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I am tired of playing with children, but I don't want to stop playing mmo's.
Fyendiar
Member UncommonPosts: 250
The problem with online games is that they are anonymous, you can't tell from anything other than their attitude what age the people you group up with are . You may feel you are talking to an immature 40 year old while perhaps you are in fact talking to a very mature 11 year old. I am beginning to see this as a bigger problem as the years go by.
I will be 37 later this month and completely tired of having to deal with childish players. I know adults can be as, if not more childish than some children, but there are just some things I don't like saying in front of children. I just act and talk, as should everyone, different when I am with a child than I would with someone my own age.
Since I know it is impossible to create a truly adult mmo (nudity, blood, gore and foul language don't make mmo's mature), I am thinking of how to continue. I could try to just find a guild that only allows adults to join, but let's face it, people can say whatever age they wish, nobody can check it. Also even if I would find a guild that in fact only had true adults in it, I still am playing in a massive multiplayer environment and secluding myself within said guild would remove much from the fun mmo's bring.
You may ask youself why I am writing all this down, but it's to ask other gamers how they deal with this. When I see a child act childish on the street it brings a smile on my face since that child is acting his or her age and is having fun. When I see childish behaviour in mmo's I often forget that it may as well be a child doing it, and as a result it annoys because chances are it's an adult. Do you just swallow the annoyance? Do you embrace your inner child and act childish as well? Do you turn off all public channels and seclude yourselves from the masses? What do you do?
I am on the edge of giving up on mmo's because I notice that it is starting to annoy me more and more. Maybe I should move away from the popular mmo's and find one that may attract a more mature audience. To be perfectly honest I am at a loss at the moment...
Thanks for listening.
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Since a topic like this will result in the same old "it has nothing to do with age" responses:
Look at the age of the majority of your friends, you will notice that their age is not too different from your own. There is a reason for that and that reason is simple: people of different ages ARE different. A middle aged man with a majority of his friends being children is suspect for a reason.
Comments
Couldn't agree more.
I think your(or our) best bet would be to look at the more complex games such as eve or ryzom that are out atm or more likely loook to the ones that are coming to offer something to the more mature audience
i agree. I tried to jsut seclude myself from the immature and morons. you'll never get away from them 100% of the time.
The problem is 100% yours and created by you. ..
there are plenty of adult based guilds.. and mutli gaming clans spread across mmo's..
Then, you can also choose a mmo known for having a more adult community "lotro and eq2 vs wow for example"
I have NOT had this issue in so so long, because of who i choose to run with. There will always be kids playing mmo's, they are very simple to avoid if you so choose. I can't remember the last time i had to deal with one.
so the solution.. picking an game with lots of adults "ie avoiding wow, sorry i have to say that" and even if you do play wow.. go to step 2
Find a clan that has an age minimum, or atleast, an "be an adult" requirement.. simple.. effective..
and..
turn off general chat.. or ignore it.. personally, my feelings are you should, at 37 years old, be more proactive to avoid what annoys you, and am shocked you would even complain about such a easily rectifiable issue. It's like saying, i beat my head into a wall, and now my head hurts.. how do you all avoid beating you heads into a wall?
I hear where you are coming from. I mainly just steer toward games with more mature populations. Agree with the above poster about EVE and Ryzom. EVE & Ryzom tend to be older because of the complexity I assume. I've also found AoC to be more mature in general. I assume due to the rating.
Otherwise, mostly get into a guild with older folks. Get into a guild that does not self describe itself as 'hardcore' since many of these (though not all) cater towards people with more free time, i.e. fewer adult responsibilities.
"Never met a pack of humans that were any different. Look at the idiots that get elected every couple of years. You really consider those guys more mature than us? The only difference between us and them is, when they gank some noobs and take their stuff, the noobs actually die." - Madimorga
As it turns out the average age of a gamer is 34 and rising. Sorry I dont have link handy.
