Open Letter to Parents of League of Legends' Players

[irishda]

It's five days old, but I haven't seen anything on it yet. Recently a forum post on the LoL site gained a lot of attention, to the point where it garnered a Penny Arcade response, which is how I found it to begin with. (I don't play League or MOBAs, with the exception of when I played Hero Attack in the Starcraft arcade.)

The post in question is titled "Open Letter to Parents of League of Legends' Players". A fairly basic letter (which I'll post below) that essentially tells parents to stop kicking their kids out of LoL games because it effects the other players. Unfortunately it reeks of two things. First, that it was written by someone who doesn't have kids of their own, as evidenced by their "advice", which amounts to "these games are long and lengths vary so stop letting your kids start a game if there's not enough time." Because every time a child is forced to leave the game, it's definitely because of a scheduled event, and not at all for something unexpected or because the time tables for both the game and real life activities vary wildly.

Secondly, while it espouses the noble goal of teaching children about responsibility to other people, it seems like the author is just using that as a shield to achieve their own wants because they lack perspective. AKA "I'm sick of children playing a game getting in the way of my imaginary score."

The comments to the letter are about what one would expect on the game's website, with most agreeing while the few actual parents that don't agree are downvoted. So I was curious as to the response from an outside community.

Spoiler: The Open Letter

This is an online game. In most cases, your child is playing with real people. Please take a moment to understand how this game's person-to-person interaction functions. In the past, I have seen numerous stories of children who routinely disconnect mid-game because it's bedtime, or their parents decide that they've played enough for the day. Some of these stories have come from parents themselves, proudly stating that they are firm about making their children stop playing at a specific time.

While it is admirable that you are teaching children some responsibility to schedules, please stop neglecting to teach them responsibility to other people. Unless your child is playing a Custom Game, his actions will permanently affect the statistics of up to 9 other people. Don't enforce behavior that involves disregarding other people. Do you want your child being callous to people in face-to-face situations too?

The average game of League of Legends lasts over 30 minutes. Many last close to an hour. When a game has begun, players have implicitly committed their time to each other until the game ends.

If you have given your child a strict cutoff time for play, do not allow him to begin a game if he has less than an hour left.

Bedtime in 30 minutes? Don't allow him to start a new game.
Dinner in 45 minutes? Don't allow him to start a new game.

If a game is in progress, do not interrupt it unless it is an emergency. You are affecting up to 10 people, not just your child.

Feel like checking your e-mail on the same computer? Please wait until the game is over so you don't completely ruin things for the real people on your child's team.
Is a game that started 90 minutes before bedtime somehow still in progress at 87 minutes? Please allow him to finish the match so you don't completely ruin things for the real people on your child's team. Games almost never last that long, and if people lose due to a teammate quitting after spending that much time on a match, they are likely to be more upset than usual.

Now you're probably thinking, "But what if my child takes advantage of me and starts a game 5 minutes before bedtime because now I'll feel guilty about making him quit a game in progress?" I have an answer for that. Are you ready for it? It's a two parter.

Let him finish the game. This sounds like you're letting your child walk all over you, but please just let the game finish normally and follow through with step 2.
Ground him. You're the parent. Don't let him play League for a while. If your kid tries to exploit you, you don't have to stand for it. Step 1 is just about showing courtesy to other people and being responsible to the team. However, your child should definitely learn that there are consequences for all actions.

If you are a parent and can't figure out why this is a problem, take some time to read how people react to children prematurely abandoning games.

If you know any parents who make their kids leave mid-game on a whim, please direct them to this thread.

Spoiler: Penny Arcade's response

 

[Qitz]

Pretty much what Penny Arcade said with the additions of:

A- Life > Game. Losing points or ELO or whatever the hell has, literally, no effect on you outside of the game. Not studying or doing your homework, however, does. Even chores do, since they're usually something that needs to be done to keep the house going, like taking out the trash or doing the dishes.

B- Things will always, ALWAYS, take different values of importance. Claiming that it's "a scheduled event and not at all for something unexpected or because the time tables for both the game and real life activities vary wildly" is just pure bunk. Even if it is a scheduled event, if that event is more important (in this case, it is 100%) then that takes precedence. You have the same deals with work. You can be right in the middle of working on a project for one client when a problem for another, either more important client or more drastic problem, pops up so you have to shift focus.

I'm not surprised the LoL Forums are self-serving either. All I can say is "tough shit, re-queue."

