I've been playing a lot of Pokemon Unite over the holidays – which I do for a few weeks every year before I get bored of it again – and after a few days, I'm already tired. That's what bothers me the most about Unite Always Unite has bothered me since it started three years ago: when people think they're losing, they quit, leaving their team with fewer players and no chance of winning.
It wouldn't be a big deal if it happened occasionally, but it happens continuously. Unite sends a message to your inbox every time it detects that a teammate was caught idling (a coward's version of quitting) and since I started playing two days ago, I've had quitters/idlers in 12 games. That's at least half the games I play, if not more.
Leavers is a video game epidemic
It's not a Pokemon Unite problem (although it's definitely worse in Unite). I've had to deal with teammates throwing games in Overwatch 2, Apex Legends, League of Legends, Destiny 2, and Heroes of the Storm. This has been a problem in every team-based game I've played, and I'm sure it's a problem in all the ones I haven't played. It's been decades of this nonsense, and I really don't understand why.
Have you ever quit a game before it's over? I'm sure it's happened to me before. I probably got caught up in a long game of Counter-Strike in high school and had to leave because dinner was ready. From time to time I had connection issues that took me out of the game. There are reasons why people accidentally or have no choice but to quit a game, so I understand why games have penalty systems that forgive quitters.
What I don't understand is why they are there therefore Sorry that people can constantly and freely quit games. There's a big difference between going off the Internet once or twice a year and quitting every time you get mad, but those things are treated the same.
Every penalty system baffles me, but just take it as an example. Each player starts with 100 fair play points. If you leave a base or remain inactive, you will lose FP points depending on how long you are out of the game. Usually players will lose five points, which is a penalty of AFKing for two minutes. The maximum is eight, which you will only lose if you deactivate the entire game. If a player is successfully reported, they may lose an additional ten points.
If you have less than 80 points, you cannot line up for ranked matches, so each person is allowed to skip multiple matches without any results. Players also earn two FP points for every game they play, meaning you can only drop two out of every seven games in the final stretch, and you'll never be penalized. Of course, Pokemon Unite is free-to-play, so if you're really feeling the pinch, you can just swap to a new account and keep terrorizing your teammates.
You can only recover five points a day, so you're limited in how much pain you can inflict on others.
I had to look it all up because the whole fair play system doesn't apply to me. I never quit the game. If the system changes to permanently ban someone the first time they become inactive, it won't affect me. I actually don't think it should be harsh, but why don't developers see how close they can get to zero tolerance? Why are these systems so forgiving?
Why are the leaves so dull?
People argue that you have to be conservative with leveraging penalties because some people have frequent internet problems, and it's not fair to punish them for something out of their control. But they queued up for the game knowing that their internet is bad, so it's completely under their control. From the point of view of their teammates, it doesn't matter if they quit in anger or quit because their internet went out. Anyway, my game is ruined because of them, so I don't see why the penalty system caters to this supposed population of gamers with bad internet. Especially when it gives all the bad actors a free pass.
People also argue that games can't ban people liberally because it's a loss of revenue. I understand that a banned account can't buy skins, but what about the other four people on that person's team who have bad timing? I'm not sure the math checks out on that. When you give a break to someone who is ruining the game for everyone else, then everyone else loses interest in the game.
So ban the perma-holidays. Let's just try this. I know this will lead to complaints online. I wonder how Overwatch 2 players reacted when Blizzard instituted the lightest penalties of all time for those who quit in non-ranked games. But hey, I'm complaining on the internet anyway. We need studios to be brave enough to say 'if you ruin games for your team, you can no longer play our games'. That shouldn't be controversial, and if someone actually did that, it would just be a game.
Pokemon Unite is a free-to-play MOBA in which two teams of five players compete to score as many points as possible before time runs out. From Pikachu to Greninja, unleash their signature moves and dominate the battlefield.
