IRL you can't fake it forever.

I've found gaming communities (and I've been in many) to be excessively toxic. You can meet good people there, but I've found it's not worth the headache.

Try RP gaming communities. By that I don't mean that hardcore RP communities or anywhere you have to do actual RP. Just the 'RP' tag in a mmo server weeds out assholes, pricks etc and ensures that there is a high age average in the server. The Wow Eu RP server I have been playing for years keeps getting 'immigrants' from US servers and PVP servers all the time. They escape the aggressive and toxic environments by moving to RP servers. They don't do RP, they just play and join raids and other activities.

I like games, but the ease of getting into a community is nowhere near as low as some people like to sell it as. Especially today. Even if they aren't toxic in the obvious sense, it often feels like a minefield navigating these communities without upsetting someone, getting dogpiled or anything.

Like in small online communities, you get to know the trolls and it's oddly endearing. You see their personality and everybody gets to know them and their trolling doesn't even derail discussion at that point it just makes everyone laugh.

Truly toxic individuals can also be booted. When a community reaches a certain size there is just an unrelenting deluge of anonymous trolls and toxic individuals, nobody can keep up.

To be honest, maybe it's a terrible idea, but I do try to bring my "real self" to the internet and not some crafted personality. I never put up anything I wouldn't tell someone in person. I don't act different than I do in person.

One strange thing is that as my age grows my preference for multiplayer game changes from "competitive" to "coop".

The currently trending social media app for younger generations is BeReal, which basically prompts everyone to take a selfie at the same time of the day, with a two minute timer to do so. No filters, and it shows the image from both cameras.

It's somewhat refreshing to see people on the bus, cooking, laying on the couch playing video games, or doing all kinds of other mundane things as opposed to a perfectly manicured feed. It's not amenable to making new connections due to it not allowing messages between unconnected users, and it's not clear if it's just a fad, but it's a somewhat welcome change in the space.

Never heard this in my entire life.

And it would just be mu computer screen and my face.

I think it's interesting that on website/apps designed for dating and meeting, all the exchange i had were very poor and shallow, the best place for me was actually lastfm before it became a ghost town.

Perhaps learn to be non-judgemental, and learn to show that too. Social status signalling and ranking prevents most people from being honest. To learn how you could try: (1) to have friends that are non-judgemental and model your behaviour from them, (2) hang out in places where status is less important and honesty is more valued. This has worked for me, even though I am not a good listener and have some other social deficits. Note that it is very tricky to train yourself to be non-judgemental: our social ranking and signalling is hidden from ourselves in so many of our behaviours.

"The problem with visiting New York City is that everyone you meet is fake."

One case see how someone could easily come away with that impression, but also, it's just silly on its face. It's all just going to be highly dependent on "the how," and frankly, also luck.