265: Curing the Noobonic Plague

[ZacktheWolf]

Good article with a few great points... especially that we were all once noobs and people should remember that.
With Steam having only recently opened their... (I refuse to make a Portal pun) doors to Mac gamers, there will be/is a huge influx of people who have NEVER played CounterStrike:Source, Team Fortress 2, or anything of HL2 before, myself included. As excited as I am to finally try these games, I'm put off by the feeling that everyone's going to call me a noob just because I don't know the best CS:S setup or have all the TF2 maps memorized.

Maybe once the current "noobs" become experienced players, we'll have new generation of gamers very welcoming to newcomers - they'll remember how harsh their initiation was, and won't want to put someone else through that. Then again, this is the internet, so that may be their justification for continuing the hostility.

*goes back to playing CS:S on a server populated entirely by bots*

 

[rembrandtqeinstein]

The solution is to man up nancy. Oh no, some anonymous troll said mean things, no reason to cry about it. Channel Spock, if the haters elicit any kind of emotional response from you then they win.

Some people will always be better than you at stupid games, such is life. Some of them have so few accomplishments and prospects in their meatspace lives that they NEED the self esteem boost of pwning nubs or else they will cut their wrists.

As for the comments, why are you even dignifying their existence with column inches? Reading internet comments is like panning for gold. The vast majority of them are useless crap but you need to wade through that to find the useful gems. And youtube comments can be summed up in this xkcd:

 

[Not-here-anymore]

Part of the problem when it comes to 'newb-bashing' is definitely due to more experienced players resenting/mocking the newer players for holding the team back/losing, badly. Some is due to resentment that these new players seem to be better at the game than them, after decades spent honing their FPS skills.
The worst for flaming on these things are the 'n00bs' - people who use only the cheapest tactics 'for teh lulz' or who just plain aren't very good. Or who are good, but insist on using 1337 speak and telling everyone else how shit they are. There are probably other faces to the many-headed n00b creature, but I can't be bothered to list them all.

But a lot of it is due to the nature of anonymity on the internet. The realisation that you can do whatever the hell you want with no consequence upon 'real you' is a powerful intoxicant, and one that few people can resist. In essence, people troll to see what it's like to be a massive tool to everyone they find. Some of them like it, and carry on. Some of them don't, and stop. Then they realise that trying to be reasonable on /b/ is like trying to not be on fire whilst on the surface of the Sun, so they leave and start an escapist account... Wait, I'm just describing me, here. But I'm sure other people have been through the same thing.

 

[Gothproxy]

I honestly believe and agree with the theory that people feel free to get so hateful due to one very simple fact: No one is going to come to their house and punch them in the face. If someone said things of this nature in public long enough, someone else would take serious enough issue with it and act upon the anger/rage it inspires. Thus, a swift punch to the choppers or other such retaliation. In my own "hating" view, I feel that those who really get up on a "noob" and proceed to tirade about the chat box/posting board, etc like some self-appointed king, are really just cowards who, away from the computer, are the ones who are picked on by others in school, work, social events, etc. Because there is no real accounting for what you say online, yet, the hate will continue.

But hey, at least it gives me something to read to occupy my time grinding out levels every once in a while. =D

 

[Danhoyt]

I have to admit that noobs do piss me off.

There, I said it. I must include though that I only mean one kind of noob. The kind that play the multiplayer without having played single-player at all. They make me mad, because when they end up on my team, they're still learning how to play, they don't know the controls and they have no clue what they are doing. Then when their K/D is -15, I want to do evil things to them. They do frustrate me, because that is what single-player is for.

Other than that, I think hardcore or experienced gamers should embrace the noobs, because we want as many people as we can to see that gaming is an entertainment medium just like movies, books, music or magazines. Noobs will come in handy when politicians start trying to impose their beliefs on us. Then we will all want the noobs we can find on our team.

Also, youtube in the dumbest site around. Whether its politics, (Obama is a Communist! He wasn't born in the U.S.!) cooking (Real chefs make their own sauce! Her accent was annoying!) or Aikido (Aikido isn't a real martial art! MMA Rulz!) discussion boards are usually just filled with idiots who usually type in all caps.

 

[Dora]

Interesting. So "hardcore" gamers are the cranky old men of the internet who used to have to walk backwards uphill through a snowstorm without shoes BOTH WAYS just to get rare item drops. I always suspected!

Man, whatever. As long as the people I am playing with are fun, I could care less about their experience level. The minute you start getting angry about something so silly as a bunch of pixels is the minute it stops being fun. If I don't like how they play, I can always take my football and go somewhere else.

 

[UberNoodle]

Basically, non-noobs think that their experience makes them somehow 'special'. Therefore, they set themselves us as gatekeepers because, of course, they were 'born' so skilled, right? They forget that everybody has been a noob at some point. Segregating the community in this way is counter productive and it serves only to massage fragile egos of certain 'hardcore' gamers who have forgotten how to be humble and that they should be contributing, not stifling, the community.

 

[Fearzone]

Let's take baseball. There are widely varying levels of ability, between families playing at the church picnic, to the pros. Obviously, it makes no sense to pit the family team against the pros. The family team would feel out of place, and the pros would feel unchallenged at the inexperience of the family team.

Now let's take Internet gaming. Generally there is little effort to separate the "pro" level players from the "church picnic" players. When there is an attempt to create different divisions, what happens then? The l33t sweep down on the n00b games and totally contaminate the system. The only way the picnic players could keep the pros out is to create their own league and set up their own games, screening the players with whom they wish to play with or not. I don't know of any online game that assists with people doing that, outside of private servers. It would be nice if games let us do that without private servers.

