It was always a thing in competition even at arcades with street fighter and mortal Kombat. It seems to have gotten worse with online gaming due to the anonymous nature of the internet. You don’t have to look the other person in the eye and I didn’t often see many kids playing arcade games back in the day. I’ve noticed a lot of kids have a playground mentality sometimes and will just trash talk and some will just say and do whatever they want because they know you can do nothing about it.

This is just what I have noticed and it can vary wildly from game to game.