, I’ve had enough since.
The voice chat will fundamentally change the game
At least, and I have to give Riot credit for this, the voice chat is disabled by default – at least according to players in the PBE. This doesn’t necessarily mean it will stay that way for the full release. But it would be better. Otherwise, I fear that some unsuspecting newcomers will be yelled at by players on their own team right in their first game and chased away.
A voice chat in LoL is still not the best idea, I can say that even with my few hours in the game. Because even the mere existence of this feature will change how the MOBA is played. Especially in ranked mode, the voice chat will almost certainly become an unofficial requirement. This is also the common opinion of many veterans who have been discussing the topic on platforms like Reddit for days.
The voice chat makes communication with the team significantly more efficient than text chat or pings, which is especially important for certain roles like jungler. Not using this would put players at a disadvantage – especially at higher ranks.
Conversely, the voice chat could lead to players using pings or text chat less frequently. Even though both can be annoying in casual rounds if it happens excessively, it is indeed an important tool for ranked players. Anyone who wants to communicate with their team will sooner or later be forced to use the voice chat.
Without a detour into toxicity
I truly believe that a voice chat will harm the game and ruin the gaming experience for many players. With the voice chat, those toxic players who give LoL its bad reputation will get a voice.
To keep up at high ranks, all players would be virtually forced to use the voice chat. However, they would then necessarily expose themselves to the toxic behavior of many other players – and that would spoil the game not only for players like me but especially for my female teammates. They often face inappropriate comments in other games and have to decide: “Should I better not say anything, even if it harms our chances of winning, or risk being yelled at just because I’m a woman?”
LoL will fall into the same pit with the voice chat and lead players without detours into a swamp of toxicity. It can only backfire.
The German LoL professional NoWay was one of the players that MeinMMO author Ody saw live at TwitchCon. However, he probably no longer wants to play League of Legends. Why, you can find out in this article: Sauercrowd and WoW Classic have changed NoWay, the Twitch streamer even wants to quit LoL
