B59: Metapragmatics of Competitive FPS Games

This project focuses on the metapragmatics of competitive FPS game communities. Like any other sport, communication skills in competitive FPS games are integral both to successful play as well as the community’s consideration and appreciation of cohesive groups, as it applies to both team play as well as wider acceptance within the community. Research was conducted via participant observation in the high-level Counter-Strike community as well as via interviews with members of said community. Textual data was also collected from publicly-available sources (i.e., Twitch and YouTube) for cross-referential analysis. The objective of the research is to determine what marks the communication system of game communities like Counter-Strike’s as different from standard speech patterns, and furthermore how the community develops, applies, and perpetuates this idiosyncrasy. The communication “skills” as described above are twofold; Firstly, Counter-Strike, the game community which has been the focus of this research, has developed a specialized system of communication with independently-developed syntax and vocabulary, and an emphasis on brevity. Secondly, the accuracy and proper situational contextuality of player communications are paramount to their effective use. In competitive play mastery of these skills is considered necessary by the community, and can shape players’ opinions of others. Players who are well known in the community for lacking in these skills, whether they truly do or are simply recognized for it regardless of skill, are ostracized by their peers. They may find it difficult to find teams to play on, or to advance to the game’s professional level. In this way, players’ perceptions of their ability to communicate, as well as their perception of their peers’ ability to communicate, becomes a deeply influential aspect of the community’s cohesion and the ways which players think about the game. In other words, the quality of communication as perceived by both the self and others is integral to the community’s language ideology.

Author(s): Brett Novits, Anthropology Major

Advisor(s): Mark Peterson, Department of Anthropology