Respawn CEO Vince Zampella had to issue a lengthy apology on Twitter after some of his developers insulted fans in a Reddit thread about Apex Legends.
On Friday, we gave Apex fans an update on how we were changing the Iron Crown event. Some of the team then joined a discussion with our community on Reddit, and things got to a pretty bad place. Some of our folks crossed a line with their comments, and that's not how we want Respawn to be represented. I apologize to any of our fans that were offended. I will always stand behind the team here at Respawn and support them on speaking out against some of the toxic and nasty comments being directed at them, including everything from death threats to comments aimed at their family and loved ones. But we shouldn't contribute to it when we do comment, and add to the very thing we want to prevent. We need to lead by example. Last week we didn't do that, and going forward we will be better. Having an open, healthy relationship with our community is incredibly important to all of us at Respawn.
The developer nicknamed 'dko5' was particularly active with comments like the ones below.
I've been in the industry long enough to remember when players weren't complete ass-hats to developers and it was pretty neat. I forged a bunch of long-lasting relationships from back then. Would be awesome to get back there, and not engaging with toxic people or asking "how high" when a mob screams "jump" is hopefully a start.
There is a wealth of data available on how monetization works in free-to-play games, and we ourselves have run tests by putting skins on sale in the store. The amount of people who spend is crazy low, most of y'all are freeloaders (and we love that!) and a change in price doesn't move the needle.
Hey everyone - found the d*ck I was talking about. Guess what, I didn't even read your comment except for the first sentence and last. This kind of garbage doesn't warrant a reply - but lucky for you I already made a comment about this earlier. Go find it.
Even Respawn Community Manager 'Jayfresh' ended up writing a needlessly confrontational post.
So it's fine for you all to call us liars, full of shit, and other personal attacks when we communicate an apology and update to the event but we're "immature" when we call people out on it. Got it.
On one hand, it is absolutely true that toxicity is a problem in online games, especially competitive ones, both between gamers and from gamers to developers. Developers should never stoop so low as to respond in kind, however.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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