 

[Mutant1988]

To the guy that wrote that letter:

If you want to guarantee a game experience going your way you messed up in the first place when you decided to play with other people.

Other people do not exist to fill slots in your dream team. Life is a thing that happens. Deal with it.

I'm not surprised the LoL Forums are self-serving either. All I can say is "tough shit, re-queue."

Well put.

Seriously, you can tell others what to do with their time, their schedules, their life outside of this one video game - When you pay them a salary.

 

[Maximum Bert]

Well whatever its a game if possible you should see it through if you start thats only manners but I dont think it has to be an emergency to stop playing because as I said its a game other things take precedence.

Im not surprised people quit though especially when things dont look good some do that even in fighters and those matches rarely last 2 minutes.

 

[sonofliber]

I agree with the letter.

while yes there are thing outside of your control that need you to drop you game(and are perfectly justifiable), there are thing mentioned that dont justify shitting on other people, basically ruining the fun of 9 other people, cause you coundt let your kid finish a game.


Penny arcade post makes no sense, since it doesnt take into account how it screws up 9 other people (who perhaps dont have the time to play another game, and just set up time aside for 1 or 2 games)

Hell an example could be why letting your kid finish his sunday football game? take him out of the field at the 10 mins of second time.

 

[Thebazilly]

Yep, sounds like the LoL community.

Their ranking is the ABSOLUTE MOST IMPORTANT THING, guys. So you can't screw it up by leaving a game to spend time with your family, or being bad at the game, or playing a character that they don't like, or playing a character in a sub-optimal configuration.

The League community is just gross.

 

[sonofliber]

Yep, sounds like the LoL community.

Their ranking is the ABSOLUTE MOST IMPORTANT THING, guys. So you can't screw it up by leaving a game to spend time with your family, or being bad at the game, or playing a character that they don't like, or playing a character in a sub-optimal configuration.

The League community is just gross.

Yeah lets fuck people over, fuck the randoms, those non exisitant non me or my family people, its not like they are humans too

 

[Silentpony_v1legacy]

SNIP

Yeah lets fuck people over, fuck the randoms, those non exisitant non me or my family people, its not like they are humans too

Yeah but strangers online playing a game about fake people fighting fake monsters to protest a fake land, all to get arbitrary scores does not overwrite real life obligations, like family, jobs, etc...

Otherwise everyone who doesn't play LoL should feel ashamed because they're not committing their time to helping 9 random people feel better about themselves by improving their rank. Should we all have a moral obligation to play LoL?!

League of Legends is not community service, its a game. And if people want to take it super seriously, great! Good for them! But that doesn't mean anyone else is obliged to to take it as seriously.

 

[Rayce Archer]

I only played LoL unranked. I had a ton of fun. Not many leavers either, and lots of good ranked players trying out weird new playstyles so crazy stuff happens.

Man now I wanna play again but I don't want to wait through the 90 million patches I probably need.

 

[irishda]

I'm not surprised the LoL Forums are self-serving either. All I can say is "tough shit, re-queue."

Did you read some of the response too? Especially to the woman who said she was a mother with two kids and she always let them finish the game?

"Thanks for not being a stereotypical parent!"

Perspective on life shifts pretty hard when you become a parent or you're at least somewhat responsible for a kid, so I know the young Irishda would've probably agreed like, that's cool, you understand the game can't be paused.

But the me now is thinking more along the lines of "Yeah, thanks for not being the stereotypical parent trying to get their idiot kid to remember not to take games so seriously that they consume their life and override their obligations."

 

[Lightspeaker]

I agree with the principle of the letter but not the way its presented or the reasoning behind it.

To explain:
To me this isn't really an issue of "priorities" as the letter seems to put it, its an issue of basic politeness. When you join a team game you are committing yourself to play that game out. No, its not the end of the world if you have to quit and real life takes priority and so on and so forth; but its also extremely impolite to the other players in the game that you're effectively ruining their entertainment and wasting their time by starting a game that you know you cannot finish in time.

It has nothing to do with the importance of the game. Or people's stats. Or anything like that. Its just straight up being impolite by starting something that is a significant time commitment with a bunch of other people when you know you're not going to finish.

I'm sure people are going to go "so what? Its randoms on the internet! Who cares? Screw them!" but frankly that attitude is why large parts of the internet are the absolutely terrible state that they are. And also why gaming communities get such a bad rep. There are real people behind those names and they don't deserve someone being a dick to them.