So, depending on what game you are playing more than likely people are above 30
Please do not respond to me, even if I ask you a question, its rhetorical.
Please do not respond to me
I try not to let the behaviour of others in a game have too much impact on my own enjoyment of it, but sometimes it is unavoidable. In most of the games I play where it will matter I tend to play with groups that use voice comms and from there it's fairly easy to see who may be lieing about their age.
Try not to fixate on it and always ask yourself 'does it really matter to me as I'm playing right now?' and try, as you state, to find a stable guild of people who you can play with long term.
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The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
Have you tried AOC? Pretty mature game, bound to have some kids in there but it seems better than most, along that line LOTRO is one of the best communities out there.
In other game removing yourself from any global chat is a good idea, I keep a good fesh rotation in my block list removing old ones reguarly and replacing them with other immature spammers.
As for a mature guild, apply to the older gamers (25+) here http://www.theoldergamers.com/forum/barracks/
Yea, pretty much what's been said.. stay away from the casual mmo stuff, and play the more "hardcore" ones (the complex high thought-processing based ones).
Them immature kids don't tend to have the attention span to play those
Turning 35 this year...
Actually i usually just ignore it..i mean most of the time it feels like if you went to a school playground and listened in to all the kids acting dumb, goofing about and well being kids...i know i did when i was young.
When some start making racist or homophobic jokes etc (kids can make them thinking they are quite harmless after all...it's the adults doing them that are the scary ones) then i have no problem asking them to please stop because it isn't cool (not those exact words but not in a rude manner). If they continue then i report them and if possible add to my ignore list.
I find i am a lot more out of touch with the 'general' community nowadays though than say when i was playing Ultima Online for example.
This is why I play games that not everyone and their mom can understand how to play.
entropia universe,second life,eve
First point: in my experience, the problem cases are nearly always 18-40 year olds playing from moms basement acting like bratty 11yr-olds because they are in an environment where mommy can't spank them. The actual 11-16yr olds playing long-term tend to be rather more stable and try hard to be taken seriously, there are exceptions of course but most of the true lolz kiddz don't have the patience or dedication to advance.
Secondly, as others have said you can isolate yourself from most of these by being in the right guild/kin/corp/alliance etc. Game selection also matters a lot.
Lastly, AoC? Are you kidding me? Its' cheeseball worse-than-leisure-suit-larry nudity and gore attracted all the jackasses.
Your best bet mate is to stick to more complex mmorpgs, specifically EvE.
Despite the fact that the game is an interactive screensaver, it has an incredibly mature community.
If The Matrix Online was still around I think that community would have been perfect for you..
About the annoying kids, there isn't much you can do. Maybe I'm just a cynical person who doesn't really care, but I act the exact same around people of all ages. I'm not concered with the feelings and mindset of any child playing the game, in my opinion anyone below 14 or 15 shouldn't be playing mmo's. Admitted I started playing when I was 9, but things were a little different back then. Point is, if the idea of children being in your mmo is this much of a problem, you have to learn to accept it, you'll never get rid of them.
@ OP you are not alone. The best thing to do is try and find a mature guild/legion and ignore all the loudmouths. Ive been playing computer games since the Sinclair Spectrum and wont give up a good hobby !
If you have a good system try Vanguard.
Experience demands that man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term to the general prey of the rich on the poor.
Thomas Jefferson
The above post is barely constructive. The example of banging one's head into the wall is completely invalid given the circumstances; the OP's issue would be better related to having their head beat into a wall by someone else. One might then argue to avoid that person at all costs, to avoid having their head beat in, but that does not address the problem it only avoids it.
Personally I don't mind children in PvE games/content, as while they can be very immature, they can also be amusing and often treat a game as, well, a game. However, children (especially early teens) in PvP can be extremely annoying due to the adrenaline and competitive factor inherent in that type of content.
I'd love to see an "adults-only" server reserved for age 25+, but it would be difficult to enforce and probably lower population overall. Then again, as noted earlier int hsi chain, there are some adults that are (and pride themselves on being) less mature and more vulgar than teenagers.
