Aleksandra D. Astakhova
Sociology, Lawson
Outsider Project
Introduction/Preface
Video games are escapism for some, entertainment for others, a social network for many,
and distinct and hierarchical for all. Each genre of video game has its own culture, language, and
hierarchy. Because digital media and virtual universes have been a hot and ever-growing debate
among psychologists and sociologists for several decades, I have decided to infiltrate the endless
virtual multiverse to see what all the fuss is about. Video games and their effect on people are
relevant and important discussions to have in this day and age where everything from preschool
education to managing a multinational corporation can be done online or otherwise with the help
of interactive technology. I believe that to truly understand the feelings, thoughts, ideas, and
connections of this generation, diaries and newspapers form an incomplete and outdated picture.
If we want to understand modern people, we must understand interactive media.
Why is it so appealing to create different versions of oneself via video game avatars?
Why do we feel more comfortable with these avatars than we do with ourselves? Why are we
addicted to the idea of pursuing our goals with the use of violence? Why are they our drugs?
Are these the musings of an eccentric sociology student, or are they symptomatic of a
pattern of the larger society? Why do video games matter? Who are the people who play video
games, and what is the difference between people who can easily return to the real world after
casually playing a game and people who become sucked in and addicted? And, most importantly,
should we care?
My Personal Experience
I do have an experience with video games. When I first moved to the United States, I
befriended a few boys at my daycare who were avid gamers. They played everything they could
get their tiny, first grader hands on. Metroid, Pokemon, Ratchet and Clank, Megaman, Cooking
Mama, Halo, and Monkey Ball are among the dozens of titles they played indiscriminately.
Every genre, any console or handheld, they were the first to try as soon as the device came out.
Soon, I started playing videogames. I played Pokemon and other relatively inoffensive titles
throughout my elementary school years.
Around middle school, I cut off my obsessive gaming to focus on my education. As I
abandoned the video game industry, it became apparent that the video game industry abandoned
me. Soon, my friends were becoming increasingly accepting of violence. They called other
players “cuckolds”, “fags”, and “Jews” to insult them. Though I never quite understood whether
the change came from other aspects of this toxic culture, one look at the most popular video
games today made one thing clear: artful or harmful, the gaming community has evolved into a
vast, elaborate culture that needed further investigating.
I consider myself an outsider to recent video game culture because I have never
participated in large-scale, multiplayer games or games involving violence. These are two often
overlapping genres that seem to dominate mainstream video game culture. I chose to study video
games as a culture because I believe that interactive gaming media is a relevant way to connect
to a variety of different kinds of in this day and age. Furthermore, I am interested in video games
as a medium of media consumption. I want to know what people learn from video games and
why they are such an addictive force for many people.
Due to my previous research into the video game community, I held many convictions of
what I was going to expect. I feared a sexist backlash from “hard core” gamers. I felt that I
would be scrutinized for being sensitive to graphic violence, and for choosing options such as
muting the blood graphics in war strategy games. The stereotype that gaming is an extremely
closed community, hostile to newcomers, made me rather uncomfortable.
Test question(s)
To what extent is a hierarchy formed within video game subculture? Does this
stratification extend beyond a single game to influence the entire community? Which achieved
and/or ascribed statuses contribute to one’s rank within this hierarchy? How is this hierarchy
enforced?
Hypothesis
A stable yet flexible hierarchy is formed within video game culture. One’s rank within the
hierarchy is mostly determined by one’s skill level, however, factors such as gender, race, sexual
orientation, age, socioeconomic status, and political/political views will have a significant impact
on where someone ends up in the pecking order. I theorize that one’s rank within the
stratification will carry over from one game community to another because video game skills are
improved by improving hand-eye coordination, muscle memory, and the ability to memorize
codes, all of which can be perfected with simple repetition. This hierarchy is enforced mainly by
using language as a sanction to keep people in their respective places, mostly because it is nearly
impossible to give non-verbal sanctions from behind a computer screen when the players are not
in direct contact with each other.
Methods of Data Collection
For this experiment, I will play several relatively well-known computer-based video
games and record my observations. I will observe how the players relate to each other, paying
specific attention to what language they use to communicate with each other, taking special
notice of the similarities and differences used to communicate between members of different
hierarchical rank. I will engage in communication with several players, though due to my
irrational online shyness, I am not likely to strike up a conversation with another player unless
they speak to me.
I will also make observations regarding the video game itself. I will take note of how the
game is organized, whether or not it is constructed to enforce certain stereotypes, and to what
extent the games are set up to favor and cater to certain people.
Finally, I will interview several of my friends who are avid gamers and learn about why
video games appeal to them and how they understand the hierarchy of video game culture
through their personal lenses.
Observations and Analysis
This category will be separated into subsections based on the video game. These are my
personal observations based on several weeks of regularly playing these video games.
Mount & Blade Warband
Mount & Blade is a single-player historical war strategy game. Though this game was not
the best way to observe stratification between players, the highly detailed organization of the
game itself gave me a look into the world of war-based video games.
