Square Enix May Withhold Its Own Products If You Harrass Its Staff

Fans can be insane sometimes. Good.

Good for them for standing up for their workers, though I'm sure some Americans would say "but I paid for my item" blah blah blah.

"stalking, repeated stalking behavior."

Department of redundancy department.

Man, I looked at this article, thought "Dang, that's a good choice", then I scrolled down to the comments to comment like I usually do and three comments were deleted.
What the heck happened here??

Here come the people who don’t understand how freedom of speech works in 3…2…1…

@shiftbarackyeaugh I'll tell you when you're older.

Wait, so if someone were to harrass their staff they would just close their physical and digital store-fronts to everyone or just that certain individual? How would that work and wouldn't they shoot themselves in the foot if they were to restrict it to everyone?
Or am I just tripping and misunderstanding this whole thing?
Kudos to them for strengthening their policies though!

So.. they want people to act like people? Seems pretty reasonable to me

More companies should do this. It ain't 'constructive criticism', it's just reinforcing the stereotype that gamers are a bunch of whiny man children.

I also think companies should be able give out ironic punishments to people as result. Think StarFox Zero was a slap in the face to fans of StarFox on every social media platform post? Miyamoto should be able to literally slap you in the face. Won't shut up about F-Zero being dormant? Get run down by a car.

You don't want to know what happens when you complain about WarioWare 💩

@JohnnyMind You're right, but to be honest gamers can be abhorrent sometimes and i totally understand when gaming companies try to install countermeasures to educate gamers.

@Dee123 we consumers pay for a lot of items but we don't have a habit of attentively reading EULAs we agree to - and this would be far from the pettiest cause to booby-trap one.😏 If your fanship ulcer drives you to stalk and [cyber]bully the creators on every point of supposed contention, there's little incentive for doing business with you in the very field of your volatile addiction. That said, existing ownerships and services might remain largely unaffected, at least on the retail side.

What the heck happened to the comments? lol.

Of course I’m fine with this as no one deserves to get treated like that over video games.

@Dee123 Why single out Americans for? This issue is a worldwide problem.

Why do I get the feeling this is largely due to a certain "love triangle" issue surrounding a certain upcoming third part of a certain trilogy?

Now, this could also, and more likely, just be a general thing that's going on, and that's wholly possible too, especially considering Square Enix's interest in dipping into A"I" and other morally questionable decisions, and while I wholly endorse taking the higher ups to task in a civil manner, to harass the lower staff is definitely not cool.

Every employer has a duty of care to its employees and every employee should feel safe at work. Companies taking active steps is positive.

Unfortunately in the digital world we live in, bullies are bigger cowards than they ever were, hiding behind fake profiles etc.

Thankfully most decent people in the world are not like this but to be blunt, there are some d@cks in the world.

@JohnnyMind And again, you're right. But this is a gaming related topic and so i pointed it out. We all know what gamers can be capable of when it comes to hate, for example Gamergate.

Bad, bad idea. People who don't care about Square Enix stuff or may not have even heard of this company will absolutely take this as a challenge to spread misery particularly on gamers who would be very vocal in their agony. Not to mention people who would get all class-actiony about promised features not delivered.

Square hasn't made anything I care about in a long long while and even when they re-release something I do care about they always muck it up somehow. But still, I'd hate to see it.

@shiftbarackyeaugh

Yeah the comments that where deleted where talking about #@&+ @€&_@€ and also about #&#&@ and the most horrible part was about #&€@#-@€&€@€& 123456689

Now you understand what happened

@MasterGraveheart I believe this has more to do with the treatment of certain Dawntrail localization staff and/or voice actors. The story was critically panned by fans and a good deal of those fans decided to take matters into their own hands and attack certain people who worked on the game on social media.

Agreed nobody should be harassing anyone over a game but also have no idea how this stance their taking would even work. Unless they have some actual way of carrying it out, it just sounds like corporate lip speak

Good. All companies and businesses should adopt this policy. People will go to ridiculous length for service or to "get back" at employees.

Cool, I wish the whole industry would protect its staff like this.

I hope this sets a standard. I’ve played games all my life and never been as embarrassed as I am now by the discourse and action of a small minority of bigot gamers.

Don't harass staff people. Never a cool thing to do.

Good. Some people need to realize their bad behavior has consequences.

Fans can be the best and the worst. Just look at how toxic the Star Wars community has become since 1999……

@Dee123 I'd definitely like to point out to those types that buying a product doesn't entitle them to act like total aholes to anyone.

I think westerners don't realize a lot of this is due to extreme Japanese fan behavior. People defending the honor of their waifus or favorite 'ships.

Most of the things on this list are already illegal (direct threats of violence, stalking) while others are Japan specific (don't show up at HQ and cause a stir by demanding apologies on behalf of Aerith).

For the most part I think both sides of the culture war are flogging this more than it deserves. This isn't S-E trying to protect itself from all criticism by attacking the speech of streamers. It also isn't them taking a novel stand against the far right or bigotry.

The part where they mention acting 'upon consulting police and/or lawyers' is key. A lot of what terminally online people want (like taking down Asmongold or whoever) is not something that can be legally done because reasonable criticism of consumer products and art is protected speech even in the EU. Bringing criminal charges will be strictly for stuff that can be fought and won in court, which is a much narrower range of behaviors than most people realize.

