Tension Between Casual and Competitive Gaming Communities

Squid School Links:

#splatoon3 #casual #competitive

[Varagoth]

Man is secretly teaching a class on how to be better humans, but contextualizing it in Splatoon because that's the only way some of us will listen

[blugoo]

The twist ending, masterful writing 10/10

[Bransbow]

19:42 I love how this whole section applies to life overall, beyond just competitive vs casual gaming and dating advice.
That’s honestly one of my favorite things about this channel: hidden life lessons.

[jmaks]

As a kid my dad was my soccer coach from when I started playing town ball up until high school when I moved up to more competitive leagues. The team he coached and I played on consisted of boys and girls who loved the game of soccer and were just looking to play with their friends on Saturdays. Something my dad always told us was “I’m not here to make the best team in the state or anything. I just want to give you all the chance to have fun, so that someday you’ll want to share the joy of soccer with your kids like I am with you.” I took it for granted as a kid but looking back it’s really important to cultivate a genuine love for something in new members of a community if you want them to stay. At the end of the day splatoon is a game, and games are meant to be played for our enjoyment, and they are better when played with other people! So no matter competitive or casual, if we want to expand our community we should make sure that we welcome new people; we don’t need to coddle them, we don’t need to demolish them. If we show them how much fun there is to glean from playing splatoon, or any game/sport/activity for that matter, they’ll want to come back. And in coming back they’ll get better and provide more challenge to those of us veteran players. Everyone benefits from making the community a better place.

[sethfeldpausch]

Ultimately, this wouldn't be an argument if Nintendo could fix their damn matchmaking! Pitting B rankers with S+ rankers is fun for NO ONE!

[LARKXHIN]

Tbh as long as you're not being outwardly mean, new players will learn and get the gist. We all lose sometimes.

[slanesd]

I liked the quote "Let them be curious, and let the curiosity bring them back" at 7:56

[theskull]

I'd say going easy on a less experienced player and challenging them to improve are not incompatible. You can beat a new player and punish mistakes without using 100% of your power. There's a reason difficulty curves tend to seek a sweet spot, as too little will get you nowhere but too much is just overwhelming.

[momzwrite]

I tried entering a smash tournament when the Wii u version was still new. I had that negative experience of the first group that Gem mentioned. I got styled-on by a few of the players there who were showing off to their friends, I felt like an outsider. It was a pretty negative experience all around and I walked away just feeling like the community is a bunch of a-holes. Which makes me sad because I still like watching certain streamers for that game.

[WeeklyMusicalShitposts]

The one I saw on Twitter most was a clam blitz game where a 4-stack got 30-40 kills each without knocking the other team out. Calling that out is not "telling them to go easy on the other team." It's just pointing out that it's a dick move. You've proven you're better than the other team. Just win and let them play against someone else.

[Boooo]

Take a shot every time something in life requires not jumping to two extremes and having balance

[Slogstin]

I almost exclusively play Turf and one thing i like to do with newbies is just hitting them with 1 or 2 warning shots and leave them a second to figure out if they really want to keep walking forward or back off.
If they keep wandering forward aimlessly, they gone. If they back off or pressure me with subs before going in, congrats, you did not die instantly and used your head!

[SicklySeraph]

Instructions unclear I accidentally became a better person with a healthier mindset and view on life

[Quargos]

A really good video on the subject, which puts a lot of my feelings on the subject into words in a better way than I would have been able to find on my own.

[scribblecloud]

as a casual player, i would not like people going easy on me intentionally, but i also get frustrated when i keep losing no matter what i try. I mean really i just wanna play only against people that are relatively in the same skill level as i.
Getting good at multiplayer games is so confusing to me because when i win, i never know if its because i was good, because my team was good, or because the other team was bad. I never feel like im learning because theres not really anything that i can consistently do that consistently results in more wins, it just kind of seems like regardless what i do, sometimes i have a win streak and i feel great, and then i have a loosing streak and i feel awful.

