Valorant is scheduled to launch fully out of its closed beta on the 2nd of June, in less than a week’s time. As such, Riot have gone out of their way to assure fans that certain currently-missing features are on the way, particularly where it concerns how they plan to deal with disruptive behaviour. The studio has promised that a range of anti-harassment tools will be ready and implemented at launch.
Riot’s Promised Anti-Harassment Features for Valorant
According to Riot, their response to disruptive player behaviour in Valorant has been “slow”. However, in a recent blog post discussing the problem, they state that the; “Closed Beta was a wakeup call”. As such, they have been working on a variety of new anti-harassment tools which they pledge will be available in-game when it launches on the 2nd of June. In their words; “Almost everyone playing VALORANT wants to compete without fear of harassment or disruption, and it’s on us to provide you the tools and community to guarantee that kind of experience. […] We have to demonstrate this commitment every day – particularly at launch and beyond.”
Specifically, Riot has committed to providing four different anti-harassment tools at launch. More will come over time, but these four areas will be the core of their initial anti-harassment efforts. Firstly, Riot promises to provide clear community expectations to all players. These should make clear to everybody what sort of behaviour is and isn’t acceptable. Secondly, the studio pledges to improve automation of reporting. More specifically, this includes automated chat analysis; “for blatant violations of our community code,” as well as automated analysis of reports and the escalation of repeat offenders for more severe punishment.
In addition to these two areas, Riot will also be punishing infractions of the community guidelines in two ways; chat restrictions and voice restrictions. In both cases, the studio will restrict offenders from using chat or voice features for 72 hours. Beyond these promises, Riot has said that they will provide regular updates on ongoing work on their Valorant anti-harassment measures. Indeed, they request that fans; “continue voicing your opinions via player support tickets, in-game reporting, and social media so we can build these systems and iterate on our expectations together.”