Banning people from an online shop or FFXIV would be easier, or would at least force a change in profile, but again, it doesn't seem like much of a change in policy to me. You already get banned for threats, sexual harassment, etc.

What's with the deleted comments?

This is obviously good, but I wish they were more specific with what they mean by "Unreasonable changes" statement and "Excessive requests for the provision of products and services exceeding socially accepted norms."

Would like examples in those categories because it is too vague for me.

Twenty years ago this may have meant something. But most games are unplayable today. Dragon Quest 3 HD has this delayed/floaty feel to it that I fear is the new standard for the HD2D games in that series.

@Bratwurst35 Typical xenophobia I'm sure

This is overreach and overkill. Protect your staff of course, but this is worded so vaguely that it becomes weaponized commercial censorship. This policy is only going to succeed at pissing off normal consumers with valid criticism
and igniting the already inflammatory minority this was clearly targeting.

I think this is great. Video game fans can be dangerously entitled, and frankly I'm tired of the idea that we all have to just listen to hateful jerks spew garbage out of their mouths all the time because of some vague idea of "free speech."
And ultimately it's the employees of the companies who are the ones that take the heat for these bad actors. If the company protects them, they're happier and we possibly get better games as a result. I hope other companies follow suit.

I mean I don't like Final Fantasy VII Remake/Rebirth either, but don't cross those lines, people.

@Oracles_fanboi Goooot'cha. That makes more sense... at least it would if I hadn't seen just how awful certain circles can be. -_-;

It's probably a buncha stuff, tbh.

I had a weird issue with the game when I first installed it off Steam. I went to the Steam forums to look for an answer (it was a conflict with Display Fusion). OMG, the posts and ranting were insane, and that's from western language posts. I half-assume that maybe Japanese posts might even be worse. Ya, they're right to want to protect their employees, and I applaud the sentiment.

This should be a rule everywhere. Honestly don't touch, threaten, or yell at any person just trying to work a day job.

@Neph thats what im trying to figure out too

First, where is the evidence that this kind of thing is happening with any kind of predictable consistency? Where is the data that this is happening to Square Enix more than other companies? Where is the proof that Square Enix treats its own employees so well that they can start pointing the finger at their audience?

Second, a lot of these classifications are incredibly vague and one-sided. "Persistent inquiries"?? So people can't ask frequent questions.. like what? When a game is coming out? How much it will cost? Why the DLC is structured like it is?

People can't ask for apologies from SE?? What deems a request for staff reprimands being "unreasonable"?? What if the SE employee does something truly detestable to the audience member? They have immunity??

~~~

TL;DR Yea, everyone should be cool to everyone else. But this feels really defensive, flimsy, and ultimately performative.

Isn't that already covered by the laws? I don't think it's good idea to sort of threaten your paying customer with unclear language such as "unreasonable" and "abusive languange".

Is the next step is to become like western publisher and outright insulting their fans?

@DiggleDog Some people treat freedom of speech as 'I can do anything I want without consequences', but that's not how it is.

Freedom of speech rules only opinions and actions who doesn't harm other people rights. You can have any political opinions you want, religious opinions, and even opinions about companies and people.

But Harass, threat, stalk and so many other things mentioned are NOT freedom of speech. This is crime and should be handled accordingly.

You are not free to cause harm to others, physically or emotional, under the banner of freedom of speach.

• You can criticize the quality of a product
• You can criticize a company decision
• You CANNOT harass the staff of said company

People should stop mixing freedom of speech with this 'behavioral anarchy'.

Also, it is great to see a company doing something about it for real. Congrats to Square Enix for that.

@eduscxbox You are correct, on the other end, people shouldn't mix things like voicing opinions, inquiries, and criticism with harassment. Freedom of Speech (at least in America) does protect being annoying, obnoxious, and even offensive. Because those are subjective things.

If I said I thought the (I don't know) outfits in a SE game were offensive, that would not give me the right to have that game removed. But I could voice my opinion about it as often and as obnoxiously as I wanted. And everyone else would have the right to ignore me, block me or just tell me to shut up. ^_^ They wouldn't even have to be nice about it!

Of course, people should be kind in how they voice their displeasure, but it can't and shouldn't be enforced because, again, it's subjective. Policing true harassment is great; policing politeness or opinions is tyranny.

Sadly, online culture has gone off the rails at both ends of this topic.

@Chocobo_Shepherd Exactly. It's always the extremes.
What is offensive to me might not be offensive to you.

And there is no problem in voice that "I find the outfits offensive", it is a valid criticism, I just can't threat staff because I think the outfit is offensive.

I'm going to send them so many inquiries.

Good. Too many crazy a-holes out there

"Unreasonable and excessive demands for punishment of our employees."
Don't do what Cloud Strife does.

@eduscxbox precisely. fist bump

Chrono Trigger 2 is out today- Except for you, Bobby. You know what you did.

This also proves that when you're buying digital products you don't actually own them.

Every locality has legal definitions for what people are claiming is vague here. Square Enix doesn't need to define harassment or stalking or anything listed because the government does this already.

I've taken enough required harassment trainings for every company I've worked for which outlines and explains in detail my local and national laws regarding most things outlined by Square Enix.

I guess the whole world harassed SquareEnix for a Chrono Trigger game because they've withdrawn an updated/remake game from all of us all those years. ☹️