I don’t really play much Tekken 8. I’m not really all that good with Bandai Namco’s flagship fighting game but I will admit it is probably the most popular fighting game at the moment. It’s the most recent fighting game released and one of the most polished. It’s garnered a lot of well-deserved praise from everyone who’s played it. And, while I may not be good at Tekken, I know a quality fighting game when I see it.

But one thing that has plagued the Tekken 8 experience for a lot of players are the pluggers. Formerly known as “rage quitters”, pluggers are the gamers who disconnect in the middle of a match when they are about to lose. Partially due to frustration of losing and also because they don’t want to lose the points they’ve earned from losing. Pluggers have gotten away with it for a long time because Bandai Namco didn’t implement a punishment for the people who disconnect during a match.

That is, until recently.

A few weeks ago, Katsuhiro Harada, the lead producer of the Tekken franchise, mentioned in a tweet that he received a huge list of Tekken players who have been seen to have been disconnecting during matches. What Harada didn’t mention was what Bandai Namco was going to do to these pluggers. Well, it turns out the plan was to outright ban players who have been noted as being serial pluggers. It’s reached a point where some high profile players such as the infamous Low Tier God was hit with the ban hammer, which he promptly refuted and cried foul.

A lot of Tekken 8 players are glad that Harada and Bandai Namco are finally doing something about the plugging situation. But was it the right solution? Sure, Harada mentioned later that they are going to add a “disconnection rate” before you opt into a match, which they did implement recently. That may help but I don’t think this really solves the problem about the culture of pluggers, though.

Like with what Low Tier God is going to do, and what other pluggers are probably going to do as well, is simply create a new account and start playing online ranked matches again. So, they can do what they’ve done previously; keep on playing and then disconnect when they’re about to lose. If that account gets banned, then they move on to a different account.

I hate to agree with DarkSydePhil, who is another infamous gamer, but he does have a point when he talked about LTG being caught as a plugger. What LTG was doing is the coward’s way out and, once again, I hate to say it, I will give props to DarkSydePhil because, despite him yelling and complaining about lag (even when there is none) or players spamming moves (wherein he should adapt to the spamming moves), DSP has never intentionally disconnected from an online match.

However, back to the topic at hand, I don’t think banning accounts will fix the issue since they can just create new accounts. Adding a disconnection rate is a neat patch but I do wish Harada and Bandai Namco nipped this in the bud early on and just made it so the plugger would lose rank points and the one who didn’t disconnect get the points. I know some gamers will whine about losing their rank points because of some accidental disconnection.

I’ve had my share of piss-poor online matches resulting in unintentional disconnections on my end. But I’m more than okay to lose my points if its my connection that caused the disconnection. It’s the risk everyone has to take when playing online. Sure, some may have to take bigger risks than others and that may seem unfair. But if you know you’re Internet is unstable, then I don’t think you have the right to complain too much.

But simply losing a match may seem a little too tame for some. I would rather Bandai Namco to do a more humiliating resolution to the plugging situation. You know how some games have creative anti-piracy solutions built into them? Rather than just not make the game not work when the software detects the game wasn’t obtained though legit means, it will still run but do something really wonky within the game to make it unplayable. Honestly, there are more examples than you may think.

Now, how would Harada use this with Tekken 8’s online system? Well, I’m not saying they should make the buttons not work or they can’t sidestep anymore if their disconnection rate is high enough to be called out as a plugger… although that would be hilarious. Rather, I would use the opportunity to humiliate the the plugger by giving their chosen character an outfit that identifies them as a plugger.

What I’m imagining is that, whenever a plugger gets into an online match, whatever outfit or custom costume pieces they’ve put on their character will not show. Instead, their chosen character will be put in a specially concocted costume to make them look silly. I’m not that creative but I’m thinking something like a plain looking jumpsuit with the front and the back of the outfit with text stating “I’m a plugger” or something to that effect. Force them to wear a “plugger costume” that they cannot remove whenever they enter an online match. This way, the opponent will know the person they’re facing off against is a plugger. The pluggers still get to wear their “normal” costumes for offline play. But, whenever they connect to a ranked match, they will have no choice but to wear the “plugger costume” either for a limited time (once they get their disconnect rate low enough) or indefinitely (for those serial offenders).

I’m not saying Tekken 8 is wrong with their solution. I think it’s fair as pluggers do ruin the game for the honest ones who are willing to lose. I also do think they should have pluggers lose points and their opponent gets some points so there is, at least, some repercussions to those rage quitters. I also think having a more robust disconnection rate would help. But I think pluggers plug because of their pride. So, why not humiliate them by outing them with a unique outfit that only pluggers can wear? I mean, imagine the rant LTG would make if he had no other option but to play with that on his character?

Do you have any other solutions for pluggers in Tekken 8 or other online games? Let me know what they are in the comments section below!