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Rohan Uppuluri
Professor Pesano
EWRT 2
5 November 2014
Happiness is Behind a Glass Screen
Why do so many Americans today spend countless hours playing video games? Whether
they play them on their smart phone, tablet, or desktop, the fact remains that Americans have
been spending more time starting at a screen to find happiness rather than trying to find it in the
real world, and the fact that the online video game industry has been rapidly increasing over the
past few years with no signs of slowing down only reinforces this trend. Americans seem to now
prefer being a part of a virtual community rather than a real one. The recent growth of the online
video game industry reflects modern Americans’ desire to be a part of a stable community
without having to go through the troubles that come about in real world communities as shown
by the MMORPG, Runescape.
To start off, many players take advantage of the fact that they can create idealized avatars
of themselves rather than avatars that are closer to how they are in real life in order to give a
false but preferable impression of themselves to others. In Runescape, the first thing that the
player must do is create an avatar. This avatar has a wide variety of customizable settings. The
hair color can be selected from brown to purple, and the avatar’s muscular build can be chosen
from a sliding scale with one being the thinnest and ten being the bulkiest. This wide variety of
choice is empowering for players considering that it is impossible to have that same degree of
control over physical appearances in the real world. This means that a majority of players in the
game look nothing like how they actually look like in real life. Players instead tend to choose
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avatars appearances based on real world societal beauty standards in online video games such as
Runescape. A Pacific National University study from Russia found in regards to avatars and
beauty standards that “female users prefer doll's types, tending to glamorous and advertising
"models" and making the dominating choice for made beauty. Male users chose well-armed
characters regardless of positive or negative context. Both girl and boy groups are characterized
by high levels of anxiety and perfectionism” (Zatuliy 294). By choosing to make avatars based
on the ideal body form in real life, players give a false impression of themselves to others. As a
result, players are less insecure about themselves with other players since they all have ideal
physical appearances in the game. The fact that the men and women in the study had anxiety in
making sure that their avatar matched the ideal beauty standard reveals a low level of selfconfidence that these video game players have in real life. When people have low selfconfidence, they will struggle with talking to others since they will constantly feel inadequate
and unworthy to be a part of that community. Avatar creation however, removes this low selfconfidence, for players can easily make their avatar have the desired ideal physical
characteristics that they are lacking in real life. Therefore, the ability to create an avatar in a
video game gives players an extra level of stability in their online community, for a player will
never need to worry that others will think he or she does not meet the ideal societal beauty
standard within the game.
Next, video games make players feel more comfortable in their online community since
their role in the video game world is that of an important hero unlike in the real world where a
majority of people are just average workers. In Runescape, the player starts off as an average
citizen at first, but as the player completes more quests and becomes more revered by the non
playable characters of the world, and the player gets a sense that his or her role in that world is
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meaningful. This growth is similar to the real world’s American dream. The idea that anyone can
rise to have fame and wealth is a popular one in modern America which never becomes realized
for many Americans. Not everyone can be a Nobel Peace Prize winner; most people have to
work in menial labor such as construction or as a restaurant busboy. However, because the idea
of the American dream is fully realized in online games like Runescape, players feel like they
have genuinely accomplished difficult tasks and have earned their way into the position of a
renowned hero. Zach Wagonner, an avid video game player and literature professor at Arizona
State University notes in regards to the player’s relationship with his or her avatar that, “The
avatar is part of the user but at the same time remains separate, and the user makes decisions as
to the nature of the avatar but the avatar also exists independent from the user” (Waggoner 492).
Video games give players motivation by making them think they are a hero through the praise
their avatar receives from characters in the game. Even though the player will most likely never
be a real life hero, he or she feels empowered whenever his or her avatar is revered as a hero.
Therefore, because players feel like they are very important individuals within the video game
world, players never feel insecure that they do not live a meaningful life when spending time
with others in their community, giving them an extra level of stability.
Finally, since video game communities are heavily moderated, players do not need to
worry about harassment as much as they would in the real world. In Runescape, there are
hundreds of player moderators on the game servers. These moderators review player complaints,
and they inspect the different areas of the game to make sure no one is cheating. In addition to
the moderators, many online games come with a block list. If a player ever does find him or
herself being bullied or harassed, the player can easily put the offender on the block list and
immediately file a report to a moderator. Within ten minutes, the report can be reviewed by one
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of the many moderators, and the offender will receive a timed ban depending on the severity of
the crime. This level of efficiency in dealing with crime is unheard of in the real world. The
process of the police arriving, the filing of a crime report, the apprehension of the criminal, and
the judgment of the criminal’s sentence can take several days to go through. According to the
United States Justice Department’s Bureau of Statistics, this inefficiency has led many modern
Americans to not even report crimes that happen to them, “Doubt of authorities’ ability or
willingness to help has lead victims of violent attacks to not report nearly two of every three hate
crimes...” ("Nearly Two In Three Hate Crimes Go Unreported" 27). In the real world, people
lose a level of security due to the fear of not being helped by the police. However, because video
games provide a faster way of dealing with online offenders, players get an extra level of
security within their online community. Therefore, modern Americans also prefer video game
communities over real world ones because video games are more efficient in managing friends
and blocking bullies than it is in the real world.
Overall, video game communities have been more appealing to modern Americans than
real world communities due to the high amount of conveniences that video games offer over the
real world. Unfortunately, this means that hundreds of thousands of Americans today spend
several hours behind a glass screen instead of in the real world. What this means is that if
modern Americans have gotten to a point where they would rather engage in a virtual
community over a real community, then perhaps drastic changes need to be made in the real
world. Narrow beauty standards should be removed, more meaningful job opportunities have to
be implemented, and response to crime should be more efficient, Until then, Americans will
unfortunately continue to lose themselves in the pixels on their monitor instead of in the real
world.
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Works Cited
"Nearly Two In Three Hate Crimes Go Unreported." Security: Solutions For Enterprise Security
Leaders 50.4 (2013): 27. Business Source Elite. Web. 31 Oct. 2014.
Wagonner, Zach. “Videogames, Avatars, and Identity.” Signs of Life in the USA. Ed. Sonia
Maasik and Jack Solomon. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin, 2012. 487-503. Print.
Zatuliy, A. I., and E. M. Burnaeva. "Gender Ideals: The Features Of Self-Presentation Of The
Internet Users. (English)." Bulletin Of PNU 24.1 (2012): 297-304. Academic Search
Complete. Web. 1 Nov. 2014.