Preventative measures can go a long way, but at the end of the day you're never going to be exclusively gaming with only those people you like in a massively multiplayer game.
I am more tired to share the frigging WORLD with kids and idiots... in that grand scheme of things sharing it in MMOs is only a minor annoyance. Especially when idiocy isnt so much locked to any age group, but making 30+ servers really would be a progress I want to see. That and IQ tests for voting rights.
Oh and just for the record: no this is not a joke.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Mid 30's here and I always try to find a guild that best suites me so I don't have to deal with nonsense some like to bring with them.
Asking a kid to stop because its not cool just makes a kid want to do it more. They are kids after all and you just gave them the attention they was looking for..
Just ignore the kids and move on. Add them to the ignore list
This is what works for me:
1) Avoid free-to-play games. Sure, there are some mature people playing those but way too many lack mature social values.
2) Avoid pvp-centric games. Sure, there are some mature people playing those but way too many lack mature social values.
3) Choose a game which requires a lot of thinking and reading, something intellectually challenging.
4) Find a guild that has a minimum age requirement.
5) Turn-off global chat.
I can't imagine having difficulties if you do any 3 of those 5 steps.
I basically make sure I join a good guild of players, block players when I'm tired of their nonsense and turn off chat channels if they just get out of hand.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
This is good advice and your only hope...immature and stupid peopel have the right to paly games too but you have the rights and means to block their inane prattle and choose woh you do actively play with.
That's the thing, I can either let others dicatate, albeit passively, what I play or not play or I just accept that there is no way to make a poisonous player respect the general space.
Over the years I've had few issues with players because I just turn them off. I also stay away from most pug's because that is the sure way to get someone you are not going to like.
This is a shame because, though pug's have been the worst mmo experiences, there have been a few that absolutely shined.
But more often than not they were bad with people who drove me nuts. And that has nothing to do with them knowing their class or playing well.
I'd rather play with a good, fun and nice group of people who aren't pros and who don't mind dying but take it in stride over expert players who are prissy or rude or demanding.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Thanks for all the replies so far!
I should probably have a less "open world" view to mmo's and seclude myself more from the masses. I have never been a fan of the ignore option since it also includes people that perhaps just had a bad frustrated day and got out of line. The reference to banging my head against a wall is probably more accurate then I at first thought. I used to seclude myself from the masses far more in the past and that is probably the reason I had less frustration than I do now.
I am a wanderer at the moment though, switching mmo's a lot in search for one that feels right again. Because of this I tend not to seclude myself too much because I am a new player in those mmo's and need to find the likeminded individuals. Seclusion does not make finding those persons an easy task.
Anyway, thanks for the food for thought so far, keep them coming!
As someone who is 60 in a couple of weeks I can entirely sympathise with the OP.
I follow a few simple rules in the way I approach MMOs:-
1. I play whenever possible on a European PvE role-play server, the combination of those factors tends to ensure a more mature community than will otherwise apply.
2. I don't PvP (other than occasional scenarios in WAR).
3. As I have got older I have made the conscious decision not to do guilds and pretty much not to do groups unless it's with RL friends. I still socialise in other ways through helping out with quests, trading, crafting, and in public chat channels with the proviso given below. I've done both guilds and grouping in the past but I'm no longer interested in political infighting, have zero interest in voice-chat and petty guild rules and never could stand the immature antics of the "jumpers and buffers" at guild meetings etc. I'm also no longer interested in hanging around for ages for a group to get under way only for it to fall apart a couple of unnecessary wipes later because someone forgot to mention he'd be logging off partway through the dungeon.
4. At the first sign of offensive or childish chat I disable the public chat channels.
I cannot emphasise too highly that my concern with childish behaviour is pretty much unrelated to the age of the players, I have played alongside some impressively mature kids while I have also played alongside some depressingly immature adults.