Knockout City Update Adjusts Penalties for Quitters

Competitive online games typically make their penalties for leavers and quitters harsher to make sure people don't purposefully exit games early, but Knockout City has done the opposite in the game's latest update. Knockout City developer Velan Studios and publisher Electronic Arts announced this week an update for the game that softened the penalties levies against people who've quit matches in an effort to get people back into their matches quicker than before.

If you didn't know Knockout City doesn't have a leaver penalty system, good on you because that means you're not leaving matches. But if you do know about it because you've been hit with penalties either for leaving on purpose or for being dropped from matches a few too many times, you'll face penalties which aren't quite as harsh from now on. The developer warned at the same time the update was released that the current timer for the time players must spend outside of a game doesn't line up with what the remaining time actually looks like, so if you see you have a certain amount of time to wait, anticipate getting into the match sooner than what's displayed.

The error text will need to be updated in an upcoming patch, so for the time being, your actual wait time will not match the messaging you receive when you encounter a ban. To see if your ban has expired, you can attempt to start a Playlist.

— Knockout City (@knockoutcity) June 2, 2021

A future update will correct the problem of the time being displayed incorrectly, Velen Studios said.

"We understand that returning to matches quickly is a priority," the developer said at the end of its thread. "In a future patch, we will adjust the messaging so that ban penalties are accurately relayed to players. We will continue to monitor this situation and make improvements. Thank you for your feedback and patience!"

While Knockout City is indeed a paid game, there are plenty of ways for people to get into it for free or at least to try it without having to commit to anything. It's available through EA Play which means it's also playable through Xbox Game Pass, and just recently, a "Block Party" event wrapped up which gave people an extended, free look at the game. Though the event is now over, Knockout City is still free to play until players get to Street Rank 25 at which point they'll have to purchase the game after they've presumably gotten hooked.