Forum ‹ General ‹ how to ban words

[nkronionik]

I want a way to be 100% sure that pedophiles will never get anything with my game
So i was thinking: is there any way to stop people to talk about msn, email, things like that in my game?
Also, how to ban words like butt, sex, whatever
Is there any way? Or even better ways to get pedophiles out of my game?

[Benjaminsen]

Users are clever, more clever than you expect. If you impose filters, users will find ways around them.

The only cost effective strategy I found is simply not allowing users to chat. The second you allow them to, issues can arise.

Alternatively, you can moderate every single sentence ever said in your game. While this is possible for big companies like Club Penguin it's hardly something you want to do as a startup.

Personally I use a hybrid model where I require people to pay for chat with a credit card to prove that they are 18+ in Everybody Edits.

[nkronionik]

I was thinking on a system where all the player can do is to choose a phrase in a box of phrases
And that's all he can comunicate
like this one: http://www.miniclip.com/games/5-in-a-row-gomoku/pt/
Problem is, i can't predict what's the most common things they will want to talk
Things like: let's hunt together, let's create a clan, came here, go to there and so on

[nkronionik]

Personally I use a hybrid model where I require people to pay for chat with a credit card to prove that they are 18+ in Everybody Edits.

I like the idea, how much do you charge? How difficult it is to implement?

[Benjaminsen]

I was thinking on a system where all the player can do is to choose a phrase in a box of phrases
And that's all he can comunicate
like this one: http://www.miniclip.com/games/5-in-a-row-gomoku/pt/
Problem is, i can't predict what's the most common things they will want to talk
Things like: let's hunt together, let's create a clan, came here, go to there and so on

That's also an option, don't worry about what people will be wanting to say to each other. Rather focus on building a system that makes it easy to extend the things people can say. This way you can simply add what is missing.

[dreamora]

I was thinking on a system where all the player can do is to choose a phrase in a box of phrases
And that's all he can comunicate

That would make a lot of sense for multiple reasons and is how Phantasy Star Online a decade ago already worked, in addition to fast emoticons.
Not only will that solve the problem you want to solve, you can actually store the phrases in some form of 'index lookup table' which allows you to show it in the users native language independent of what the sender used.

[nkronionik]

That's a great idea
Problem is, there's only two languages i care: english and chinese, and i don't speak chinese