The worlds of Massive Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Games are all incredibly unique. With people from all over the world playing, it’s more than a game, it’s a society. However like with any society, there are rules.
To someone not into gaming, it may sound silly that there are a bunch of rules. Isn’t the point of a game to get away from rules and regulations and to just kick back? Games are more complicated than just escapism though. Like in real life, there are systems that can be taken advantage of by other players that can ruin the experience for others.
However, there are other rules that are just ridiculous due to copyright. Maybe someone named their character after someone from their favorite movie. Or a streamer played publicly online with the game music on. Or you may even get a virtual instrument and unknowingly play copy-written music!
There are even many instances in which players are banned on accident because they are bystanders trapped in a war between bots and game regulators. They have to fight to get their account back. Sometimes as an apology, the creators will unban people and give them in-game money!
Major issues in online gaming are also balancing content for all ages, freedom of speech, and preventing online bullying. People cannot tell who they are interacting with. You could be playing with an eight-year-old or someone in a retirement community. People can make the community toxic without rules.
So here is our list about crazy online regulations.
24 Playing Music In Final Fantasy 14
If you play Final Fantasy 14, then you probably already know that no one listens to this rule. If you play a Bard class, you eventually get to play an instrument. If you have musical talent, you can actually play songs on it by pressing buttons. It is a lot like a real musical instrument.
However, the rules and regulations forbid players from playing any 3rd party songs.
So nothing that’s outside of the game. No one listens to this, however. A player just has to be unlucky enough to be caught and banned.
23 Star Wars: The Old Republic Name Restrictions
A big issue in online games is naming your account and/or character. Many people, like they do in some single player games, try to get a laugh out of making it inappropriate. Star Wars: The Old Republic had no time for that mess.
They had the basic “no inappropriate names” policy but they also went a little farther.
They really wanted the names to be reflective of the universe they created, so even no gibberish was allowed. You couldn’t use trademarked names like Dr. Pepper or pop culture names like Lady Gaga. Also, you can’t be Dorth Vader!
22 Playing Catch In Smash Bros.
This is less of a restriction and more of a bug that crashes your game. The Villager and Isabelle playable characters from Animal Crossing both have the same neutral move.
If you play both of these together and make a game of catch with the moves, it crashes the game.
It’s pretty funny since Animal Crossing is one of the sweeter and innocent games out of the Super Smash crossovers. It just goes to show that the Villager and Isabelle are too powerful to play catch without crashing the game.
21 No Music When Streaming Dragon Quest Heroes
Streaming a game goes not typically have a lot of rules and guidelines. However, Square Enix managed to make some of the most ridiculous rules when it came to streaming their Dragon Quest Heroes game. The most insane of the restrictions was that they did not want in-game music to be in the Twitch Streams.
The guidelines released hinted that Square Enix could delete any videos or streams that it deemed not meeting its rules. So if you plan to stream Dragon Quest Heroes, best turn off the volume.
20 Modding Game Consoles In Japan
Not only is modding consoles not allowed, but getting caught can get you actual prison time for a hefty fine. Specifically, five years of prison time and fines up to about fifty thousand dollars. Japan does not mess around! So you can be punished for distributing game save data editor and serial codes without the software maker’s permission.
This also includes services that edit save data.
Why so harsh? It violates Japan’s Unfair Competition Prevention Law. So if you like to mod consoles, maybe do not move to Japan anytime soon.
19 Final Fantasy 14 Language Ban
Profanity is an enemy of online games because it often perpetuates a toxic atmosphere for the players. So online games often make some measures to get rid of inappropriate language. The way Final Fantasy 14 did this is common, a profanity filter. So the words are replaced by question marks. This filter can be turned off in the settings. However, some players still get banned despite a filter being there. To make matters funnier, their NPCs use inappropriate language all the time.
18 Overwatch’s Hilarious Profanity Filter
Some online games get a little creative when it comes to ways to decrease toxic players.
Overwatch takes the cake, as they found a way to troll the trolls.
If someone types “Gg, ez” which stands for “good game, easy win,” then it will change into something else along the lines of “It's past my bedtime. Please don't tell my mommy," “For glory and honor! Huzzah comrades!,” or “I could really use a hug right now.”
Definitely one of the funnier restrictions.
17 Splatoon’s Restrictive Voice Chat
Nintendo is infamous for making it difficult for players to team together in a voice chat. This is interesting though, as it’s made it so that Nintendo’s online games are very positive and friendly communities while maintaining almost complete anarchy. How they did this just by just making it incredibly different to voice chat and only give characters the ability to say gibberish!
So if you want to voice chat with your teammates, good luck. It’s very difficult. But hey, at least there is no toxicity.
16 Starter Chat Restriction In World Of Warcraft
This is not just for World of Warcraft, as other online massively multiplayer games are adopting this regulation. It’s meant to combat bots that are known to spam advertisement messages.
