Exploring in-game military identities within CS:GO

Computers and Composition, 2015

This article argues that roleplaying games have the potential to challenge, encourage, and subsume the privilege of the stereotypical gamer, one who is white, male, and heterosexual. Though roleplaying games as they are currently designed are neither ideal nor perfect, the article contends they embrace feminist programming strategies and offer those who do not want to play a straight male avatar the opportunity to develop and explore identities through characters in ways that other genres do not. Roleplaying games extend the privilege of representation to other gaming demographics, giving players the opportunity to "play who they are" in the digital world, whether they are able to, or even desire to, explore this identity offline. Without the diversity of representation found in roleplaying games, players would be unable to participate in the potentially fruitful criticism of stereotypes and the ability to interact with players and characters different from themselves.

European Journal of Social Psychology, 2015

This article investigates the ways in which players of massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs) internalize being a player into their self-concept. In accordance with the social identity framework, we assume that being a player and being a member of a guild within the game can both shape the social identity of members. In two studies, we survey players inside or outside the MMORPG. Players are interviewed either at an interguild comparison level or at the more inclusive level of MMORPG players. Study 1 (n = 84) reveals favoritism for the in-group guild in a within-game context, and Study 2 (n = 200) shows that valuation of and identification with the in-group are moderated by the interview context and the level of category inclusion: Inside the game, the guild is more valued and identification is emphasized. In contrast, valuation of and identification with MMORPG players is not influenced by the interview context. Together, by examining both valuation and identification processes, this research reveals that playing online games may be self-involving because being a player, but also being a member of a guild, directly contribute to the social identity.

Massively multiplayer online games (MMOs) have emerged to be one of the most popular gaming genres over the last decade and have been studied from various perspectives (e.g., player demographics, addiction, socialization, player motivations). This popularity is partly because of MMOs’ affordances to allow players to temporarily become a game character and adopt the salient characteristics of that character (Looy, Courtois, Vocht, 2010). Players’ identification with their avatars/characters impacts their gameplay experiences (e.g., enjoyment in Klimmt, Hefner, &Vorderer, 2009). Determining aspects of games that improve players’ identification with their characters would be of interest to game designers as well as educators who choose games for their students. One potential game aspect that may influence how players identify with their characters/avatars is avatar-based customization. Avatar customization is an understudied factor when it comes to identification. It allows making each character different in MMOs by providing different combinations of attributes, adornments/physical properties, skills, and traits (Dickey, 2007). This experience may help the player identify with the character, increasing the likelihood of affecting his/her self-identity. Avatars and characters mean different: Avatars are the embodiment of the user in virtual environments whereas characters are fictional identities within the narrative setting of a game. In this paper, “avatar” and “character” will be used interchangeably because this research study was not set up to differentiate avatar customization from character customization. This paper expands the literature on digital identities constructed within virtual worlds, specifically MMOs, by examining novice players’ identification with their characters over multiple gameplay sessions varying avatar-based customization. Therefore, the following research question is asked: How does avatar-based customization interact with the number of gameplay sessions to predict players’ identification with their avatars?

Sport, Ethics and Philosophy, 2016

This paper explores the implications that the construction and use of avatars in games such as Second Life and World of Warcraft have for our understanding of personal identity. It asks whether the avatar can meaningfully be experienced as a separate person, existing in parallel to the flesh and blood player. A rehearsal of Cartesian and Lockean accounts of personal identity constructs an understanding of the self that is challenged by the experience of online play. It will be argued that playful engagement in virtual worlds invites the participant to reflect upon the human being as embodied and social; qualities of which are marginalised by Descartes and Locke. The strangeness of this experience of virtual worlds confronts the player with a challenge to construct a coherent narrative of online life, of which treating the avatar as a separate person is a coherent option. This opens up the virtual world as an important space within which personal identity is explored, but one with complex implications for our understanding of what counts as reasonable and ethical behaviour.

2016

permission from the author. I’m a warrior, I’m a monster – Who am I

Journal For Virtual Worlds Research, 2009

Within Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPG) studies, there are many papers dedicated to player typologies. This is especially true when it comes to themes that directly or indirectly touch the social identity of opposing groups of players: “roleplayers” vs. “PvPers”, “helpers vs. griefers”, “power gamers” vs. “casual gamers”, etc. Every time researchers label a group of players as, for example, "roleplayers" they are indeed assuming the existence of a social identity of this group. However, in MMORPG literature there are very few pages dedicated to theorizing about social identity. In this paper, I provide practical examples of how social identity in MMORPGS can be analyzed through the application of Salazar's (2006) social identity (re)production theoretical model. The basic unit of analysis is what in this paper will be called an Identity Liminal Event (ILE), or specific MMORPG events on which the constitutive elements of social identity can be obse...

Loading, 2007

This article examines the implications of video game play on identity constructions. Our study focused on the gendered nature of identity and young males' construction of their gendered identity. Our study involved interviewing 3 young adult males aged 21, 24, and 30. T h e interviews allowed for the participants to reflect on their particular (previously unexamined) ideologies and values, as they began to question the incongruence of these values with particular game-based behaviours. For example, practices of competition, aggression, and violence were issues that either conflicted with or paralleled participants' practices in other aspects of their lives.

Human IT: Journal for Information Technology Studies as a Human Science, 2008

This article relates computer gaming to the social psychology of identity, focusing the notion that identity construction has a reflected character not only in virtual reality but also in real life. This gives a tight correspondence between the two, although the screen construction of identity goes on in greater independence of real other persons. Gaming has the trait that it contracts several events at one point in space and time. This provides for two extremes of identification: functional and existential identification, which are tightly coupled in gaming, but also for the element of meaning creation in gaming, where the step from concrete action to mental act is short, as well as for the processes of anticipatory identification that are found in it. This gives a high emotional intensity to it. The analysis is based on a theoretical sketch of stages in the act, building on the work of G. H. Mead.

2021

Aims. “Gamers” have historically been described via consumption habits and other unidimensional definitions such as genres played. Increasingly, researchers understand social identity as situated within multidimensional contexts, including community members’ interactions with other members and society at large.Methods and results. Our qualitative study involving 434 fighting game community members suggests this expanded, more multidimensional view of social identity is a more accurate reflection of how people who play games view their identities. Our findings focused on four themes of gamer identity: (1) behaviors, (2) player motivations, (3) centrality, and (4) negative perceptions.Conclusion. Our research complements more recent research on gamer identity incorporating individual-level gaming habits or preferences and group-level identities emerging from out-of-game and/or in-game worlds. In this way, we consider the influence of multiple contexts on individual identity. Understan...

CyberPsychology & Behavior, 2007

In this study, we examine the identity exploration possibilities presented by online multiplayer games in which players use graphics tools and character-creation software to construct an avatar, or character. We predicted World of Warcraft players would create their main character more similar to their ideal self than the players themselves were. Our results support this idea; a sample of players rated their character as having more favorable attributes that were more favorable than their own self-rated attributes. This trend was stronger among those with lower psychological well-being, who rated themselves comparatively lower than they rated their character. Our results suggest that the game world allows players the freedom to create successful virtual selves regardless of the constraints of their actual situation.