Another thing that creates the noob problem: in competitve events, beyond picnic fun, rarely do participants go in without some level of training and practice from a coach or someone experienced with the activity. But with computer games, you might have single player to figure out the commands and controls, but other than that the casual player is thrown in with the wolves.

 

[TerranReaper]

I'm fine with noobs, but what really irks me is any noob that goes into a game, expects us to go easy on them or expects it to be some easy game and then complaining or asking really obvious questions that would've been addressed on the in-game tutorial. Baptism by fire, deal with it.

 

[MissAshley]

I feel primarily two points come into play:

1) Many, many people either lack the capacity for empathy or simply choose not to engage it.

2) The "persecution" many gaming enthusiasts had to endure during the 80s and 90s has made them very weary of "outsiders."

I must come clean and admit I sometimes feel threatened by certain types of newer gamers: Those who I think probably would have tormented me as a child for playing games then, but play them now because the general tone of games has changed from fantastical to realistic.

 

[DanDeFool]

The old school-versus-noob phenomenon reminds Madigan of the kind of hazing that can show up at college fraternities and sororities.

"People who have to endure hardships to get or enjoy something are much more likely to value it than people who get it without those hardships," Madigan says.

I heard a story about a frat pledge at a local state university that was sleep-deprived for probably four days, had his ass filled with Cheez-Whiz, and had to have another sleep-deprived pledge scrape it out while weeping and naked in the shower.

...

I think we can all agree that being called a 'f***ing n00b' is at least somewhat more civilized than that.

 

[Squeaky]

I'll help actual new people, but like in BF or BFBC2 when lvl 30 - 50 spawn camp i tell them were to f$#king stick it. Maybe playing CSS for years made me this way but hey i like me.

 

[Larsirius]

To some extent, regarding online gaming in games such as Halo, GOW, COD, BF, etc, I believe that one part of the problem is that most experienced players aren't playing their games to play with greenhorns. They want a balanced, competative experience, with their friends or strangers. Sure, people could to be more patient, but when you come home from a long day of studies, school, work, etc, and look forward to sit down and enjoy a video game, you don't want your experience ruined because several teammates are at a whole different skill level than you. When you have limited time to play, you don't want to spend most of your time playing an unbalanced game where you're bound to lose, or spending a lot of time finding a balanced game.
Imagine if you were rehersing for a cencert with your long time band, and it's a gig you've been looking forward to, and you know the song like the back of your hand, and the rehersal is to polish the song to make it shine. However, you have to include a newbie player at the arranger's request(a VIP of the arrangement, etc). That person is noe "invading" your experience, you will have to spend the whole reharsal teaching the newbie the basics of the song, and you can kiss that polishing goodbye. In this case, your patiance WILL be limited.
Mix that scenario up with teenagers with hormones pumping, anonymity, mices, and you've got a volatile mix.

 

[Dhatz]

I'm in gaming for at least 10 years and never did I think the best games are already made. I agree that most of new stuff is just dumb, but still the best way to go is invention, not copying of the old stuff, so no, never do I overvalue history.

 

[BuchalBainne]

I don't mind 'newbs' if anything, I'm glad to see them. It's nice to know that your gaming community in growing and that the new guys are willing to learn and have fun.

On the other hand, 'noobs' make me sick.

 

[Drakfyre]

By any chance did you ask David Braben when Elite 4 is coming?

 

[beefpelican]

There's a reason, I think, as to why most hardcore gamers seem to be fine peeps IRL while usually being the kinds of twats who insult casuals over the internet to make themselves feel better.

It's the internet itself. It's not just gamers, but anyone who uses the internet immediately goes through ego-inflation, hence no wonder why forums and chatrooms and such tend to be so attractive for people who are shy in real life. And in the case of hardcore gamers it's the same thing really. IRL their egoes are still held in check, because they see other people as people, rather than some faceless internet forum user, and hence exert at least some common courtesy.

But put them into a videogame forum or chatroom and watch them spout out whatever they will in order to make themselves feel better, feed their egoes and subscribe to the illusion that their words are actually having an impact on their object of adoration, whereas that far more likely could not be farther from the truth.

But what about the author's other point about guitar training videos and forums? Those are also on the internet, yet aren't filled with the same level of anger. I think the necessarily competitive nature of video games contributes to all the hatin'. Also, like the author said, there is a general perception that the 'non-gaming' world sees all gamers as losers wasting their time. I'd say these two factors are just as important as the facelessness of the internet.

 

[LightningBanks]

I dont help noobs because I cant BECAUSE I never use any form of communication headset unless im talking to friends. Speaking of friends, one of em pisses me off when he says everyones a 'noob' because HE falls into thier trap or gets repeatedly killed by them.

BUT when i used to play killing floor (great game btw) on my laptop when it was good (if it still was id still be playing it) I used to help the team by supplying weapons and tell people to watch out. And in team fortress 2 everyone always complements people on good shots, instead of getting fussy and calling them a 'lucky noob'

I also hate it when people accuse you of ebing a noob for the way you play. On cod6 (when i used to play it) There was a guy camping and using one man army and m203 (or noob-tube), so to stop him I switched to my speed clasee with tactical knife. When I killed him I got a huge message saying on how i was a 'noob' for using it, and how 'pro' he was.

Ive never used to recieved any of this crap on Killing Floor, Counter strike or team fortress 2 on pc, and every console game I play online just makes me want to sell the console to save for a new laptop.

But im ranting now, i apologize, to summarise, Consoles are full of Idiots