No online gaming experience can go without gaming slang. If you don’t use it, other players do and escaping it is impossible. Whether you’re playing just one match or you’re taking part in an online gaming session, you’ll see terms and acronyms being thrown around all the time. Even in case, you’re not a true gamer, becoming familiar with the slang could uplift your gaming experience and increase your chance of winning. So, what’s the most important gaming terminology players need to know? Read on to find out.
In-game terms and acronyms
Let’s take a second to discuss why gaming terms and acronyms exist in the first place. Most of them emerged due to players typing in a hurry in order not to lose a turn or get killed in the game. As a result, we now have a plethora of in-game terms and acronyms that players use regularly. For example, when playing online, you’ll often hear players say ‘DPS’ which stands for ‘Damage Per Second’ or ‘HP’ which stands for ‘Health Points.’ If you and other players encounter a character not played by another real player, you’ll hear others refer to them as ‘NPCs’ which is short for ‘Non-Player Characters.’ ‘Loot’ are items and drops you get from defeating AI characters while grinding refers to doing something repetitively.
Setting up your game
Now that you know some of the in-game terminology and you’re ready to play, let’s take a step back and help you with some terms and acronyms you’ll encounter when setting up your game. Most ‘MMORPGs’ or ‘Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games’ allow you to choose whether you want to play versus other players or AIs. “PvP’ stands for ‘Player vs Player’ and “PvE’ means ‘Player vs Environment.’ As you can see, knowing the terminology can sometimes help you make the right choices from the start.
Some games like Minecraft, give players a chance to play many ‘Mods’ or ‘Modifications’ that can do various things from fixing bugs to creating new game types. Also, there are different types of games to keep an eye on when playing online. Some games are ‘P2P’ or ‘Pay to Play’ while some are ‘P2W’ or ‘Pay to Win.’ P2W games include micro-transactions that give buyers an upper hand over players who don’t spend money.
Toxic player encounters
Playing games with other layers online sounds great. It often really is great, but there are also times you encounter toxic players who’ll do everything they can to disrupt their own team. The worst part of it is that they don’t even realize what they’re doing. In all games online, these players are referred to as ‘toxic’ players. You’ll often hear them call their teammates and opponents ‘Noobs.’ A ‘Noob’ is someone who’s new to the game and can’t compete with seasoned players.
However, ‘Toxic’ players often use the term for anyone with a losing score. Another thing they do in games like Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO), accuses other players of ‘Camping.’ The term refers to standing in one spot and shooting at other players with a sniper. When they call someone ‘Salty,’ it means they’re upset or bitter.
Genre-specific terms and acronyms
In this post, we covered some terms and acronyms that appear in a majority of games available today. However, there’s also terminology that’s only associated with a specific gaming genre. Depending on what games you want to play, learning it might be necessary. For example, FIFA franchise lovers often use terms
such as ‘TOTS’ which stands for “Team Of The Season.” Terms like this refer to special in-game collectible cards you can use in most sports games available today. iGaming has grown a lot in the past few years and fans of this genre have developed their own terminology as well. For example, you may see players call someone a “High Roller.” If you sit across a high roller, it means you’re up against a veteran player who takes a lot of risks.
Miscellaneous terms
Some terms and acronyms in the gaming world simply belong to their own categories. Let’s talk about them for a moment. Game developers often want clues and hidden features for players to discover in-game. These features are usually referred to as ‘Easter Eggs’ and they now come in most popular releases. When talking about mods, we mentioned ‘Bugs.’ In case you don’t know what these things are, the term stands for any coding errors with unintended results.
If you browse gaming sites and keep up with news in the gaming world, you may stumble upon the term ‘Triple-A’ or ‘AAA.’ That’s how gamers call games that have a big budget and receive a lot of praise. These are games belonging to franchises such as Call of Duty or ‘CoD’ and Battlefield.
Over to you
The terms and acronyms we covered in this post are just some of those you’ll encounter when playing games online. Depending on the genre you opt for and the game you choose, you might have to learn even more terms and acronyms for the ultimate online gaming experience.