My first observation was that women were highly sexualized, even when it was
unnecessary or even inconsistent with the time period in which this game was set. Granted this
game did not objectify women the way more gruesome “mature” games do, but the amount of
completely unnecessary sexualization in this game became somewhat absurd and illogical. The
best example of this rather illogical sexualization female characters occurs whenever you, as
your avatar, are training your troops and yourself for combat. In the training fields, your avatar
and your soldiers use wooden practice weapons and are stripped of their armor. Male avatars and
male characters wear a suitable outfit of a shirt and pants. Female avatars, on the other hand,
appear in a bra and panties. This example outraged me not only because of the blatant sexism
and objectification, but mostly because the rest of the game is incredibly well orchestrated and
admirably realistic, as well as historically accurate, thus it appalled me that the creators of the
game found it logical to show a woman sparring in underwear.
I believe that the reason for this sexualization is that the intended audience for this and
for most other violent and/or war-based video games is comprised mostly of heterosexual men
and boys. To appeal to that audience, even incredibly well created video games will objectify
women to some extent.
Another observation I collected from playing Mount & Blade was that a game’s
mechanics are an incredibly important part of establishing a hierarchy between players. When I
first played this video game, I had never before used the mouse to change my avatar’s
perspective. For the first few days of attempting to play this game, I absolutely sucked because
using this function was an integral part of everything from walking to commanding a cavalry. I
think that this is why gamers who are good at one video game or one type of video game find it
relatively easy to maintain their high status as they move from playing one video game to the
other.
Soul Calibur/Dead Or Alive
Because of the relative similarity of these two player vs. player fighting games, I have
chosen to discuss them as one entity.
Much like in Mount & Blade, I witnessed sexualization and objectification of women,
however this was to a much greater extent than in Mount & Blade. Soul Calibur and Dead or
Alive, female fighter characters are scantily clad, sporting unrealistically large and perky breasts
to match their cartoonishly thin waist, and often make noises that sound strangely akin to noises
one would expect to hear during pornography. In fact, in Soul Calibur, the longer your avatar
fights another avatar, the more their clothing and armor mysteriously disappear until they are
wearing only very minimal underwear. Again, I believe that this is due mainly to attract
heterosexual men to these particular games and to stand out against other player vs. player
fighting games, because apparently everyone loves a strip show during their fight.
Unlike Mount & Blade, however, many male characters in these two games are also
sexualized. They generally sport six-pack abs, unrealistically bulging arm muscles, chiseled
faces, and some avatars even go so far as to showcase an unnaturally sized bulge in a male
character’s crotch area. Whether this phenomenon occurs to attract heterosexual female players,
homosexual males, or to feign gender parity, the sexualization of men in these types of video
games is a fascinating phenomenon to study.
Unlike Mount & Blade, I was able to play these games with other people and observe
their behavior as opposed to observing only the set up and mechanics of the game and
extrapolating how it may affect players with whom I have had no contact. I observed that a norm
of players of this game was trash talking. Trash talking your opponent in video games serves as a
way to show one’s dominance in a game. Very specific language and terms are associated with
video game trash talk; most of these infer or imply that the recipient of the insult is lower in the
video game culture social hierarchy than the insultor. Seemingly the most popular trash talking
norm is that of calling a player perceived as holding a lower rank within this stratification a
“noob”. This term is derived from the word “newbie”, and implies that the recipient of the insult
is new to or is bad at the video game in question. Skilled players will often bond over calling
certain people or entire groups “noobs” and discriminating against them. This term and the
language associated with video game trash talking serve to unite certain members of the
community and create in-groups and out-groups that further tie together people in the video
game community as they develop a sense of belonging to a certain group and an animosity
towards another.
Adventure Quest Worlds
Adventure Quest is an extremely popular and well-known massive multiplayer online
role-playing game (MMORPG or MMO as these games are commonly referred to within the
gaming community) in which players from all over the world can design an avatar, fight dragons
and other monsters, and complete quests for non-playable characters (NPCs) to earn rewards
which help them progress through the story. Playing Adventure Quest was instrumental for me to
understand video game culture because people from all over the world play this game. Beyond
this, I was able to observe the behavior of players whom I did not know personally, as well as
large groups of players.
Like in the other games, sexualization of women was a very early observation for me.
However, unlike in the other games I played, I was able to see how groups of players responded
to this phenomenon. I was able to observe how the level of an avatar’s sexualization would affect
other players’ response towards me as a player.
I began playing this game by designing a female avatar that was true to me. This avatar
was fully clothed in fantasy metal armor. My username was a simple fantasy-style made-up
name. After playing for a while, I noticed a clear pattern. Male players approached female
players whose avatars wore sexy clothing or whose usernames alluded to their femininity,
flirtatiousness, or sexuality (i.e. Evil_Kitten666 or MissFoxy) while largely ignoring other
female players. Likewise, I found that when I approached another player (most of the players on
this game are male) to ask for help fighting a particularly difficult monster, I was often ignored.
Meanwhile, I watched as female players with “sexy” avatars did not even have to ask for help, as
when male players saw them fighting a monster, no matter the monster’s difficulty, they
immediately ran over to aid them.