 

[Mutant1988]

It has nothing to do with the importance of the game. Or people's stats. Or anything like that. Its just straight up being impolite by starting something that is a significant time commitment with a bunch of other people when you know you're not going to finish.

Multiplayer interactions are always at your own risk. You can never ever be guaranteed a good experience, because other people do not exist to facilitate your entertainment.

If you want to guarantee that, you play with people who would never be interrupted and only those people. Or you play singleplayer games (And this is a large reason why a lot of people prefer them).

This letter is a person going out of their way to tell parents that they are in the wrong, in being parents, because the game should take priority over dinner.

Why? Because he says so. Some random internet ****wit that has no claim our authority to impose any kind of rule whatsoever on their kids. He himself has made no effort to minimize the possibilities of his entertainment being cut short by other people's lives interfering, but is demanding that other people do it for him.

The notion that a kid should or would "know" they don't have time is laughable. I've never heard of a kid that could keep track of the time while they were playing.

It is impolite to leave, sure. But it happens. It's even more impolite to throw a hissy fit because of it.

 

[Zhukov]

Yep, sounds like the LoL community.

Their ranking is the ABSOLUTE MOST IMPORTANT THING, guys. So you can't screw it up by leaving a game to spend time with your family, or being bad at the game, or playing a character that they don't like, or playing a character in a sub-optimal configuration.

The League community is just gross.

Yeah lets fuck people over, fuck the randoms, those non exisitant non me or my family people, its not like they are humans too

It's not about them being people or not, it's about the fact that it's a game.

Just a game. Basically a virtual football match.

It's some kid throwing a tantrum because Timmy's mom interrupted their football game when she had to take him to the dentist.

You're not being "fucked over", you're being put at a disadvantage in a video game multiplayer match. Get some perspective.

 

[Dandark]

Rather than saying that parents should let their kid finish the game I would prefer a letter that tells the kids to not start a game when they may have to go soon. It's incredibly frustrating when people quit out of games in League and while real world concerns do take priority over game concerns it would be great if people actually check that they have time to play a match of LoL before starting one up.

A match of LoL will usually take about 30-45 mins while sometimes lasting even longer. Please be sure you have at least 40 minutes available before starting a game.

SNIP

Yeah lets fuck people over, fuck the randoms, those non exisitant non me or my family people, its not like they are humans too

Yeah but strangers online playing a game about fake people fighting fake monsters to protest a fake land, all to get arbitrary scores does not overwrite real life obligations, like family, jobs, etc...

While I agree that anything in real life takes priority over an online video game...
It is not "fake people" fighting "fake" monsters. It is real people playing a game against other real people. A game that usually lasts 30+ minutes and in which a teammate cannot be replaced. Someone quitting before it's finished effectively ruins the chances of one team and forces everybody to waste their time on a non-satisfying match until it ends.

A team can choose to surrender but this requires at least 20 minutes of game time before they can even try it. In a ranked match this will also count as a loss which will upset some people when it happens enough. I imagine the letter was written by a player venting after losing the promo match he spent a month working towards because a kid decided to try and play a ranked LoL match 10 minutes before dinner or something.

Real life takes priority but that doesn't make it any less frustrating for the other players whose time is being wasted.

 

[Mutant1988]

Rather than saying that parents should let their kid finish the game I would prefer a letter that tells the kids to not start a game when they may have to go soon. It's incredibly frustrating when people quit out of games in League and while real world concerns do take priority over game concerns it would be great if people actually check that they have time to play a match of LoL before starting one up.

A match of LoL will usually take about 30-45 mins while sometimes lasting even longer. Please be sure you have at least 40 minutes available before starting a game.

To reiterate what I said in my last post:

I have never ever seen or heard of a kid that can keep track of time while they are playing.

Also, multiplayer is always played at your own risk. It's up to the player jumping into it to take measures to ensure their enjoyment.

It is not a task to be delegated to the parents of other players.

If he wants to guarantee his enjoyment he can create a team of people that will not quit for any reason and make sure to always play with those people. He can only make that kind of demand on his friends or anyone he pays a salary.

 

[Dandark]

Rather than saying that parents should let their kid finish the game I would prefer a letter that tells the kids to not start a game when they may have to go soon. It's incredibly frustrating when people quit out of games in League and while real world concerns do take priority over game concerns it would be great if people actually check that they have time to play a match of LoL before starting one up.