Thats honestly part of why i barely play anything besides salmon run, because in salmon run i actually know what i can do to become better, and i can actually feel myself get a lot better in a noticable way and reasonable amount of time, whereas with other gamemodes i have always just been floating around in an uncertaintly of am i decent or am i bad, and is that something you can even measure?

If any competitive player knows about this please let me know, because i really would love to play more gamemodes besides just salmon run, but the way it is right now its just not as fun..

[flight]

One thing that's a bit more Splatoon-specific is the Splatfests. I've noticed that the comp-vs-casual debate tends to flare during and after Splatfests, and I don't think that's an accident.

The calculus is a bit different here for a few reasons:
- In Splatoon more than most other shooters, there's a very strong expectation that the majority of players AREN'T in communication with each other. Running into a comp team that's clearly coordinating over Discord becomes a double disadvantage, because not only are they mechanically better, they can work together in a way that you can't with your randoms.
- If I had to question one thing about the video, it'd be the inherent assumption of building a competitive community, retaining interested players while keeping mindsets strong... all that stuff is completely legitimate, but I think a lot of the time, the battle is really happening between those in (or prospective towards) the competitive (or at least competitively-minded) community, and a distinct community: those who've already eschewed the former, but still enjoy the game as a fun pastime without caring much about working hard to improve. In most games, and indeed most of the time in Splatoon, these communities simply self-segregate (ie into Turf War and the ranked modes), but in Splatfests, everyone is forced together. Worse, the Open and Pro categories are misleadingly labeled; it's in Open that the coordinated teams will be playing, while Pro is solo queue only.
- Splatfests are genuinely meant to be a casual environment. There aren't real-world stakes like a competitive tournament, it's a friendly match in a festive atmosphere. It's a community event.

In the specific context of Splatfests, I do think it's more sportsmanlike for comp players to hold back in some way. Personally, I think the best way to do that is to just not team up with other comp players, because that's a lot more organic than purposely playing worse at the individual level. It feels more like just leveling the playing field, instead of throwing. From the casual standpoint, it probably feels fairer to lose because a single cracked player happened to show up and carried the enemy team, rather than three hopeless minutes against four cracked AND coordinated players shutting down any approach.

[morganowings]

Funny enough with that last comment, my gf and I had a bit of an argument earlier today. She was frustrated that I didn't seem to be talking as much and that she was pushing the conversations these past few days. I was frustrated because I had been trying to start conversations, but I would be doing other things at the same time or she would be. We called and both expressed those frustrations calmly, and we were on the same page in less than 5 minutes. It's crazy how a change in your mindset for dealing with conflict/roadblocks in a video game can change your approach to life, too

[ryanames]

YOU'RE AN ENGLISH TEACHER? that's so cool and it makes so much sense with how well-written your scripts are

[_EQ_]

As someone who got into competitive Splatoon a few months ago, I made the assumption that I wouldn't be dunking on people out of the gate, the opposite if anything. I joined the community because I liked the game and wanted to be challenged by stronger players. Going easy on people would defeat the whole purpose of playing competitively. This is why LUTI is composed of Divisions, so that you'll be able to play teams at a similar skill level than you. Even in casual settings, the goal is still to win. Just because you don't want to spend thousands of hours developing the skillset to be "good" at the game doesn't change that fact. This is why the Glicko system exists within the game itself. So that you'll be matched up with players of a similar skill level. Sometimes you just want to play a few games of Splatoon. I get that. I don't play chess nearly as much as I used to, but I still try my best and learn from my mistakes.

At the end of the day, nobody likes losing, but what's the point of winning if you didn't do it fighting tooth and nail?

[LumeanTV]

16:47, that comment is wild to me. I have my quick jump shoes on almost at all times, regardless of my gear because I know I'm not a fighter. I will happily jump out of a 1v1, because I'm not the best player equipped to handle it. I'm good at distracting, annoying, and _painting._ Not fighting someone on the field. It is wild to me how someone will see this self-preservative tactic to keep yourself on the field as frustrating because it means _they_ can't take you off of the field themselves.