When this unfairness was brought up in the moderator forum, the admin team decided to ban all mention of romantic relationships in profiles. In one example, a player had the words “lg bt | married” in their profile, and was asked to remove it or face a ban. The moderators were instructed by the game’s administrators to heed these complaints and remove such mentions, even though this policy ended up only affecting LGBTQ+ people, since no one tended to take offense at mentions of hetero relationships. I’ve been able to contact a former member of the HI moderator team, and they tell me that players would disproportionately report mentions of partners and relationships if they were implied to be between people of the same gender. Over the years – the first Horse Isle launched in 2007 – there have naturally been disagreements, both among players and among moderators. This practice, in combination with the fact that the HI3 forums do not have a search function and don’t seem to be indexed by Google, makes it very hard to find reliable information.
Concrete information about what has previously been discussed in the Horse Isle community is almost impossible to find however, apart from simply listening to what players say happened: The game’s forums announce that threads are removed regularly, “to keep clean and recent”.
What is or is not family friendly has apparently led to discourse and disagreements in the past. That no inappropriate content appears and stays in Horse Isle 3 is therefore the responsibility of players who report problematic content, and the dev team who reviews these reports and warns or bans offending players accordingly. There is a reason popular kid-friendly MMO Star Stable only allows its players to combine names from a list of pre-approved words, by contrast. This means there is a plethora of player-generated content, which is always a certain risk and something that requires proper moderation. In Horse Isle 3, players can create their own clubs and stores, and name the horses they breed. “Family friendly games made for horse fanatics” is how Horse Isle 3 introduces itself on its website and promises “Clean, nonviolent fun, with some education tossed in.”
I chose to tackle this subject nonetheless, because I know many players are unhappy with what went down and want it documented, and because this whole discussion can serve as a fantastic example for why community management is a crucial component of game development.Īnd for readers who do not usually follow The Mane Quest and the general horse game situation: Dear God, please take notice of how badly we need well made, well managed games in this genre. If you’re not already part of this community or its surrounding discussions, much of what I’ll tell you in this article is going to sound absolutely ridiculous. After all, I had made my peace with the fact that the game is not for me, had put my most urgent criticisms into words, and had offered players a bit of insight into how HI3 is being made, and what problems I see with that.Īnd then, the Gulag incident happened. When I published my article about Horse Isle 3’s development in December, I was certain I was done writing about this game for a while.
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