Since Destruction AllStars Released 72 hours ago for PlayStation 5, the game was plagued by reported instances of verbal harassment, made worse by a voice chat turned on by default. Today developer Lucid Games released a solution that sets the default chat to “off”.
Hotfix 1.2.2 “has disabled voice communications in the multiplayer lobby for all players by default,” said one tweet from the developer. Lucid Games also writes that it is “actively working on longer-term improvements to the voice communications system.”
Soon after Destruction AllStars went live, players took to social media to share examples of racist comments, sexism, homophobia, and other bigoted language. a reviewer wrote that they heard an alt-right podcast.
While revolting and inexcusable, language like this is unfortunately an essential part of online games. It’s just that they generally come with tools to combat it. To get shocks to shut up Destruction AllStars, you should rely on system-level workarounds in the PS5’s settings and menus. There is no in-game way to mute individual players or disable voice chat altogether. The group chat for Destruction AllStars was passed through that tinny speaker on the front of your DualSense controller, so you could mute your TV and still be subject to language you don’t want to be a part of.
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After today’s hotfix you will no longer hear players through your speaker. Pull up DestructionThe Activity Cards of – those system-level inputs on PS5 – no longer display one for “Voice Chat | Destruction AllStars. “In my competitions, the public voice chat turned out to be off for the time being. (The option to create your own party is still there.)
While it’s baffling that such a design choice has been implemented in the first place, it’s great to see developers taking such quick and determined action to fix a pervasive problem.