A match of LoL will usually take about 30-45 mins while sometimes lasting even longer. Please be sure you have at least 40 minutes available before starting a game.

To reiterate what I said in my last post:

I have never ever seen or heard of a kid that can keep track of time while they are playing.

Also, multiplayer is always played at your own risk. It's up to the player jumping into it to take measures to ensure their enjoyment.

It is not a task to be delegated to the parents of other players.

If he wants to guarantee his enjoyment he can create a team of people that will not quit for any reason and make sure to always play with those people. He can only make that kind of demand on his friends or anyone he pays a salary.

I should have mentioned it but yeah I disagree with the letter blaming parents. They can't control what their kid does 24/7 and kids don't always keep track of time.

It just annoys me to see people talking as if players don't have a right to be annoyed at someone quitting simply because "it's only a game" or "Kids! What can you do?". While some may get too angry over it (The lol community has a lot of rage problems) it's not unreasonable to be frustrated for them to be frustrated.

I think that people also look a lot angrier than they really are since the outlet for players frustration is often to just yell about it on the LoL forums or in game chat.

 

[Lightspeaker]

I've never heard of a kid that could keep track of the time while they were playing.

My point is that parents should be teaching their kids that. That's how kids learn. Its how I learned to manage my own time. I don't exactly see this as something as controversial as you seem to be making it. Sure, kids can be dumb; but that's why parents are expected to teach them.

The letter came across as something of a temper tantrum. But I see no issue with the concept of "people should learn to manage their time and be polite" that you seem to dislike.

 

[Mutant1988]

I've never heard of a kid that could keep track of the time while they were playing.

My point is that parents should be teaching their kids that. That's how kids learn. Its how I learned to manage my own time. I don't exactly see this as something as controversial as you seem to be making it. Sure, kids can be dumb; but that's why parents are expected to teach them.

The letter came across as something of a temper tantrum. But I see no issue with the concept of "people should learn to manage their time and be polite" that you seem to dislike.

The letter writer made a concious choice to play with strangers. Strangers do not exist to facilitate his entertainment.

If strangers interfere with his entertainment, by accident or on purpose, that's a risk he should have known before he clicked "Join Multiplayer Session".

Shall we write a letter admonishing the parents of griefers as well?
Or maybe spawn campers?
Or how about parents that are distracted by their children?
People that get sudden visitors and have to go open the door?
People that get sudden unexplained explosive bowel evacuations?

It's a childish complaint and he should know better. If you want the game to go your way, you chose who you play with. It's that simple.

I mean, for **** sake. I would curse about people quitting (This is why I don't do competitive) but to keep that anger going for long enough to write a letter to those people's parents? That's insane.

 

[Denamic]

It's basic netiquette to finish games you commit to. Nevermind imaginary points; if you up and leave 30 minutes into a game, you're taking a shit on up to 9 other player's time. It may be 'just a game', but the time and effort put into it is very real. It's very disrespectful to disregard it as insignificant.

 

[happyninja42]

Yep, sounds like the LoL community.

Their ranking is the ABSOLUTE MOST IMPORTANT THING, guys. So you can't screw it up by leaving a game to spend time with your family, or being bad at the game, or playing a character that they don't like, or playing a character in a sub-optimal configuration.

The League community is just gross.

Yeah lets fuck people over, fuck the randoms, those non exisitant non me or my family people, its not like they are humans too

It's not about them being people or not, it's about the fact that it's a game.

Just a game. Basically a virtual football match.

It's some kid throwing a tantrum because Timmy's mom interrupted their football game when she had to take him to the dentist.

You're not being "fucked over", you're being put at a disadvantage in a video game multiplayer match. Get some perspective.

I like that you make the comparison to other types of games, as it reminds me of playing with my friends when I was younger. When one of us would peel off from the mass of kids because of obligation, it was never a big deal. If it effected the imaginary thing we were doing, we'd alter the game we were playing to deal with this. If it wasn't a big alteration to the game, we'd just keep playing.

As for the letter itself, yeah I don't really have any sympathy for this guy and his problems. When I played LoL, I got really tired of the toxicity of the players, and their entitled mentality. Some of the other threads I've seen, trying to justify this behavior make me laugh, there was one here, something about "Try Hards" I think. Yeah, no thanks. I'm glad I never bothered with ranked shit in that game, as the few times I did rank, it was even worse than random queue. I'd rather play ARAM and just have fun.