Awesome Games Done Quick 2018 Modifies Its Chat Room Rules - And Not Everyone Is Pleased

Awesome Games Done Quick 2018 is officially underway, with some of the best speedrunning gamers in [...]

Games Done Quick

Awesome Games Done Quick 2018 is officially underway, with some of the best speedrunning gamers in the world raising money for a variety of good causes, while showing off their elite gaming skills. And, just like last year, there are plenty of folks chatting it up in the Twitch channel, talking about players' skills and conveying their excitement for what's coming next in the multi-day event.

But not everyone is pleased, as the Games Done Quick team has made a slight change as to how the chat room works. In the past, the room has been loaded with all kinds of spam and hatred talk, with the low point being the introduction of a bearded lady emote that popped up anytime a transgender gamer took part in a speed session. Not cool, to say the least.

The organizers of the event have put the chat into a "subscribers only" mode, which means that casual fans won't be able to speak unless they're a subscriber to the channel, paying the $5 monthly fee or utilizing the Twitch Prime membership in order to unlock it. This filters out the chat nicely, according to the modders, and makes for less "hate speak".

Surprise, though, because not everyone is a fan of the decision. In fact, some fans have created their own chat channel in order to keep fans happy – but they got loaded up with "a constant flood of emotes and spam" as well, according to GQQ_Poverty channel creator Tatortotts, who recently spoke on Reddit. The channel was shut down soon thereafter.

So maybe Games Done Quick is onto something – and they're actually putting the subscriber money to good use. Speaking with Polygon, the organizers released the following statement:

"We take moderation seriously and want to maintain a positive atmosphere in all of our events, especially as we are representing the charities we are benefiting. As Games Done Quick has grown over the years, our channel has now been averaging between 100k-150k concurrent viewers, and moderating a channel of this size has been extremely difficult. We're currently exploring options to alleviate the situation and have opted to make the chat for AGDQ this year subscription-only. All GDQ subscription revenue in January will be donated to Prevent Cancer Foundation."

A rep from Twitch also spoke to Kotaku on the matter, noting, "Anyone is welcome to host the GDQ event as long as they're not blocked by or banned from the hosted channel and do not violate our Community Guidelines. The majority of channels hosting GDQ have done so without issue."

So play it cool, people. It's for a good cause.

You can watch the Games Done Quick 2018 marathon here.

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