Former professional esports player Dennis Fong founded GGWP in 2022, more than a year before companies like Microsoft and Google debuted their natural-language search engines and the AI revolution officially gripped the globe. GGWP is an AI-powered moderation system that identifies and takes action against in-game harassment and hate speech, and after two years on the scene, it's now integrated into titles at more than 25 studios. Fong may be a veteran of the Doom and Quake esports scenes, but he's interested in protecting players from abuse in every genre, especially as social features become easier to implement for studios of all sizes. These aren't all gritty military sims or hardcore competitive franchises like Counter-Strike or League of Legends, where you might expect emotional outbursts and increased toxicity. One-third of the games that utilize GGWP are co-op and PvE experiences, rather than competitive PvP settings, according to Fong. Turns out, cozy games need moderation too.

When it comes to online games, we all know the "report" button doesn't do anything. Regardless of genre, publisher or budget, games launch every day with ineffective systems for reporting abusive players, and some of the largest titles in the world exist in a constant state of apology for harboring toxic environments. Franchises including League of Legends, Call of Duty, Counter-Strike, Dota 2, Overwatch, Ark and Valorant have such hostile communities that this reputation is part of their brands -- suggesting these titles to new players includes a warning about the vitriol they'll experience in chat. It feels like the report button often sends complaints directly into a trash can, which is then set on fire quarterly by the one-person moderation department. "I'm not gonna name names, but some of the biggest games in the world were like, you know, honestly it does go nowhere," Fong said. "It goes to an inbox that no one looks at.