Basically, the restriction is that you have to be a high level in order to use the chat system with other players.
While it may help a little with those stubborn bots, players will have to be isolated from talking publicly to others in the world until they reach a certain level.
15 League Of Legends Chat Restriction
Many online games implement self-policing. For example, it’s up to other players to report bullying and cheating. That report will reach the regulators and they will react. League of Legends implemented a very active regulation team to combat the toxicity in the gaming community. However, that did get them some push-back from annoyed fans who were banned for the smallest of jabs. But hey, no law is perfect.
So players that offend others can get chat banned. It’s unlimited, forcing you to play a number of matches with the restriction on in order to get your chat feature back.
14 Gift Wrapping Restrictions In World Of Warcraft
If you are in the spirit of gift-giving in World of Warcraft, your creativity and generosity may be limited by in-game restrictions. At least one poor player discovered this. They wanted to make a Secret Santa game happen. Then they found out they couldn’t wrap up any stackable items or bags, which severely limited their options.
After wrapping 50 limited gifts, the player then realized they couldn’t put the gifts in the guild tab like they planned. Unlike the other rules, we do not know why this restriction exists.
13 Can Only Have One Character On Red Dead Online
There should be a poll for how many gamers use multiple characters in massively multiplayer online games and why they choose to have more than one. There are many reasons to have multiple characters. Maybe you can’t choose what race, gender, or class you want so you settle to make multiple.
Or maybe you have friends on different servers so you make different characters for different servers.
However, in Red Dead Online, you are limited to a single character. Maybe this will change in the future?
12 Overwatch On Different Consoles Are Non-Compatible
There are people out there who bought Overwatch twice, once for their PC and again for their Xbox or Playstation. The reason for this is that they have friends with consoles and others with PC. The Overwatch games are non-compatible between the PC and consoles so you may have to choose between who you play with if you don’t want to buy both.
There are concerns that if they were compatible, that PC players would have an advantage because they have a mouse versus a controller.
11 Parental Restrictions On Fortnite
Addiction to Fortnite is a real problem in the young gamer community. So much so, that there are many articles warning and educating parents about the game. Game companies are aware of this, so they created restrictions parents can implement for console gamers.
However, a parent needs to be pretty tech-savvy to implement these regulations.
If they are tech-savvy though, they can control a lot. For Fortnite in particular, they can control chat settings, friend settings, and how long the kid can play all from their Smartphone.
10 Online Gambling Issues
Online gambling is illegal in many countries. Among those that have banned all online gambling are Turkey, The Netherlands, and China. Many other countries have more complex bans with different rules and spectrums.
Gambling in relation to online video games is a current issue. Players can online gamble with loot boxes, skins, and other in-game items. Some loot boxes have been outright banned in The Netherlands and Belgium and some United States lawmakers are pushing for the ban too.
9 Oversharing Information About Yourself
Privacy has always been a huge issue online, so of course, it’s an issue in online massive multiplayer gaming as well. This regulation is a no-brainer but it also is a very difficult one to enact.
For example, it’s very difficult to stop players from using their real names. It is mostly just discouraging.
However, there are major no-no’s that can get you banned from online play. That is sharing personal information when it comes to social networking accounts and personal websites.
8 Hacking Your Achievements On Xbox
A major frustration for some online games is that you can look at a leaderboard and know that the winners are people who have obviously cheated. To some it doesn’t matter, it’s just a number. Other gamers are frustrated because it takes away a fair opportunity for their hard work. Some gamers are even awarded in the real world for high achievements, so it’s all the more upsetting that they could be cheaters.
There is a risk if they get caught in some games though. They can be permanently banned.
7 Sharing Your Game Library On PlayStation
This one is just a tricky situation. Game sharing is fine within a household, but if you share your game library among multiple houses, you are basically stealing from the game companies. So if they find out, you can be banned.
However, many gamers report sharing a library with friends for years and never getting banned.
So either they just didn’t get caught, or the Playstation’s Terms of Service is becoming outdated. Just be sure to read closely, because it’s allowed in some cases and not in others.
6 Using Tools To Cheat At Call Of Duty
If you are an avid Call of Duty player, then you have probably met at least one player who obviously cheats through aimbots and other hacks. It’s very frustrating for other players who want a fair game. However, it can be more frustrating for cheaters who get caught, as they can get permanently banned. They get what’s known as a VAC ban, which stands for Valve Anti-Cheat. It’s a permanent ban. Though some players say they get away with cheating for a while before getting caught.
5 Changing Your Xbox One Account Region More Than Once A Few Months
It should be clarified that changing the region on your console is different from changing the region on your account. Changing the region of your account has a three month waiting period.
It’s much easier to change the region on the console.
That’s because the account makes more serious changes such as what your subscriptions are and are so on. There are other aspects that limit someone's ability to change account regions such as your account being suspended.