Recently, the Netflix drama "True Education" has been a hot topic. It features a newly established "Teacher Rights Protection Bureau" that vows to restore a broken education system by so-called giving "true education" to unruly students and parents, and it includes a scene that would catch the eye of game users.
In one episode, a perpetrating student uses another friend's account to commit secondhand marketplace fraud, buy game items, and place delivery app orders, causing material and psychological harm. In response, the Teacher Rights Protection Bureau secretly logs into the perpetrator's game account and types slurs, and the account receives a "300-year access suspension" for verbal abuse. Would such penalties be possible in real games?
According to the game industry on the 29th, major game companies have their own operating policies and use restriction standards. Sanctionable acts range from verbal abuse to use of unauthorized programs, disrupting gameplay, spreading false information, impersonating operators, and account theft. While detailed standards and penalty durations vary by game, most game companies commonly sanction verbal abuse, slander, and hate speech as language-based violence.
The game appearing in "True Education" is the currently live "ETERNAL RETURN." According to developer Nimble Neuron, in ETERNAL RETURN, penalties increase with the number of violations for verbal abuse and hate or discriminatory remarks. A first violation brings a 14-day restriction, a second violation 30 days, and a third violation can result in a permanent restriction. While it does not use the phrasing "300-year ban" like the drama, repeated violations lead to a structure where the account can no longer be used.
Other game companies also escalate penalties based on the number of violations. Netmarble's "Vampir" imposes 1-day, 3-day, 7-day, and 365-day service suspensions across the first through fourth violations for acts that impede others' smooth gameplay. Spreading rumors or using inappropriate language, among others, are subject to 1-day, 3-day, 5-day, and 7-day service suspensions.
So has there never been a case in real games of an access suspension measured in centuries? To date, no cases have been confirmed of long-term sanctions in the hundreds of years for verbal abuse. However, there have been cases of long-term sanctions effectively akin to permanent bans for other reasons. In 2013, Riot Games restricted the account of well-known "League of Legends" streamer "Apdo" Jeong Sang-gil until Oct. 29, 3013—about 1,000 years out by the standards of the time—for account boosting. The drama's 300-year ban is a setup that evokes such long-term sanction cases.
Even within the same company, sanction standards differ by each game's operating policy. Nexon's "MapleStory" and "DUNGEON & FIGHTER" both restrict chat use for general swearing, profanity, and slanderous chatting. However, there are differences when a specific user is targeted or when the severity of expression increases.
MapleStory restricts gameplay for 7, 15, 30, and 60 days when a user directly inconveniences others with acts such as defamation or threats, human rights violations, or behavior that causes sexual humiliation. DUNGEON & FIGHTER classifies insults or profanity directed at an identifiable target, hate or discriminatory expressions, and the like as "special" violations, applying 3-day, 10-day, 30-day, and 100-day gameplay restrictions, and from the fifth violation onward, even permanent restrictions are possible. In particular, harmful or hate expressions, sexual expressions targeting real minors, and content that violates laws such as defamation or insult can be subject to immediate permanent restriction.
Each game also has unique detailed standards. While most companies set sanction periods such as chat bans in days, NC's "Lineage" applies minute-based penalties for chat spamming. A first violation brings 60 minutes, a second violation 60–300 minutes, and a third violation 300 minutes or more of chat ban.
Riot Games divides the scope of sanctions into "the account in question" and "all accounts under the same name." Depending on the case, verbal abuse or acts that disrupt gameplay may result in sanctions on only the account in question, or all accounts registered under the same name may be sanctioned together. In some cases, such as the use of illegal programs, hardware restrictions may also be possible.
Meanwhile, the sanction standards of game companies appear likely to become more granular. In the past, relatively clear language-based abuse such as swearing or slander was the main target, but recently the scope of prohibited acts has been expanding to include hate speech, spreading false information, use of unauthorized programs, and disrupting gameplay.
A game industry official said, "As unhealthy behavior occurring in games becomes increasingly diverse, game companies need to refine operating policies by segmenting types of prohibited acts and specifying sanction standards by act."