I began to notice that sexualization of female avatars, and, in turn, women was a norm
not only for men who play video games, but also for women players. As male players paid
attention to female players with sexy avatars, so did the women’s avatars become more and more
sexy. However, the attention paid to the women with sexy avatars was often negative or even
predatory.
This norm is likely a reflection of how women are treated within the real world and larger
society. While most video games are marketed towards men, women also discovered video
games and subsequently this culture, and women began to internalize these norms as a sort of
rite-of-passage of joining video game culture, which has historically been considered a boys’
club. Because of these inherent biases, female gamers often find themselves alienated by the
intersectionality of being both a part of video game culture, which is generally quite sexist and
regressive, and being female, the gender which sexism and regressive thinking are targeting.
Many female gamers respond to this confusing intersectionality by alienating themselves from
their gender, and engaging in ridiculing feminism and degrading women alongside their male
peers.
This type of thinking among female gamers manifests itself in ways that are not only
inconducive to gender equality, but that are blatantly against it as female gamers try to identify
with their male peers by throwing other women under the bus in order to fit in within this highly
patriarchal form of media. This phenomenon was well exemplified when prominent feminist
media critic Anita Sarkeesian was forced to cancel her speech about sexism in video games at an
Ohio university when several students threatened a “Columbine-style shooting” if she were
allowed to speak. Ironically, much of the backlash against Sarkeesian and other video game
sexism whistleblowers came from women, specifically women gamers. This is a perfect example
of how women will discard their identity as women to fit into a society of largely ruled by, made
for, and made by men.
I also observed that socioeconomic status played a relatively large role in determining
where a person will end up in a video game’s social hierarchy. In many games, players with the
resources to do so can purchase special weapons, armor, items, and privileges that players
without the money to spend on video games cannot. These video game luxuries give special
privilege to those who have money, and thus end up buying them higher places within the
stratification.
Literature Review
Video games first gained popularity in the 1980s. This medium of entertainment fit in
with the era using capitalism as a basis for culture. In the 90s, video games took on the era’s
“edgy” tone (Alexander). Journalist Leigh Alexander describes video game culture as diverse,
largely misunderstood by the public, and rapidly growing. According to Alexander, video game
culture has seen a rapid spread due to marketers aggressively pushing edgier and more violent
titles aimed at young male viewers who have been taught since toddlerhood to accept violence as
a means of gaining power. Smartphones, tablets, and other portable devices have made a variety
of video games accessible to average people. Likewise, the availability of game creation tools
have drawn a whole new wave of people to the culture.
Various authors talk about how progressive and especially feminist critique of video
games have been suffered a severe backlash as gamers fear that “social justice warriors” are
conspiring against them to take away their identity as a specific demographic.
Adrienne Shaw, a Philadelphia University cultural studies professor, defines gaming
culture by its psychological, economic, historical, and sociological intersections. Shaw asserts
that to understand gaming culture, we must understand the underlying causes and assumptions
about gamers, stereotypes, and gaming as a culture.
In another article, prominent gaming journalist and editor Leigh Alexander states that
marketing and commercialism have turned video game culture into a “petri dish of people who
know so little about how human social interaction and professional life works that they can
concoct online ‘wars’ about social justice or ‘game journalism ethics,’ straight-faced, and cause
genuine human consequences”. She goes on to explain that the culture itself was curated by a
series of marketing stunts which aimed to cater to this demographic in hopes of these people
buying more from the enterprise. According to Alexander, gaming culture is fueled by
corporations preying on social outcasts and peoples’ need for escapism by masking these
marketing stunts as modern methods of social interaction.
Alexander asserts that the large gaming corporations are capitalizing on young men’s
insecurity and need to feel masculine in a sexist and patriarchal society. These corporations give
gamers a formula to follow to supposedly increase their confidence and masculinity: “Have
money. Have women. Get a gun and then a bigger gun. Be an outcast. Celebrate that. Defeat
anyone who threatens you. You don’t need cultural references. You don’t need anything but
gaming” (Alexander; “Gamers Don’t Have to Be Your Audience”).
Alexander then goes on to say that video games are evolving, and that in the past few
years video game culture has experienced an influx of new and creative people who are
embracing video games entering the mainstream and creating games that are of interest to many
diverse groups that were very underrepresented in the culture in the past. Alexander believes that
only if these changes are embraced can video gaming truly call itself a culture, while the term
“gamer” and the association with such will become obsolete. Alexander assumes that the term
“gamer” will become as obsolete as “cinephile” or “bibliophile”, as it becomes just another
medium of entertainment for the public at large.
Game developer Nicky Case refers to gaming culture as a “closed system”, where
anonymity gives players the power to establish a hierarchy regardless of real-life qualities. She
argues that gaming culture is monolithic, lacking diversity and favoring traditionalism. She feels
that a culture of escapism and fear creates a tight, closed hierarchal structure and is symptomatic
of larger societal issues.
Bibliography
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Shaw, Adrienne. "What Is Video Game Culture?" Games and Culture: n. pag. Abstract. Print.
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