Xbox introduces new strike system to curtail bad behavior
By Ash Parrish, a reporter who has covered the business, culture, and communities of video games for seven years. Previously, she worked at Kotaku.
Today, a new strike-based enforcement program is coming to Xbox. The system is meant to clear up confusion regarding how Xbox enforces its community standards and help players keep track of enforcement actions made on their accounts.
In an interview with The Verge, Xbox player services corporate vice president Dave McCarthy explained the new enforcement system and its place in Xbox’s overall community management strategy. “This is all about player transparency,” McCarthy said. “We didn’t have a way to show our players what their standing was in our community. And this makes it completely clear.”
In the new system, if a player violates the Xbox community standards, they’ll receive a strike. The severity of the violation determines the number of strikes and the length of the punishment. If a player receives a total of eight strikes, their account will be banned from using Xbox services like voice chat or multiplayer for a year. The strike program starts today with everyone on the platform getting a clean strike-less slate.
McCarthy shared that only about 1 percent of the Xbox player base receives any kind of enforcement action and that only a third of that 1 percent goes on to receive additional enforcement actions. Without any kind of standardized program in place, McCarthy said that players would express confusion as to why some enforcements earned daylong suspensions while others would ban a player for a week or a month.
In a blog posted to Xbox Wire outlining the new enforcement system, McCarthy wrote, “This revised system gives players a better understanding of
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